The Shiksa Syndrome: A Novel (12 page)

“Just make sure you call me when you get back to th—”

I close the phone and stuff the paper with the info into my pocket without saying good-bye. Josh will wonder what took me so long. I should really tell him I feel sick, at this point the only thing that’s not a lie.

“Which way?” he asks, once we’re back in the car.

“You know, it’s not all that interesting,” I tell him. “So if you just want to head back—”

“No way,” says Josh. “I wouldn’t hear of it.” Definitive. Waiting. Ready to go.

“Okay,” I say. I know when I’m stuck. “But before we go to my house, let me show you my church.”

Because I tell him how much I love it, we feed the address for the church into the talking road navigator. The calm and assuring voice directs us the 2.7 miles from the Hilton. I praise the Lord when we find the Plymouth Congregational Church still standing. A parking lot is filled with cars of Sunday churchgoers; my fellow neighbors, my friends.

“That’s it.” I point. “The minister used to come by our house for eggnog every Christmas.”

God, please forgive me for I have sinned. That’ll be ten Hail Marys. Oh, wait—that’s not my religion.

“You want to get out?”

“No, definitely no. We don’t want to . . . interrupt anything. Besides”—I look at him with pleading eyes—“I really just want to go home.”

“Just point the way,” he says, misunderstanding, assuming I mean my long-forgotten Scranton home.

If I could think of any legitimate reason we should get right back on the road, I would. Instead, I look at the map on the navigator screen. All the blocks surrounding the church seem good. Oak Street. Maple. Golden Avenue. Wayne. They all sound residential. I make a decision and hope we’ll find my childhood house on Oak.

“Um”—I keep my eyes glued to the computerized map—“go to the corner and take a right.”

I study the neighborhood. Absorbing whatever I can. These streets define me. They are my roots. An industrial town, Scranton is known for coal mining and establishing railroads. Traditional. Middle-class. Blue-collar. I identify. I did grow up in Manhattan, but I wasn’t a rich kid. Public schooled over private, rental over co-op. Summer jobs instead of sleepaway camps. My father instilled the importance of education and hard work.

Looking around, I see I have not chosen a background of wealthy WASPs, country clubs, and the cocktail hour. And I couldn’t have planned it better if I had planned it.

We make a right at the traffic light and drive up Oak.

“This block?” asks Josh, not sure whether or not to slow down.

“Uh . . . we’re close.”

I need to find
my house.
And it’s really important I find the right house because it will inform Josh’s impressions of my childhood.

“Go slow so we don’t miss it,” I say, but as we continue to drive I don’t see any place on Oak Street where I feel I could have grown up.

On my right we pass a place so run-down it almost looks like a shack. I look over to see Josh’s reaction. Perfectly content, he keeps driving. Until we get to the end of all the residences and the beginning of a little town.

“Do I keep going?”

“Uh . . .” I look back to the screen with the map. I won’t be able to navigate us much farther. “It’s been so long I . . . I think we may have passed it. Turn around and let’s go back.”

“You sure you grew up here?” He laughs.

We drive back down Oak as I peer out the window to the side streets. I feel pressure now to pick a house. Any house. I’m afraid we are nearing the end of the street when I scream, “Here! Make a right.”

To my great relief, McDonough Avenue’s perfect. Some kids are outside. Families appear to fill conventional wood frame houses painted yellow, tan, or gray. Fairly close together, the houses each have a front yard and a back. Stacks of wood in winter, swing sets in the summer. Spring must be so pretty. Gardens will bloom, and leaves will cover the trees.

“This is my block,” I say with pride. “McDonough Ave.” My eye takes me to a scooter in the middle of a driveway. I assume a young family has moved in. Young enough so this family will not remember mine. “1764,” I point to the address on a gray house with a white picket fence and white shutters. Around the back we see the side of an above-ground swimming pool and, though still winter, the place where there’s a garden.

“We planted herbs back there,” I say, hopeful now this whole house thing is over. But Josh parks across the street and jumps out of the car.

“Maybe they’ll let us in.” The thought gets him excited.

Uh-oh.
Don’t look now, e-May, but I think it’s curtains. I look at Josh like he’s crazy.

“Why not?” he asks. “I think they’re home.”

Eager, Josh opens the car door and grabs my hand to escort me. He jabbers about little Aimee. Wide-eyed, pretty red hair, home from church frolicking down this path. His words paint a montage of me. The me nobody knows.

A child runs out from the back as we head up the stairs to the front porch. Josh looks at her and waves. Perhaps it is her bicycle on this porch, parked under the big wreath that hangs next to the front door. Yellow, with a cross in the middle, the family appears to have a head start on Easter.

