—
At the end of October, with the fall athletic season having just come to a close, it was time for Boyd’s sports award assembly. And since Kepplemen was also the varsity cross-country coach, it meant that he had to give a speech summing up the team’s results in front of the entire school, after which he read the names of everyone who’d lettered. He sat onstage, his usually mussed salt-and-pepper hair slick and combed, all dressed up in a suit and tie, except for his wrestling shoes—a signal to those of us on the team that the real season, the one that really mattered, was about to start.
At its conclusion, we were each grabbing our book bags from where we’d slung them beneath the front hall pews. We were off to class even though the bell had not yet rung, and during this dispersal, Kepplemen intercepted me in the front hall and said, “I have something for you.”
He was already walking ahead of me, toward the school’s exit, and nodded for me to follow. I tugged at my bag’s strap, readjusting it, and then slung it beneath the pew and hurried after him. He was out the front doors now, hanging a right. At the corner, he turned right again, south on Central Park West, briefly disappearing from my sight, turning east a block later, on Ninety-Fifth Street. I knew we were going to his apartment.
Several other wrestlers had been there.
It was Cliffnotes who’d described it best: it was like being in a hamper, perhaps because there were clothes strewn everywhere: an odor of still-damp socks and, perhaps because of all the cross-country practices in Central Park, the loam of mud and tang of long-dried dog shit adhered to spikes.
The building had several units dedicated to faculty, and Kepplemen’s apartment was on the eighth floor.
It was a one-bedroom with a small kitchen and dining alcove, whose outstanding feature was its north-facing view of the low-slung skyline, which I gazed on when we arrived, above which a very light cloud fled, and below, the Boyd Astroturf, on whose gleaming green the lower school kids now played: the boys in their navy-blue uniform shirts and corduroy pants; the girls in their blue-and-green cardigans and skirts, shouting their high calls.
I watched their games from the pair of open windows: Nerf football, wiffle ball, tag.
Eight stories below and the children sounded so far away and proximate, remote and magically near, I imagined if I’d whispered, Nice catch, the boy who’d just made it might shield his eyes and look up toward where I stood.
Kepplemen nudged my arm with something blunt.
It was a rolled-up magazine, which I took and uncoiled: Wrestling USA.
I perused its cover: an action photo of one wrestler executing a perfect hip toss.
He had hold of his opponent’s head and arm; the latter’s feet were pointed toward the ceiling while the former was also airborne with the throw’s force.
Before I could express my appreciation, Kepplemen, already unknotting his tie, said, “A subscription’s been mailed to you.” And when I looked up from the cover again, Kepplemen handed me another package.
It was still in its mailing envelope.
I tossed the magazine onto his large bed.
It was the only thing kempt in the room.
Even its blanket had hospital corners.
He said, “Open it,” and his expression was strange.
It was not exactly expectant; there was an aspect to it of apology, as if the gift’s contents contained incriminating information he’d been ordered to reveal.
I tore open the package, wanting to get this over with.
I was already late for class.
Kepplemen removed his blazer and tossed it onto the nearby chairback.
It missed and fell into a heap on the floor.
I was through the clear plastic now; Kepplemen removed his tie.
I pulled a pair of neoprene kneepads from the wrapping; Kepplemen had by now pulled his shirttails from his pants.
They were in Boyd’s colors, gold at the knees and blue at the thigh; he was toeing off his shoes.
“A starter needs proper equipment,” he said.
When I thanked him, he said, “Try them on.” He’d removed his trousers but not his briefs.
He was changing into his athletic clothes, I hoped.
When I told him I would, he shrugged. “Try them now,” he said, unbuttoning his collar, “in case I have to send them back.”
