The Kiddush Ladies Read online

  “Well, we can’t stand by watching good friends let something as stupid as a catered meal destroy their relationship,” Laurie said.

  “Right.” Naomi nodded and tried to ignore the uncomfortable lurching in her stomach. “Do you want some more coffee?”

  “I really do need to go. We’re meeting Dan’s parents for dinner in Squirrel Hill. Next week, you, Esther, and I must organize a plan. We have such a good group of people at shul. We can’t let these two pig-headed women screw up our peace--shalom bayit.

  Laurie rose from the seat and walked to the basement door. She whipped it open, but didn’t bother walking down the steps. “Come on, Sarah. We have to go.”

  Naomi and Ezra stood shivering in the doorway, watching as Laurie and Sarah shuffled down the icy walkway. From behind, they looked more like sisters than mother and daughter. It would be nice if Ezra and Sarah ended up together. The good thing about converts was the fresh DNA they brought to the Jewish gene pool. Once Laurie pulled out of the driveway, Naomi closed the door and put her arm over Ezra’s shoulder. “Please go shovel the sidewalk.”

  ***

  Becky

  Becky stared at the clothes hanging in her closet. Seeing all the designer labels gave her no joy. What to wear was a question she couldn’t care less about today. David showered, shaved, and dressed, told her to hurry up as he walked out of the bedroom. Now, she suspected he was downstairs, clock watching. Better pour yourself a drink, David. She turned away from the closet. The bed looked so welcoming. As she walked toward it, she sniffed the air. A hint of lavender scented the room. Instead of being calmed by the aroma, it made her more upset. The pretty reed diffuser was the last gift her mother bought her before dying. Becky regularly refilled it with the same lavender oil. Time for the diffuser to meet the attic. She sat on the edge of the bed and stared at the rich colors and patterns of the Oriental rug.

  Moments later, thinking she heard David calling, she looked up and caught her reflection in the dresser mirror. She turned her head to the left and then to the right. Tears moistened her eyes--Jewish. Her face reflected her soul and the genes of her ancestors. She didn’t want her son to marry a non-Jew. And she didn’t want to have dinner with the girl’s parents. Sure, under different circumstances, she would probably like them, but she didn’t want them to be family.

  “Becky,” David shouted up the steps. “Hurry up, the reservation is for seven-thirty.”

  “I’m sick. Go without me.”

  His feet pounded the stairs, and his breathing was heavy when he walked into their bedroom. “What the hell do you mean ‘go without me’? Get dressed. We agreed to meet with them. And this conversation will decide whose checkbook is going to bear the brunt of this damn wedding.”

  “I don’t care what it’s about.” Actually, she didn’t care about anything. She didn’t want to talk about it and really wished David would just leave her alone. “Agree to anything they want. I don’t give a shit. In fact, I may not go to the wedding.”

  David, the normally calm half of the couple, stomped to the closet, grabbed a dress, and thrust it into Becky’s face. “This is getting old. We’re beyond it. You’ve got ten minutes--max. Get dressed and put on some lipstick.”

  She followed his instructions and got dressed. She really hated fighting with him. Before leaving the bedroom, she reached out to switch off the bedroom light, but instead extended her arm a few inches past the switch plate to the picture hanging next to it. She stroked the glass--the three of them at the beach. Noah was about seven. The thrill in his eyes didn’t come close to the joy she and David experienced watching him build his sand castle. In the background, her mother sat on a blanket wearing a flowered, one-piece grandma-style swimsuit. The camera caught her as she was about to clap her hands together. It was one of the few vacations they had with her mother. Becky hit the switch.

  Chapter 8

  Naomi

  The rest of Naomi’s weekend crept by slowly, just like every other weekend since Jake left the house. He packed their weekends with events and parties. A lazy weekend without plans frustrated him. An unbooked Saturday evening sent him googling for something to do. She always believed his extroverted nature kept his engine running in overdrive. Now, she realized their hyperactive social life was his way of avoiding spending time alone with her.

