Come for Dinner
I emailed Shoshana via her website, with Rachel Klein thanking you! in the subject line, followed by a sycophantic paragraph about her kind attentions to my possible anti-Semitic sacking. I asked if she’d known that I’d been knocked down by a big German car, driven by the now-confirmed paramour of Donald Trump, then immediately doubted the wisdom of mentioning Trump’s adultery. Why did I think I had to remind a religious woman about broken commandments? Thirty-six hours later, an answer arrived, a mere How did you hear about that?
Which thing? I took a few minutes to consider what to say, decided on Did you mean your rallying to my cause?
Yes. Who told you?
Had Lorna or anyone else at BuzzFeed sworn me to secrecy? I didn’t think so. I wrote back, BuzzFeed.
That was on an anonymous tip line!!!!
I wrote, You included your phone number.
For BuzzFeed. Not for them to throw around!!!
Should I end this now or challenge it? I reminded myself of the goal—a debriefing dinner. But your tip involved me. That’s why I’m thanking you. After you told BuzzFeed to look into the last Jew fired by the White House, they came up with me.
What do you want? she wrote back.
Though feeling way less than hospitable, I wrote, I’d like you to join us for a Shabbat dinner some time.
Who’s ‘us’?
My roommates, my boyfriend, my boss.
The next morning she named two dates. I wrote back, Wonderful! Let me check with my people & confirm ASAP. Food allergies?
She sent a capitalized list: EGGS, BROCCOLI, DUCK, FRESH (AS OPPOSED TO CANNED) TUNA, VINEGAR, PINE NUTS. NO PORK, NO SHELLFISH.
I sent the proscribed foods to Yasemin, who wrote back, What kind of crappy challah is made without eggs?
I wrote to Shoshana, confirming a date and asking, A regular challah ok, i.e. made with eggs?
Her answer sounded like another scold: Of course regular challah ok.
One more question: Anyone you’d like to bring?
She wrote back, No! But if you know any eligible men between 35–60, I’m game.
Well that certainly didn’t sound as pious as I would expect from her. I clicked on “images.” She was stunning in every shot, with dark, layered, tumbling hair. She favored a pose where her hands were on her waist, as if to emphasize its admirably small circumference. I knew from Wikipedia that she was thirty-eight, twice married. Her second husband had been a rabbi famous for taking up with married female congregants, of which she was one. She’d coached sons and daughters of movie stars, including a child of Jerry Seinfeld’s and a great-grandson of Abe Vigoda.
Did I really have to invite Kirby to this staged Shabbat dinner? I sat at my desk, wishing I worked for a writer who had better instincts, better reviews, whose work had weight, whose demeanor was serious, whose suits weren’t loud. Inevitably, and with little else in the way of work, he buzzed me, asking if I’d followed up with Shoshana and was dinner a go?
I said, “Didn’t I fill you in? She’s getting back to me about a date.” And for further dissuasion: “I’m sure you know that at Orthodox shuls the sexes don’t mingle, so maybe it’s best if it’s just me and my roommates.”
No, he did not think that best. He needed to speak to her himself. It’s settled: he was coming. “I have a yarmulke somewhere, from my ex-agent’s kid’s bat mitzvah. And I know a few Yiddish words.”
“Such as?”
“L’chaim!”
“That’s Hebrew, but sure. It’ll fit the occasion. Any others?”
“Something might just pop up that I’m not remembering this second.”
I said, “Be careful, though. You don’t want to look like you’re pandering.”
A half hour later he texted Shmuck!
Who? I wrote back.
Nobody. It just popped into my head!!
I sent back a clapping emoji, hoping we were done.
Elizabeth wanted to know why I thought Ivanka Trump’s Hebrew coach should be fed and/or feted.
I said, “Don’t mention this at dinner, but she’s proven she’s not loyal to Trump. Kirby thinks, if wined and dined, she’ll sing.”
“Disloyal how?”
I told her about the main thrust of the BuzzFeed tip—that Trump was going to inject himself into Hanukkah.
“So? Don’t they all do that, pander?”
“Not like this; not just ‘I’m wishing my Jewish friends a happy holiday.’ He was going to say how much the holiday meant to him because his grandparents came to America, fleeing the Nazis.”
Yasemin yelled from the living room, “Idiot-in-chief!”
Elizabeth said, “Wait. Did he actually do that?”
