“One of those pottery-painting places. Super Olivia-ish,” Cassie says, and Mina nods.
Distantly, I hear the front door open, and someone yells, “Hello?”
“We’re in the basement!” Mina calls.
The door thuds shut, and there are footsteps on the stairs. I’m definitely nervous to see the guys again. Not because I have a crush on Will. It’s just that they’re both so inaccessibly cool. And when they step into the room, it’s immediately confirmed. There’s just something about them that looks completely right. Like they’re in the right bodies. Max is vaguely muscular, in an understated way, and his anime-boy bangs are actually kind of nice today. Maybe. And Will basically looks like he was born inside an American Apparel. He’s wearing an old Ben’s Chili Bowl T-shirt and jeans, and he still manages to look stupidly perfect. I think that’s what I want. To look stupidly perfect in a T-shirt.
Also, Will is holding a beer.
There’s a throw pillow beside me. I pick it up and hug it tightly.
“You guys all remember each other, right? Will Haley, Max McCone—and this is Cassie and Molly Peskin-Suso.”
“What the what?” asks Will.
“It’s hyphenated,” Cassie says. She looks up at them. “You brought beer?”
“We stole it,” Will says. And I guess I must look scandalized, because he turns to me and winks. “Just from upstairs. Mina’s dad has a beer fridge in the garage.”
“I can’t believe your parents just let you take beer whenever you want it.”
“Uh, no. But my dad is really unobservant, so . . .”
“I want unobservant parents with a beer fridge.” Cassie sighs.
Mina grins. “It’s actually a kimchee fridge.”
“And all the normal food goes in the kitchen,” adds Max.
“Oh, really?” asks Mina. “Care to explain why kimchee isn’t normal food?”
“Max is like the verbal equivalent of a bull in a china shop,” Will explains, settling in beside me on the couch. I can’t resist sneaking a peek at him: his rumpled mess of red hair and sleepy blue eyes. He leans back and stretches, and his shirt rides all the way up, exposing his stomach—pale and flat, and dusted with light hair. I need to stop blushing. Especially because Max and Will are now exchanging what appears to be a very meaningful glance.
If it is a glance about me, I will die. We are amused by the sad chubby girl who is clearly enchanted by our hipster beauty.
Seriously, I will die.
I’m probably paranoid, but now I can’t stop thinking about this. I get locked into this cycle sometimes. I develop counterarguments in my head. Actually, gentlemen, I’m intrigued, not enchanted. And I’m anxious, not sad. And if you call yourself a hipster, guess what? You’re not a hipster.
Of course, it’s possible the meaningful glance was about beer.
Cassie sits up straight. “Will, I hear you’re an artist.”
“Uh, I do photography.”
“That counts.” Cassie smiles. “Molly’s really artistic, too.”
Oh God.
“Hey, that’s awesome. What do you do?” Will slides off the couch and settles onto the carpet, cross-legged, smiling up at me. I feel like a kindergarten teacher. If kindergartners drank beer.
“What do you mean?” I ask.
“What kind of art?”
I shake my head quickly. “I’m not artistic. I just like crafts.”
“She makes jewelry,” Mina says.
Okay, they need to fucking stop. This is so mortifyingly transparent. HEY, WILL, LOOK AT ALL THE STUFF MOLLY HAS IN COMMON WITH YOU. EXCEPT SHE ACTUALLY DOESN’T HAVE ANYTHING IN COMMON WITH YOU. SHE JUST THINKS YOU’RE HOT.
“That’s not art,” I mutter, burying my face in the throw pillow.
“She did all this Pinterest shit for our brother’s first birthday party last month,” Cassie says. “It was so cute. And she does all the decorations for our birthday parties. She did the centerpieces for our b’not mitzvah.”
“Is that like a bat mitzvah?” Mina asks.
“Yeah, like a double bat mitzvah. Or, in our case, a barf mitzvah.”
Mina laughs. “What?”
“Ooh. I’d like to hear this,” Will says.
Cassie’s eyes flick to me, and she looks suddenly sheepish. Like it just occurred to her that sharing the details of my vomitous past might not help the cause. Something tells me Will won’t consider it a turn-on.
But it’s too late. He’s staring up at her, rapt.
“Molly, do you want to tell it?”
“I’m not telling it.” I hug my knees.
Cassie shrugs. “Okay, so we’re up at the bima, and the rabbi’s holding the Torah. And Molly and I are supposed to undress it.”
“Whoa,” Will says, and he and Max smile at each other.
“What?”
“That’s what they call it? Undressing the Torah?”
“Oh my God, guys, please stop.” Mina shakes her head. “You’re being offensive.”
“I’m just asking!”
“Anyway,” Cassie says, “the rabbi starts taking off the breastplate and the top thingies, and Molly’s just standing there, looking, like, dead white. Like what’s his name. The vampire.”
“Edward Cullen,” I say.
“Yes. Edward Cullen. And I’m whispering, like, ‘Molly, we’re supposed to be undressing the Torah.’ And she’s like, ‘I don’t feel good.’”
“Oh no,” Mina says, hand over her heart.
“But I’m like okay, well, this is literally our bat mitzvah, so you’re gonna have to suck it up. And then I hand her the pointer . . .”
I remember this perfectly. The way the tip of the yad looked like a hand, with a tiny little metallic pointer finger. I used to think the yad was adorable. But when Cassie extended it toward me in that moment, it felt like an accusation. YOU, MOLLY, YOU. I remember the sudden sensation of bile burning the back of my throat, the tidal wave in my stomach.
“And she’s like—” Cassie clutches her stomach, making gagging noises. “And she jets out of there. She runs down the stairs and out the side door, and everyone’s like oh holy shit. It’s totally silent. And then you could just hear these insane puking sounds going on for like twenty minutes.”
“Okay, it was not twenty minutes.”
Seriously. This. This is how Cassie’s going to convince Will to make out with me.
“It was twenty minutes. And at first, we’re all like, oh shit, she barfed in the lobby of the synagogue. Because, you know, we can hear it.”
“Oh God,” Mina says.
“But then . . .” Cassie raises a finger. “I remember.” She taps her collarbone. “We’re wearing microphones.”
“No. Oh, Molly.” Mina looks at me. “Oh my God. That is just. I’m sorry, but, can I hug you?”
I nod, and she actually slides down from her perch on the love seat. She actually hugs me. “That sucks,” she says. “I’m so sorry.”
“And then I chanted my entire Torah portion without missing a single syllable,” Cassie announces smugly.
“Yeah, well.” I wrinkle my nose at her.
“You know what I love about Jewish people?” Max says. He looks so different when he smiles. His face lights up entirely.