The family. Oh, no.
THE FAMILY.
I can’t go in. Please, please don’t be home. Please don’t be in the house. But they are, and I’m afraid in a minute so will I.

“Ring the bell,” instructs Josh.

What if I’m right? What if this house does belong to a young family? Will I be asked about its history? Will I have to give a tour? Where is my room? What if they renovated and I’m supposed to tell how everything was before?

But what if the person behind the door has lived here for forty years? What then? What if Josh asks them about the Plunketts?
What if he wants to meet Muffy?

“Can I help you?”

Josh tells me later she was blonde and pretty and said she was a nurse, but I don’t remember. For after I ring the bell, I run back to the car and throw up on the walk. His curiosity satisfied, Josh listens when I insist we leave. We drive back to the Hilton and I clean up in the bathroom. Now, finally, at long last, Josh takes me home.

H
ouse
C
alls

A
IMALA
.” Tova’s strong, spry voice carries through my apartment door. “I want to see you. Can I come in?”

I saw her early today in the hallway, after putting my garbage in the trash room. Shaking my head, I indicated I was not able to talk. Though by the looks of me, I’d say it was obvious. Sleep deprived, dressed in sweats, dirty hair piled on top of my head, and all on a Monday. Reaching the end of my twenty-four-hour stomach flu, I took the day off from work and stayed home.

Josh was appeased yesterday; fascinated to see where I actually come from. He wasn’t the only one. And while I’m not sure if it was the milk or my
mishegas
that turned my stomach, the timing worked out just right. Still, that homecoming cut close enough to make me reevaluate just what the fuck I think I am doing.

“I’ve been sick,” I tell Tova, opening the door. Said aloud, I believe this to be true in more ways than one.

“Yes,” she readily agrees, showing a small shopping bag before brushing past me into the kitchen. “I saw you this morning, and I thought you didn’t look like Aimee.” Tova speaks from the other room. “I brought you chicken soup. You can keep the container. Maybe you’ll want to heat up some soup for dinner?” I see it is now that hour. Apparently, I slept the day away.

I do feel better, and it feels good to see her. My connection with Tova is somewhat maternal. As of late, I am so estranged from my own mother. I can tell when we speak that she knows I am hiding something. Certainly she could never guess what.

“You want to sit down?” I ask, leading Tova into the living area, taking a seat on the brown leather club chair to face her on the beige chenille couch.

“All right,” she says, moving a needlepoint throw pillow to make herself a space. “I’m going to a book review at the 92nd Street Y so I cannot stay too long.”

“Who’s speaking?”

“It should prove to be a very interesting lecture,” she tells me, rearranging the colorful bangles on her wrist. Tova always does interesting things accompanied by interesting people and very interesting clothes.

“A female psychiatrist,” she continues, “who wrote a book called
I’m Jewish, You’re Not.
” She lets out a big laugh. “And it’s a guidebook to interfaith relationships.”

“
Very
interesting,” I say, definitely agreeing. “But why are you going?”

“Well, it happens my nephew, Ari, from Israel was visiting, as you know, a few months ago. He brings with him to New York a portable computer . . . a . . . a . . .” She moves her hands to approximate the shape of a box. “He calls it a top—”

“A laptop. Yeah.”

“That’s right. A laptop. So-o”—she says the word as if it is two syllables—“he is here three weeks for business, he wants a little company, and he tells me one night he is going on a date. On the computer!” This makes her laugh again. “Wait. I can tell you exactly from where.” Tova pauses to think. “Something latch, snatch, catch . . . ?”

“Match.com. Go on.” I want to hear the interfaith story already so I can assess if she is talking about Ari, or somehow she found out and is really talking about me.

“So-o.” Tova pauses. “He meets a girl, very nice. Christina Murray. A divorcee, his age, no children, a teacher. They meet. They go out every day. Then they stay in touch with the e-mail and the fast messages. He tells me how, I don’t even know what he’s talking about. But finally she takes a trip to Israel, and they fall in love. Now she’s moving there and wants to convert. Tonight I’m going to have the author sign for her a book. A present.”

“How about that,” I say. “And so fast.”

“Oh,
very
fast. Like a whirlwind,” says Tova, her bracelets clanging together as she demonstrates, waving her hand in the air.

I can’t believe this. God, this is so not fair. Every single shiksa who dates a Jewish guy is instantly swept onto the J-Bandwagon except for me. What am I doing wrong? How is it that I’m at a roadside diner on my way to church, when everyone else is learning how to baste a brisket before they even get to the second date?