“Someone must’ve talked him out of it. The math alone is ridiculous—his Lutheran grandparents came over in the 1870s. So BuzzFeed didn’t run with it.”
“But you are?”
“Sort of. Kirby loves it. Thinks there has to be a lot of animosity there if she left a tip on a tip line.”
“Kirby loves everything,” Yasemin yelled. She returned to the kitchen with her laptop open and resting on her forearm. “Chicken with apricots, caramelized onions and cardamom rice,” she announced.
“Sounds great,” I said.
“Think it’s okay if I found it under Ramadan entrees?”
“Even better,” I said.
“You’ll get the challah Friday morning before they run out,” Yasemin instructed.
Elizabeth, speaking over running water at the kitchen sink said, “I think one of my grandparents was Jewish.”
“Think? You don’t know?” I asked.
“He never said he was, but all his relatives were buried in a Jewish cemetery.”
“Which would be persuasive, if only the end result wasn’t Ms. White Bread, here,” Yasemin said, nonetheless blowing a kiss in Elizabeth’s direction.
I asked Elizabeth why she’d never told me this before.
“When have we ever discussed religion?”
“Or had a Shabbat dinner?” said Yasemin.
“What was his name?” I asked.
Elizabeth looked stumped.
“Your mother’s maiden name?”
“Coffee.”
“With a K? Probably changed,” I said. “Kaufman? Either way, it could be a nice topic to bring up at the dinner if there’s a lag in the conversation.”
“Lizzie’s specialty: the non sequitur,” said Yasemin.
“Think this woman is okay with”—Elizabeth motioned back and forth between her and Yasemin with a wet hand.
“Meaning gentiles or lesbians?” I asked.
“The latter.”
“See what her parents have done to her?” said Yasemin. “She thinks everyone’s a homophobe.”
“No worries. The vast majority of my people are very pro-gay,” I said.
“Maybe she’s gay,” said Elizabeth.
I said, “Married and divorced twice. Hinted that she was in the market if I knew anyone.”
“Doesn’t sound very holy,” said Elizabeth.
“You know what she’ll think when we’re all seated and paired up?” asked Yasemin. “That you’re setting her up with Kirby.”
What a thought. I said, “Her last husband was a rabbi. And she’s probably twenty-five years younger than Kirby.”
“He’s a man,” said Elizabeth.
“Kirby’s kind of charming,” Yasemin said. “Am I the only one who thinks that?”
Elizabeth said, “He takes up a lot of oxygen, I’ll give him that.”
Yasemin had to be Googling Shoshana because she asked, “Did he invite himself? Because I must say, she’s quite the knockout!” She turned the laptop around for us to see the smiling line-up of tightly belted Shoshanas.
“Will Yasemin have to cater their engagement party, too?” asked Elizabeth.
Alex said he could get Walter to work for him the Friday night of Coach Gottlieb’s visit.
“Have I met Walter?”
“You’d remember if you had. We call him ‘the world’s greatest authority’.”
“On?”
“On every vineyard, every grape, every bottle. He visits and studies the merch even when he’s not working. Big plus: he’s retired, so he’s free and willing whenever we need him.”
“We’ll need Kosher wine, but don’t go overboard.”
“Kosher wine is one of Walter’s sub-specialties, along with everything else.” Side by side in bed, he gave me a nudge. “Can I give him a thrill and tell him they’re for a dinner with Ivanka Trump’s Hebrew coach?”
“You don’t think he’ll ask what that’s all about?”
He didn’t answer as quickly as usual, and when he did, it was more serious than I was accustomed to. “If Walter asks me why I need wine for Ivanka Trump’s Hebrew coach, I’ll say, ‘I’m in love with a Jewish girl who’s invited me to a Shabbat dinner’.”
Was that said in jest? Did the “in-love” part count when embedded in a hypothetical conversation? I hesitated, not wanting to jump the gun with my own declaration, so I asked, “Did you mean this Jewish girl?”
“The naked one in my bed? Ms. Klein? Yes.”
I said, very carefully, “I hope you know she feels the same way.”
C’mon, he was prompting, not good enough; say it.
We’d been lying on our backs, shoulders touching. I sat up and faced him. “I think I fell in love with you when you rang up that first bottle of Prosecco, the day Kirby hired me. Isn’t that crazy?”
With some laborsaving app on his phone, he made the room go dark. “Come here, you little meshuggeneh,” he said.