The Shiksa Syndrome: A Novel (21 page)

“Oh, my God!” I shriek. “What are you all doing here?”

Front and center on the big, burgundy chintz sofa are my parents. Kitty-corner on a rosewood side chair is my brother, Jon. Seated on the piano bench is Daphne. She signals to Rich, playing on the floor with Hannah and Holdenn, to take the kids and the Harry Potter puzzle into another room. A guy I don’t instantly recognize sits across from the piano on a loveseat. His arm solidly wrapped around a woman. Ohmygod. It’s Matt . . . and Krista. Tova, behind me, motions to the latecomer, who came in behind us, to take a seat.

“Wow, Aimee, you look fabulous. You been doing it yourself, or you go somewhere to get it blown dry?”

“Jackie?”

“I’m sorry I’m late,” says Jackie, going to sit next to my dad. “But Jon said I had to be here because the makeover got the whole thing started. So what’d I miss?” She pauses to take a breath. “I’ve never been. What do you do at an intervention?”

“A what?” Starting with Krista, I look from person to person. My eyes make contact with each individual till they finally land on my mother.

“It’s a shiksa intervention,” announces Maddie. “We’re all very concerned. I’m sorry, Aimee, but I didn’t know what else to do,” she confesses. “Where’s Josh?”

“He’s not here,” reports Tova.

“Is he in your apartment or parking the car?” asks Maddie.

And if he was? Then what? Were they going to embarrass me shamelessly in front of him? How would that have made both of us feel? Did they think he’d just bless the relationship in its new kosher package, and we’d all have a good laugh and order in? Yet knowing how Josh reacted today upon learning the truth, I realize the bigger question now is, did I?

The thought of Josh potentially walking into this is chilling. Having bypassed this potential disaster, I want to yell at everyone for what they almost did to me. For what they are doing. How dare they? But no one looks angry. The tone in the room is subdued. Everyone is here because they care. And after all I’ve put everyone through, I’m glad they still do.

I open my mouth to speak, but, instead, all that comes out are tears. Tears of loss and embarrassment, of remorse, reproach. My mother rushes off the sofa and puts her arms around me. She’s quickly followed by Krista and Daphne.

“I’m sorry,” I say to Krista, repeating it over and over to Daphne, who doesn’t even completely know why. “I’m such a mess, but I’m so glad to be back.”

“So where is this Josh?” asks Jon. “Forget about what happens with you two. You said he’s a Yankee fan, and I’m going to kick his ass.”

“Well, you can’t now,” I blurt, riding a new wave of tears. “It’s
over.
”

“He knows?” asks Sid.

I nod.

“How’d it happen?” Everyone asks the big question in different ways all at the very same time. This is the news they’ve been waiting for. The room buzzes with the expectation of hearing how I actually spilled the beans.

“Wait one moment please.” A singer, Tova speaks several octaves above the noise in order to be heard and quiet us all. “I have a delicious dairy meal prepared. So you’ll all come to the table, and while Aimee tells her story, we will eat.”

I take a seat at the head, grateful to be surrounded, again, by my family and friends. I’ve never been to an intervention, but I doubt the problem’s usually solved before it even begins. I also doubt the hosts generally serve such great food. I reach into the bread basket and grab a bagel. First I slice it in half. Then I begin to talk.

T
he
R
ed
H
airing

H
OW STRANGE IT FEELS
to sit next to Krista at a Shabbat service. She and Matt hold hands, and I am surprised to see the extent to which she can participate.

The idea of socializing with Matt had me more than a wee bit embarrassed. After all, I did kind of get off on the same foot with him as with Josh. But since he’s not emotionally involved with me, it was easy for him to forgive and forget. Especially after the intervention. Should you ever find yourself on the receiving end of one, do try to resolve your problem quickly. Already surrounded by your closest friends and family, it can make for a lovely little get-together.

The rabbi talks about the recent debates featuring the Democratic candidates for president. The obvious front-runner, so far, is the mission. Before any one candidate emerges, all candidates express the overwhelming collective objective to replace the current administration. That prompts the rabbi to talk about lies. How lying affects relationships. While he considers those political, it is the personal that resonate for me.

