He opened his eyes wide, but didn’t say anything.
Benjamin was delighted to accept the invitation. He wore a dark suit that fitted him well, she thought, and a blue striped shirt with a tie that was knotted a little too tightly. She saw the red streaks of a too-close shave on the delicate skin of his neck just above his collar and how his light skin reddened in the winter wind. It filled her with tenderness.
He brought them a bottle of rare kosher wine for which he’d traveled all the way to lower Manhattan in the hope of future invitations. He’d run home after services to fetch it, looking forward to the opportunity of handing it to her, acutely aware that it would be their first physical contact.
“Oh, look, Chaim, French kosher wine!” Delilah said, delighted, delaying the transfer of the bottle from Benjamin’s hands to hers a little
longer than absolutely necessary. Her touch went through him like an electric shock. He moved his hand so quickly that the bottle almost fell.
She pressed her lips together, hiding a smile as she dipped to rescue it.
“Ah, a true
Oneg Shabbat.
” Chaim nodded. “But it looks very expensive. You shouldn’t have. I’ll be afraid to invite you if it forces so much trouble on you!”
“No trouble at all,” he lied.
Two of the shul’s board members and their wives—kind, aristocractic, German Jews who spoke with a thick accent—had also been invited. Benjamin sat at the end of the table, casting sidelong glances at Delilah as she passed up and back, serving the food, conscious of how her shoulder arched beneath her dress as she brought in the trays and set them down. The first course was some kind of mushy-looking whitish thing covered with horseradish. “It’s gefilte fish,” she murmured, breathing softly in his ear as she put the plate in front of him. Her fingernails were well trimmed and painted a delicate shade of clear pink that made them look shiny and clean, like a newly washed child’s, he thought. And her cheeks, pink and hot from the steaming kitchen, gave her a moist youthful glow. She smelled like vanilla.
There was a sudden knock at the door.
“Zaydie!”
Chaim’s grandfather walked in with a gracious smile. He hardly ever visited and then only during weekday holidays, like Chanukah and the Intermediate Days of the Festivals, when taking a car was permissible and Chaim’s parents could drive him over. That he had made the effort to walk several blocks and climb up two flights of stairs was remarkable and a bit disturbing. Chaim, touched and concerned, ushered him in with great reverence, giving up his own seat at the head of the table. “This is such a long walk for you. Why did you strain yourself, Zaydie?”
The old rabbi coughed and looked down at the table. “I spoke to your mother. She’s… well… she thought it would be a good idea if I came to see you a little more often. I hope you don’t mind. Please, go on with your meal.”
“I was just about to serve the chulent, Zaydie,” Delilah said, laying a plate for him, not looking into his eyes. She hurried into the kitchen, leaning heavily against the sink for a moment. What could Chaim’s mother, that
klafta
, have told the old man? She could just imagine. She shrugged. Well, what of it? What could she do?
She served Chaim’s grandfather first and then went over to Benjamin.
“Would you like meat or potatoes?” she asked him, and for some reason it sounded intimate, like a separate, secret conversation that involved only the two of them. Her eyes glanced at him sideways, a small smile on her pursed lips.
The old rabbi’s eyes glanced up, studying them.
Benjamin caught the end of the heavy platters, helping her support them. They gave each other a quick but meaningful glance as their fingers touched. “Oh, whatever you give me will be fine,” he said softly.
The old man suddenly pushed his chair back from the table. “I’ll go now,” he said, getting up abruptly.
“But why, Zaydie?” Chaim begged him, upset and confused. “You just got here! Please don’t go!”
But the old man was already at the door.
People began to leave after that, a sense of impropriety and discomfort suddenly poisoning the atmosphere like someone rudely exhaling from a big cigar as all around people choked on the smoke. They quickly said the Grace After Meals, and were gone.
“Why don’t I bring some tea and cake?” Delilah said brightly when only Benjamin was left. She, Benjamin, and Chaim sat together around the table, drinking tea, speaking casually, as Chaim, trying to be hospitable despite his sense of lingering discomfort, talked in a friendly way about his adventures with various shul committees about upcoming synagogue functions.
