On my way upstairs to say hi to Hammy and change into comfortable clothes, Lindsay bumps into me.

“Watch out,” I say.

She stops. “What’s with you?”

I shrug, realizing I’m thinking about Tommy’s slamming me into the lockers and how much my shoulder still hurts. “Where you going?”

“Out,” Lindsay says.

“Out where?”

Lindsay points downstairs. “Anywhere that’s not here. It’s Rock Band night.”

“Nooooo.”

“Yeah,” Lindsay says, trotting down the rest of the stairs and out the front door.

Every few weeks, Dad and two of his buddies, Alan Wexler and Alan Drummond, play the video game Rock Band with toy plastic guitars and drums. They’re hopeless at it, and it’s totally embarrassing to watch. I don’t know why Dad doesn’t play his real guitar. Mom said he was better than Eric Clapton, whoever the heck that is. She said she used to watch Dad all the time when he played in his college band, Widow’s Kiss. Dad said she was the most loyal of all his groupies. I hope he was joking about having groupies.

Sometimes I wonder whether Mom might still be around if Dad had kept playing guitar—if he hadn’t lost that part of himself. But I know that it goes way beyond Dad’s not playing his guitar anymore.

I change into a T-shirt and shorts, pet Hammy behind the ears and head to Bubbe’s apartment. Maybe after a slice of cake we could go to the movies and then to Rita’s for a custard and a soft pretzel. Or anywhere until the two Alans leave.

“Hi, Bubbe,” I say, strolling into her apartment.

Bubbe shoves keys and a fat wallet into her pocketbook. “Hi, bubelah. I’m late.”

“For what?” I hope she’ll ditch her plans and take me out instead.

“There’s an interfaith peace activist meeting in town.”

“An interfaith … huh?”

Bubbe shoulders her huge bag, and I think it’s going to knock her over, but she steadies herself and puts my cheeks between her warm hands. It’s like she’s got portable heaters in her palms. “I’ve got to go,” she says. “Stay here and watch TV if you’d like.”

The moment she leaves, I call after her, “But what’ll I eat for dinner?” thinking that might be enough to guilt her into staying home.

Bubbe appears in the doorway, breathless. “David Todd Greenberg,” she says. “There’s a slab of kugel in the fridge. Think you can handle the microwave?”

Before I answer, she’s gone.

I turn off the light in her apartment, close the door and trudge to the kitchen.

The three Alans are in the living room, plugging in their “instruments.”

Dad spots me and waves. “Join us,” he calls, dangling the toy plastic microphone.

“No thanks.”

“We could use you,” Alan Drummond says, adjusting his guitar strap and looking very serious.

It’s a toy, I want to yell. A video game. For kids!

“Can’t,” I call. “Homework.”

“Hey, David,” Alan Wexler says. “Watch this.” He twirls one of his drumsticks. It falls out of his hand and plops noiselessly onto the carpet.

I nod, then grab the slab of kugel from the fridge and run upstairs.

“It’s just you and me tonight,” I tell Hammy.

Even Hammy burrows in his wood shavings and ignores me.

I take one bite of kugel, then go to my closet to get my K’nex set. When I remember I tossed it, my shoulders slump.

I turn on the computer, watch a few video clips on the Daily Show site and eat some more kugel. Then I check my Jon Stewart TalkTime video on YouTube. A piece of kugel drops out of my mouth and falls onto the keyboard.

There are nearly a thousand views and forty-seven comments! Forty-seven comments!

I scroll through some of them while I pick kugel off my key board.

Great vid, dude. Make more.

2 Funny!

This rox!

“Oh my gosh,” I say to Hammy. “I’m famous.” I click on the Hammy Time video and find that it has more than fifteen hundred views and one hundred and five comments. I push my chair back. “Come on!”

I hit “refresh.” One hundred and six comments. “Oh, my …” I press my face to Hammy’s cage. “You’re more famous.”

Hammy looks unimpressed.

“I can’t believe all those people watched our videos. And commented!” I’m dying to tell Elliott, but remember the orange incident in the lunchroom today. It feels like the nice comments fill up that empty space inside me. I wonder if this is how Jon Stewart feels on the Daily Show set when he walks out and hears hundreds of fans in the audience scream for him.

Take that, Tommy Murphy. My videos aren’t lame. You are!

I scan the comments.

Cuuuuuute hamster.

Luv the hamster.

Hammy Time sooooo awesome.

Oh my gosh. They’re eating Hammy up! I need to tell someone. But the three Alans have started playing, so no way I’m going down there. Bubbe and Lindsay are gone. Elliott’s a jerk. And I don’t have Sophie’s e-mail address or phone number.

Sophie! Your homeschool network. How many people did you tell?

I pull out a sheet of paper and a pen.

Mom,

You will never guess what happened. I met this girl and she came over to work on this project and

I tap the pen on my desk. It will take too long to explain. Besides, Mom doesn’t even have a computer, so she won’t understand what I’m talking about. I don’t want to write to Mom; I want to talk to her.

But I can’t.

I crumple the paper and throw it away.

I hear Alan Drummond yell downstairs, “Rock on, dudes!”

It’s going to be a long, long night.