“To lie is a fragmentation of the soul,” he says. “It is fraud.” Involuntarily, my face turns red. “And if you are successful. If you are able to—pull it off—you cheat not only the people you lie to, but yourself. For you are not whole. You are broken.”

The rabbi discusses recent history, and my eyes fill with tears. Thoughts of our president, starting with how he got into office, can easily make me cry. But now I feel as if God looks down at me and points.

When the service is over, I want to go home, but Krista and Matt insist I join them and a few friends at Krista’s for dinner. Downtown, at her apartment, my friend lights Shabbat candles and puts out a traditional meal.

“Admission,” Krista says after the fourth compliment on the chicken. “Dean & DeLuca. What’s a working girl to do?”

In her way, she has embraced Friday night rituals. Later in the kitchen, while I help Krista prepare the dessert, she tells me she is sure she will convert.

“Things between you are that solid?” I ask. Impressed she formed a real and lasting relationship in the same time frame I created a holy mess.

“Yes,” says Krista, arranging whole strawberries around a sour cream coffee cake. “Matt’s younger sister, Leah, is getting married at the beginning of June. And after that . . . well, at some point, I hope he’ll pop the question.”

“Well”—I’m not sure why I’m so surprised—“they always say when it’s right you know.”

But they don’t tell you what you need to know about yourself first to recognize it. And for each person that’s different. If there’s anything I have learned about how
It
happens, it’s that there are no rules. There’s no right way to meet. No best way to date to ensure you will mate. Though I can safely rule out a few things.

“You do this one.” Krista hands me a decanter to fill with tea while she handles the one with coffee.

“Boy, while I was playing Shiksa Barbie, you turned into quite the
baleboosteh.
”

“You saying I went up a bra size?”

“No.” I laugh. “It means ‘a terrific housekeeper.’ Like . . . you can eat off her floors! She’s some
baleboosteh.
”

“Oh. For a minute I thought you meant I gained weight,” says Krista, patting her stomach.

“Not a pound. But I think I have a little since Josh and I broke up. I may feel like crap, but I’m not anxious anymore,” I say, cutting off a piece of coffee cake to pop in my mouth. “My appetite’s back.”

“Good. You were a little too thin,” says Krista, suddenly perfecting my mother’s New York accent. “Speaking of Josh. Any word?”

“Nope. I think he’s still pretty mad.”

“He’ll come around. Matt thinks so too,” Krista says as she places the cake and some coffee mugs on a big tray. With a nod of her head, she indicates I carry out the two beverages.

“Hey, Kris, how do I ask you something without hurting your feelings?”

“You probably don’t. But at least I won’t be carrying the hot stuff.”

“Don’t you feel that maybe it went so fast with Matt because you kind of made yourself into the girl he was looking for? I mean, I know firsthand now what it means to give up a part of who you are. Are you really so okay about all this?”

“All right, Aimee. Here’s the truth,” she says, placing the tray back on the table to talk. “The truth is I didn’t grow up with any sense of who I was in a religious or spiritual way like you or Matt. I didn’t even know how much till I met him, but I was looking for something. And Judaism fit for me the same way Matt did.”

The words sound familiar. To some extent, it’s what Peter had said to me.

“You’re lucky, Aimee. You know who you are. Believe in that. Believe in your passions. Believe what
feels
right. Then identify
who
feels right. You love being Jewish. That will always belong to you, no matter who you belong to.”

I take Krista’s advice into a taxi along with my reclaimed box of
JEWISH THINGS: TO BE OPENED WHEN I’M SAFE AND MARRIED
. Now, alone in my apartment, I open it. Neither safe, nor married.

As I return each piece to its proper place, I feel another piece of me return home. Finished, I’m ready to dispose of the box when I hear something inside move. I undo the flaps to see what I forgot to unpack. Grateful to find I did not accidentally throw out my siddur, I flip through the pages before putting it back on the shelf. Hebrew words fly by in a blur, but when I close the book I notice—for the first time ever—handwriting in the back.

