“Yeah, I was. Kind of. I was pretty much over it by the time I graduated. I liked the music okay, but mostly I just wore a lot of black and rode around on an old Triumph motorcycle that my dad helped me fix up. The worst I ever did was give myself a mohawk, but my mom got upset, so I buzzed it off after, like, two days.”
“But she was fine the motorcycle?”
“Go figure.”
“That’s pretty fucking sweet,” she said. “But not very punk of you. I thought making your mom upset was the whole point.”
“Actually, the whole point was to make girls think I was cool and tortured and mysterious.”
“I’m not even gonna ask if that worked.” He heard her shift, the phone rustling, like maybe she’d gone from sitting to lying down. “You know what I’ve always wondered?” she asked.
“What?” Shane lay down, too, staring up at the ceiling fan as it circled lazily above him. Maybe it was because they were already on the subject, but he was reminded of being back in high school, when he would fall asleep with his flip phone next to him on the pillow because he and his girlfriend could never agree on who should hang up first.
“How did you only end up with one tattoo? I feel like you should have a few basement stick-and-pokes, at least. Or an eighteenth-birthday mistake.”
He paused, tracing his finger around the decorative groove at the edge of the headboard as he thought. “I don’t know. I mean, I came close a few times. But I was always trying on different things when I was growing up, different personas, trying to figure out who I was supposed to be. I never really felt the urge to commit to anything permanently like that.”
She went silent, and he wondered if he’d admitted something.
He changed the subject. “What wereyoulike? Queen of the theater geeks? Star of every play?”
“Pretty much. I took myselfveryseriously.”
“Shocker. You were right to, though. It’s kind of amazing.”
“What?”
“That you always knew exactly what you wanted. That youmade it happen. But I’m sure it’s not surprising, to people who knew you back then. I bet it was obvious. What you had, what you were capable of.”
He heard more rustling, like she was moving again. “What would you have thought of me, do you think? If we’d known each other at that age.”
He considered it. “Honestly? I probably would’ve called you a nerd to my friends, then secretly thought about you when I was jerking off.”
“So, the same as now, basically.”
He snorted. “Fair enough.” He paused, weighing whether it was worth pushing his luck, his hand sliding down to rest on his belt buckle. “Is this the part where I ask you what you’re wearing?”
“Wanna see for yourself?”
His heart leapt at the seduction in her voice. Before he could respond, she’d already switched it to a video call. When he accepted and her face appeared on his screen, he burst into surprised laughter.
She was lying on her bed, propped against the pillows, no makeup, hair in a messy bun, wearing an oversized hoodie in a hideous shade of purple emblazoned with “Fort Washington High School Presents:Cat on a Hot Tin Roof” across the chest.
You look beautiful.
It popped into his head before he knew what to do with it. Thankfully, she spoke before he did something stupid like say it out loud.
“Wait, let me show you the best part.” She turned the camera around so he could get a look at her legs, which were covered in baggy fleece pants printed with cartoon menorahs and dreidels. “Better not let these babies near a real menorah. Or any openflame, really.” She flipped the camera back to her face. “How hard are you right now?”
“I already came,” he deadpanned. “I thought you weren’t religious, though?”
“You’renot religious, and you still celebrate Christmas.”
“Well, yeah, that’s because it’s—”
“—everywhere?” she finished. “Maybe us secular Jews deserve hideous holiday merch, too. This is how you know Hanukkah has really made it to the mainstream: you can buy as much polyester menorah garbage as you want.” She heaved an exaggerated sigh. “Anyway. Are we having phone sex or what?”
“Are we?”
