Dating Kosher

by Greene, Michaela

  “We’ve ironed it out,” Jen spat, utilizing as little energy as possible to respond to my nosy question.

  “That’s wonderful,” I lied. But it was okay that she was going to the wedding; I’d still look way better than she would. She looked like she’d even put on a few pounds; how nice for me.

  “Yeah, what a joyous occasion.” Jen had yet to make eye contact with me, but her sarcasm couldn’t be overlooked.

  What a bitch. “What’s your problem? Why are you so down on this wedding?”

  She looked up at me, daggers shooting out of her eyes. “Are you kidding me with this? You think I should be happy?”

  “Your mother is happy, why shouldn’t you be?” My phone rang, the tone muffled by the leather of my purse. I grabbed it and glanced at the screen. My mother. No thanks. I dropped it back into my purse, unanswered.

  “My mother leaves my dad and shacks up with some guy and I should be happy for her? She’s the one who’s being totally unreasonable. I can’t believe I’m even going to this wedding. She’s so selfish.”

  The train started to slow and thankfully it was my stop. I slung my bag over my shoulder and rose out of my seat. “She’s being selfish? Your mother is happy after how many years in a crappy marriage? You know, if I had my way, my parents wouldn’t have split up either, but you’re just being a spoiled brat. You need to get your head out of your ass.”

  I shook my head at her and turned to leave. The look on her face was burned in my memory as one of life’s most amusing moments: jaw dropped, eyes wide, nostrils flared. Speechless, just the way I liked her.

  Too bad I’d have to see her again in just a few hours. There’d better be an open bar at this rehearsal, I thought as I stepped off the train and onto the platform.

  * * *

  As it turned out, Jen was the least of my worries.

  I stood on the makeshift bima at the front of the east ballroom of the swanky Jardin hotel, obediently waiting for the rest of the small wedding party to make their way down the aisle.

  Once we were all assembled under the chuppah (except for Jacob, who was scheduled to land early Saturday morning) and the rabbi (since it was shabbos; he would arrive after sundown on Saturday just in time to officiate) the wedding coordinator went through what would happen during the ceremony. Jen glared at me from where she stood next to Susan the whole time.

  Midway through the pretend ceremony, my dad began to recite his fake vows to Susan (the real ones would be composed on the day of the wedding – they had decided to be spontaneous, though Susan had confided in me that she had composed hers weeks before). The wedding coordinator said nothing though her white-knuckled grip of death on her ever-present clipboard and her lips pulled into a thin line bisecting her chin and her nose said volumes about how she felt about it all.

  Dad ignored her and took Susan’s hand. “I promise to eat tacos with you in bed while watching Game of Thrones and not steal all the covers. I will endure your cold feet on me with fortitude and will always make sure I leave enough milk for your morning tea.”

  Awww. Dad could be so cute. Susan smiled and squeezed his hand before she began. “And I promise to indulge your fetish for peanut butter and mayonnaise sandwiches (ew) and will take the rubber bands off of the morning paper for you and will try to only put my cold feet on you when absolutely necessary. I will watch Seinfeld reruns with you and laugh at the appropriate places and promise to not back seat drive unless I am in danger of being killed or otherwise maimed.”

  They smiled at each other, sealing their pretend vows. I glanced over at Jen, marveling at the omnipresent scowl on the girl’s face. How could you not, at least, find that endearing? Well, whatever. Her presence was all that counted; Susan could, at least, be able to say her daughter attended her wedding in body if not in spirit and blessing.

  Dad and Susan were just about to kiss when a shriek arose from the back of the room. As one, we turned: Dad and Susan, Jen, myself and the wedding planner. What I saw was no less a shock to my dad and Susan than it was to me. Then the shock gave way to anger and embarrassment over what was about to go down.

  Because it was my mother.

  Not only my mother but my mother in a powder blue sweat suit (how was it possible she even owned such a thing?) weaving unsteadily up the aisle toward us.

  So many things wrong with this picture. I turned toward Dad, who was pushing Susan protectively behind him while he began to step forward toward his ex-wife.