  More snow fell on Sunday night. On Monday morning, Naomi decided to leave the car in the garage and took the bus into work--so did the rest of the people in her neighborhood. Even with the crowd, she pulled off a window seat. The view beyond the scratched bus window made her shiver--snow and more snow. The driver cranked up the heat, but each time the door opened another arctic blast whipped through the bus. But when they passed Becky’s street, Naomi forgot about the weather and returned to the wedding fiasco. The date hovered seven weeks away, plenty of time to get Becky to drop the grudge. Naomi unzipped her bag, reached in, and groped around until she located her antique cell phone.

  “Becky, hey, it’s me, Naomi. Call me when you get this message.” Relief loosened the lump stuck in her throat as she hit the end-call button. Thank heaven for voicemail. She had no idea what she would have said if Becky answered the phone. How could she bring her two friends to their senses?

  ***

  On Thursday morning, before the sun rose and before her first cup of coffee, the phone rang. Her stomach fell. Who died?

  “Hello,”

  “Becky really didn’t invite me. I can’t believe her. Can you believe her? She sent an invitation addressed to Joe and the kids--the nerve. This is unbelievable. It’s Noah--I love him like a son. I’m going to call and let her have it.” Miriam’s voice squealed at a pitch much higher than her normal squeaky tone.

  “Calm down. I’m sure it’s a mistake. Maybe someone from Maria’s family addressed the envelopes and made the error.”

  “Nonsense, you know she did this on purpose. For goodness sake, I’m the one who snuck her out of the hospital for a cigarette after the epidural wore off. She could barely stand and refused to ride in a wheel chair. I practically carried her out of that hospital. And who caught her when she fainted at Noah’s brit? Me, that’s who. I don’t know why she’s trying to hurt me, but I’m going to get to the bottom of this, and I am going to get an invitation to that wedding--whether she likes it or not!”

  Even in her barely awake state, Naomi pictured Miriam rolling her eyes and flipping her black corkscrew curls. “Please, Miriam, relax. We’ll get this mess straightened out. You will see Noah get married.”

  “That’s right. Either she sends me one or I’m calling Noah.”

  “Listen, I’m still in bed.” Naomi squinted to see the numbers on her alarm clock. “I have to get moving. We’ll continue this conversation this evening. Do not do anything stupid like call her.” Naomi put the phone down on the dresser and pushed her index fingers against her temples. Ughhhh.

  This whole situation echoed of middle school girls bickering over bat mitzvah invitations. People don’t grow up. They just get taller.

  That evening Naomi couldn’t bring herself to call Miriam back. Instead, she breezed through some house work, plopped onto the couch, and watched sitcoms with Ezra. Both were in bed by 10:30. When she woke on Friday morning, it dawned on her that Becky neglected to return the message Naomi left for her on Monday. The big chicken was hiding from her. Naomi vowed to find a solution before candle lighting time. That gave her ten hours.

  ***

  Miriam

  Miriam hung up the phone and then picked it back up. There was no way on Earth, she was going to let Becky get away with this.

  “Hello,” Becky answered.

  “Why are you doing this? It makes no sense. Listen to me--stop it. I don’t want to him to marry a shiksa either, but don’t take it out on me,” Miriam said.

  “If that’s what you think this is about, you’re stupid,” Becky shot back, letting the venom flow.

  The phone went dead in Miriam’s ear. A few
heartbeats later, tears started rolling down her cheeks. She wiped her nose with the same napkin she used to wipe up the coffee she spilled while dialing Naomi. It was time to get ready for her volunteer job at the hospital. Instead, she sat down on the hard wooden chair of her kitchen table, so different from the soft backed nursing chair she sat in years ago...

  ***

  Becky slept in the metal hospital bed. Her hair still mussed and flattened from the delivery. Miriam sat in the high-backed nursing chair, cradling the newborn infant in her arms. Becky and David’s beautiful blessing come true--a baby boy. Miriam didn’t bother wiping away the tears rolling down her cheek. This baby was her blessing too.

  He stirred in her arms and opened his eyes--bright and beautiful. The little thing had no idea that he was a dream that was almost given up. Even the doctor told Becky to give up after the last miscarriage. But David insisted on one more time. Baruch Hashem, he was right.

