Nothing Read online

  I can’t say no. I can’t say no to being Parker Rabinowitz.

  Besides, for me, the important questions are doubled:

  Will it get me into college?

  Will it make Dad happy?

  Danielle

  Parker drives me, Rachel, and Foxy home.

  Rachel’s so excited she’s actually

  bouncing up and down in her seat.

  After all, she’s in an Audi with two seniors.

  Two hot seniors.

  “Wanna stop at Starbucks?”

  she asks hopefully.

  Nobody from school can see us here in Parker’s car.

  But if we were at Starbucks

  with Parker Rabinowitz and Jarod Fox …

  Now that’s a coup.

  Parker meets Rachel’s eyes in the rear-view mirror

  and she lets out a little gasp,

  breathless, I guess, at his attention.

  I know he’ll say no.

  He’s still got temple youth group, Torah enrichment,

  Make-A-Wish Foundation,

  and peer leadership today.

  “Sorry, Rachel, maybe another time.”

  He grins.

  She melts.

  “I wonder if we’ll hear anything this week,” Foxy says.

  This is all seniors talk about.

  Who applied where, who got in where,

  who didn’t get into their first-choice school

  and has to go to a state school.

  Foxy won’t say which schools he applied to.

  Nobody reveals that.

  But I know Parker’s are HYP.

  Harvard, Yale, Princeton.

  It’s bad now that both Harvard and Princeton

  dropped their early decision programs.

  “I know a kid with a formula,” Foxy says

  in a voice barely above a whisper.

  Parker looks up sharply,

  first at Foxy, then at me.

  Livingstone High School eliminated class rankings a year ago, but it’s still highly valuable information.

  Knowing how to get it

  is like knowing who to get drugs from.

  86 days before

  Parker

  According to the information Foxy gets from some math-club geek, I’m number one in our class. Which is great.

  But Amber Weinstein, of all people, is a too-close second. Which is not great. Not to mention hard to believe.

  “Because Amber can’t ‘act smart,’” Danielle says. “Because she’s a babe.”

  I snort. “It’s the twenty-first century, Danielle.”

  “Of all people, you should understand, Parker.”

  “Why?”

  Danielle fixes me with a hard stare. “Because it’s okay for guys to be smart, just like it’s okay for guys to be slutty.”

  “And that’s the way it should be,” I say lightly.

  Danielle rolls her eyes.

  I gaze down at the scribbled note Foxy passed along to me.

  “All I need are a couple of B’s on my quizzes in AP Calculus and I’m toast,” I mutter. I get a tickle in my throat.

  Amber Weinstein should focus less on being smart and more on being a babe.

  Or, at the very least, stop going out with Spaz.

  It looks like Danielle wants to say more, but it’s almost time for dinner. Besides, I’ve wasted enough time today, first with Foxy, now with Danielle. I’ve got a paper due tomorrow in AP Spanish, plus a lecture tonight at the synagogue on “Emotional Parenting.”

  And since I’m a youth representative, I can’t not go. Just like I can’t drop any activity, even the ones I hate, because I need them for college.

  –––––

  At age eleven, I set my sights on Princeton.

  I was reading by the time I started kindergarten. I’ve been a straight-A student since first grade. I’ve had a college consultant since I was a freshman.

  It’s a competitive world and I want to do something with my life. I want to feed the hungry, and house the homeless, and stop global warming, and eliminate poverty and AIDS and war.

  I want to succeed. I want to make Dad happy.

  Mom makes one of my favorites for dinner, chicken enchiladas, and it’s absolute torture for me not to eat as many as I want. I know I can get rid of them later, but I have to watch it. I don’t want to get caught.

  “How’s calculus?” Dad asks.

  I take my time in answering this question, because I’m not sure how much I can fudge it.

  “It’s getting pretty hard,” I say, reaching for my water glass. I’ve been really thirsty lately.

  “Anything worth doing is hard,” he says, smiling, but it’s not one of those smiles that makes you want to smile back. “Nothing’s easy, Parker. And anything less than success is failure.”

  I say nothing in response. What can I say? I’ve been hearing this all my life.

  “Parker works so hard,” Danielle pipes in.

  I turn to her in both shock and admiration. Danielle’s braver than I’ll ever be.

  Dad smiles again. “He should work hard. If he wants to make something of himself. It’s tough out there.”

  “Please pass the guacamole, Parker,” Mom says pleasantly, and if I weren’t feeling so miserable I might’ve laughed.

  None of us talk for several minutes. Mom, in her role as Passive Bystander, fills the silence with news from Sisterhood’s Paid-Up Membership Dinner about who’s getting divorced, whose kid got accepted to medical school, who’s moving to Boca.

  I pick at my food, keep my head down, and try to make myself invisible.

