Bream Gives Me Hiccups
Read Bream Gives Me Hiccups Online
Authors: Jesse Eisenberg
BREAM
GIVES ME
HICCUPS
also by
JESSE EISENBERG
The Revisionist: A Play
Asuncion: A Play
The Spoils: A Play
First published in the United States of America in 2015
by Grove/Atlantic Inc.
First published in Great Britain in 2015 by Grove Press UK,
an imprint of Grove/Atlantic Inc.
Copyright © Jesse Eisenberg, 2015
Illustrations copyright © Jean Jullien, 2015
The moral right of Jesse Eisenberg to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act of 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of the book.
Every effort has been made to trace or contact all copyright-holders. The publishers will be pleased to make good any omissions or rectify any mistakes brought to their attention at the earliest opportunity.
1 3 5 7 9 8 6 4 2
A CIP record for this book is available from the British Library.
Book design by Fearn Cutler de Vicq
Trade paperback ISBN 978 1 61185 560 9
Ebook ISBN 978 1 61185 972 0
Printed in Great Britain
Grove Press, UK
Ormond House
26â27 Boswell Street
London
WC1N 3JZ
CONTENTS
I.
BREAM GIVES ME HICCUPS: RESTAURANT REVIEWS FROM A PRIVILEGED NINE-YEAR-OLD
My Little Sister Texts Me with Her Problems
Separation Anxiety Sleepaway Camp
My Mother Explains the Ballet to Me
My Prescription Information Pamphlets as Written by My Father
Final Conversations at Pompeii
Alexander Graham Bell's First Five Phone Calls
IV.
MY ROOMMATE STOLE MY RAMEN: LETTERS FROM A FRUSTRATED FRESHMAN
A Post-Gender-Normative Man Tries to Pick Up a Woman at a Bar
A Post-Gender-Normative Woman Tries to Pick Up a Man at a Bar
A Guy on Acid Tries to Pick Up a Woman at a Bar
A Lifelong Teetotaler, Embarrassed by His Own Sobriety, Tries to Pick Up a Woman at a Bar
Carmelo Anthony and I Debrief Our Friends after a Pickup Game at the YMCA
A Marriage Counselor Tries to Heckle at a Knicks Game
Smiling Tricks Your Brain into Thinking It's Happy
Nick Garrett's Review of Rachel Lowenstein's New Book,
Getting Away
A Short Story Written with Thought-to-Text Technology
IX.
WE ONLY HAVE TIME FOR ONE MORE
BREAM
GIVES ME
HICCUPS
I.
BREAM GIVES ME HICCUPS
RESTAURANT REVIEWS FROM A PRIVILEGED NINE-YEAR-OLD
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SUSHI NOZAWA
Last night, Mom took me to Sushi Nozawa, near Matt's house. Except she didn't let Matt come with us and I had to leave in the middle of my favorite show because Mom said we would be late for our reservation and that I didn't know who she had to blow on to get the reservation.
At the front of Sushi Nozawa is a mean woman. When I asked Mom why the woman is so angry, Mom said it's because she's Japanese and that it's cultural. The woman at school who serves lunch is also mean but she is not Japanese. Maybe it's just serving food that makes people angry.
Sushi Nozawa does not have any menus, which Mom said made it fancy. The Sushi chef is very serious and he stands behind a counter and serves the people whatever he wants. He is also mean.
The first thing they brought us was a rolled-up wet wash-cloth, which I unrolled and put on my lap because Mom always said that the first thing I have to do in a nice restaurant is put the napkin in my lap. But this napkin was hot and wet and made me feel like I peed my pants. Mom got angry and asked me if I was stupid.
The mean woman then brought a little bowl of mashed-up red fish bodies in a brown sauce and said that it was tuna fish, which I guess was a lie because it didn't taste like tuna and made me want to puke right there at the table. But Mom said that I had to eat it because Sushi Nozawa was “famous for their tuna.” At school, there is a kid named Billy who everyone secretly calls Billy the Bully and who puts toothpaste on the teacher's chair before she comes into the classroom. He is also famous.
Mom said they have eggs so I asked for two eggs, but when the mean woman brought them, they didn't look like eggs; they looked like dirty sponges and I spit it out on the table in front of Mom, who slammed her hands on the table and made the plates rattle and so I got scared and spit out more sponge on Mom's hands and Mom yelled at me in a weird whispery voice, saying that the only reason she took me to the restaurant is so that Dad would pay for it. Then I started crying and little bits of the gross egg came out of my nose with snot and Mom started laughing in a nice way and gave me a hug and told me to be more quiet.
The mean woman brought me and Mom little plates of more gross fish bodies on rice. I asked Mom to take off the fish part so I could eat the rice. Mom said, “Great, more for me,” and ate my fish. I like rice because Mom said it's like Japanese
bread but it has no crusts, which is good for me because I don't eat crusts anyway. I also like it when Mom says “Great, more for me” because it seems like that is her happiest expression.
