A Brief Chapter in My Impossible Life (18 page)

“I’m sorry. Was that story supposed to make any sense?”

“It’s complicated.”

“I think that means you can’t really answer my question.”

“I’ve been celebrating Passover every year of my life.”

“Well, then, can you try for a more coherent explanation?”

“I guess I need to brush up.”

I stop for a minute and think about whether I’m ready to ask him my next question.

“Will you come to Rivka’s with me? She told me to invite you. You made quite an impression on her.”

“I’d love to. I have to run it by my parents, though. It’s kind of an important family holiday in my house in spite of my lame grasp of its actual meaning. But really, I mean it, I’d love to go with you.”

Zack stays for dinner. Dad has tried to make it look as if he didn’t make a special effort. He brings out a big bowl of pasta with peppers and chicken sausages, and an arugula salad. Jake is out tonight at a meeting about a group project for social studies. So with Zack in Jake’s seat and Mom and Dad at either end of the table, it almost feels like we’re on a double date with my parents. That sounds like it would be painfully awkward, but Zack just seems to have a way with everybody. We talk and laugh, and Dad doesn’t make any of his stupid jokes, and they don’t grill Zack with questions, and it’s just a really nice evening.

Then Mom and Dad go to clean up, and Zack gathers his books. I sit next to him on the couch as he zips up his bag.

“You know,” I say, “I feel like we’ve done nothing but talk about me and my family situation, and I don’t really know much about your family other than that your brother’s name is Jesse and that you pretended you had to go visit him rather than go to James’s birthday party with me.”

“I’ll show you the pictures from my weekend. I have proof. And anyway, your story is far more interesting than mine. That’s why we talk about it.”

“You mean you don’t have any pregnant Hasidic teenagers lurking in your family tree?”

“No. Just a boring old mom and dad who met in college and have been married twenty-three years. You should come meet them. Maybe this weekend. But I’m warning you, my dad can’t cook.”

“What about your mom?”

“She’s even worse than Dad.”

I take his hand and put my palm up against his. His fingers are long and skinny. He intertwines them with mine. “Come on,” I say. “There must be something dark in your past.”

“Okay. Are you ready? I used to play the electric bass. I thought I could join a punk rock band. I contemplated getting a mohawk.”

“What happened?”

“I was really, really bad. Too bad even to play punk rock music. And I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but my hair is just too good to butcher like that.”

I walk him to his car. We stand in the freezing cold with our bodies pressed together. His lips are cold, but his mouth is warm and he tastes a little salty. I could stand here like this all night. He finally pulls away and gets into his car and gives one last wave and then drives off. I wrap my arms around myself and look up at the stars. The sky is filled with them. There are more stars to see than sky tonight. I think about how I used to look at a sky like this and it would make me feel small and insignificant. And tonight, as I look at the stars, I realize that I am starting to know my place among them.

TWENTY-ONE

It’s only about ten days until Passover when Rivka calls to say that she can’t do it. She tries to tell me that she’s just really busy and she doesn’t think she can get it together but when I press her she finally admits that she isn’t well enough. She’s exhausted. Twenty minutes on her feet sends her to bed for two hours. Too much work goes into making a seder, and Rivka reluctantly has accepted that she just isn’t up to the task.

“Why don’t we have it here? I’ll do it. You won’t have to lift a finger.”

“That’s really sweet of you. But come on, Simone. You don’t have to do this. You can’t do this. What do you know about Passover?”

“You’d be surprised. I’m a quick study. Anyway, it’s settled. You’re coming here. Someone will come get you, so you don’t have to worry about driving.”

“I’m not really driving anymore. Doctor’s orders. But if you wouldn’t mind another guest, I’m sure I could get a friend to bring me up.”

“Bring as many friends as you want. It’s a holiday. We should have a house filled with family and friends.”

I realize that I’ve just offered up our home, and by default Dad’s services in the kitchen, because—who am I kidding?—I can’t cook. I certainly can’t cook for a crowd.

I’d better run this by the parents.

