by Naomi Ragen
The room erupted with life as the children, hopping and crawling, crowded in along with his wife, who was talking softly to the baby. She sat down next to him, whispering into his ear.
“Well, mitzvah accomplished?” She smiled.
“I think so,” he said, smiling back.
“What was it all about?”
“I’m now a shadchan.”
Her look was incredulous and amused.
“Yes, I have made a match for my chavrusa, Yaakov the widower.”
“Who is the girl?”
“Her name is Leah. She is a baalas teshuva who was one of the community volunteers helping him with his children.”
“What do you know about her? Her family? What she did before she came here?”
Meir shifted uncomfortably. “I don’t know.”
“But a shadchan is supposed to investigate before he makes a match! How much will the dowry be?”
“I don’t know. We didn’t talk about it.”
She shook her head. “A fine shadchan you make!”
“I don’t think I will do it again, Bruriah.”
“That’s a good idea, Meir. So what do you know about this girl?”
“Only that—if it be God’s will—she will make my friend Yaakov happy.”
“For a time. Like any marriage,” Bruriah said wisely.
“Even if a man lives many years, let him enjoy himself in all of them, remembering how many the days of darkness are going to be,” he quoted, wiping the sweat from his forehead and kissing his wife on hers as he took the baby from her arms.
27
Leah put down the phone, her heart racing, her eyes moist. Yaakov had kept his word! And with a swiftness and honesty that took her breath away. Everything would be out in the open now, arranged according to the strictest tradition. Anyone who would be offended now by their relationship was clearly in violation of all the Godly laws written in the Torah. It was their problem, not hers.
But as usual when a thing most hoped for and dreamed of suddenly goes from the far-off realm of vague imaginings into the fleshy, solid presence of reality, she found it hard to make the transition. While in the past, she slept as if drugged, her worries and hopes too distant to prey on her fears, now she found that however she tried, sleep would not come. Like bees swarming from an overturned hive, her thoughts darted in and out, stinging and menacing, as well as dropping tantalizing bits of sweet nectar.
What if, she thought, turning over once again to find the unfindable comfortable spot that would let her sleep, what if, in spending time together, in growing more familiar, we suddenly realize how incompatible we are? After all, they had nothing in common—not lineage nor upbringing nor even language, hers a product of her California upbringing, his the rare distillation of thousands of years of Jewish wanderings and holy books, glued together with the recent Eastern European immigrant past washed up on the shores of New York City.
What if, at closer inspection, he saw how newly minted was her acceptance and practice of a lifestyle and customs that had been his and his family’s bread and butter for decades, if not centuries? What if she made mistakes, said the wrong blessing, put on the wrong clothes, forgot to do something she should, mistakenly did something she shouldn’t? Would he look at her differently? Would he change his mind?
What if she changed hers?
Boro Park was such a different world—another planet, really—where native-born Americans spoke English like foreigners. As much as she tried to talk herself out of it, that bothered her, that uneducated speech. It made her feel as if people were in some way primitive. When they said things like “I’ll go by you” instead of “I’ll go to you.” Or “How’s by you?” instead of “How are you?” It grated. But if she was a snob, they were worse.
Although she did her best to keep all the laws, still, she was singled out as a “penitent.” She found the very term baalas teshuva repellant. As if those who used it against her had nothing to do penance for! Or the idea that a person born of a mother who didn’t go to the ritual baths was somehow inferior, tainted. How she sometimes longed to stand on a soapbox in the center of Boro Park and shout at them, “We were all born from a human womb and began with a putrid seed! Do you think father Abraham’s mother, who was married to an idol worshipper, went to the mikvah? Do you think Moses’s mother, who was an Egyptian slave, went to the mikvah? You and I both came naked into this world, bawling our heads off. What we make of our lives doesn’t depend on whether our mothers dunked naked into a little pool of much-used water filled with hairs. We were born pure, all of us. Or all born tainted. So give it up, you wretched snobs!”
Could she commit to living the rest of her life in that world? And if not, could she go back to her old life? Did she want to?
Her life had changed so radically, she thought. There was a new rhythm, something ordered and meaningful.
It started with the Days of Awe in September, beginning with Rosh Hashana followed by days of deep introspection that culminated in fasting and prayer and the long, urgent call of the ram’s horn, that went off like a bomb siren, increasing in urgency and intensity. Hurry! it seemed to shout. There is no time! Search your life! Become a better person! There is no time! How different from the secular New Year’s celebrations she had been part of—the loneliness and attempts at false hilarity washed down with alcohol to numb herself to the relentless passage of time.
She thought of Sukkos, moving out of your house for a week to eat and even sleep in a flimsy little booth, reminding you that homelessness was man’s natural state, and everything solid in your life was temporary, a gift from God. The first time she’d grasped the lemony, ripe citron in her hands together with the tall green fronds of the date palm, the myrtle and willow leaves, waving them up and down, back and forth, toward heaven and toward earth, it had felt almost pagan, connecting her to ancestors from a distant past who had lived close to the earth, in harmony with the changing seasons, the planting and harvesting.
