Love and Other Four-Letter Words (17 page)

B
ad news,” Eli said, locking the front door behind us. “Shay just called … he can't come.” “Why not?” I set my backpack in the hallway. The apartment was quiet. Shira and Becca must have already left for the day.

“He had an asthma attack last night that landed him in the emergency room.”

“Oh, no … is he okay?”

“Yeah. This sort of thing happens a few times a year. But his doctor thinks he should stay in town, just in case.”

“That's too bad.”

“I know. He said to tell you hello.”

We stood there for a second looking at each other.

Eli's poison ivy was mostly cleared up, just a few dry patches on his neck and arms. I liked the way he'd pulled his hair back into a ponytail. It showed off his long eyelashes and olive-colored tan. I tried to think of something to say, but my mind was drawing a blank.

“My mom bought some food for us to bring along,” Eli said. “Do you want to help me pack it?”

“Sure.”

Once we were in the kitchen, I watched Eli dig through the refrigerator. As he loaded a half dozen bagels, four nectarines and some cheddar cheese into a plastic bag, he explained that Max and Ellen were driving in from New Jersey and would ring the buzzer when they arrived. I glanced at the corkboard next to the phone, where I'd once seen that message from Jenna. This time it was empty, except for the colored pushpins that someone had arranged to form a smiley face.

“Do you want one?” Eli was holding up two peaches. I nodded.

“They're really drippy.”

As Eli handed me a paper towel, we caught each other's eyes again.

“I like your shirt,” he said.

I reached my hand up to my tank top.

“It really brings out the brown in your eyes.” Eli spun toward the sink and began filling a bottle with water.

It was only when the buzzer rang a minute or two later that I realized I was still touching the front of my shirt.

I must have done a double take when Max jumped out of the minivan parked on the street, because he grinned as he slid our bags into the back.

“Uncanny, isn't it?” he asked. “I can't believe it. You look exactly alike.”

And I wasn't exaggerating. Eli and Max could have easily passed for brothers, practically twins if they were the same age. They had identical blue eyes and curly, dark hair, except Max wore wire-frame glasses and his eyebrows met in the middle, above his nose.

“Don't mind me for not helping.” Ellen skipped down the steps of Eli's building and hopped into the passenger seat, sticking her bare feet out the window. “I'm feeling lazy today.”

“You
should
mind her.” Max slid the back of the minivan shut. “Ellen's copping attitude again.”

“Copping attitude?” Ellen pulled her feet in as Max started the engine. “I'll cop you.”

I glanced at Ellen, with her long, black hair twisted
into a messy bun. She was very unique-looking, maybe part Asian or Hawaiian.

As Ellen poked her foot into Max's ribs, he yanked at her toes, reciting “This Little Piggy.” Ellen squirmed away, shrieking that she was ticklish. I smiled as we took a right turn. I could already tell I was going to like Max and Ellen.

“You should've seen the traffic coming into the Lincoln Tunnel.” Max adjusted his rearview mirror. “It was a mass exodus from New Jersey.”

“Is that where you're from?” I asked.

“For now at least,” Max said. “Ellen and I are sharing an apartment in New Brunswick, finishing up at Rutgers.”

“And living in sin,” Ellen chimed in as we started over the George Washington Bridge.

We couldn't have been on the Palisades Parkway for fifteen minutes when Ellen announced that she had to pee.

“El,”
Max whined, “you just went at Aunt Shira's.” “What does that have to do with anything? When you gotta go you gotta go.”

“Ellen has a bladder the size of a pecan,” Max explained to Eli and me.

“About the same size as Max's brain,” Ellen retorted.

But after a few minutes, Max switched on his signal and turned into a rest area. The car hadn't come to a complete stop when Ellen leaped out the door and peeled toward the bathroom.

We made it to Bear Mountain in a little over an hour, even though Ellen insisted we stop once more along the way. Just before we pulled out of the second gas station, Max turned in his seat so he was facing Eli and me.

“I'm hereby appointing you the Fluid Police,” he said. “If either of you catches Ellen near
anything
wet, I give you permission to clamp your hand over her mouth.”

“Dream on, Maximilian, dream on,” Ellen chided as she popped the cap on a bottle of iced tea and took a long swig.

“Got that?” Max shifted the car out of park and pulled back onto the Palisades.

We all voted to go directly to the mountain rather than setting up our tents at the campground, which was only a short drive away.

“Play now, work later,” Max sang as he grabbed Ellen's hand and started across the crowded parking lot.

At first, the trails were congested, but as the ascent
steepened, we passed fewer and fewer people. The hiking was beautiful: clear paths, craggy rocks and lush trees that offered shade from the glaring noontime sun. After an hour or so, we reached a clearing over a cliff, with a spectacular view of the Hudson River in the distance.

“Good place to break, El?” Max asked, pulling up his T-shirt to wipe the sweat off his forehead. I noticed a line of hair running from his belly button down into his shorts.

“Fine by me,” Ellen said.