  Becky celebrated the birth of each of Miriam’s children. Miriam knew she wouldn’t have survived the twins’ first year without her friend. Becky was their favorite “aunt.” Now, Miriam would get to be an “aunt.”

  ***

  The heck with her. Miriam pounded her fist on the tabletop. I’m going without an invitation. Aunts don’t need invitations.

  She rose from the chair and walked up the steps toward the bedroom. The pictures, lining the staircase, documented the wonderful life she and Joe shared together. The children’s portraits hung alongside her wedding photo. The next one provided the family with a lot of laughs. She and Becky, complete with 1980s big hair, dressed in the puffy pink bridesmaid’s gowns they wore for Naomi’s wedding. She paused in front of an old black-and-white photo of her parents, kissed her fingertip, and swiped it across the glass. Even after all the years, her heart still winced when she looked at their photos. She adored this visual history, but today, it was the last picture that froze her in her spot. She gently lifted it from the small nail, her honeymoon picture. The two of them, looking very young and excited, standing in the open square in front of the Wailing Wall. The most amazing trip of her life--the homeland. She replaced the picture on the nail, finally knowing the solution to the problem. There was a way to make Becky happy again.

  ***

  Naomi

  It was 5:06 p.m. Fifteen minutes until candle lighting time and not one idea to salvage the invitation train wreck. Naomi inserted the plain white candles into the silver candelabra her mother-in-law gave her before the wedding. It was beautiful, but Naomi hated cleaning it.

  She and Ezra were due at Esther’s house for dinner at six-thirty. They both loved spending Shabbat at her house. Ezra claimed to dream about her moussaka and brisket.

  Naomi could follow a recipe, but she wasn’t very creative in the kitchen. Her mother never taught either of her daughters to cook. This was probably good, considering she raised them on a heart clogging diet, which included gefilte fish, kugal, chopped liver, and anything she could fry in schmaltz. The same foods all of her synagogue friends grew up eating--Ashkenazi food, Eastern European shtetl food--except Esther.

  Esther’s family originated in Persia and immigrated to Israel. Her Sephardic recipes dealt out a kick. Forget the gefilte fish and broccoli kugal, Esther served spicy salmon and cilantro rice.

  After lighting the candles and murmuring the blessing, Naomi walked down to the basement into the mini workshop Ezra set up for repairing computers. “Ezra, take a shower. Mrs. Raz expects us to be there by six-thirty.”

  It didn’t even bother her that she said the words to the back of his head.

  “Do you think she made moussaka?” he asked, without shifting his eyes from a complicated-looking computer part.

  “Get dressed. The sooner we get there, the sooner you’ll know. Hurry and leave some hot water for me.” She headed toward the stairs.

  “Hey, Mom, wait a minute.” He pushed his chair away from the old card table and slumped forward--elbows to knees.

  Something odd resonated from the tone of his voice. She leaned against the banister of the staircase. “What’s up?”

  He dropped his head as if ashamed. “Dad called me today.”

  What have I done? My son looks like he committed a crime for speaking with his father. She forced her facial muscles to cooperate and put a semi smile on her face. “That’s great, Ezra. Did he call just to talk or did he have another reason?”

  She faked a cheerful tone to mask her paranoia regarding anything to do with Jake. Sometimes it was hard to remember he divorced her, not the boys. She had to give him credit. He gave Josh and Ezra the space to process the changes in the family situation but still made an effort to be part of their lives. But, lately, Ezra refused his invitations for dinner or a weekend at his swank, new condo.

  “He wants to take me and Josh to Florida for Passover to see grandma’s new apartment. He said she really misses us.” An air of hesitancy clung to him. He didn’t meet her eyes or stop fidgeting with the small screwdriver in his hand.

  “Would you like to go?”

  “I--I don’t know,” he stammered. “I don’t want to upset you. And I don’t want you to be stuck home alone for a week.”