The whole way home in the car, all Josh talked about was Scranton. Scranton this, Scranton that. Home and hearth, holidays and holy days. Question after question about growing up in picture-perfect Pennsylvania. Whenever I countered with a question for him, Josh pooh-poohed it, insisting mine was the much more colorful background. No argument there.

“Excuse me,” I say when I hear a buzz. I cross to the front door, next to it the intercom. A glance takes in Tova looking at the now sparse bookcase. Unlike my mother, she probably won’t notice what’s missing. “What, Willie?” I talk into the handset. “You’re kidding?”

“What happened?” Tova walks over to the door.

The doorman tells me I have a visitor. He is supposed to be a surprise (Josh is literally killing me with them), but knowing I am sick, Willie wants to give me an alert. He says Josh is on his way up in the elevator and should be ringing my bell about—

Buzzzz!

“Are you expecting someone?” asks Tova.

“Uh, not exactly. I think it’s—”

Buzzzz! Buzzzz!

“Aren’t you going to answer?”

“Yes. Yes, of course,” I say, and open the door to see Josh standing there with a shopping bag from Zabar’s and a big bouquet of roses.

“Surprise!”

“Ah.” I feign happiness. “Josh.” And getting really good at this one, I feign surprise.

“Wanted to see how the patient was doing.” He marches in, giving me a quick kiss before he stops in his tracks upon seeing Tova.

“Well, hello,” she says, extending her hand. “We met downstairs—”

“Of course,” says Josh. “Tova. The Philharmonic. I remember.”

“Mr. Hirsch,” she announces. “And look what he brought you, Aimala. Go sit with him in the living room,” she says, taking the shopping bag and the flowers from his hands. “I’ll put everything in the kitchen. I think I know where there is a vase. These are so beautiful, uh . . .” She searches for his first name.

“Josh,” he fills in.

“Josh. Josh Hirsch,” Tova practically
cvells
as she goes inside the kitchen.

I head straight for the couch and cover myself up with a dark green fleece throw. Is there anywhere left I can run and hide?

“Feeling better?” Josh sits at my feet, places them on his lap, and rubs them.

“I was,” I say. “Until just a little while ago.”

“Ohhhhhh.” He sounds so sad. “I’m sorry.”

Tova bustles out of the kitchen, holding a big crystal vase she found in the cabinet. The yellow roses splendidly arranged, she places them in the center of the square wood-and-glass coffee table.

“Look how beautiful,” she says, and takes a seat on the club chair. “Aimala, look how nice.”

“They are truly lovely. Thank you, Josh. Thanks, Tova.”

There is a momentary silence. Tova looks from the chair and smiles. She approves. Now that she is actually sitting here with
Hirsch
, I know she will want to stay a few more minutes. In and of itself that’s potentially harmless. On the other hand . . .

“Aimee got sick yesterday just as she was showing me where she grew up.”

“So that was good,” Tova says to Josh. “You weren’t far.”

Oh, boy. I thought they would talk about the weather. Snow so late in March. Talk of next year’s election. But no, they have to get right to this and talk about that.

“It was fine,” I declare.

“Well, you were just west,” says Tova.

“Exactly.”

“No, we were northeast,” states Josh.

“ Ninety-sixth Street is north, yes,” says Tova. “But from her parents, you are west and come east.”

Josh looks at me and shakes his head, no use trying to explain, right?

“How is your mother?” asks Tova. “I haven’t seen her in a long time.”

“She’s in Florida,” Josh answers for me. “On Plantation Island.”

“Plantation Island?” Tova purses her lips together as if she is considering. “Miami, I know. Delray Beach. Boca. Who do they have on Plantation Island?”

“Tons of people,” I say. “You know Boca; they know Plantation Island. You have a lecture, yes?” I say, standing, ready to escort Tova to the door. “You don’t want to be late.”

Josh, the polite guy he is, stands and asks, “What’s the lecture?”

Of course he has to ask. He has to know. And now Tova has to tell.

“But our Aimee doesn’t need
that
book anymore!” Tova winks after she has explained.

“I’ll say,” says Josh. “After yesterday I would never ask her to give up her religion or her church.”

“Her religion?” asks a more than baffled Tova. “Her
church
?” She looks at me, but I avert her glance. I will definitely be sick all over again.

“Her church in Scranton. Where she grew up.” Josh looks at me to say the unspoken. Either Tova doesn’t know me well, or else she is losing her marbles.

“You know.” I hurry over to my neighbor, take her arm, and walk her to the door. “I’ve told you all about my church many times, and we can talk about it more
tomorrow.
”

I flash Josh a look over my back to let him know it’s the latter. Yes, she is losing her marbles.