Always, the topic returned to the morning prayer service. They needed at least ten men—a minyan—to hold a prayer service. It was a disgrace, a disgrace!—that in a community of this size they had trouble finding ten men. Every morning! The absence of mourners required to say Kaddish for the departed souls of parents—the mainstay of Orthodox morning prayer services everywhere—left them at a distinct disadvantage, most of their congregants having lost their parents decades ago. Benjamin, who felt he should now offer to get up at five every morning to attend, shifted uncomfortably in his seat. There was no point in offering if he had absolutely no intention of keeping his word. And yet—
“I’d be happy to join,” he found himself saying, aware of her eyes on him and the small nod and smile with which his words were acknowledged.
“That would be great!” Chaim rubbed his hands together appreciatively, already feeling better, fully rewarded for his efforts to integrate this stray. “Really wonderful.”
“More tea? Or coffee?” Delilah murmured to Benjamin. Their eyes held.
Chaim, already busy pouring over the Torah reading of the week, smiled but didn’t look up. “Thanks, my dear. Coffee.”
As the liquid cooled in their cups, Delilah and Benjamin sat across from each other in the living room, she on the sofa, he in the armchair, reading magazines. “I think this is a beautiful ad,” Delilah said as she thumbed through a women’s magazine, trying to find in it something that would connect them. She wanted to sound sophisticated.
He took the magazine from her, pretending to study it. It was a silly ad, he thought, predictable and corny: a family in white shirts sitting on the grass. It could be selling anything from detergent to perfume to milk of magnesia. “I see what you mean.” He nodded seriously. What lovely eyes she had! That color, like a jewel, with tiny gold flecks. “It takes special eyes to notice this kind of thing.”
She found herself blushing.
“Well.” Chaim yawned, oblivious, stretching.
Benjamin, who had only his lonely apartment with its unmade bed waiting for him, reluctantly began to realize that he too was expected to leave. At the door, she handed him a package.
“Here, another piece of cake. I know how single men are. They have empty refrigerators,” she scolded him, her hands touching his. His fingers pulled back as if scorched. When he got home, he unwrapped the package, eating the cake greedily, crumb by delicious crumb.
He took to jogging past her house Sunday mornings.
Delilah, her hands encased in rubber gloves as she scrubbed the grime of the city from her neglected windows, felt herself start when she saw him run by. How slim he was, she thought. His shoulders and stomach were like a college student’s in his running outfit, his hair still adolescent in its thick golden shine. She gazed at her reflection in the glass, studying her face: still young, still sexy. She pouted at herself until she heard Chaim open the door as he returned from the morning minyan.
“Could have sworn that was Benjamin… strange guy. He hopped over to the other side of the street when he saw me coming.”
“Maybe he’s embarrassed he didn’t show up for minyan,” she said, her eyes lowered.
“Yeah, that’s probably it. But, then, what is he doing hanging around here?”
“He’s jogging!”
“But he’s got a park right across the street from his house.”
She didn’t answer him. Why should she? He didn’t expect her to know anything. Besides, she wasn’t sure she did. It could be a coincidence. He had plenty of women in that ad agency, all those
Sex and the City
wannabes breathing down his neck.
Be realistic, Delilah.
But it was so much fun to think about. Much more fun than thinking about her next scrape and polish. Or her next
chesed
project.
If you were the rabbi’s wife, you always had to have a
chesed
project. Feed the hungry, visit the sick. The more time-consuming and distasteful, the more worthy the project. So far, she had resisted anything with hospitals. Chaim got stuck with all the sick calls; considering that the entire congregation practically took weekly vacations in Mount Sinai the way other people went to Florida, he spent endless time in sickrooms.
They had been after her to do the old-age homes, the openmouthed snorers sitting in their diapers in wheelchairs. The mumbling, insistent ones who grabbed you and made you their slaves. Get me this. Pick up that. Wheel me there.
She wasn’t going back to the Moscowitz Hebrew Geriatric Center. Only one afternoon, and it had taken her three shampoos to get the smell out of her hair. She liked kids well enough. She offered to find some Jewish ones and do something with them.
“That doesn’t actually sound like much of a plan,” Chaim said mildly.
“So you think of a better one!”
“I don’t know,” he said, exasperated. “Maybe you could help some of the shul members with their shopping. Or take them to their medical appointments—so they won’t wind up in the hospital.”
