Total pages in book: 128
Estimated words: 124320 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 622(@200wpm)___ 497(@250wpm)___ 414(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 124320 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 622(@200wpm)___ 497(@250wpm)___ 414(@300wpm)
“Race?” he asks, his voice quiet.
Without answering, I hop on my bike and take off. Ezra sputters behind me. His kickstand clanks and his wheels whir as he speeds after me.
“Kimba, you can’t just start,” he yells from behind me. “We have to count off.”
“Who says?” I shout back, shaking off the embarrassment of Mrs. Downy and laughing at the irritation in Ezra’s voice. Getting a rise out of Ezra Stern is one of my favorite things.
“The rules say.” His voice is closer now, his breaths little pants of exertion. “You always wanna break the rules.”
He pulls up beside me, doing that standing pedal thing that gives him the edge in our races. Flashing a grin, he pulls ahead and rushes toward the merry-go-round that always serves as our finish line. To rub it in, he climbs off the bike, sets the kickstand down and sits on the merry-go-round to wait for me. At least he didn’t do the Rocky dance like the last time he beat me.
“Cheaters never really win,” he says, smiling and leaning back on his palms.
“Butthead.” I set my bike and, ignoring him, walk over to the sliding board.
“And that was another come-from-behind victory, by the way,” he says. “Since you like to cheat.”
“I didn’t cheat. A head start isn’t cheating.”
“Well, I didn’t know you were gonna have a head start.” He climbs up onto the monkey bars and hangs by his skinny arms. “You know what my daddy calls it when one person has a head start that the other person doesn’t even know about?”
“What?”
“America.” He laughs, and I grin even though I don’t understand half of what Mr. Stern says most of the time.
“Did he hear anything about that job in Chicago?” I ask, facing him and hanging from the bars, too. I hold my breath while I wait for him to answer.
“He didn’t get it.”
Suspended from the bars, our bodies twisting, we face each other and give ear-to-ear grins. I’ve been worried Mr. Stern would get one of the many jobs he’s always applying for up north.
“Why’s your mom want to leave Atlanta so bad?” I ask, dropping to the ground, a dusty cloud puffing around my feet.
Ezra drops, too, and shrugs. “She says here, people still make a big deal out of me being mixed. She says in New York, folks won’t stare or make dumb comments.”
“What kind of dumb comments?” I ask, but I’ve heard some of them. I kinda know.
“Asking if I’m adopted,” Ezra mumbles, his chin sinking into the collar of his T-shirt. “Asking what I am, or calling me Oreo or zebra, or whatever. Dad’s applying in lots of places, but Mom’s hoping for New York. She misses our family up there.”
“You see them all the time, though.” My insides are heavy like there’s a roll of pennies at the bottom of my belly.
“Mama says holidays and a few weeks for summer’s not enough. She wants to be closer to my bubbe.”
Thinking about Ezra moving makes my stomach go all swimmy and my eyes burn and my throat tight. He’s my best friend. We even have the same birthday. He can’t leave.
“M-m-maybe your g-grandmother could m-m-move here.” When I get nervous or upset, my tongue “skips,” and I want to bite it clean in half. My speech therapist tells me to just take a deep breath and slow down before I talk. I forget sometimes, but Ezra never makes fun of me like some of the other kids do.
“Bubbe is never leaving New York,” Ezra says. “She wants me to Bar Mitzvah.”
I’ve learned a lot about Jewish traditions from the Sterns—enough to know that’s a big deal.
“Are you gonna?” I ask, glad my tongue is cooperating again.
“I guess.” Ezra shrugs. “I’d have to start going to Hebrew school every day after school.”
“Crap.” I relish the word my mother won’t let me say. “What about chess? You just started competitions.”
“I’ll still play chess. It’s a lot of time, but Mom says the busier I am, the less trouble I’ll get into.”
And the less time he’ll have to play, to spend with me. I look around the park, empty now that the sun has set. The streetlight blinks to life, reminding us it’s time to go home. Soon Mama will walk to the front porch and yell my name, telling the whole neighborhood I’ll come home if I know what’s good for me.
I take off running across the playground, willing to risk it to have a few more minutes with Ezra.
“L-l-let’s swing!”
Chapter Three
Ezra
12 Years Old
Be strong, be very strong, and we will strengthen each other.
Hazak, Hazak, Venithazek.
The Hebrew words turn over in my head, sloshing with Outkast’s lyrics pouring through the headphones fitted over my yarmulke as I walk home. This is my life—all the influences and interests colliding, conflicting, making sense and chaos. Bubbe wants me to become Bar Mitzvah, so I’m playing crazy catch-up, attending Hebrew school three days a week after school. I practice chess the other two.