I did not tell Naomi about this. Nor did I tell anyone how after I’d removed my pants and slid on the kneepads, how after executing, at Kepplemen’s urging, a couple of practice shots to test their fit, after a tap of his knuckle to my chin and a playful slap and then some hand fighting, I found myself holding Kepplemen in a headlock on his bed, staring at the magazine’s cover as he groaned beneath me. I torqued his neck, pressing his arm over his nose so that he labored to breathe. His ankle had hooked mine. His body spooned my hip and thigh, affixed. There followed a feeling of tremendous suction, of all space between us removed. I noticed that both wrestlers in the photo wore red shoes, that these matched their singlets’ color, the Illinois wrestler had an I on his chest, the other an OU. At which point Kepplemen jerked once, twice, violently, against my length, groaning, and then he went rigid. During these several hundred heartbeats we lay tensed, and the only sound, before he went limp, were his teeth chattering.
Later, as I hurried out, Kepplemen said he would see me soon. He was pulling on his sweatpants behind me. I did not turn to face him. The morning’s light from his windows made the hallway seem dimmer when his door closed. At the elevator bank and then on the short walk around the block, I flipped through the magazine. I did not take my eyes off it until I arrived back at school, where I threw it into the garbage before entering Miss Sullens’s class.
“You’re late,” she said.
That afternoon, instead of heading straight home, I tarried. I got off the bus at Eighty-Sixth Street to kill time at West Side Comics. I walked two blocks downtown to Tom’s Pizzeria and bought a slice. I got change and then played Asteroids for a solid hour. I caught the bus again but got off at the stop before mine, walking west on Sixty-Seventh Street, circumventing Juilliard. I spotted Naomi’s car up the block, after I’d safely crossed Amsterdam Avenue. I could neither bear the expectation on Naomi’s face when I took my seat nor her expression of joy. When I returned to the apartment and no one was home, I climbed into my top bunk and reveled in the silence, pretending, with some guilt, that everyone in my family had died and I, unbeknownst to anyone, not even the doorman, lived here all alone, and it made me feel strangely at peace.
But later that week, my discomfort inexplicably banished, I was thrilled to spot her car. I hopped in the passenger seat, and she hugged me, hard. “Where have you got off to?” she asked. “I was getting so worried I almost called your mother.” We raced to the Dead Street, as if we were late for an appointment. She cut the engine and held up her finger; she reached in back and produced a gift-wrapped box, which she placed on my lap. “Open it,” Naomi said.
I lifted the top and peeled aside the tissue paper. It was three neckties in patterns that were Willy Wonka colorful—of lighthouses, of tiny fish, of hundreds of little H ’s.
“Those are Hermès,” she said. “It’s a French brand. Do you like them?” When I said yes, she asked if I would put one on. “Do you know how to tie a Windsor knot?” she asked. When I said I didn’t she put one around her neck and told me to copy her. “I used to tie my father’s,” she said, and pulled down the visor to regard herself, chin up, in its tiny mirror. I did the same. “Sometimes I tie Sam’s,” she said, as if to assure me she loved him. When we were finished, we sat in the back seat together, each with a tie around our neck. “I like the idea of you wearing something I gave you.” When I told her I did too, she said, “But maybe keep those at school.”
Which I did. In my locker. Next to the kneepads.
—
I didn’t see Naomi the next evening. It was the wrap party for The Nuclear Family ’s fourth season, and I had asked my lab partner, Deb Peryton, to go with me.
The party was held at an event space next to the Rockefeller Rink.
The oval, recently iced, and shining whitely through the windows, wasn’t open to skaters yet.
The gilded statue of Prometheus presided over this.
There was a buffet, and, after dinner, a projection screen was set up, and they rolled Tom’s outtake reel and set of pranks, which Deb thought were hilarious, and I thanked God they didn’t include my duping of Andy, since his wife was not only in attendance but sat at the table with us.
As a congratulatory gift for a fourth season, I was given a brass Tiffany table clock, as bright as the statue outside, whose face cover swiveled into a stand and was engraved with the NBC peacock.
Deb and I didn’t have much to say to each other.