“Old people,” she griped.
“Well, it’s their pensions that are putting food on our table and paying our credit card bills, my love. Show a little compassion. We’ll be old one day too.”
She looked up at him, suddenly stricken with conscience pangs. He really was a good person, she realized, ashamed of herself. He really did care about other human beings. And she, in taking on the job of being his partner, had to be a better person in spite of herself.
“All right. I’ll take them shopping. I’ll even do makeovers.”
“Honey…” he cautioned.
“Just kidding.”
She began by making a few phone calls, asking for advice from the president of the sisterhood, who liked her. She got a list of names and went about calling them, asking if they’d like her to join them the next time they went shopping. But that’s not what they wanted. What they wanted was for her to pick up their shopping lists and do their shopping for them.
So, after work, she hurried to make dinner, then ran down to pick up their lists. Then she took the car and drove from store to store, buying farina and canned green beans and Metamucil, standing in lines and carrying heavy brown bags to the car. And, of course, she bought the
wrong green beans,
the ones with salt. They all had salt, except for one brand, sold in a little health food store where it was impossible to find parking. In the end, the old biddy even refused to pay for it. “I’ll just have to throw it out. All that salt could increase my Lenny’s blood pressure. Is that what you’re trying to do, give him a heart attack?! What kind of help is this, anyway?”
Without telling anyone, she stopped picking up the shopping lists. Chaim was deluged with phone calls from outraged congregants who had immediately gotten used to the idea of having a personal shopper and were now furious at having their old lives back.
“You work for the shul, not me. I quit,” she told him when he protested. “You go search all over town for low-sodium vegetables.”
Being left with no choice, he came to a compromise, offering to drive them around to their stores. But this meant he needed the car and Delilah would have to take the subway to work. She was furious.
“Why is it I’m always the last person on the list, the last one you worry about being nice to?” she fumed. “Why does every stranger in this place, people who hardly say hello to you, who don’t care about you at all, always have to come before me, your own wife?”
He shrugged helplessly. “I’ll try to work something out. Please, Delilah, just be patient!”
But as she entered the subway station, there was Benjamin, waiting on the platform. They approached each other a little awkwardly at first. But then, meeting every morning, he got more talkative. He told her about his childhood, the inevitable grandmother who lit Sabbath candles, the grandfather who was “very religious,” which Delilah knew could mean anything from eating chicken soup to wearing a
streimel and kapota.
You never knew what people meant by it. What Benjamin meant was that his grandfather wouldn’t eat pork in the house, only in restaurants.
What had brought him to their synagogue? Delilah asked.
“I don’t know. I was feeling kind of lonely, maybe. At loose ends, with the divorce and all. I was thinking about families and rituals, and I just happened to pass your synagogue. It was dark outside and the building was all lit up. I just walked in. Your husband was so friendly. He seemed really glad to see me.”
“He is glad. The synagogue needs new blood.”
“The old people seem to love him. To love both of you,” he hurriedly corrected himself.
“Sure,” she said wearily. “But let’s not talk about the synagogue. Let’s talk about you and your relationships. What kind of woman are you looking for?”
He swallowed hard.
“Don’t be shy. This is what rabbis and their wives in Orthodox congregations often do for members of their congregations,” she assured him. That was it! A
chesed
project! He was obviously unhappy. Perhaps she could help him? “Tell me about your ex-wife.”
He spoke at length, in intimate whispers, making up things as he went along, editing out his penchant for short-lived affairs, creating a persona that was similar to his but deeper, more steadfast, more moral.
She listened with deep concentration, offering Dr. Phil-type clichés that made her feel both virtuous and wise and salved her conscience.
He looked at her, taking in the pious high collar, the demure covered knees, the silky blond hair beneath the charming beret. How does one seduce such a woman? He entertained the idea idly, not so much making plans as daydreaming. He pondered her, and his predicament. She was, after all, the rabbi’s wife, like Caesar’s, above reproach. But he could tell she was fed up with her husband and her life, even if she couldn’t. A woman like that could be dangerous, he knew. And he certainly wasn’t ready for anything sticky or complicated—not after having just extricated himself from a mess of lawyers and court appearances and fights over CDs and dishes.