Max passed around a bottle of water as Eli swung his backpack off his shoulders, pulling out a Swiss Army knife and the bag of food. After we'd all grabbed a bagel, Eli sliced off a chunk of cheese, handed it to me and then cut one for himself.

“Are we staying at the same campground as last year?” Eli asked, handing the knife to Max.

“Yeah … Beaver Pond or Beaver Creek, or something.” Max tossed a wedge of cheese into his mouth. “I hope you brought your swimsuits because there's a lake on the grounds.”

Ellen had been quietly munching a cinnamon-raisin bagel, but as soon as Max said
swimsuit,
her head jerked up. “I'm convinced that women's swimsuits were invented by a misogynist.”

“El,”
Max asked, “what are you talking about?”

“Think about it. While guys hit the beach in shorts, women are expected to wear these skintight numbers. When they're not giving you a constant wedgie, they're showing off every bit of cellulite you didn't even know you had. And with all that, you're supposed to parade around in front of people, acting comfortable?”

“Uh-oh,” Max said, “I'm afraid Ellen's getting on one of her feminist kicks.”

Ellen began to sneeze, little quick ones, three or four in a row.

“Whenever Ellen gets worked up, she begins to sneeze,” Max explained to Eli and me.

“
Of course
I'm worked up. You say
feminist
as if it's a dirty word. All feminism means is that women are entitled to the same rights as men … so with that definition”—Ellen sneezed two more times—“anyone with half a pecan-brain is a feminist.”

“I'm a feminist.” Eli rubbed the knife blade on his shorts before snapping it closed.

“Me too,” I said, “definitely.” “Your generation”— Ellen cast a glance over at Max, who was devouring a nectarine—“is much more enlightened than mine.”

We were all quiet.

“What did I miss?” Max shook his head. “Why is everyone staring at me?”

Ellen leaned over and kissed Max's cheek. “Don't worry, Maximilian, I'll convert you yet.”

“What did I miss?” Max asked again as he tossed his nectarine pit over the cliff.

I recently heard this line in a John Lennon song that really hit home. It went something like
Life is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans.
The way I see it, he was saying that we spend so much time fretting about the future that we forget to enjoy the present. I know I'm guilty of doing that. It just seems like there's always so much to worry about.

But today was different. Maybe it was being out in the country, breathing clean air, getting dirty. Or maybe it was spending time with Max and Ellen, which was like watching a live comedy routine. Or maybe it was being around Eli.

Whatever it was, it was turning out to be one of those days where I wasn't even thinking, I was just living. I couldn't believe how smoothly everything was going. That is, until we got to this roadside diner, where we'd stopped off to grab dinner on our way to the campground.

We were sitting in a booth Max and Ellen on one side, Eli and me on the other. Max had ordered a hamburger
and potato salad. Ellen, Eli and I were getting grilled cheese with french fries on the side. The waitress had just brought our drinks when Ellen whipped the paper off her straw and looked from Eli to me and back to Eli again.

“So,” she said, sipping her Sprite, “how long have you two been together?”

Eli and I froze. The table fell silent. It suddenly seemed like everything was moving in slow motion.

There ain't no doubt in no one's mind that love's the finest thing around,
James Taylor sang in the background.

My cheeks felt so hot I thought they were going to catch fire.

After an eternity, Eli finally mumbled, “We're not together,” and dove into his Coke.

“I just thought by the way you look at each other …” Ellen's voice trailed off.

“El?” Max pushed his glasses up on his nose. “Remember what to do when you're at the bottom of a hole? You've got to stop digging.”

As the waitress arrived with our food, Ellen began sneezing, four, five, six rapid sneezes.

Eli and I still hadn't looked at each other. “I just put my foot in my mouth, didn't I?” Ellen blew her nose into a napkin.

Eli and I still hadn't said anything.

“Ellen's foot”—Max held the Heinz bottle over his hamburger so the ketchup slowly dripped out—“is surgically attached to her mouth.”

“You're one to talk!” Ellen grabbed the ketchup out of his hand and poured it over her fries. “We were in line at the grocery store the other day and Max asked this lady when her baby was due and she was like, ‘I'm not pregnant.' You put your entire
leg
in your mouth!”

The image of Max with his leg down his throat made me crack up, and as I did, Eli started laughing too. Then Ellen joined in, and soon the three of us were in hysterics.

“She was wearing one of those tent dresses.” Max took a bite of his hamburger, smearing ketchup on his cheek. “How was I supposed to know any better?”

We didn't arrive at the campground until it was practically dark. Max left the headlights on so Ellen and I could pitch the tents while he and Eli ran off to collect firewood.

By the time we got the campfire going, the air was so cool that I zipped up my navy-blue sweatshirt. As Max and Ellen huddled under a blanket, we sang everything from “Puff the Magic Dragon” to Jewel to “Jingle Bells,”
which Max suggested after we thought we'd covered every song ever written.

“I know one we can do,” Eli said as soon as we'd made it through the gamut of
Christmanukkah
tunes, as Max had deemed them.