“Josh,” I say. “Would you be so kind as to unpack the shopping bag and show me what you got?”

He nods and heads to the kitchen.

“So long,” he waves when I open the door for Tova to leave, but she doesn’t go. Not that fast.

“I am a smart woman,” she says, standing outside the door, speaking quietly in the hallway. Her eyes peer into the apartment to be certain Josh is out of earshot. “You know I feel close and so I can always talk to you. So I will tell you, Aimee, something is not right. Not just today, because I can see. You’ve lost weight; you dress different; you have this red hair.” She tucks a loose strand behind my left ear. “And always, you are nervous.”

“I’m fine, Tova. Really.” I step out into the hallway. Not wanting Josh to hear, I must be strong and end this conversation now. “Let’s just say goodnight, and we’ll catch up later.”

I should just turn around and shut the door. I need to deal with my own business. After all, it is mine. But Tova does not move, and neither do I. I cannot be that rude. Besides, I’m just too exhausted.

“Does your mother know what’s going on?”

I don’t answer.

“This talk now with the church and what was that? Scranton? You’re like somebody else. What? Did you tell him you’re a shiksa?”

People say things, outlandish things, because once said it makes way for the truth. The real story is probably much less fantastic, therefore, much easier to confide. No one expects the outlandish story to be true. Why would they? It’s outlandish. The accusation, now, from Tova is
so
outlandish I just have to laugh.

Don’t I?

“A
shiksa? Me?
” I cackle. I cluck. I crow. “That’s absurd. What in the world gave you the idea that I would ever say I was a
shiksa
?”

Tova looks me in the eye. She ain’t buyin’, but I ain’t sellin’ anything else. Josh comes to the door to get me.

“Come on, the soup will get cold. I’m giving Aimee Jewish penicillin,” he tells Tova. “Do you know what that is?” he asks me.

“Uh? Chicken soup, right?”

“She knows, Josh,” says Tova.

“Of course. Everybody who lives in New York knows,” I say, looking at Tova, knowing now that
she
knows. Okay. So Tova knows. So does Krista, so does Daphne, and so does Jon. So what?

“Well, I’m off to my lecture. Good night, Josh. Aimee, I hope you are soon better and wake up tomorrow feeling like your old self,” she says before she is off and down the hall.

Bolting the two locks, I quickly close the door. Whew. At least she kept quiet. I take one of the two seats at my square table, on the wall nearest the kitchen, to eat the soup. Josh got the good kind with the carrots and the noodles, the chicken chunks and the
knaidlach.

“You like?” he asks as he sits and joins me.

“It’s delicious,” I tell him, my appetite for my soul food suddenly voracious. “Does your family have a special recipe for this passed down from generations?”

“My mother buys it ready-made,” says Josh, blowing on the soup before dipping in his spoon. “It’s a ton of work.”

“I wouldn’t mind giving it a whirl,” I suggest. This is a good excuse to get my Jewish cookbook back from Krista. It would help get a few Jewish words back into my vocabulary too. “You know, for you.”

“That’s sweet,” he says. “But don’t waste your time. It’s not important.”

But, oh, how I wish it were. If only he’d let his Jewish traits out, they could rub off on me. I could get some of my personality back. What’s up with him and being Jewish?

Krista was all aglow when she told me about Makor, the Jewish cultural club, where she’s begun to study. She is very excited to prepare Shabbat meals for Matt. Telling me how they will go to Friday night services first and then have dinner after.

“You know, Krista’s kind of involved now,” I tell Josh, who has also put out a delicious LoveLoaves challah. My stomach stronger, I break a piece off, silently saying the
beracha
and blessing the bread. Ironically, in private, it’s not something I’ve ever done before.

“She signed up yet to convert?” he asks, sounding a lot like my brother.

“Well.” I seize this opportunity as my opening. “She’s taking a class,” I say. “Judaism 101: Or, I Know Nothing.”

“Funny.” He laughs. “
I
know nothing. Maybe I should go.”

Now I laugh. Slightly encouraged.

“Except I don’t really care,” says Josh. It stings when I hear this, especially as I feel it’s said with a hint of pride.

What I love about Judaism is that it is so accommodating, making room for the different kinds of Jews among Jewish people. It’s already your culture and blood; you can observe any way you like and to the extent that you choose. So . . . why not?

There is comfort in tradition, strength in passing a torch from one generation to the next. But among a certain type of modern American Jew, there seems to be no room for anything unless it is secular. An attitude I all too often encounter, it would have hardly pardoned anyone Jewish during World War II.