It was strange how much easier it was talking to Naomi than to her.
Was I unlearning how to talk to girls my own age? I was relieved when Kevin Savage, who was the show’s heartthrob and could tell my date was going poorly, asked her to disco dance.
Dad had given me money for cab fare home, and because Deb lived on the Upper East Side, I told the driver—also according to Dad’s advice—to drop her off first.
“I really liked the DJ,” Deb said when we arrived at her building. “And the outtakes of you were funny.” Before she got out, she added, “Thanks for taking me. I’ve never gone out on a school night before.”
“Me neither,” I said.
“Well,” she said, “this is where I get out.”
Then she leaned forward and kissed me. It was a long kiss, a surprisingly sweet kiss, far less probing, less hungry, than Naomi’s. With the utmost delicacy, she touched her tongue to mine. Her lips tasted like the strawberry lip balm she’d applied when we first got in the cab.
“See you in lab tomorrow,” she said, and then exited.
In the rearview mirror, the cabdriver caught my eye and winked.
The next day, for no reason I understood, I felt compelled to tell Naomi about the date the moment we parked.
“Well,” Naomi asked, “is she your girlfriend now?” She said this with just a hint of pettiness. I was not prepared for how much it hurt her.
When I said she wasn’t, Naomi added, “I think I’m jealous. Which is crazy, I know.”
When I said she shouldn’t be, she asked, “Why’s that?”
I considered her question. When I spoke, I did not recognize my voice. “I don’t talk to her like you.”
“No?”
“I don’t talk to anyone like this,” I added. Which was true.
In response, her face went through a moon phase: first, a sort of frown, her lower lip pressed forward, as if she might cry; followed by a smile that was warm and blooming; and finally, an expression that was slit-eyed and wicked.
“Kiss me like you did her,” she ordered.
This I knew how to do. We kissed for a long time in the dark.
“Oh,” she said, finally pressing herself away from me, “it’s so nice to feel desire.”
When I did not respond, she said, “What’s on your mind? Got somewhere else you need to be?”
No, I said, but I had something to tell her. I had been keeping the news like a secret. Tonight, I explained, would probably be the last time we’d see each other for a while. “Oh?” she said, and in a tone of concern asked, “Why is that?”
“Because Friday night is Halloween,” I continued, “and on Monday, wrestling season begins.” Practice ran until six, I said, and she and her girls would be headed home by then.
“Huh,” Naomi said.
She was watching me, I could feel it, but I refused to look at her, lest she see my relief.
“Have you decided what you’re gonna dress as?” she asked, too brightly, to change the subject. “It’s probably your last year to trick-or-treat, I’m guessing.”
“I’m going as Peter Proton,” I said. The symbolism was not lost on me. Nor, I knew, on her. “I should get home.”
“I’ll drop you off,” she said, and hurried to adjust in her seat to face the wheel.
“That’s okay,” I said before she turned the key, “I’ll walk.”
“Well,” she said, “good luck with your season.”
“Thank you,” I said, which felt like not enough somehow, and I exited the car.
When Naomi turned east at the end of the block, she was going fast enough that her tires squealed.
—
Flash-forward several weeks.
It is a Thursday in mid-November.
On one hand, I can count every meal I’ve eaten since Monday.
The rest of Boyd Prep’s varsity and I are standing in our locker room with the Riverdale wrestling team.
It is our season’s first dual meet.
We have formed two lines for weigh-ins.
We are arranged from lightest to heaviest before the scale.
Some of us are in our underwear; some are naked.
We do not speak.
There’s a reverence that attends moments like this one.
Even Kepplemen, who is formally dressed—blazer, tie, black loafers—pitches his voice so low it barely overtakes the hum of the fluorescents.
We study one another’s bodies.
Some boys have acne on their chests.
Some have sprouted chest hair.
Some are hairy as fathers.
Some are studies in disproportion, with outsized forearms or hypertrophic calves.
