Off the Menu (26 page)

“Will do.”

Ever since that first date, whichever of us leaves to go home has to call the other so that we know we are safe. And if we aren’t together, RJ calls before he goes to bed.

He kisses me one more time, and heads out.

I clean up the kitchen, take Dumpling for his last walk of the night, come back and get into my pajamas. I turn on the TiVo and play an episode of
The Killing
, an amazing police procedural that Lacey turned me on to, and which I am catching up on. The end credits are rolling when I realize that RJ still hasn’t called, and he left well over an hour ago. I check my watch. Eleven fifteen. I check my cell, in case he called while I was walking Dumpling. Must have gotten caught up in the game. I dial his cell.

“Hey, this is RJ, leave a message and I’ll get back to you.”

“Hey, it’s me, you forgot to call. I’m going to call your house phone.”

I dial his land line. It rings and rings. Eventually it beeps.

“Hellllloooo? RJ? You there? If you are, honey, pick up. No? Maybe you’re in the bathroom. Call me when you finish.”

Just what a guy needs, his girlfriend announcing on his machine that she suspects he may be pooping.

I go to the kitchen and grab a Pamplemousse. I flip channels. I check my e-mail. Eleven thirty. I call his cell. It goes to voice mail. I try the house phone again. No answer.

Now I’m a little bit worried. What if he got into a car accident? I think of how much pain he was in, and the fact that his laundry is in the basement. What if he fell down the basement stairs? What if he went to pick up the laundry basket and made his back worse and he is now lying on the
basement floor in pain and not near a phone? I take a breath. He probably just fell asleep with the game on. Eleven forty. I try the cell one more time. No answer.

“Dumpling, I can’t take it. I have to go for a ride.” My voice catches a bit, and I’m surprised by how upset I am, how worried. If something has happened to him, I just don’t know what I would do. The very idea of him in pain or something being really wrong makes my whole stomach turn over.

I throw my coat over my pajamas and slip into my boots. I drive the two and a half miles to RJ’s house, figuring I will just peek around to make sure he is okay.

His car is there. The lights are on. I get out of my car, and walk up the stoop and look in. I can’t see him. I walk back around the side of the house and onto the porch. Not in the kitchen or down the hall. I try to peer in the basement window, but it is dark down there, which I figure is a really good sign, since if he had headed down to do laundry he would have turned the light on. So not writhing in the basement. I walk back around the side. The light in the den is on, but I am too short to see in the window and there is no shadow moving.

I take a deep breath. I call his cell. Straight to voicemail. I call his house phone. I can’t hear it ringing in the house. Okay, Alana, don’t be insane, he probably has his cell on vibrate, and something is obviously wrong with his house phone because you are standing right outside the window and you would hear it. He is asleep with the game on. Go home and he will never know you were here behaving like a stark raving lunatic. I turn to leave.

“Alana?” RJ is standing on his stoop, looking at me quizzically.

And I? Burst into tears.

He comes down the stairs, and puts his arms around me, shushing me. When he realizes I am not in pain, and nothing tragic has happened, he leads me inside, where I snuffle into a Kleenex and try to explain why I am there.

“I promise, I’m not insane, I just … You didn’t call, and you didn’t answer when I called, and your back was so bad and you said you were going to do laundry and I thought maybe your back went out and you were on the floor and …”

“Shh. Honey. I’m fine. I came home, and wanted to get the laundry in, started some work, fell asleep with the game on. Never heard the phone ring. I’m sorry I didn’t call. But this is a little bit of crazy behavior.”

“I know. I was just getting ready to leave. I wasn’t going to ring the bell, I swear.”