Mom and Dad are sitting out on the porch. It’s just warm enough that with a sweater and a coat and a mug of something hot to drink, sitting outside is a pleasure. I know that they’re the ones who pushed me to call Rivka, to spend time with her, but I wonder if maybe I haven’t crossed the line. I just invited Rivka and her friends here for Passover. I’ve volunteered to have a seder in the home of my devoutly atheist parents.

“Hi, guys.”

“Hey, kiddo. Do you want some hot chocolate?” asks Dad.

“No, thanks.” I sit on the bench next to Mom and put my feet up on the table. “About Passover…”

“Oh, right. That’s coming up, isn’t it?”

“Yeah. But Rivka can’t do it. She isn’t feeling up to it.”

“Oh, honey. I’m sorry.” Mom puts her hand on my knee.

“So I offered our house. I told Rivka she could come up here with some friends and that we would do a seder. I’ll be in charge, I promise. I’ll figure out what we need to do.”

They look at each other.

“I really want to do this for her. This is important to me.”

Dad gets up and squeezes himself onto the bench so that I am wedged in between them. They both put their arms around me.

“Are you up for this?” asks Dad. “This may not be easy.” I know he means more than just putting on the seder. I nod and rest my head on his shoulder.

Zack and I don’t see that much of each other at school, and I’ve stopped reading too much into this. Our schedules are just incompatible. I’ve also stopped waiting for him to break up with me. I’ve stopped waiting for him to tell me that he can’t help that he loves Amy Flannigan even though she already has a boyfriend. I’ve started to just enjoy that something really nice is happening between us.

Today we have a rare free period together. We find a corner of the library with a couch and not too many people around, and again we pretend to do homework, but instead we just talk. I’ve kicked off my shoes and he’s rubbing my feet. Zack has volunteered to help me with the seder. His parents and his brother are going to come. Rivka is driving up with the three friends we met in the hospital. That makes a total of twelve people.

“Thirteen,” says Zack.

“No, twelve.”

“No, thirteen when you count Elijah.”

“Who’s Elijah?”

“Oh, Simone. You still have so much to learn.”

I smack his hand. “Don’t patronize me.”

“Okay. Elijah is a prophet. You set a place for him and pour him a glass of wine, and he’s supposed to visit your home during the seder.”

“Well, then, I guess I’d better add one more for the shopping list.”

Zack suggests that we go see the rabbi who bar mitzvahed him to get some advice and instruction. I remind Zack that places of worship give me the creeps and that I don’t really relate to men of the cloth, be they priests or rabbis or monks.

“Don’t worry. You’ll dig Rabbi Klein. He’s really cool. And I think we’re in over our heads. We could use his help. I mean, we could just go talk to my dad and let him help us, but then we’d wind up with the same old seder my dad does every year. It would be more fun to do it on our own. I think Rivka would appreciate that.”

I could just kiss him.

We have an appointment with Rabbi Klein a few days later. When Zack tells me that he’s the rabbi at Temple Isaiah, I remember him from the town seal protest back in October. I remember how he was bald with a close-shaved beard. I remember how eloquently he spoke about the importance of keeping religion, any and all religion, out of public life. Maybe Zack is right. Maybe I will dig this Rabbi Klein.

When we arrive, he embraces Zack and musses his hair as if he were still a child. Zack steps back and puts his arm around me and says, “I’d like you to meet my girlfriend, Simone.”

My girlfriend, Simone.

I shake the rabbi’s hand. He seems just like a normal guy. I don’t really know what I expected. Certainly not a black shirt and white collar. I know enough to know that that uniform doesn’t belong in a synagogue. But I guess I expected some kind of overt sign that he’s a rabbi, a holy man, not just an average-looking middle-aged white guy with dark Levi’s, brown leather shoes, and a green button-down that looks like it came from Banana Republic.

He sits behind his big wooden desk, and we take the two chairs facing him. Zack says, “Simone and I are hosting our first seder and we need some guidance, because I’ve never led a seder and Simone has never even been to one.”

The rabbi looks at me quizzically.

“I’m an atheist,” I offer.

“I see.”

“I’m uncomfortable with the idea of God.”

“Well, then, Passover is the perfect holiday for you.”

“How’s that?”

“Because it is really about liberation. It commemorates the freeing of our people from enslavement. And it provides an opportunity to focus on other people in the world who are not free. That is something even the most nonreligious and even antireligious Jew can relate to.”

