BEFORE I DIE, I PRAY TO BE BORN | ✓

▬▬ 17

SUNDAY
23 SEPTEMBER, 1990
DORIAN

               'Dorian, will you need a rod screwed to your spine?' Ima is a gold medalist in speaking through a smile so charismatic it tricks any strangers into declaring brutalities sweet. 'Sit straight.'

'Sorry.'

'Stop playing with your food.'

'Sorry.' The fork digs into my fingers as I tighten my grip.

I was relieved by the arrival of the first appetizers — I'm a naturally slow eater and I've mastered the art of drawing out each course so that I'm never pulled into conversation; it's bad manners to address someone while they're chewing — but the hope of reprieve wilted the instant I recognised the aubergine. The sight of it already makes me want to rock back and forth.

More than it already is from the overlapping sounds of the fundraiser.

I force a morsel onto my tongue and nearly spit it out. This is ridiculous. I'm eighteen; I need to learn to eat foods I don't like without making a scene. (Grow up!) But it's so awful. The aubergine turns to mucus that expands the more I chew.

I wish I could be as unbothered by other people as Isaiah is. He never uses a knife when he eats. Left hand always holding a book, he eats with the fingers of his right, or in the case he uses a fork, hacks up his food using the edge. Isaiah has a confidence I never will, the kind of self-assurance that allows him to write everything with a pen; the paper of his school assignments is never worn thin from eraser burn. How do I learn not to tie myself in knots over mistakes before I make them?

I wish Isaiah was here. I never feel this nauseous with him close.

'Dorian, I want you to play something.'

I snap my head up. 'Why?'

'We are raising money for your school,' Aba says with a humorous undertone. 'You should play.'

'But I've not prepared–'

Ima cuts me off. 'If you still need to prepare for a simple performance, I don't know if you'll be worth an Oxford tuition.' It's an empty threat. She would kill innocents before she lets me not go to Oxford. The men in my family have gone to Oxford since they came to this country. 'You'll play second — nobody listens to the first song because they're still thinking and by the third, they're bored.'

Entirely blinded by their mirage, Mrs Hoffman watches me excitedly from across the table. 'You play the piano?'

Whoever planned this fundraiser chose large round tables and we're seated with the Hoffmans (which I wasn't made aware of until we arrived). At Elijah's prompting, I tried to start a conversation with Sally, who I went to primary school with, but it took under a minute for her to call me weird.

I spend several seconds trying to manage eye contact and my nod is delayed.

Sighing (speak up; strike two), Ima answers for me. 'Dorian plays five instruments.'

'Do you really?'

I offer another meek nod.

'That's impressive.' Mrs Hoffman casts her daughter an almost pitying glance. 'How have you done it, Miriam? You must have some kind of secret to have raised three sons who are all so excellently skilled and well-behaved.'

Ima's delight is venomous. To others, this fundraiser is a consequence-free domain to express their most conservative views — People have forgotten scripture, the coming decade is doomed. To Ima, it's a covert tallying of every other Jew in the county to confirm that her sons are most observant of halakah.