“Look, I’m tired, you’re tired, and I think I do understand why you’re here, and I’m going to assume this is just an anomaly and I know it comes from a place of caring. And I really am sorry I didn’t call.” But for the first time in our relationship, he is looking at me like maybe I’m not as easy and normal as he thought. And I realize that just like I have been secretly waiting for the other shoe to drop, for the magic to fall away, he might have been thinking the same thing. Actually, this makes me feel somewhat better. To know that maybe he is scared too, that he isn’t so blithe about believing in our magic. I know that, as disappointing as my past relationships have been, his have been in some ways worse. We don’t dwell in the past, but there have been some clues about a couple of his exes that imply a rough time. And knowing that maybe he harbors his own fears and trust issues makes me feel both less insane and the teensiest bit more confident in what we have.

“I swear this is not my usual. And you’ve forgotten to
call a couple of times before and I haven’t come over. It was just because of your back, all I could think was that you were hurt and couldn’t call for help.”

He smiles at me the way you smile at a small child. “Well, it was sweet of you to worry and very rude of me to not call. I’ll make you a deal; I’ll try to remember to be better about calling, if you promise to not assume I’m dead if I forget now and again.”

“Deal.”

“Thank you for caring about me enough to be so worried and to come all the way over here.”

“You’re welcome. Thank you for caring about me enough to not break up with me for acting like some crazed stalker.”

I kiss him, and he walks me to the door. “I would never break up with you for caring about me. And I don’t think you’re crazy.”

“Okay.” I feel like such a complete idiot, and just know that even though he is being kind and understanding, I’ve taken something of a step back in his estimation.

“Alana?”

“Yeah?”

He grins. “Call me when you get home.”

“You bet I will.”

And I do.

I
open the oven at my parents’ house and pull out the pans of chicken. In the other room, I can hear the buzz of my insane family as they compete to try to impress RJ with funny stories, details of exceptional children, and embarrassing tales of my youth. The whole gang showed up for this Shabbat, including Aunt Rivka and Uncle Eli. Luckily the cousins have scattered to the four winds, two on the West Coast, two on the East, and one in Amsterdam, so it’s just the insanity of the immediate family. RJ claims that he is jealous, he just has his folks and sister and her family, and isn’t able to really be close to his extended family in the way that my family is.

Nat wanders in to see if I need any help. “He is so freaking charming. Mama and Papa are eating out of his hand.”

“I know, he’s good-manned adorable.”

“He really is. And he seems to just fit, here and at your party and with your friends and stuff. And you guys are so, I dunno, easy together. Do you think he’s the one?”

I take a deep breath. “I do. I really do.” I haven’t dared say it out loud, but there it is, my secret joy and terror all in one.

She throws her arms around me. “Good for you, Lanuschka. That makes me very happy.”

“Okay, okay, let me get this chicken organized, would you? Aren’t there children to deal with out there?”

“Fine. You better be careful, mouth off too much and this family will vote you off the island and keep RJ instead.” I swat her on the butt and shoo her back into the melee. But I can’t keep from peeking down the hall; RJ is flanked by my parents, with my niece Lia in his lap. He is laughing at something she is whispering in his ear, and my folks are grinning ear to ear. My heart swells with pride to see him so connected already, and to hear from Nat that everyone approves. Not that I was worried. After the last schmegegge I brought home, the bar was very low. But it increases my joy to see how well RJ fits in.

I get the chicken out on a platter. I fluff the kasha varnishkes, sautéed buckwheat groats with little pasta bowties, and spoon it into a large serving bowl. Glazed carrots, steamed green beans, pickled beets. Rivka has brought the challah, as usual, and RJ brought wine. I’m discovering that when he says he has an interest in wine, what he means is that he has enormously vast knowledge, is so good that wine importers invite him to come on buying trips to France to help taste the wines and make notes to advise them on their purchases, and that he has a cellar so deep that it will outlive him. Tonight he has brought three magnums of a gorgeous Burgundy, and a bottle of port older than me. I mean, it’s no unlabeled Polish vino, but it’ll do.

I’m just getting ready to call everyone in for dinner, when the doorbell chimes. Who on earth?

I walk out to see who it is, and there it is, the only thing that could spoil this perfect night.

Patrick.