The note is on the inside cover, written with a black pen. The firm slants and squared-off edges are so memorable, I cannot believe they’ve been all but forgotten.

“So what are we doing?” Nicole asks the next morning, snapping me out of my daydream. I am still stunned I’d never seen my grandfather’s inscription before. I called my mother to see if she knew when he wrote it.

“You think I’m going to remember when he wrote it? I don’t know what I ate for breakfast, and I’m going to remember what my father wrote the day of your bat mitzvah?”

But what a gift to receive. Especially now. Dropped down from the heavens, it is the icing on Krista’s cake of wisdom. All these months I had myself believe my posturing was for a greater good. Now I see it only compensated for something I could not face inside me. Except I’m still not sure exactly what.

“Yeah. The same,” I tell my hairdresser now. My mind on everything but my hair. Nicole’s professional hands and eyes examine it.

“Your roots are showing,” she explains, and pulls up a lock to show me in the mirror. “We’ll need to do color. Okay?”

“Okay,” I tell her, staring past my Raggedy Ann reflection. My ragged unblown and unkempt hair.

“Have you been sick?” Nicole asks, putting on rubber gloves to mix the color in a small plastic bowl.

“That would be a pretty fair assessment.” I look at my watch. I’ll have to go into work after this. It may be a Saturday, but KISS is exactly four weeks away.

“Since it’s already May,” begins Nicole, “would you like me to add a highlight for extra brightness? A lighter red for summer?”

“Why not?” I’d never been anything but a brunette in summer. Gosh. There’s always so much prep for summer.

“But you’ll need to keep your hair out of the sun,” she says, lifting the small brush to the first strands. “Red oxidizes.”

“No problem. I doubt I’ll be out in the sun this summer.”

“No? You and your boyfriend won’t be in the Hamptons?” she asks, picking up another clump to paint with her brush.

“Broke up,” I say, picturing a summer of Saturdays in the office instead of Sag Harbor.

“You’ll meet someone else.” Nicole winks. “Someone attracted to redheads.”

Redheads? I may have considered myself a shiksa, but I never thought I was a redhead. Well. So what? It’s nothing bad. Except . . . I don’t want to be a redhead. And I don’t want to be careful about my hair.

I love what the beach does to it. The saltwater, the wind, the sun. People buy products just to reproduce tousled waves like the ones you end up with at the beach. It’s fun, and when I most love my dark wavy curls.

Ohmygod.

“Stop.” I bolt up in the chair. I pull away before Nicole can paint another hair on my head. “I changed my mind. I don’t want to do this.”

“Okay,” she says, and stops. “But I can’t leave you like this, Aimee. Do you know what you want?”

“Yes. I do.”

Nicole throws a brown rinse over my hair that sorta-kinda matches my real color. It will suffice till the roots all grow out. I make certain she doesn’t use a flat iron after she blows it dry.

Munching on a bagel while meandering over to the office, I catch my reflection in a storefront window. I am more than pleased when Aimee smiles back.

Now logged on to my computer, I begin a new e-mail.

G
rown
U
naccustomed to
Y
our
F
ace

P
LEASE TELL ME
this isn’t happening.”

When you get an e-mail that makes you unhappy, if you stare at the screen long enough will it go away? I don’t understand. How can he do this?

Krista arrives at my office after receiving my frantic call.

“Yikes,” she says, hovering over my desk. She shakes her head as she reads each and every abysmal word.

“I sure never planned for this,” I say, and know just how bad it is because I can feel panic announce itself in every nerve center of my body.

“So what now?” she asks.

“I don’t know. But there has to be a way to fix it. And I think it’s up to me to figure it out.”

We look at the clock; it’s getting late.

“Well, I’m headed uptown now,” says Krista. “Meeting Matt. Friday night.” She looks at me.

“I’m leaving too,” I say, and gather up my stuff. “Just running to the ladies’ room first.”

