“The best falafel I’ve ever had I bought by a gas station. This guy at a soccer game told me I should go to this place and get falafel, and I thought he was lying. He wasn’t. Gas station falafel is hands down the best falafel ever.”
—R.D.
BY THE TIME we get to Ben Yehuda, I remember that I haven’t really eaten that much today, and I’m more than happy to take advantage of all the tofu and salady goodness that’s there. Do normal people eat from the tofu buffet for dinner? I don’t care, because my tofu and I are more than happy to spend time together at all hours of the day or night.
Yoni and Salome, without a doubt, continue to be the absolute cutest together. And because they have pity on my teeny tiny French vocabulary, they speak in English. Mostly, and then every once in a while one of them will say something to the other one in French and all the blushing will ensue and I can’t even with their adorable, honeymooning selves.
I have a forkful of tofu in my mouth when Salome turns to Yoni. “So, Tamarie met a chayal today.”
“Another one?” he asks, grinning.
I fake glare and wag a finger at him.
“In Chevron,” Salome continues.
“I would assume so.”
I continue to wag my finger and chew.
Yoni wags a finger back. “So. What happened this time?”
“Are you saying that like I did something wrong?” I ask.
“God forbid. But any time you end up making friends with a chayal, there’s usually a story that goes along with it.” He turns to Salome and flutters his eyelashes, making the two of us laugh. “I’m feeling the FOMO.”
“I regret ever teaching you that,” Salome says, trying and failing to be serious. “And anyway, Tamarie does a better job of telling her chayal stories than I do.”
“Tamar, my favorite shadchanit.”
“I’d darn well better be your favorite shadchanit,” I say. “Did anyone else set you up with Salome that I should know about? I didn’t know I had competition.”
“Well, you and then that homeless guy when we were dating,” Yoni says.
“But we were already dating when the homeless man told you that you should marry me,” Salome says. “So that doesn’t count.”
“Shhh,” Yoni jokes. “Don’t tell her.”
“Well, I guess I won’t tell you about how I eloped with a chayal this morning,” I say, pretending to look bored. “Whatever. It’s a good story, though.”
“If you had actually eloped with a chayal this morning, you would be wearing a mitpachat or something on your head. Also, I would assume that said chayal husband would be going out to dinner with us.” Yoni smirks.
“Well, I am an American, you know,” I say gravely, and then laugh when Salome starts to giggle.
“You should get a T-shirt with that on it,” Salome says when she finally finishes giggling. “And wear it like Superman wears his . . . costume? Uniform? I don’t know. And then anytime you want to say it, you can run into a phone booth or something.”
“I don’t know if there are enough phone booths around for me to pull off something like that,” I say. “But I would love a ‘Well, I am an American’ shirt.”
“And we’ll get a matching one for your chayal,” Yoni says.
“He might appreciate it,” I muse. I look at Yoni’s raised eyebrows, and fill him in on today’s adventures with Avi.
“And then we saw him by the burned house museum,” Salome says. “And I may approve.”
“Approve of what?” I demand.
“Pretty much anything within reason, I think.”
“Whoa,” Yoni says. “That was honestly not where I thought the chayal adventures would end up.”
“I know, neither did I,” Salome says.
“Same.”
“You do realize you’re going to see him everywhere, right?” Yoni says. “That’s just how these things work.”
“Of course I’m going to see him everywhere,” I agree. “Especially since he’s stationed a ten minute walk from Barbara’s apartment.”
“I can’t wait for all the chayal chamud updates,” Salome says. “All the details.”
“What kind of friend would I be if I didn’t include all the details?” I demand. “Seriously, Salome.”
“A terrible one,” she says. “Which thankfully, you are not.”
“You see the same people everywhere you go. It’s ridiculous. And you’ll see people more often when you’re both six thousand miles away from home than you will when you live around the corner from each other. I have no idea why, but that’s just how it works.”
—B.K.