And then came December and Chanukah, candles shining from every window on the street, the light growing more robust with every night’s addition of a new candle until the windows blazed, banishing the darkest nights of the year, reminding you that miracles did happen, and black nights, danger, and sadness could be collectively banished, transformed into light and joy. She thought of Purim, which saw the staid streets burst into color, becoming a carnival with endless little brides and queens, little soldiers and tiny high priests in their white robes and glued-on beards, carrying loaded baskets of cakes and sweets to friends and neighbors, the only holiday one was encouraged to get drunk out of frivolity and joy. And soon after, the open windows, the pails of water flowing down gutters as people scrubbed their homes for Passover, readying themselves for the sacred retelling of the tribe’s beginnings: Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses, Aaron, the ten plagues of Egypt, and the miraculous journey through the desert to the promised land.
Here in Boro Park, time didn’t pass; it was embraced, celebrated, every month with its rituals and reminders of who you were and where you came from and the God Who watched over you. The very thought of leaving all that behind, going back to the thin fabric of her old life, was chilling.
Yet at the very base of all those rituals was the belief—the hope—that leading a religious life made you a better person; that living among religious Jews meant living among good people, raising your children to be like them. With a heavy heart, she realized this was not so.
Although it was true of some—she thought of Yaakov and some of the rabbis who were her teachers—many others, perhaps even most, were at best simply ordinary human beings and at worst narrow-minded, cliquish, prejudiced gossipers with the same moral failings as most people. Indeed, there was something hard and unforgiving and almost brutal among those who considered themselves the most piously stringent in their observance, something ugly and positively vicious in their unrelenting persecution of those who deviated from their standards. They were nothin
g like the compassionate, kind, forgiving God they desired—or pretended to desire—to serve. With their bullying, they had succeeded in creating a little closed and unwelcoming kingdom, an unforgiving and brutal place where the truly pious, indeed, goodness itself, deprived of life’s blood, couldn’t survive.
Was that too harsh? She didn’t know.
But her deepest worry was not if she could live in Boro Park. After all, people picked up and moved all the time. No, her deepest worry of all was something else entirely.
How, she thought, can I be sure I am in love with the man and not just with the father of my beloved children? After all, their courtship had been shockingly brief, a few notes, some words exchanged. You haven’t yet agreed to marry, she comforted herself. Just to go out. And she knew way more about Yaakov Lehman than any other man she had agreed to meet on a shidduch date.
She thought about his eyes, so warm and true and expressive, the way they lit up when he looked at his children, when he looked at her. She loved how honestly they reflected every nuance of his heart: his pain, his regret, his disappointment, his sadness, as well as his joy. His eyes never lied, never obfuscated or hid. They mirrored whatever was happening in his soul.
And then there were his hands, those large, gentle, dependable hands with their graceful, clean fingers. You would never hesitate to put a tiny baby inside them, or the hand of a child needing guidance. You would never worry that they would be harsh or unkind or abrupt. They were soft. They were patient. They were strong. She would never be afraid to have them hold hers, or touch her.
She loved his body, tall and lean and broad shouldered. He was handsome. Handsomer than either Joshua or Andrew had been. And while she couldn’t imagine him climbing a mountain, she could see him running another kind of marathon: standing in place and praying for hours without eating or drinking. There was something of the ascetic in him, but not in an aggressive way. He looked like a man who lived a great deal in his mind. And yet because of the laws of the Torah—which exhorted men to live also in the body, to be connected to the ordinary cares of normal people—he was also deeply connected to life. He was a man who laughed, who loved, who had children and raised them.
She loved his reticence and modesty, his gentlemanly deference and protectiveness around her and his daughters and even his mother-in-law. In the secular world, it was impossible to find a man who had not been infected by the worst accomplishments of feminism: the idea that women should be treated as men not only in their paychecks but also in their physical strength. Yes, she could open her own door, carry her own packages, lift heavy objects. But what woman wanted to be treated like that, unless you were a brainwashed Soviet comrade? She loved how Yaakov treated her.
But most of all, her soul was seared by the love he had for her, of which she had no doubt. She had experienced it and knew how it felt. She could hear it in the tone of his voice, in its breathlessness when he approached her. She could see it in the way his eyes roamed over her, as if she were a precious, almost sacred object to be studied and admired. She could see it in the corners of his mouth as they turned upward with joy each time she walked into a room.
And then, there was this: the time she had grabbed a handful of his white shirts to place them into the washing machine and instead had impulsively buried her face in them, breathing them in.
She turned over, her body shot through with sudden passion. His neck, she thought. His shoulders. His chest. His lips. Yes, that could not be denied. It was alive in her, and it was alive in him, the longing, the need.
Leave it alone! What does it matter? she begged herself. Maybe, God willing, if she decided it was right, she would be his, and he would be hers. For better, or for worse. And she would get used to Boro Park, and they would get used to her. Or not. And with that, she finally slept.
* * *
Yaakov called her early, giving her just enough time to ritually wash her hands and recite her prayers.
“Shalom aleichem, Leah. It’s Yaakov Lehman.”
“Yes,” she whispered hoarsely. “I know.”
“What is wrong?”
