You Are My Heart and Other Stories by Jay Neugeboren Page A

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    â€œI figured,” I said. “I mean, I figured you had nothing to do with it.”
    â€œAnd also, as long as we’re talking, that I followed your team this year. I saw a lot of your box scores.”
    â€œYou did ?!”
    â€œSure. Some girls like saxophone players, but—shh: don’t tell anybody—I’ve always had a thing for basketball players.”
    â€œWell, we lost the big one—”
    â€œLose the game, win the girl—” she said quickly.
    â€œWhich one?”
    â€œThe girl of your dreams.”
    â€œSure,” I said.
    â€œOnly listen,” she said. “I’m probably embarassing you—which is definitely my intention—but I really did want you to
know what happened, and also that if you invite me to the prom, I’ll go with you.”
    â€œDon’t do me any favors,” I said back, and when I did she laughed.
    â€œReally, though,” she said. “I was just pulling your chain. You don’t have to go with me. I mean, it’s no big deal. Only—”
    â€œOnly what—?”
    â€œI heard you were seeing somebody—keeping company, as my mother likes to put it.”
    â€œWe broke up,” I said. “I mean, we just broke up—”
    â€œOh Jesus,” she said. “Sorry and double-sorry.”
    Then, after she apologized some more for giving me such a hard time, she told me the story of what happened when she’d broken up with her boyfriend at the end of the summer—he wasn’t black, but he wasn’t Jewish either—and about how her parents had been on her case and how devastated she’d been, and I said I didn’t think that part of it—being devastated—had hit me yet. When I told her that my best guy -friend wasn’t talking to me either—I didn’t tell her he was Karen’s brother—and that it felt good to talk to someone —her voice got softer and she said I could call her anytime I wanted to talk. She knew what I was going through, she said, and she knew it helped to talk with somebody who’d been there too.
    We stayed on the phone for a long time, talking a lot about how our parents had bugged us, and we wound up deciding that the two of us could probably become Platonic friends—maybe even introduce each other to guys and girls we knew and double date some day, but that until then, where would the harm be if we called each other sometimes just to talk, or if I came out on Saturday night and we went to the prom together? If nothing else, it would make things easier for us at home with our parents so that we’d be freer to do what we wanted to do outside our homes. I asked about arrangements, and she said not to worry about a tux—it wasn’t formal—and that she’d call me back later in the evening with details.

    Instead of Marcia calling back, though, her mother called my mother to say that given the bus ride out to Belle Harbor, and given the fact that the dance might end late, I was welcome to stay over on Saturday night in their guest room.
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    So I went to the prom, and Marcia and I danced close all night, with her blowing in my ear sometimes and telling me she remembered what a great dancer I was and that if she remembered correctly, I was a pretty good kisser too. Mostly, though, she seemed happy just to be there, and to show me off to her friends—some of whom had seen me play in Madison Square Garden, and remembered when I’d come out to Belle Harbor before.
    After the dance, we went to one of her friends’ houses—all the kids from her crowd lived in private homes with garages, yards, and finished basements—and some of her friends passed around flasks of whiskey. There was a lot of necking and slow dancing, with the lights out except for a few candles, and some of the couples disappeared into other rooms. Marcia could tell I wasn’t in the mood for much, and when