I’M SITTING IN the pizza store in Chevron, eating lunch and chatting with a few seminary girls who are here for the day. They’re telling me about how their first Shabbos in Chevron, the week of Parshat Chayei Sarah.
“We slept in a tent,” one of them is saying. “It was like sleepaway camp all over again, except that it was an actual tent and not a platform with a tent cover.”
“Where did you even go to camp?” another girl asks, her very adorable British accent making it clear that she didn’t go to the same camp. Or any camp in the Catskills, for that matter.
“Oh, no. We’re going to let Miriam talk about camp again,” Elisheva Stein groans.
“Um, excuse me, Miss I Am Obsessed with HASC?” Miriam demands.
“Well, I didn’t sleep in a tent there,” the redhead says, and this is déjà vu to so many conversations in the dorm’s library at midnight when everyone was supposed to be doing homework. “I slept in a bunk with my camper, like a civilized human being. As one does when they work in a camp.”
“Parshat Chayei Sarah was my first Shabbos in Chevron, too,” I tell them. “But I stayed at someone’s house, not in a tent. I kinda feel like I missed out on part of the Chevron experience.”
“I’m sure if you really wanted, you could camp out here for Shabbos,” says Miriam. “It’s probably not the smartest idea, safety wise and everything.”
“True. Also, I’m kinda into the whole having an actual roof over my head, you know?”
“Do I ever,” Elisheva says.
“Is that some sort of Far Rockaway thing?” Miriam asks.
“Totally not,” I say. “But maybe it’s a Reads Lane thing.”
A chayal standing on line turns around. “Reads Lane?” he asks.
“Yeah . . .”
“At mekirah Chaim Stein?” he asks. Do you know Chaim Stein?
“Betach. Hu ha ach sheli.” Elisheva says. Of course I do. He’s my brother.
“You’re the sister!” the chayal exclaims. “He told me you were in Israel this year. He’s right outside now. Hold on.” He jogs to the door, machine gun bouncing, and yells for Chaim.
Five chayalim come into the pizza store and head straight over to the table where we’re sitting. Things like this may be why Salome is convinced that I’m friends with the entire IDF. Mostly because things like this happen fairly frequently.
“Hey, Eli,” Chaim says, reaching over and snatching a fry from her plate before she can slap his hand away. “Long time no see. What’s it been, half an hour?”
“Give or take,” she says, scowling. “Fry stealer.”
He laughs. “I’m not eating your pizza. Be thankful for that, at least.” He hip bumps her and slides in. Another two chayalim pull up chairs and prop their feet up as a third goes to order.
“Wait, you’re not in seminary now, are you?” Chaim asks me.
“Nope. Just visiting for a bit.”
“I was wondering. Especially since you brought me that duffel bag.”
“Wait, she’s Mezkaina Tamar?” one of the chayalim asks.
“Wait, what?” Mezkaina Tamar? Poor Tamar? What the heck?
The chayalim are cracking up. “It’s Mezkaina Tamar!” one of them calls to the guy by the counter.
“Mezkaina Tamar!” he calls. “Thank you for the chocolate!”
“What the heck is happening?” Elisheva asks.
“Ima told me Tamar from down the block was going to be going back to New York for a week in November for a wedding, and she could bring me a bag of things. And so every time I’d remember something I wanted, or anyone else wanted, I’d think about poor Mezkaina Tamar, who was going to have to schlep the whole world to Israel to me.” Chaim smiles, sheepish. “It kinda stuck.”
“It wasn’t so bad,” I protest. “It wasn’t like I had to schlep it on the plane or anything.”
“Well, let’s just say that my entire unit had decided that you were their favorite person for a really long time,” Chaim says. “So, thanks.”
“No problem.”
The door opens, and one of the guys at the table yells. “Avi, bo l’fgosh et Mezkaina Tamar!” Avi, come meet Poor Tamar!
Avi. Of course it’s Avi.
He strolls over to the table, looking just as excellent as he did when I saw him last. “Mezkaina Tamar?” he repeats. “Aifoh?” Where?