“Nothing. Just … I didn’t sleep very well. Excited.”
“So, the shadchan called you about me?”
She smiled to herself. So this was how it was going to be played. “Yes, Reb Lehman. I was expecting your call. He said very nice things about you. Told me that you were a fine catch.”
“He didn’t!”
“No, he didn’t,” she teased. “But he did say you were sincere in wishing to remarry.”
“That I am, Leah-le.” His voice caressed her as it sank into intimacy, dropping the forced formality of role-playing. “You want that I should come tonight? I mamash can’t wait. I will find someone to watch the kinderlach.”
She sucked in her breath at the language. It will be all right, she thought. I’ll get used to it. Maybe I’ll learn to speak the same way. “Who will you get? Shaindele?”
“Why not?”
“Are you going to tell her what’s going on?”
“I am. I feel we shouldn’t hide and pretend.”
“You know she isn’t going to be happy, to say the least.”
“She is young and sometimes farmisht. But she has a good heart, Leah. She will want me to be happy, for you to be happy. B’ezrat HaShem she should be zoche to be as happy as we are in her own shidduch.”
“She’s never wanted me to be part of your family. Even that first time, I could hardly get her to open the door and let me squeeze inside.”
“She still suffers from losing her mother. Please, Leah, don’t hold her narishkeit against her.”
“No, of course not, Yaakov. I’m just warning you what to expect. But whatever happens, please, Yaakov, don’t get angry at her! Let her say what she feels, let her be honest. Make it clear to her that you understand how hard it is for her to accept that you have a new woman in your life, but that it doesn’t mean you’ve forgotten her mother. Please, most of all, tell her that our relationship has nothing to do with her! She will never be displaced. She’ll always be your beloved daughter and that you will always love her more than anyone or anything.”
“You are a tzadakis, Leah.”
“No, just a woman. I understand womanly rivalry.” She smiled. It was so easy to be generous to Shaindele now that the girl had been so thoroughly vanquished on all fronts. She did feel genuine sympathy for the girl, who was obviously bitterly confused and unhappy—just not enough to fulfill the little schemer’s fantasies and magically disappear. Life is tough, and then you die. The child would just have to learn to put up with her.
“So, when can I come to you?” he asked breathlessly, making an extra effort to speak correct English.
She felt touched. “Go home and see your children first. They wait for you all day. I’ll be ready whenever you can come.”
“Where should we go?”
“Take me wherever you took your other shidduch dates,” she told him, laughing.
* * *
He was waiting at her door at eight thirty in his best black suit and the blue tie he had worn to meet Rachel.
“I rented a car,” he told her excitedly when she opened the door.
He didn’t know what he was doing, what he was saying. He was so happy, so overjoyed that she was there, smiling up at him with her big green eyes and long, curly hair. So sweet! So young in a way that had nothing to do with age! He felt the joy spread down his body like a slow anointing with holy oil, warm and soothing, from head to toe.
“Shalom, Rav Lehman,” she said softly, her voice teasing. “So nice to finally meet you.”
He sobered up only slightly, trying to get back into character. “Hello, Leah. I’ve heard so much about you. The shadchan sang your praises.”
“Given that he’s never met me, he must be very creative.” She laughed, watching a slow blush creep up Yaakov’s cheek. Or was that simply the golden reflection of her own happiness? “Would you like to come in? But of cour
se, I will have to leave the door open so there will be no fear of yichud.”
He smiled, the car keys almost electric against his palm, the idea of being alone with her—open door or not—dizzying. “Why don’t we just go?”
They walked out into the late spring night, Leah pulling the pretty lavender pashmina around her shoulders against the gentle chill.
“You look very nice, Leah. I like … the color of your shawl,” Yaakov said awkwardly, trying to behave the way he imagined normal American men behaved on dates with normal American women. He was terrified she would suddenly realize who he was and think better of the whole thing.
Leah found his attempts charming but a bit dissonant. “Relax, Yaakov. It’s just me.”
“I’m not relaxed?” He frowned.
“No, you are as tightly wound as a little boy’s sidecurls.”
He exhaled. “I just want it should be perfect. To be everything you would want, Leah.”
She looked at him, his eyes, his hands, his beautiful warm smile.
“It is,” she told him.
He took her to the same revolving lounge on Broadway where he had sat with Rachel in what seemed like a lifetime ago. But for some strange reason, it all seemed so new, as if it were the first time. He couldn’t remember anything about it, most of all the girl who had sat opposite him. He wondered vaguely what had happened to her, hoping she had also found happiness. He felt generous, giving. Everyone deserved to be happy! He wished God’s blessings on every living creature, on every blade of grass, on every stone.
He could not even remember what Rachel looked like. Leah was an eraser, he thought. Whatever had come before her was neatly wiped away from his memory and thoughts. He could see only her, hear only her, want only her. There was no divorcée, no rich widow, no Rachel, even no Zissele. He was not himself, not the Yaakov who had known all those women. He was a young man with no past. This beautiful young woman was the first woman he had ever met and fallen in love with. The room turned around and around, the city spinning out of control as his body and mind filled with such fierce and unfamiliar longing he felt almost sick with desire.