“Mm-hmm,” I say, begging my voice not to shake.

She pats me on the shoulder and walks away.

I listen to her heels click down the hallway and sigh. Why does high school sometimes feel timeless? Meaning that time loses all meaning, and I feel like I’m going to be in 11th grade forever. And why, ON EARTH, am I always one sneeze away from bursting into loud, embarrassing tears?

Tammy Lerner sticks her head out of the science lab and says, “Rikki brought cookies,” and pulls her head back in.

Ahh, Rikki, bless her baking soul. The girl loves to bake, and even better, she loves sharing her hard work with us all.

We sit in a circle behind the stainless-steel sinks and munch on lemon bars and caramel chip cookies. Rikki and Tammy start telling the rest of us a hilarious story from camp, and we laugh until we cry, and then I get scared that 11th grade is flying by too quickly and how short high school is, and by the time I get home I’m so exhausted I could cry.

“You are not going to Miri for Shabbos,” I say, my voice rising until the last word comes out in a sort of hysterical squeak.

Libby looks apologetic. “I’m so sorry, hun. But she asked if I would be there in case she needs to go the hospital, and I told her I would.”

I am NOT spending Shabbos alone with Ma and Ta. I refuse.

“Libby, no! I can’t do this, not right now. You don’t understand, school is so messed up, everyone’s always mentioning it, and I feel like such an outsider in Ma’s class and Mrs. Katz made me cry and Debbi doesn’t get it and I’m so tired and I’m not.”

Libby reaches out a hand to touch my shoulder but I brush her off.

“Don’t. I cannot believe you. You’re literally abandoning me.”

She raises her eyebrows. “Naomi. I am not abandoning you, I am leaving you with your loving parents for Shabbos while I go to our very expecting sister. I think you’ll be fine.”

I take a deep breath, try to quell the rising air. “Well, I guess you won’t know, because you won’t be here.” And then I storm up the stairs to my room.

Shabbos is fine. My poor parents put in effort to make it fun. Ma orders a sushi platter for Friday night and makes babka for Shabbos morning. She has every Jewish magazine and settles on the couch with me after the seudah, all ready for a good schmooze. But I just read.

What would we even talk about? I don’t wait to find out. The second Ma puts down her magazine, I stand up and stretch.

“Soooo tired. Good night, Ma, good Shabbos. Thanks for the sushi, that was so fun!”

And then I head to bed with the solitary goal of trying to get in 12 hours of straight sleep before the day seudah.

“It’s a boy!” Ma calls.

I shriek and run downstairs. “Ahhhhhh! When was he born? How big? How’s she feeling?”

We get on the phone and shriek some more, with Libby as our middleman; she’s holding down the fort at Miri’s.

“I’m glad you were there for her,” I say before even saying hi.

Libby laughs. “You’re a good sister, Nomes.”

“You’re a better one,” I say.

“Oh, I know, hun. I know.”

And we crack up.

To be continued…

(Originally featured in Teen Pages, Issue 971)