“What about people who aren’t even sure if they’re really Jewish or not?”

Again that quizzical look.

Maybe it’s the quiet of this office, maybe it’s having Zack next to me holding my hand, maybe it’s the kindness in his eyes, but for some reason I take this look as an invitation to tell Rabbi Klein the entire story of Rivka and me.

I’m feeling like I’m hanging by a thread when I get to the end, when I get to the part about Rivka getting sicker and sicker.

“Simone,” he says, “this act of yours, this wish to provide Rivka with a seder when she is too weak to create her own, is a true act of kindness and grace. It may take you a lifetime to decide if you’re Jewish or not, but I will tell you that what you are doing by having this seder and inviting Rivka and her friends into your home is an act rooted in the basic tenets of Judaism. You are performing a good deed, a mitzvah, worthy of the most divine soul.”

That’s it. I put my face in my hands and sob. My fingers and palms are wet with tears. Zack slides his chair closer and gently rubs my back.

“I’m so sorry,” I say. “I really didn’t mean for this to happen. This isn’t why we’re here.”

“There doesn’t have to be only one item on our agenda today, my dear.”

“She’s only thirty-three.”

“It is a tragedy.”

“Why? Why does this happen? I mean, you must have a better understanding than almost anyone. Why would God do this?”

“I don’t know.”

“And you’re comfortable with that?” This comes out sounding like more of an accusation than I intend.

“I have to be.”

“Well, there you go. This is why religion makes no sense to me.” I take a tissue from a box on his desk. “At least Christians believe in an afterlife. At least they have the luxury of pretending that when you die you go someplace better.”

“For what it’s worth, Simone, I believe that you are giving Rivka the gift of an afterlife.”

“You mean by passing down her genes?”

“No. I mean by remembering her. I believe that is how we all live on after this life. By being remembered by those who knew and loved us. Every time you speak of Rivka after she’s gone, every time you tell a story about her, every time you think of her, imagine her, for that moment she is living on. It isn’t about genetics. If you had never come to know her, I wouldn’t be telling you this, even though her physical traits may be passed down to your children. We are made of much more than our genes. I would imagine, Simone, that you understand this better than most.”

In spite of my breakdown, we manage to leave Temple Isaiah with advice and instruction from Rabbi Klein about how to conduct our seder. He has loaned us a stack of Haggadahs, these little pamphlets you read from during the seder that tell the Passover story. And he’s given us a few articles about modern-day slavery because he says that during the seder, when we taste the bitter herbs and dip the parsley in the salt water to remind us of shed tears, it is important to think of the terrible injustices that happen in the world today, right now, all around us, and to think about what we might be able to do to repair and heal the world.

We talked about the seder plate and all the things that need to go on it, including, among other things, a lamb shank bone, which I find kind of nasty. But I put a lamb shank bone on my shopping list. We talked about the wine (did you know that each participant is expected to drink four cups of wine throughout the course of the seder?) and the matzoh and the songs to sing. He wishes us luck and asks that in return for his taking the time to meet with us that we promise to come back and tell him all about the evening.

When I get home I do some more Internet research on Passover. Here’s what I learn: I was wrong about Easter and Passover having nothing to do with each other. Jesus was celebrating Passover when he was crucified. The Last Supper wasn’t just a regular meal Jesus was having with a group of friends. The Last Supper was a Passover seder.

TWENTY-TWO

Even assuming Elijah fails to make an appearance, there is no denying that we are having a huge Passover seder. What was originally going to be a party of twelve has ballooned into a party of eighteen. So if Elijah does show, that makes a total of nineteen—eighteen people and one prophet crowded around our dinner table. The more Zack and I worked on preparing for the seder and the more we talked about it, the more the people who watched us preparing started to take an interest in the evening, and soon enough everyone was inviting themselves over. First it was Cleo, which really means Cleo
and
Darius. Mom and Dad said we should include Jules. Jake asked if Sam could come. James said he wanted in. And then Zack told me that Amy Flannigan was hoping she could join us too. So there you have it. Poor Dad has his work cut out for him, but he seems to be enjoying the dual challenge of cooking for so many and of not using any leavened products such as bread, pasta, or pretty much anything containing flour. Remember? You eat matzoh during Passover because the Jews didn’t have time to finish baking the bread before they fled from Egypt. Anyway, we’ve cleared the living room of all the furniture and moved in the dining room table and a few folding tables from the garage, creating a large rectangle around which all eighteen of us and even Elijah will fit.

