Back home I’m pretty busy right away, on account of starting in a new school, Charles Evans Hughes High. It’s different from the junior high, where I knew half the kids, and also my whole homeroom there went from one classroom to another together. At Hughes everyone has to get his own schedule and find the right classroom in this immense building, which is about the size of Penn Station. There are about a million kids in it—actually about two thousand—most of whom I never saw before. Hardly any of the Stuyvesant Town and Peter Cooper Village kids come here because it isn’t their district. However, walking back across Fifth Avenue one day, I see one kid I know from Peter Cooper. His name is Ben Alstein. I ask him how come he is at Hughes.
“My dad wanted me to get into Peter Stuyvesant High School—you know, the genius factory, city-wide competitive exam to get in. Of course I didn’t make it. Biggest Failure of the Year, that’s me.”
“Heck, I never even tried for that. But how come you’re here?”
“There’s a special science course you can qualify for by taking a math test. Then you don’t have to live in the district. My dad figures as long as I’m in something special, there’s hope. I’m not really very interested in science, but that doesn’t bother him.”
So after that Ben and I walk back and forth to school together, and it turns out we have three classes together, too—biology and algebra and English. We’re both relieved to have at least one familiar face to look for in the crowd. My old friend Nick, aside from not really being my best friend anymore, has gone to a Catholic high school somewhere uptown.
On the way home from school one Friday in September, I ask Ben what he’s doing Monday and Tuesday, the Jewish holidays.
“Tuesday I got to get into my bar mitzvah suit and go to synagogue and over to Brooklyn to my grandmother’s. Monday I don’t have to do anything special. Come on over with your roller skates and we’ll get in the hockey game.”
“I skate on my tail,” I say, because it’s true, and it would be doubly true in a hockey game. I try quick to think up something else. We’re walking down the block to my house, and there’s Cat sitting out front, so I say, “Let’s cruise around and get down to Fulton Fish Market and pick up some fish heads for my cat.”
“You’re a real nut, aren’t you?” Ben says. He doesn’t say it as if he minds—just mentioning the fact. He’s an easygoing kind of guy, and I think most of the time he likes to let someone else make the plans. So he shrugs and says, “O.K.”
I introduce him to Cat. Ben looks him in the eye, and Cat looks away and licks his back. Ben says, “So I got to get you fresh fish for Rosh Hashanah, huh?”