The Bed Moved

by Rebecca Schiff

Genres: Family Life; Short Stories; Women's Fiction

Synopsis

*A LOS ANGELES TIMES BOOK PRIZE FINALIST* 

A razor-sharp, devastatingly witty debut collection of stories on adolescence, sex, death, being Jewish-ish, and finding one’s way as a young woman in the world.

A New Yorker endures a romantic getaway with a cash-strapped pot grower to a “clothing optional resort” in California; a nerdy high-schooler has her first sexual experience at Geology Camp; an unemployed college grad returns to her childhood home after her father’s funeral and encounters a surprise in his browser history. With bone-dry humor and unexpected tenderness, Rebecca Schiff’s stories offer a singular view of growing up (or not) and finding love (or not) in today’s ever-uncertain landscape. The Bed Moved is a wry and irreverent take on the human connections—no matter how fleeting—that make us who we are.

Release date: April 12, 2016

Publisher: Vintage

Print pages: 160

Sample

The Bed Moved
 
There were film majors in my bed—they talked about film. There were poets, coxswains, guys trying to grow beards.
 
“Kids get really scared when their dad grows a beard,” I said.
 
Finally, I had an audience. I helped a pitcher understand the implications of his team’s hazing ritual. I encouraged indecisive dancer-anthropologists to double major. When a guy apologized for being sweaty, I got him a small towel. I made people feel good.
 
Then I took a break. Then I forgot that I was taking a break. Spring was here. Jake was here. Also Josh. One dancer-anthropologist dropped anthropology, just did dance. He danced with honors.
 
“Mazel tov,” I said.
 
The bed moved. Movers moved it. Movers asked what my dad did, why he wasn’t moving the bed.
 
New guys came to the bed. New guys had been in the Gulf War, had been bisexual, had taken out teeth, had taken out ads. Musical types left CDs with their names markered on—I kept a pile. I was careful not to smudge them, scratch them. (Scratch that, I wasn’t careful.)
 
“So many musicians in this city,” I observed, topless.
 
Boxer shorts were like laundry even on their bodies. Guys burrowed down for not long enough, popped up, smiled.
 
Did I have something? Did I have anything?
 
I did.
 
Something, anything, went in the trash, except one, which didn’t. One hadn’t gone on in the first place.
 
After, cell phones jingled: Be Bop, Mariachi Medley, Chicken Dance, Die Alone.
 
Nervous, I felt nervous. There was mariachi in the trains, or else it was just one guy playing “La Bamba.” I slow-danced into clinic waiting rooms. Receptionists told me to relax and try to enjoy the weekend, since we wouldn’t know anything till Monday. Sunday I lost it, banged my face against the bed. Be easy, girl, I thought. Be bop. Something was definitely wrong with me—I never called myself “girl.” I played CDs, but CDs by artists who had already succeeded. They had succeeded for a reason. They weren’t wasting time in my bed. One did pass through the bed, to brag. He had been divorced, had met Madonna.
 
He asked, “Is this what women are like now?”