The Unthinkable Thoughts of Jacob Green by Joshua Braff Read Free Book Online

I really don’t.”
    Rule Number 5 of the Green House Rules
    Failure to sufficiently acknowledge the generosity of any gift or offering, however unsubstantial it may be deemed, will result in the repossession of the aforementioned offering. Depending on the severity of the child’s apathy, punishments may exceed the retraction of the ignored gift and focus more keenly on the removal of privileges, allowances, expressed desires, and any and all previously acquired generosities. Yours is a family whose blunders—be they failures of youthful indifference, failures of judgment, failures of academia, failures of faith, or other—reflect each of the members of this family. As a result, if one of us must wear the humiliation of another’s error, then the culprit of said error, will need to relearn the repercussions of failure.
    “Hunch your shoulders a little,” Asher says as he writes. “. . . for . . . the . . . gen . . . er . . . ous . . . gift . . . which . . . you . . .”
    “Asher?”
    “Hunch more . . . like, bend. Good.”
    “Are you nervous?” I ask him.
    “. . . am . . . using . . . the . . . act . . . ual . . . pen . . . to . . . write . . . this. Nervous about what?”
    “About today.”
    “What, school? I don’t know.”
    “You are.”
    “It’ll be fine. Sin . . . cere . . . ly.”
    “I think I miss yeshiva. I miss Eliahu.”
    “Are you outta your fuckin’ mind? Miss
Eliahu?
Don’t even say that around me, okay? The address and we’re out of here. Hy . . . and . . . Molly . . .
Weiner,
” he says with nasally exaggeration. “Livingston, New Jaaazy. Home-udda blintz and the giant schnaaaz. I should write Hy and Molly
Penis
instead. You think your dear old dad would like that?”
    I laugh.
    “Stop shaking, I got to write the zip.”
    “Hy and Molly Schlong,” I say over my shoulder.
    Asher takes the envelope off my back and we walk out to the sidewalk. “Hy and Molly Love-sausage,” he says.
    “Hy and Molly Stiffy.”
    “Hy and Molly Dork . . . pud, putz, poker, pecker, peenie, twanger . . .”
    We both crack up and Asher drops the letter in the mailbox on the corner.
    “Hy and Molly . . . um . . .
bean
pole,” I say.
    “Bean pole? That’s not one.”
    “Yes, I think it is.”
    “No.”
    “Hy and Molly
Dong,
” I try.
    “Better,” he says. Asher stops at the corner of Saber and looks down the hill. “Well, I’m outta here,” he says with a quick salute.
    “Wait,” I say, and step closer to him.
    “What?”
    I turn to see the front of my school through the trees in Knole Park. It’s got red bricks and smokestacks, looks like a crematorium.
    “You’re stepping on my foot, man. Get off me.”
    “Sorry.”
    “What’s wrong with you?” he says.
    I turn back to the school. “I don’t think I . . . like this place.”
    “You like it fine.”
    “No.”
    “You
like
it.”
    “I don’t.”
    “Then snap out of it.”
    “What time is it?”
    “Time to get over whatever you’re—”
    “What time do you—?”
    “Half past cow’s ass, all right?” he says and rubs the back of my head with his palm. “First day’s . . . shitty and . . . then it’s just . . . ya know . . .”
    “Just what?”
    “
School.
Fuckin’ school,” he says, walking away. “See ya later.”
    “Wait.”
    He stops with his back to me and stares up at the clouds. “For what, man?”
    I walk around him and look up at his face. “Let’s not go.”
    Asher brings his chin down from the sky and squints at my hair. “You’re bein’ a puss.”
    “No I’m not.”
    “You should comb this,” he says, and licks his palm.
    “What are you doing?”
    “I just want to wet it.”
    “Go away.”
    “It’s sticking straight up in the back.”
    “Don’t.”
    “Let me just flatten it. You didn’t shower, did you?”
    “Get off. I’ll fix it. Stop.”
    “Fine,” he says. “Go to school like that. Alfalfa. The kids’ll call you Alfalfa for the rest of the year. Look at the new kid and