And then he sees me and breaks into a huge smile. “You’re Mezkaina Tamar?” he asks.
“So it seems,” I say, trying not to smile too big. “I didn’t realize this was such a thing.”
“Are you kidding? We thanked God every day for Mezkaina Tamar.” He leans against Chaim. “I guess you do know Chaim.”
“Wait, how do the two of you know each other?” Chaim asks, snatching another fry from Elisheva’s plate.
“We were on the same bus to Jerusalem,” Avi answers.
One of the other chayalim turns to me. “I’m sorry about their dancing,” he says, all serious. “We try to stop them but they don’t listen.”
“Avi, you were dancing?” another chayal moans. “Oh, no. Avi. We talked about this already.”
Elisheva’s friends are confused, Elisheva is poking Chaim with a straw, and the chayalim are all tsking.
“Avi, Avi, Avi. How are you going to get married like this?” Short Chayal asks, doing an excellent imitation of some over worried mothers in my neighborhood. “Dancing in public? In front of a Bais Yaakov girl? When are you going to learn?”
“I assume you’re going to have this conversation with Asaf next, right?” Avi asks.
“No, he’s not looking to marry a Bais Yaakov girl,” Short Chayal says.
“Shlomo . . .” Avi says, shaking his head. “What do we do with you?”
“Well, you don’t keep dancing like that in the street,” he says, trying not to smile and failing.
“Nah, I’m gonna keep dancing. You’re just jealous that Asaf and I have sweet moves.”
“Sweet moves?” Short Chayal repeats, confused. It doesn’t have the same ring in Hebrew. “I don’t know, Avi.”
“I don’t know, either, Shlomo.” Avi grins. “But mostly you’re jealous. It’s okay. It happens.”
Short Chayal mutters something to Avi and the whole group starts laughing.
Boys.
The table is overcrowded with people, but after fifteen minutes of being thoroughly entertained by a group of ridiculous chayalim, they all get up and get back to work. I leave around the same time as them, because I have some errands I promised Barbara I’d run for her this week.
The rest of the guys are walking a little ahead of me, but Avi hangs back. “Sorry about that.”
“About what?”
“Barging in on your lunch.”
“It’s fine. I wasn’t planning on staying, and then I bumped into Elisheva.” I zip my coat and shove my hands into my pockets as a cold gust of air blows by. “And now I know an entire unit of chayalim refer to me as Mezkaina Tamar.”
“Yeah, about that.”
I laugh. “It’s hilarious.”
“It’s mostly kind of weird,” Avi says.
“Yeah, well. Such is life. How was the bar mitzvah?”
“Nice. Weird, but nice.” Avi waves a car by before we cross the street. “How was your friend?”
“So cute.” And we spent a significant time talking about you, I don’t tell him. She thinks you’re cute, I also don’t tell him. So do I, I definitely don’t say. “It was really nice to get to hang out with her and her husband.”
“That’s good.” We walk in companionable silence for a minute or two. “Can I ask you a weird question?” Avi asks.
“Sure,” I say, having no idea what he wants to ask, and trying not to think too deeply into the question.
“Had we met before Tuesday?”
“You, too? I thought it was just me. I’ve been trying to figure out why you looked so familiar.”
“Oh, thank God,” Avi says, sighing in relief. “I’ve been trying to figure out why you look so familiar and I can’t place it.”
“I have no idea,” I say. “Maybe we just saw each other around somewhere last year.”
“Maybe, but you look more familiar than just some random girl I saw once or twice.”
“I don’t know. I spent a lot of time in Chevron last year, so maybe that is just it.”
“Maybe. I don’t know. Well, at least it’s not just me.”
“Definitely not.”
“How was your sufganiya?” Avi asks.
“Delish.” I grin. “Obviously.”
“Good to know we haven’t let you down in the doughnut department.”
No complaints in the cute chayal department, either.
Tamar. Don’t get too attached to people you’re going to be leaving in less than a month.
Don’t do it. It’s only going to hurt you.