A Moses Request

Fictionette 2023

A Moses Request              

Mom is excited. She got a text from Moses telling her he’d be in town for a few days and did she have room to put him up. We pick him up at Greyhound and we’re into week two and Moses is still staying at our house.

“Boychick”, he says “I, want you should do me a favor. Go to Bernstein’s Deli and bring me back a good-sized jar of pickled herring and a large egg cream.”

“Holy Moses!” I say. “That combo will make you sick.”

He insists and doesn’t ask much from me. Once home, I wake him from his nap. He chugs the egg cream in two gulps and finishes the pickled herring almost as fast.

A half-hour later he knocks on my bedroom door, and before I say, come in, he comes in. He has a sheepish, blue look on his face when he reaches into the pocket of his flowing white robe, peels a sawbuck off his roll, and says, “Boychick, go to the Walgreens and bring me a box of Alka Seltzer. Buy yourself a piece candy with the change.”