  Later that evening, before the lecture at the synagogue and instead of writing my AP Spanish paper, I sneak away to the twenty-four-hour drive-through at McDonald’s, order two Big Mac meals, sit at the furthest end of the parking lot, and wolf down everything in less than seven minutes.

  Then I go home and hurl it into the toilet bowl.

  Danielle

  How Mom and Dad

  can sit in this auditorium

  and listen to “Emotional Parenting”

  without feeling like

  it’s directed specifically at them

  makes no sense to me at all.

  “Wanting our kids to be educated is a Jewish value,” the speaker says.

  “From their toddler years we instill in them that the defining moment of their lives will be the college admissions process, that success equals admittance to a top-tier college.”

  He pauses and looks around the room slowly.

  Everyone suddenly sits up straighter.

  “The Jewish community needs to redefine success.

  It isn’t getting into the best schools.

  It isn’t making a lot of money.”

  Parker started seeing his college consultant

  when he was a freshman,

  but Mom and Dad haven’t talked to me about it yet.

  Sometimes I want them to

  drive me hard too,

  as hard as they drive Parker.

  Why am I not worth that kind of attention?

  What does Parker have that I don’t have?

  But, most of the time, I’m glad they act

  as if I don’t exist,

  because I don’t think Parker’s life

  is a whole lot of fun.

  Or is it?

  I keep looking over at my brother

  to see his reaction

  to the speaker’s words.

  But his expression is

  emotionless

  like a mask

 
; like it was at dinner.

  85 days before

  Parker

  Track is one of the extracurricular activities I hate.

  I’ve been pushing myself harder lately and things have started to hurt. Still, I tell myself I can take it. Besides, if I can’t hand Dad calc on a silver platter, at least I can deliver track.

  We’re doing laps outdoors today even though the wind is bitter cold and my nose is manufacturing nonstop snot icicles. Coach has his obnoxious whistle in one hand and his trusty stopwatch in the other. He barks at us like one of those Marine drill sergeants in the movies. I just ran a 200 meter, but Coach gives me barely enough time to catch my breath before making me do another one.

  I haven’t eaten much today. No breakfast or lunch, just a Red Delicious apple right before practice.

  When I pass the bleachers, a girl waves at me.

  I squint into the sunlight. It’s Julianne.

  Julianne!

  I smile, then frown, then smile again.

  Is she here to see me?

  What if I do something lame?

  I wave back and do a half-lap past her. I feel dizzy. But this time it’s different. This time I see explosions dancing in front of my eyes.

  Am I going to pass out?

  No. Not now. Not with Julianne here.

  I slow down, try to breathe more deeply, but it’s too late.

  The explosions get brighter and bigger. Then everything goes pitch black.

  I crumple to the squishy red track, right on top of a brightly painted number five.

  Coach hurries to me, Julianne rushes over, the whole team arrives.

  I can’t look at anyone.

  I am a failure.

  –––––

  “Are you sure you’re okay?” Julianne asks.

  “I’m fine.”

  We’re leaning against my car in the school parking lot.

  Coach called practice over and sent everybody home. Then he pulled me aside and made me lie down while he gave me a lecture on taking care of my “temple” and being a responsible athlete.

  “I didn’t mean to … distract you, Parker,” Julianne says. “I just … I wanted to say hi.”

  “You didn’t distract me,” I say.

  I reach out without meaning to, and Julianne responds immediately, stepping into my arms. The next thing I know, we’re kissing urgently. Julianne pulls back but stays in my embrace, looking up at me, waiting.

  “Parker?” she prompts.

  “Julianne, I … I … I’m sorry.”

  Spaz and Foxy can have girlfriends because they’ve got nothing to hide.

  Julianne blinks furiously, then squirms out of my arms, sniffling.

  I floor it to Dunkin’ Donuts and inhale a dozen doughnuts, then get rid of everything, poof, down the drain, bye-bye.

  84 days before

  Danielle

  The bathroom’s

  been smelling funny lately.

  I’m not sure what it is.

  Why do Parker and I

  have to share a bathroom

  in such a big house?

  Because Mom says we

  need to learn to live

  “cooperatively.”

  Whatever that’s supposed to mean.

  83 days before

  It makes sense, I guess, when you say it.

  It’s totally different when you have to live it.

  82 days before

  Parker

  I make it through the day without eating anything but an apple.

  Yellow Delicious.

  Danielle

  Jews technically don’t celebrate

  Valentine’s Day.

  I mean, it’s named for a saint and all.

  I think he died defending true love.

  Or something like that.

  I wonder how he would feel

  if he knew his martyr’s death

  revolved around heart-shaped boxes of bonbons.

  It’s kind of hard not to

  celebrate Valentine’s Day at Livingstone.

  Each year, the junior class

  sells roses to raise money

  for the United Way.

  Sounds good, doesn’t it?

  Then why does Valentine’s Day

  make me sick to my stomach

  as I wait in homeroom

  for the cart of roses

  at the front of the room

  to be given out to everybody?