“You’re going?” Krista sounds concerned enough for both of us.

“Well, I can’t change anything tonight staying here.” My voice is strong, but worry spreads itself across my face like a makeup base.

“Okay. Meet you out front in five.” Krista gets to the doorway and turns to face me. “I’m impressed. I think maybe a little shiksa rubbed off on you, after all. Oy, I’d be a nervous wreck.”

Masks off, we still seem to be exchanging traits. Or, perhaps, now we share them, moving in a similar direction. Also true of the subway, we both exit the 1 train at Eighty-sixth Street.

“Do you want me to meet you later?” she asks. Ever since the intervention, Krista has been most protective.

“I hope you won’t have to,” I say. “I’ll call you tomorrow, okay?” Then I leave Krista at the corner and continue north for a few blocks.

It’s above a boutique and a knitting store, the entrance on Broadway. I was never here, and it’s awkward to come now. But before I know it, I am in the small building, riding up in the elevator that opens onto the fourth floor, a big open space devoted only to this company.

The front desk is empty, everyone gone for the day. I suddenly wonder if so is he, and the joke is on me. I feel like a fool standing here. But with the sound of approaching footsteps, my fears, or some of them, are soon allayed.

“Can I help you?”

“Hi.” My heart beats fast. I’m taken by surprise to find how much I’ve missed him the past month and just how good he looks.

He stands with uncertainty at the entranceway of the reception area, not venturing toward me. “Aimee?”

“You were expecting someone else?”

“Uh . . . kind of,” says Josh. He walks with caution; his eyes narrow as if to be sure. “It is you.”

I don’t understand what he doesn’t.

“Your hair,” his words explain. “And . . .” He looks closely. “Your eyes,” he says, seeing me for the first time in glasses. “And . . .” Josh peers in even closer and looks at my waist. But gentleman that he is, he doesn’t utter a word.

“Yeah, well . . . this is the real me,” I say, unprepared that he would be upon seeing a curly haired, brown-eyed, slightly (only
slightly)
plumper brunette.

“Well, you look great,” Josh says, recovering.

“So do you,” I say, no lie.

“Thanks for meeting me here. I appreciate it. A bread emergency,” he quips. “We just have to make a quick pit stop before dinner.”

“No problem. Right after I got your e-mail, I got another one, and . . .” I shake my head.

“What happened?”

“The KISS launch. It’s a disaster. I’ll tell you later. First show me around LoveLoaves headquarters.” It’s quite an operation, and these are just the offices.

“I’d love to go with you sometime to the factory,” I offer. “When I was a kid, we went on a class trip once to a bread factory. Silver-cup. Now it’s a movie studio. You know, in Long Island City.”

“Oh, yeah?” asks Josh.

“You know it, right?” I trail behind Josh as he makes sure all the lights and computers are off for the weekend, then rings for the elevator. “What’s the matter?”

Josh carries a shopping bag filled with a bunch of challahs fresh from the factory. A delivery truck behind schedule, he offered to walk them over to the synagogue that needs them for tonight’s
kiddish.

“It’s strange to hear you talk about your childhood in New York,” he says once we’re outside. “Although this Aimee looks more like she’s from here.”

In regard to my looks, the statement does not feel like a ringing endorsement. But, instead, I explain how my shiksa look had come and gone.

“This Aimee feels the same though, right?” I take his free hand in mine.

Josh takes my hand but smiles uncomfortably. I try not to push for too much too soon and so walk with him in silence. A few blocks later, I can only laugh out loud when we arrive.

“Temple Shalom?” I shriek. “This is wild. This is my parents’ synagogue. I was bat mitzvahed here,” I say, happy this info is not a secret.

“All right,” says Josh, uncertain how to negotiate this new version of me.

We walk up the entrance steps into the austere lobby. I point ahead to the staircase that leads downstairs.

“The kitchen is down here,” I say as we make our way. “Between Hebrew school, the bar mitzvah circuit, and the Teen Center, I can’t tell you how many millions of hours I spent in this room.” My hand references the banquet hall we enter.