  “This should be good,” Jen whispered under her breath. I turned toward her and would have decked her were it not for more pressing issues at hand. Instead, I delivered her a glare, silently willing her to shut up. In step with Dad, I moved toward my mother, hoping to diffuse the situation.

  Tippy was having no part of it. “You are not marrying that whore, Martin,” Mom hollered up at us. “You are married to me! I will not allow it!”

  Although Mom’s words were slurred, (by drugs or alcohol, which I couldn’t be sure) her meaning was still as clear as her beloved Swarovski crystal vase she had fought to win in the divorce.

  “Mom, you can’t do this,” I said when I got to her. I slipped my arm around her waist, trying to provide her with some stability and direct her away at the same time. Sliding away, she looked at me and scowled, taking a step back to focus on my face.

  “Shoshie? What are you doing here? Why is Marty leaving me?” She began to sob, throwing her arms around me so suddenly that I almost fell backward under her weight.

  “Tippy,” Dad put his hand on her, trying to pry her away from me. “Come on, Tippy. This is not a good time…”

  Mom spun around and faced him. “Not a good time? Marty, it’s the perfect time!” Wiggling away from us, she pitched toward the stage. “If anyone here knows of any reason why this man and woman shouldn’t…I do, I do!” she lifted her right hand and waved it frantically. “I know of a reason, he’s married to me.”

  Dad jogged the few steps toward her. He grabbed her, trying to lead her out of the ballroom, but wasn’t having much luck; she kept slapping his hands away, like a belligerent child who didn’t want to be picked up. I looked back to where Susan cowered against the far wall. She was biting her lip as she frowned at the scene in front of her. It wasn’t hard to figure out what she was thinking: that this crazy woman was going to ruin her wedding.

  Not if I had anything to do with it.

  “Mother, let’s go,” I said as I grabbed Mom’s arm, pinching hard enough for her to squeal in protest. I led her out of the ballroom, ignoring her loud complaints.

  I continued right through the foyer, not slowing down at all, my pincer grip still tight on her arm. She was struggling to keep up, but I swear I would have dragged her along the floor if I’d had to, not even caring that every person in the hotel lobby was staring at us.

  Once I got her into the bathroom, I let go, blocking the door with my body and facing her. “What the hell is wrong with you?”

  She inspected her arm where my fingers had been only a moment before. “I should ask you the same question! I’m going to have a bruise.”

  “Do you have any idea what you are doing?” I hissed, my heart pounding in my chest, my breathing becoming shallow. I’d never been so angry in my entire life.

  Tears erupted from my mother’s eyes, her face contorting in her pain. If it hadn’t been for her insane outbursts, I might just have felt sorry for her.

  She leaned back against the counter, looking down at the tiled floor. “You have no idea how hard this is, Shoshanna.”

  I opened my mouth to speak, ready to fill her in on how hard she was making it for everyone else, but before any sound came out, she lifted her head and looked at me. Her eyes were red and swollen, her face blotchy from crying. “You can’t possibly know what this feels like. I know you’ve been avoiding my calls. I know you’ve been poisoned against me. There’s not much I can do about that, but I’ll be damned if I will sit back and watch my husband marry that whore!
”

  “You are one crazy woman, Mother,” I spat out just as the bathroom door opened. My head snapped toward it and my heart leaped into my throat when I saw Susan standing there, biting her lip, nostrils flaring with every breath. She held on to the door, assumedly so she could make a quick escape in case Tippy was feeling frisky enough to attack her.

  “I am not a whore, Tziporah,” Susan said, her tone low and dangerous as she glared at my mother.

  Mom snorted, folding her arms across her chest. “Like hell, you’re not.”

  Susan stepped fully into the bathroom and stood in the center of the room, forming the third point of our triangle of dysfunction. Mirroring my mother, Susan folded her arms. She was furious, her lip twitching. “And I suppose you are above reproach?”

  “You stole my husband!” Mom spat.

  Susan seemed to chew on her words before letting them out. Her tone was low, but her voice wavered as she held back her anger. “Tziporah, we go back a lot of years. You have no right to call me a whore. You have no right to even consider admonishing me after what you did to my family.”