My mom is hugging him, and the nieces and nephews are jumping up and down and running around him. He is carrying a casserole dish, and has a huge Toys R Us bag over
his shoulder. Jenny takes the food from him, while Sasha relieves him of the bag, and tells the kids they can have it after dinner, removing the temptation to the hall closet. RJ is standing back watching, and I immediately go to his side.

“Oy. You ready for this on top of everything else?”

He kisses the side of my neck, right under my ear. “Born ready, baby.”

Patrick makes his way through the crowd and finally lands in front of us. “This must be the famous RJ.”

“Hello, Patrick, it’s nice to finally meet you.” They shake hands firmly. I’m waiting for a black hole to open in the floor, or a break in the space-time continuum. But nope, nothing exciting. Just Patrick meeting my boyfriend, as if it is the most normal thing in the world.

“Mama …” I say, as she walks by.

“Vat? Is shabbas. Patreek ees alvays invited shabbas.”

“Yeah, Alana. I am
always
invited shabbas,” Patrick says, putting his arm around my mother and kissing her cheek.

“And yet, this week, no one mentioned it to me.” I should have known Patrick would weasel his way into this dinner, especially when he overheard Gloria and me talking about how much she liked meeting RJ and telling me that the dinner would be great, especially now that he had bonded with my siblings at the party. Whatever. I’m not going to let it bug me.

Patrick’s offering for the meal, short rib tzimmes, joins the rest of the items on the buffet, scarily perfect and utterly traditional, completely incongruous coming from someone who oozes Gentile out of his pores. Mama must be sneaking him family recipes now. Everyone walks down the line, entering the kitchen through the door from the living room and
exiting out the other door to the dining room, plates full of delicious.

We are not a religious family. For us Shabbat dinner is just an excuse to get the family together. But we do say the three key prayers, wine, candles, bread, just to honor the tradition. Mama lights the candles.
“Baruch ata Adonai, eloheynu melech ha’olam asher kiddushanu bat mitzvoh tov vitzi vanu le chad lich ne’er, shel Shabbat.”

Papa breaks a piece off the nearest challah, the shiny mahogany crust of the braided bread giving way to soft yellow interior.
“Baruch ata Adoani, eloheynu melech ha’olam hamotze lechem mein ha’aretz.”

Mama looks around to see which of us will step up for the blessing over the wine. Suddenly, at my elbow, RJ says, “Shall I?” And raises his glass.

Mama nods.

“Baruch ata Adonai, eloheynu melech ha’olam, boray prei hagofen.”
His Hebrew is perfect, if somewhat strange spoken with the slight lilt to his voice, a tiny remnant of the Tennessee accent he has all but obliterated in his thirty years in Chicago.

Papa claps delightedly, and Mama grins. My siblings nod approvingly, and the kids at their end of the table giggle, but they don’t really know why. Patrick, sitting on my other side, raises his glass to RJ, leaning over me slightly. “Showoff.”

“Not bad for a shaygetz, huh?” RJ says, using the somewhat derogatory word for a Gentile man. “It’s not my first rodeo.” It’s not Patrick’s first rodeo either, he’s probably been at a couple of dozen of these over the years, but he’s never offered a prayer.

“You do very goot,” my mom says.

“You can be shabbas goy!” Aunt Rivka says.

We all laugh, even Patrick, who must suddenly feel like the second cutest girl at the dance. I lean over to him and whisper, “I’m glad you’re here. And I hope you get a chance to really chat with RJ.”

“Alana, if you like him, I’m sure he’s great. You don’t need my blessing. He seems fine.”

I’m not particularly sure why it hurts my feelings, but it does. Every single person in my life who has met RJ has raved, gushed, expressed personal delight at having made his acquaintance. Patrick’s casual dismissal of “fine” really rubs me the wrong way. I’m about to call him on it, when RJ takes my hand under the table.

“Thank you for bringing me here.” And my ire melts away. If Patrick has his head so far up his own ass that he doesn’t want to make an effort to know this spectacular man, that is entirely his loss.