  Well, no, not everybody.

  81 days before

  Some people get nothing.

  I get one red rose from

  Rachel

  and one white rose from

  Parker.

  Parker gets eighteen

  red roses

  that morning.

  Parker

  Amber Weinstein throws a party and we all go.

  Julianne chooses this exact time to punish me for my indecisiveness. She’s wearing the tightest, shortest micromini I’ve ever seen on a girl, and whenever she spots me, she flirts with the nearest guy around.

  It kills me. It really does.

  Everyone’s either paired themselves off to hook up or they’re a couple to begin with. Foxy and Tina have gone upstairs. Spaz and Amber are making out like crazy—Amber using Spaz as a chair—in the middle of the living room. When Spaz sees me watching them, he gives me the thumbs-up sign. I want to respond with the finger.

  “So, who do you like, Parker?” he asked me last summer.

  “Amber Weinstein,” I replied.

  “Julianne Jennings has the major hots for you, ya know,” he said.

  “I know,” I said. “She’s hot too.”

  “So who would you pick?”

  “Amber Weinstein,” I said again.

  I walk over to where Julianne’s hanging all over some creep from Newark Academy.

  “Julianne, can I talk to you?” I ask.

  She appraises me coolly. “I’m busy, Parker.”

  I stiffen. She’s dismissed me, and it stings worse than a slap across the face. But I don’t give up.

  “Please,” I say.

  She swallows. “Okay.”

  We go into the laundry room. I pull her into my arms. “Are you trying to make me jealous?”

  “Yes,” she says with a smile.

  “Well, it’s working.”

  “Cool.”

  I lean forward and kiss her, and she kisses me back, but she pulls away in the middle.

  “I can’t, Parker,” she whispers. “I want … more.” She stares into my eyes, waiting.

  I know that if I don’t do this now, if I let Julianne walk away from me—even though it’s close to two o’clock in the morning—I’ll end up at Kings, pulling cheese doodles, onion rings, and Doritos off the shelves. The thought of doing this excites me, makes me feel good, makes me feel great, and I want to do it.

  Desperately.

  I let Julianne go.

  80 days before

  Danielle

  Rachel wants us to try out

  for pom-poms

  or flags

  or whatever

  those dumb things are

  that involve jumping,

  screaming,

  and acting like a moron

  in a short skirt

  and boots with tassels.

  “It’ll look good on our applications,”

  she says.

  “Maybe I don’t wanna

  go to college,” I say.

  “Maybe college is evil.”

  Rachel gasps
r />   as if I’ve said something

  absolutely horrifying.

  But I mean every word.

  Especially the evil part.

  79 days before

  Parker

  I have an appointment with Myrna Katz and Associates after school.

  “Call me Myrna,” she said on the day we met, my freshman year. “You don’t look Jewish at all, Parker, so what do you want to major in?”

  The sign on her desk read:

  Ask Me About My 98% Track Record

  Of Getting Your Child Into

  The Nation’s Most Elite Universities

  Myrna Katz and Associates (I never did meet the Associates) was my new college consultant. Her office was in a building above a Japanese restaurant in downtown Millburn. (“Before you leave, be sure to try the sushi platter downstairs,” she’d say every time. “The spicy salmon rolls are to die for.”)

  Mom and Dad came with me to that first meeting, and I wore a tie. I was excited, and eager, to be working with a college consultant.

  “I want to major in pre-med,” I replied. “I want to be a neurosurgeon.”

  Myrna nodded. “A nice Jewish doctor.” She leaned forward. “Tell me, Parker, is that what you really want? Or are you doing it to make Mom and Dad happy? Because if you’re doing this for anyone but yourself, you’re going to fail miserably. It’s a long, hard road, and I need you to be 200 percent committed. Can you give me 200 percent for the next four years?”

  I was thunderstruck. Mom let out a cry of surprise and Dad started to say, “We don’t—”

  Myrna held up her left hand, and without even looking in Dad’s direction, said, “I believe I addressed that question to Parker. What’s your answer, Parker?”

  Well, truth was, I didn’t know. What I wanted and what they wanted never diverged. They were inseparable—tangled together. I was seven years old when they bought me my first toy stethoscope.

  “I’ll give you 200 percent,” I said.

  Myrna nodded for the second time. She took out a purple folder and began writing in it. “For the next four years, we’ll meet twice a month. I want you to take every AP class your school offers. They don’t offer AP Gym, do they? No, I guess not, but I’m working on it, because do you know what you could do with a 5.0 weighted GPA? You’ll sign up for one sports activity, two extracurriculars, one community project, and two Jewish projects every semester. Don’t ever make any summer plans without consulting me first. And when it’s time for your testing”—she looked up from her folder—“that’s PSATs and SATs, mind you, we’ll meet every week.”