  My mother’s expression turned from rage to fear as she quickly glanced in my direction before turning back to Susan. “That was three decades ago. Don’t you dare…”

  Susan’s eyes narrowed to slits. “You started this. I was willing to leave it all as water under the bridge, but if you want to start casting stones, I’ll bite. You like airing dirty laundry; why don’t you tell your daughter what you did to us?” She jerked her thumb toward me.

  In only a few seconds, Mom had lost her upper hand and it showed. Panic colored her face as her eyes darted from Susan to me and back. She suddenly took the few steps to close the gap between us and grabbed my arm, much like I had done to her only moments before. “Come on, let’s get out of here.” She turned toward the door.

  But Susan was standing in front of it, her hands on her hips, not moving. “You’re not going anywhere.” She glared down at my mother, having a good two inches on her.

  I’d never seen Susan like this. Where my mother had always been outspoken and tenacious, Susan had been demure and quiet. It was a no-brainer to figure out what Dad saw in her: she was the anti-Tippy.

  She turned to me, her face softening slightly. “Sorry about this, Shoshanna, but if this doesn’t get hashed out tonight it will go on and I…”

  “STOP POISONING HER!” my mother shrieked, digging her acrylic talons into the soft flesh of my forearm, lunging at Susan at the same time.

  Before I could do anything to intervene, Susan had put her arms up to block and in doing so had knocked my mother flat on her ass. She landed with a dull thud on the hard, tiled floor.

  “Oh my God,” Susan’s hands flew to her mouth.

  I bent down to tend to my weeping mother and saw out of the corner of my eye as Susan got bumped in the back by the door as someone tried to get into the bathroom.

  It was Dad. “Susan? Tippy? What’s going on in here?”

  Susan poked her head around the door, speaking to my dad in an authoritative tone. “I’m handling this, Martin. Go away, we’ll be out in a minute.”

  As I helped my mother to her feet, I took the opportunity to whisper in her ear. “Mom, what’s going on? What did you do to Susan?”

  “Nothing, Shoshanna. Let go of me.” She wriggled, trying to get out from my grasp, looking like she was going to try to pounce on Susan again. This was turning ridiculous; seriously, my last chick fight in a bar had been less catty than this. I kept my grip tight on her arm.

  “Come on, Tziporah, tell her what you did.” Susan was goading my mother. It was a side of my soon-to-be stepmother (if this drama ever blew over) that I didn’t love so much, though I could totally see how Mom had pushed her over the edge.

  Mom was crying again. “Shut up, Susan and let us out,” she said, sounding more pathetic than authoritative.

  It was more than I could handle. “Susan, I don’t think that this is going to solve anything.”

  Susan looked at me, blinking. “Your mother started this, Shoshanna. I have put up with her calling me every name in the book, and phoning me almost on a daily basis to do so. I have lost friends because of her and almost lost my fiancé over her because for some reason,” she glared at my mother, “Marty feels responsible for how crazy she is.”

  I had to admit, Susan had a pretty compelling case for losing it on my mother.

  “He should feel responsible,” Mom said, sounding like a five-year-old.

  Susan growled, her frustration evident. “I can’t see what my brother ever even saw in you. You always were just a spoiled over-privileged debutante.”

  Brother? This was news; I didn’t even know Susan had a brother. Turning to look at my mother, I wondered if she’d had some sort of affair with Susan’s brother after learning about Dad’s marital indiscretion. Mom was clearly on the verge of a breakdown: not a good time to ask.

  Susan took a deep breath and continued, her voice slightly calmer. “Listen, Tziporah…Tippy: I’m ready to put this all behind us. I’m beyond tired of this bullshit. I did not steal your husband. Contrary to what you want everyone to think, you and he had already started the divorce before he and I ever got together. I kept my mouth shut all this time, trying to make it easier on you, but I’m done with that now.”

  Looking at Mom, I realized that what Susan was saying had to be the truth. Mom was completely deflated, not even bothering to look at Susan anymore. She just stared at the floor, nodding slightly. She was beat and she knew it.

  But Susan wasn’t done with her. “I suggest that you get a good shrink and keep him on twenty-four-hour standby.”

  Not a bad idea, I thought.