Others are as ribbed as the Christ.
The opposing coach says his competitor’s name and weight class, which Kepplemen writes on a sheet, and then the boy steps onto the scale.
He does this as we all do, delicately, respectfully, carefully, as if the Detecto’s platform were an altar.
The boy I’m to wrestle is so big compared with me, his back so wide and shoulders so broad and musculature so comparatively developed, it seems impossible we are the same weight.
And then there is his name.
“James Polk,” says his coach.
“One hundred and twenty-one pounds.” Kepplemen, who sets the scale, nods at him with great respect; it is almost a bow, as if he actually were the president.
Polk steps on.
He tucks his chin into his neck and stares at the balance with such concentration it appears as if he’s trying to control it with telekinesis.
In spite of his size, it does not budge.
The wrestling gym is a space just off the cafeteria, low-ceilinged and half its size.
As the home team, we make our entrance second.
We race through the room’s double doors and then circle the mat’s ring several times.
Next we do our warm-ups, led by our captains.
We count out our stretches and calisthenics, so loudly they are like war cries.
Ten rows of foldout chairs are full, and there is standing room only at the back.
Parents are in attendance.
Girls from every grade.
Teachers as well: Miss Sullens, Mr.
Damiano, Mr.
McElmore, Mr.
McQuarrie, even Mr.
Fistly.
At 121 pounds, I am fifth up.
Two matches ahead of mine, I retreat to the practice mat and shoot single-leg takedowns, fire stand-up escapes, and execute sprawls, hoping my heart, which seems made of tissue paper, might settle into a more even rhythm.
Something thunderous and final occurs behind me, at which point Kepplemen calls out my name and waves me over.
I snap my headgear’s chin strap and run to face him.
The crowd is going apeshit.
Coach screams something about “moving, always be moving,” and smacks each ear guard and then slaps my face.
My spit is as pasty as Elmer’s glue.
I feel a nearly uncontrollable urge to pee.
Before I step onto the mat, the three captains—Pat Santoro, Roy Adler, and Brian Dolph—huddle around me to bark advice, which I do not hear, and then push me toward the ref.
I give a final look over my shoulder.
I am loosed and untouchable.
Kepplemen suddenly seems tiny.
Naomi is not in the audience.
The gym is raucous; the cacophony is a kind of silence.
The ref gives me a green anklet that I fasten.
Polk stands at the mat’s center and I am directed to shake his hand.
Then the ref blows his whistle.
Polk takes me down.
It occurs with blinding suddenness, like having a trapdoor open beneath you.
As quickly, I pull a switch, a move that reverses our positions.
It is half instinct, half desperation.
It is perfect.
From a great distance, I hear the crowd roar.
With my arm wrapped around his waist, I chop at Polk’s elbow.
It is as stiff as a parking meter’s pole.
I pull at him with all my strength.
He feels as big as a sofa.
I cannot say what happens next, but he rolls, we roll, and it feels as if I have been launched in the air.
I find myself on my back.
How soft and pliant I suddenly am.
How relaxed.
I have never taken the time to stare at our gym’s overhead lights, which, I now notice, are housed in metal cages.
Riverdale’s team, out of their chairs now and on their hands and knees, pound the mat, chanting “pin, pin, pin” in unison, until the ref, on his belly perpendicular to me, with great finality, slaps the mat too.
He takes our wrists as soon as I stand and then raises Polk’s arm in victory.
The captains are huddled around me again.
In the row of chairs, I see Miss Sullens, who sits next to McElmore.
She nods at me and then gets up to leave.
Kepplemen is already giving Tanner a pep talk before he takes the mat.
“You did great,” the captains say, “that switch you pulled was amazing, he was a two-time state champion, you never had a chance.”
I sit through the meet’s conclusion, blind to the proceedings, crushed but utterly elated. I replay the match with perfect recall. Was this what my father meant about being in the moment?
Nothing in my life ever felt so real.