Josh reaches into his pocket and retrieves a slip of paper with the name of the person who is to receive the bread. But a blonde woman exits the kitchen to greet us.

“Just in the knick of time,” she says, eyeing the beautiful challahs that stick out of the brown paper shopping bag. “You’re Josh, right? I’m Janis. Thanks a million. Let’s put them on this table over here.”

We follow behind the woman, who I now am certain is . . .

“Aimee Albert?” she says when she turns to take the bag.

“Janis Greenberg? Is that you?” She nods, and we give each other a big hug. “How funny. Her daughter, Meryl, was in my class at Hebrew school,” I tell Josh. “Does she still live in D.C.? Oh. Janis, meet Josh Hirsch.”

“Hel-lo,” says Janis, as if she’s just answered the telephone. “Sound familiar? We never met in person, but we speak often enough on the phone.”

“Nice to meet you,” Josh says, and extends his hand. “Officially.”

“Your mother didn’t tell me you were with the guy from Love-Loaves,” says Janis. She looks back to Josh and gives an approving smile.

“Oh . . .” I look to Josh. I’m not about to explain. “I didn’t realize you and my mom were in touch.”

“Sure,” says Janis, arranging the breads in baskets. “In fact, she’s upstairs. We’re honoring our Hadassah group tonight. And services should be over right about—”

The empty hall is suddenly swarming with the patter of feet and voices several decibels high and climbing higher. But the voice that emerges as the highest is of such intensity, it shoots across the room and knocks me for a loop.

“Look who’s here! Is that Aimee?”

“Hi, Ma,” I say, glancing over to Josh as Maddie comes rushing toward me. Dressed in black pants and a hot pink sweater, she looks very nice. I’m glad as I will now, finally—

“I’m Aimee’s mother,” she says, reaching to shake his hand. I knew it was a mistake telling her today I was seeing him tonight.

“Hello, Mrs. Albert.”

“Call me Maddie.”

“Okay, Mom, chill out.” Her eyes are already lit up with hope. “This is Josh.”

“I remember you. From Passover. That night in Aimee’s lobby.”

Josh quizzically looks at me. How did I think we could pick up where we left off when practically everything about me is new to him? And most of what he does know he’ll need to forget.

“I’ve heard such nice things about you, Josh,” Maddie says, as if this is a normal introduction at a cocktail party. “Tell me. Are we going to break
your
bread?” She laughs at her joke along with Janis, who holds the challahs up as trophies for her to see.

“Thanks, Maddie. And I heard nice things about . . . though I’m not sure if what I heard is actually tr . . .”

It’s a beautiful night, and we walk east through the park. Hoping to reacquaint ourselves and find some kind of comfort level before we eat.

“So,” says Josh. “Your mom. That was a trip. I’d never say she was from Plantation Island.”

We are able to laugh. It’s encouraging.

“Wait till you meet my dad.”

“Now your dad
is
in advertising, right? And that
was
your sister?”

The baby naming for Adam and Stacy’s newborn girl was last Sunday. I knew about it from Daphne, who was invited, but said she did not discuss me when she briefly spoke with Josh.

The small talk takes us only about as far as the restaurant. After we order, we stare at each other across the table. Both wishing the other person would do or say the magic something to dissolve our discomfort into a puff of smoke that would float away.

“How’s your uncle Mickey?” I finally ask. “I really liked him,” I tell Josh. I pause. “After what happened, does your family hate me?”

“No, I think they hate me,” says Josh.

“Do you?” I ask, the elephant now on the dinner table along with the edamame.

Josh reaches across the table and takes my hand. “Nobody hates anybody.”

“I know, I know. I use the word like hyperbole. I really don’t mean
hate
, you know. Not literally anyway, I mean—”

“Calm down,” says Josh. “Boy, you’re wound tight as a top. When did this happen?”

“Happen? This is me. Kind of.”