  Mom lifted her head but just glared at Susan, her lips pursed tightly together.

  “And know this,” Susan continued, her voice lowered to a menacing hiss. “If you so much as set foot in this building tomorrow, I will have you arrested and thrown out on your ass, even if I have to do it myself. Do you understand me?”

  A nod was my mother’s only reply.

  “And I don’t want any mention of this anymore or I’m getting a restraining order on you. Do you understand?”

  Ouch. Mom just kept nodding. I respected Susan so much in that moment—what a badass she was being.

  The door opened again and Jen sauntered in, a blank look on her face. It was as though she hadn’t even witnessed the scene back in the ballroom. She stopped and looked at her mother’s strained face. “What is going on in here?”

  Are you a moron? I thought, disbelieving that she could be so clueless.

  “Nothing, Jennifer. Tippy and I had a conversation but it’s over now. Right Tippy?”

  Suddenly Mom’s head snapped up, the corners of her mouth edging outward into a garish smile. “Yes, it is, Susan. We are all done here.”

  Jen looked from my mom back to Susan. “Okay, well I gotta pee like nobody’s business.” She pushed past on her way to one of the stalls.

  Mom turned toward the mirror and plucked a Kleenex out of the box on the counter, dabbing at her make-up. She opened her purse and pulled out several compacts, her lipstick and a small bottle of perfume, arranging everything on the counter. To the untrained eye, she looked cool and calm, as though she were fixing her make up after a meal. But she was still rattled. I could tell by the way her hand quivered ever so slightly as she applied more mascara, replacing what had come off with the tears.

  In the mirror, I watched as Susan, without a word, slipped quietly out of the room.

  As I stood amid a cloud of newly spritzed Chanel No. 19, I pondered a new conundrum: should I escort my mother out of the hotel and attempt to calm her down further, or was it my duty to stay behind and rejoin the rehearsal?

  I was about to open my mouth to ask my mother if she was okay when I heard a flush and Jen emerged from her stall. She headed over to the sink and looked at my mother in the mirror.

  “Why are you here?” she asked.


  Uh oh. I stood ready, poised to intervene should I need to. Nothing like adding some fuel to an already roaring bonfire.

  Mom held her lipstick away from her face as she turned to regard Jen. She looked the girl up and down before she answered. “Who the fuck are you to ask me why I’m here?”

  Wow, Mom almost never swore. ‘Ladies don’t swear, profanity is as distasteful as wearing last year’s fashions’ she always said. I held my breath and looked back at Jen.

  She shoved her chin out and threw her shoulders back. “I’m the daughter of the bride, who the FUCK are you? The EX-wife of the groom? You have no right to be here. All you’ve done is cause my mother stress and heartache…”

  Uh, excuse me? I couldn’t stand it anymore. “You know, Jennifer, my mother does not have a monopoly on causing heartache. I seem to remember your mother calling me up in tears because you told her you weren’t coming to the wedding and that you’d called her a homewrecker. So don’t give us this self-righteous horseshit.”

  Jen spun on me. “You shut your fucking mouth, you spoiled bitch.”

  I’d been called worse, especially lately, and by way more important people, so the insult slid off my back. “Truth hurts, huh, Jen?” I smirked.

  “It’s enough. ENOUGH!” my mother cried, her eyes closed as she shook her head. “She’s right, Shoshanna. I shouldn’t be here.”

  I could hardly argue, but didn’t expect the admission from my mother.

  She exhaled really loudly and then said, “I’ve really screwed this up. Jennifer, can you give us a moment alone? Please tell your mother I’m leaving in a minute.”

  Jen opened her mouth to speak. I shook my head and glared at her until she turned on her heel and left without another word.

  Mom stared at the door for a moment after it had closed behind Jen. “Hard to believe she turned into such a little kurveh. I changed her diapers, you know.” Despite the fresh application of make-up, my mother looked haggard and utterly exhausted.

  She leaned forward and took my hand. “I’m sorry for all of this, Shoshie.” She looked down and seemed to notice the sweat suit for the first time. “Ugh, what am I wearing?” She looked back up at me, wide-eyed. “People will think I’m crazy!”