Zack has been here all afternoon. Everyone else is just arriving. His parents and his brother, Jesse, who looks almost nothing like Zack, are at the door. Jesse gives me a hug that literally lifts me up off my feet. He plants big loud kisses on both of my cheeks as if we’ve known each other forever. Mom whisks Zack’s parents into the kitchen to meet Dad. I take another check of the table. Everything is set. The seder plate is ready. It has the matzoh, the bitter herbs, the roasted egg, the haroset (chopped-up apples and nuts and wine that is supposed to signify the mortar that the slaves of Egypt used while in servitude, or something like that), parsley, a dish of salt water, and the dreaded lamb shank bone, which has a symbolism so unpalatable to me that I’m going to let you look that one up yourself.

I’ve also placed an orange on the seder plate because I read a story about an old Orthodox rabbi whose reaction to the news that the Reform movement was to begin ordaining female rabbis was this: “Women belong in the rabbinate like an orange belongs on the Seder plate.” I think Rivka will approve. And I’m right. She smiles the minute she sees it.

She has arrived with her friends Lila, Elena, and Val, the long-haired man who I mistook for a woman back in the hospital. You’d think if you were a man and your name was Val you might go out of your way to cultivate a look of masculinity, but apparently Val doesn’t have this concern.

Rivka looks thin, pale, tired, even—and I hate to admit it—sick. But to me she still looks extraordinarily beautiful.

The house is buzzing with family, with friends, with life. Rivka and I step out onto the porch.

“What do you think?” I ask. “Did we overdo it? Are there too many people here?”

“No, no,” she says. “This is exactly how it should be. This is perfect.”

“You look good.”

“You’re lying.”

“No, I mean it. I think you’re beautiful.”

Rivka takes a strand of my hair and tucks it behind my ear. She takes a long look at my face. “Simone,” she says, “you’re an angel. You make me question how I ever could have questioned my faith, because looking at you, I just can’t believe that there isn’t a God and that he didn’t conspire to send you to me at the very moment when I most needed an angel in my life.”

I’m not sure what to say. And even if I tried to speak, I don’t think words would come out. I think I would open my mouth and out would come a big howling wail, and I’m not sure I would be able to stop.

“Come on,” says Rivka. “Let’s go inside.” She takes my hand. “It’s time.”

If I wasn’t already in love with Zack, which I am, I would fall for him hard tonight. He commands the attention of everyone in the room. He leads the group through the seder and explains each stage of the evening for those people who have never taken part in a seder before, which is the overwhelming majority of the group. He keeps bringing the conversation back from the ancient past to the present. I’m proud to be seated beside him.

We come to a part in the seder when the youngest child is supposed to ask the Four Questions. Since there’s no child at our Passover table, this duty falls to my little brother, Jake, who is the youngest among us and who seems irritated that this fact has to be pointed out to everyone. I don’t care what Jake thinks. To me, in many ways, he will always be the little boy with blond curls, a freckled nose, and Bugs Bunny teeth, even though tonight there is no denying that he has become a stunning young man. As he stands up to speak I could almost fall out of my chair with the force of the love I feel for him. The questions Jake reads from the Haggadah ask why this night is different from all other nights. Why we do we eat matzoh? Why do we eat bitter herbs? Why do we dip greens into salt water? And so on. But to me the answer to the principal question, the question of why this night is different from all other nights, is crystal clear. Just take a good look around this table.

There are mothers and fathers. There are sons and daughters. There are brothers and sisters. There are friends who are like brothers and sisters to each other. There is every configuration of family you can imagine.

I think again about family trees. I think of Rivka’s and how it includes Mordechai and Hannah and all her siblings, and then there is an offshoot that includes me, and by extension Jake and Mom and Dad, and then it curves around with more branches for her friends like Lila and Elena and Val.

I think about my family tree. I think about how wrong I was for all those years to imagine it as bare.