It almost feels like a blind date where you each show up with an expectation that’s not met, but you don’t let go because you expect it soon will be. Josh apologized for his behavior at the bar mitzvah, but under the circumstances it was hardly necessary. I am so ashamed of what I have done. I feel so dishonorable, my only goal is to get us on an equal footing so we may begin again.

“Well, the Aimee I knew was, I don’t know, more self-contained,” says Josh. “You were always . . .”

“Hard to read? Yes, eMay kept you wondering.” I wait a few seconds before . . . “Do you think that’s better, Josh? Because I think we only fill in what we want to hear in those silences. It doesn’t mean it’s real, you know.”

“Yeah, I know,” says Josh. “But even though I know, I don’t get it. I guess that’s why I’m here tonight. To see . . . to try to . . .” Josh pauses. “So what had you so bent out of shape at work?”

And just like that, the conversation turns to work. Well, I’ve been holding all that in, too, and feel like I’m going to bust.

“You got Kim Cattrall. Awesome. She was my favorite when the show was on,” he confesses.

“Well, Glenn wrote today—I told you about that booker at Celebrity Access, right? Well, Glenn sent an e-mail just as I was heading out to meet you that, listen to this:
Kim might not be able to do it!
They were supposed to be finished with
More Sex and the City.
I can’t believe they talked about doing a movie for years. And when it finally happens, it’s the same time as KISS! So they’ve been shooting in New York, obviously, and Kim was going to be free for the launch.

“Only now there’s some film problem, technical glitch, I don’t know what he was talking about, but some of her scenes need to be reshot. And the other actor in them is a big TV star in L.A., and he’s doing a series and doesn’t know when he can get back here. So she may have to go out there. And it might be exactly the day of the launch. But wouldn’t that only work if it’s interior scenes? Not that that’s my problem. Believe me, I’ve got plenty of my own, because listen to this . . . he told me to start thinking about other people who might work. But it’s
got
to be Kim. I can’t look for a backup.

“Backup? I mean I can’t get someone else. The whole concept’s based around
her.
We have a contract; I
think
she already signed. I’ll have to check with legal and see what’s up with that. Maybe someone can, you know, put the screws to someone. I mean, there’s a lot riding on this. Especially for me.”

I take a breath before taking a sip of sake. That might be the most I’ve talked at once since I’ve known Josh. It’s also the most upset I’ve been about anything, aside from lying to him of course. But Josh is cool. He’s smiling. Or is that a smirk?

“What’s funny?” I put down my glass.

“You remind me of Lauren. Jewish girls can get really intense about work.”

Oh, how I wish I had the opportunity to replay this scene as eMay. I can’t help but wonder how he’d have reacted if we had this identical conversation prior to my coming out. Yes, I spoke less before, and yes, I feel different with Josh now, but I’m no actress. So am I really acting that different? Is how we relate to others based on real interactions or on our perceptions of what we need them to be?

“Gosh, Josh, I don’t know how to say this. But, uh, you’re making sweeping generalizations.”

“Excuse me?”

“Like when we were together, you made assumptions. I understand; so did I. I assumed you wouldn’t like me if you knew I was Jewish. I didn’t give you a chance. Who can say if that was even true?

“But you also assumed things about my sexuality, my drinking. My work habits. All based on me being a Protestant. But they weren’t true, and I wasn’t even a Protestant. And now you’re making them based on me being Jewish. And I’m the same girl. I’m just me. You see?”

Silent, Josh looks down at his uneaten sushi.

“I’m sorry. Have I hurt your feelings?” I ask. “I don’t mean to. I’m confused by my own behavior as much as anything else. I want to understand and make it better. I just want to talk.”

“I’m happy to talk, Aimee. I know all about
wanting to talk,”
says Josh. He drops his chopsticks to use his forefingers and middle fingers to mime quotes around the words. “But you’re not talking to me; you’re challenging me. It feels way too familiar.” He shakes off the negative memory. “And you never did that before. So why now?”

This new Japanese place is off the beaten track, and I’m grateful for our quiet table in the dark corner. I am hopeful it is so dark that Josh cannot see I have started to cry.