When the woman brought the bill, Mom smiled at her and said thank you, which was a lie, because Mom hates when people bring her the bill. When Mom and Dad were married, Mom would always pretend like she was going to pay, and when Dad took the bill, which he always did, she said more lies like, “Are you sure? Okay, wow, thanks, honey.” Now that Dad doesn't eat with us anymore, maybe I should pretend to take the bill from Mom and say a lie like, “Oh, really? Okay, thanks, Mom,” but I don't because lies are for adults who are sad in their lives.
The mean woman took the bill back without saying thank you. I guess she is not sad. But she is definitely angry.
I understand why the people who work here are so angry. I guess it's like working at a gas station, but instead of cars, they have to fill up people. And people eat slowly and talk about their stupid lives at the table and make each other laugh, but when the waiters come by, the people at the table stop laughing and become quiet like they don't want to let anyone else know about their great jokes. And if the waiters talk about their own lives, they're not allowed to talk about how bad it is, only how good it is, like, “I'm doing great, how are you?” And if they say something truthful like, “I'm doing terrible, I'm a waiter here,” they will probably get fired and then they will be even worse. So it's probably always a good idea to talk about things happily. But sometimes that's impossible. That's why I'm giving Sushi Nozawa 16 out of 2000 stars.
MASGOUF
Last night, Mom took me to a new restaurant called Masgouf. Mom said that it was an Iraqi restaurant and that we had to go because we are open-minded people and we should support it. I thought it was weird though because Matt's brother is in the army in the real Iraq and their car says support the troops. So it kind of felt like we were supporting the restaurant instead of Matt's brother.
Mom said that all the women in her book club already went to the restaurant, but I didn't know why that meant we had to go to the restaurant too. And I don't know why Mom is even in the book club, because she doesn't read any of the books and, on the nights before the book club meetings at our house, she says “fuck” a lot and asks me to look on Wikipedia. Then I have to read the plot synopsis and major characters to
her while she vacuums, which is hard because the vacuum is really loud and I have to follow her around the house holding my computer and reading.
The first weird thing I noticed when I walked into Masgouf is that a lot of the people eating there were wearing big black face masks so you can only see their eyes. Mom said to me kind of disappointedly that she was hoping there would be more people who “look like us.” But I said that we don't know what those people look like because they're hiding in the masks. Then Mom elbowed me in the neck, which is what she does when I say things that are either too loud or too quiet or if I'm laughing.
When Mom looked at the menu she said, kind of quietly under her breath, “Figures, it's fucking dry.” I'm not sure what she meant by that but I think it has something to do with alcohol, because whenever Mom opens a menu, the first thing she does is look at the alcohol and breathe a sigh of relief.
Mom said that she would order for both of us and that we should share, which she usually says when she doesn't think the food will be good. When the woman came over to take the order, Mom looked at her like she was kind of a homeless person and said, “And where are you from?” When the woman said, “Iraq,” Mom said, “Oh, beautiful, what city?” Then the woman said, “Baghdad,” and Mom said, “Aww,” as though the woman was crying, but the woman wasn't crying, she was smiling. So I looked up at the woman and I smiled very big to show her that I was not always on Mom's side, but when the woman saw me smiling she made a weird face like I was making fun of her, which I wasn't. Then Mom kicked me under the
table and my leg hurt for the rest of the night and a little bit the next morning, which is today.
The first thing the woman brought us was a weird pile of rice on a plate and a big bowl of soupy-looking eggplant in a red sauce. I could tell Mom got a little nauseous by it but she smiled at the woman and said, “Wow. Traditional! Can't wait to dig in!” But I could tell that Mom was lying because when the woman walked away, Mom took a little bite of it, just with the front of her teeth, and then flared her nostrils like she wanted to puke right there at the table. Then she said, “Sweetie, I think you'll like this. Why don't you try it,” so I knew she must not have liked it. Then Mom poured the eggplant stuff onto the rice and kind of moved it around the plate to make it look like we had eaten it.
Then the woman brought us the other dish, which was a chicken shish kabob with French fries. The French fries just tasted like French fries, even though they didn't have ketchup, and the chicken shish kabob just tasted like regular chicken. When Mom and I tasted how normal it was, we looked at each other in a relieved way, like we were Matt's brother and we had just come back from Iraq.
On the way home, Mom called all the women in her book club to tell them that we went to Masgouf. She lied the whole time, telling them how nice it was to spend some alone time with me and how interesting it was to see all the Iraq people in their black face masks, and that she didn't even think about Dad's new girlfriend one time during the fun and tasty dinner. When Mom lies, she doesn't just say things she doesn't mean, she says the
opposite
of the things she
does
mean. And
probably most children would be angry at their moms for lying so much, but for some reason it just makes me feel sad for her.
When we got home I read Mom the plot synopsis for
Wuthering Heights
while she vacuumed in her underwear. Then Mom said her stomach kind of hurt and I thought that mine did too. So Mom and I both went to separate bathrooms and didn't come out for a long time. That's why I'm giving Masgouf 129 out of 2000 stars.