  “Don’t pass up a trip to Florida because of me. I know your grandma misses you. Go see her and enjoy some time with your dad.” As the words passed her lips, her mind flipped to Brian. Jake wouldn’t dare to take Brian on a trip to visit his mother. Or would he? No way. His mother would stomp her little size-five feet all over that idea. Naomi imagined her ex-mother-in-law’s voice. “Jacob Feldman you can be gay in your house, but you will not be in mine. Leave that man back in Pittsburgh.”

  Ezra continued fiddling with the screwdriver.

  “Passover is a long way off,” she said. “I’m sure your father doesn’t expect an answer right away. Think about it, but don’t worry about me. You know I spend the week before Passover helping your aunt scrub down her house while her kids walk around behind us eating pretzels. By the time the first seder ends, I’m ready to take a week long nap.”

  He looked at her and smiled. “Yeah, Aunt Marsha does need you.”

  “Hurry up and get dressed so we can go pig-out on Esther’s food.”

  Marsha, Naomi’s orthodox sister, lived in a perpetual state of either pregnancy or post-partum. After Jake left, Naomi spent many hours crying in her kitchen. Marsha listened, as long as Naomi whined and vented while spoon feeding or diapering her twins. Marsha tried to be supportive, but the idea of living in a penis-free environment sounded pretty good to her on most days.

  Ezra set the screwdriver on the desk and covered the extremely complicated part he had been working on with an old dish rag. “I really, really hope she made moussaka.” As he said it, he grabbed Naomi in a hug. “Love you, Mom.”

  The hug made her smile. Some days she looked at him and saw a young man. On other days, he resembled a clumsy, oversized toddler. Naomi followed behind him, watching his long legs take the basement steps two at a time.

  Ezra continued to the second floor. Naomi stopped in the kitchen, rinsed out a few cups, and set them on the top rack of the dishwasher. She wished to reach a day when hearing Jake’s name didn’t cause her stomach to wince.

  ***

  The Raz family lived a half mile away. In the summer, she and Ezra walked to their house. Today, the weather sucked. Ezra drove.

  Esther answered the door, wearing an apron with a giant chicken screen-printed down the front. Something red was splotched down the middle of it, making it look like a giant, bloody chicken. “Ezra!” She stretched up on her toes and engulfed the now red-faced boy in a hug, still clasping her wooden spoon in her right hand.

  Naomi stepped inside the vestibule, pulled off her boots, and inhaled the aroma of cilantro and cumin emanating from the kitchen. A serious indication that Esther cooked her favorite dish, a chicken recipe with an impossible to pronounce name. For simplicity purposes, she and Ezra dubbed it green rice and spicy chicken.


  “Hurry, Naomi. There’s so much to talk about.”

  Naomi loved the way Esther pronounced her name, giving it an exotic flare.

  Esther’s large extended family still lived in Tel Aviv. After her son moved to Israel to study at Hebrew University and her daughter joined the Israeli army, Esther waged a constant revolt against empty-nest life. She packed her Shabbat table with willing friends and neighbors. Occasionally, she would pick up a Jewish stranger at places like the supermarket, gas station, or Macy’s ladies’ room. This infuriated her husband, Lewis, who on many occasions said, “Some people feed stray cats. My wife feeds stray Jews.”

  Tonight the house was oddly quiet. Naomi and Ezra were the only guests. Esther refused to allow Naomi to refer to herself as a guest. “You’re family!” Esther loved to exclaim every time the word guest slipped off Naomi’s tongue.

  “Becky and Miriam,” Esther said. “Must sit down at the same table and talk this through.” Esther stretched her tiny arm over the huge dining room table and set two heavenly smelling loaves of challah on the bread board. Then, with a flick of her wrist, she spread the embroidered challah cover over the still steaming loaves. “I’ll bake rugelach and invite them to come for coffee. Then you and Laurie will walk in, and we’ll force them to talk. Honestly, this whole situation is strange. Friends, not friends, what does it matter? We’re part of a community. We must take care of each other.”

  As Esther spoke, her hands flew in gestures that correlated with the rising and lowering of her voice. When she hit the part about community, she threw her arms into a giant letter Y above her head.