Chapter Thirty-Three
“You’re a terrible businesswoman,” Sissel says to me, the following night at her apartment over Chinese takeout. “The number one rule of a matchmaker is to never make out with a client.”
“I know,” I sigh.
“And you literally only had one client.”
I actually have several, but I’m too depressed to correct her.
“And now you have zero.”
I frown and pick at the rice in my cardboard box. “Whatever.”
“No, that’s how math works, Ashira. You have one client,” she says, holding up a finger, “and then you kiss one, and then you end up with zero. That’s basic math.”
I told Miri what happened that very night, but Sissel isn’t exactly the most sensitive when it comes to matters of the heart. At the same time, she knew something had been bothering me, and I was too tired to lie.
Sissel pops another dumpling into her mouth. “You want to know what Mrs. Schwartz has been saying about you?”
“Not really.”
But Sissel being Sissel, tells me anyway. “You seduced your oncologist. Your married oncologist.”
A small whimper escapes me.
“Hey, hey!” Miri calls out as she returns to the living room. “Did I not just tell you to watch what you say to Ashira? She’s vulnerable right now.”
“I was giving her business advice. I think she found it very helpful,” Sissel says, wiping her mouth with a napkin, then turning to me. “Right?”
“You told me I need to disguise myself with plastic surgery and get a new identity,” I say, putting down the rice. Not only have I lost my best shot at saving my mother’s legacy, but I’m also too much of a coward to take a chance with the man I love. “I feel sick to my stomach.”
Sissel trips over herself in her hurry to get off the couch. “Are you going to vomit?”
“Maybe.” I swallow. “I don’t know.”
“Can you go to the bathroom then while you figure that out?” Sissel says, looking panicked.
“No, vomit on the couch,” Miri says to me. “That’ll teach Sissel to watch her mouth.”
“Miri!” Sissel cries.
“You did this,” Miri tells her, gesturing at me. “So fix it.”
Sissel rubs her forehead and cringes, and I can practically see the wheels turning frantically in her brain.
“Um—so, Ashira, you’ve been a matchmaker for eight years and you never kissed a client before.
So that’s good of you. And besides,” she adds with a shrug, “Caleb was never a real client anyway.”
I frown. “Why not?”
Sissel and Miri exchange a look, as if this is a discussion they’ve had between themselves many times.
“I’ve never seen him look at anyone the way he looks at you,” Miri says simply.
Sissel nods. “It’s true.”
“So this whole time I was being his matchmaker . . .” I trail off, and shake my head. “Were you guys laughing at me behind my back?”
“It was more like scoffing,” Sissel says, reaching for her Coke.
“It was not scoffing or laughing,” Miri says firmly. “We hardly ever talked about it, anyway.”
I gaze between her and Miri. “You could’ve said something.”
“It’s not like you would’ve believed us anyway,” Sissel says. “You’ve been in denial about your feelings for him for years.”
I frown because, well, she isn’t wrong.
“What am I going to do?” I start to sweat. “About the matchmaking, about Caleb—”
“Don’t make any decisions right now,” Miri says. “There’s no emergency.”
“What’s there to think about?” Sissel says, waving her chopstick. “Marry the poor man and put both yourselves out of misery.”
“But what if I’m cursed?”
“Yeah,” Sissel nods. “I could see that.”
“Sissel!” Miri hisses.
“Everyone that gets too close to me eventually leaves, one way or another.” I wave my finger at them. “You two could be next.”
Sissel recoils and gazes at me in what is either shock or fear.
“That’s the most absurd thing I’ve ever heard,” Miri says firmly.
“But if you had to guess,” Sissel says, glancing between Miri and me, “which one of us would go first?”
“Sissel.” Miri scowls at her.
“What? I’m not allowed to ask?”
“I’m not getting married,” I say, shaking my head. “I’m not doing it.” Saying the words out loud gives me a rush of relief, like I’m back on safe territory after visiting a beautiful island that was also fraught with danger. “Caleb can find someone else.”
“And you’d be okay with that?” Miri asks, her voice laced with doubt.
“Yes,” I reply, my voice also laced with doubt.
Miri shakes her head and reaches for her water. “Well, I don’t think he would be.”
The air feels tight, like there’s not enough oxygen in the room to go around. I claw at my neck, feeling like I’m stuck on a slow-moving conveyor belt that’s going to plunge off a deep cliff.
“For the record,” Sissel says, “I think you’d have the cutest kids.”
“I know what you’re doing,” I say, turning to her. “And that’s not how a curse works. You can’t try to flatter me out of it because I don’t control it in the first place.”
“I wasn’t trying to flatter you,” Sissel says, looking offended. “It’s the truth.”
“It really is.” Miri smiles. “Can you imagine? They’d be too adorable.”
I’m suddenly transported back to my childhood, to being seven-years-old again and having people I’d never met before pat me on the head and call me adorable.
Strangers would give me secondhand toys and books, even though it wasn’t my birthday or Chanukah.
It was only when I was older that I realized the community had rallied together to try to help our family once my father left.
But no amount of rugelach and babka, or dolls or Percy Jackson books, could remove the pain of losing the man I hero-worshipped.
Maybe I’d feel differently if my dad had been a jerk or just an average father.
But he wasn’t, he was awesome. He was the one who regularly took me to the park and then afterwards, go out for ice cream.
He was the one who comforted me if Leah made me cry, and he was the one who told me bedtime stories and tucked me in every night.
One minute, I was his special princess, and the next, I wasn’t even worthy of a goodbye.
In books and movies, people get closure. They eventually either reunite and talk, or they uncover the truth about someone after their death that can provide some sense of peace. But that’s not how it works in real life, or at least, not in my real life.
I imagine little children with light brown skin and dark eyes, Caleb’s lips and my dimples, and trying to comfort them if he were also to one day—
I stand up. “I have to go.”
“Now?” Miri asks, looking alarmed. “Where?”
“I’m not sure,” I say, grabbing my coat off the couch and thrusting my arms into it. “But I need air.”
“Do you want me to come?” Miri offers.
“Or me?” Sissel adds.
I shake my head and zip my coat. “No, thanks. I need to think. But thanks.” I give each of them and hug. “Love you, guys,” I say, stepping into the hallway.
“Say no to drugs,” Sissel says as her departing message, then shuts the door.
But it isn’t drugs that I have to say no to.
It’s Caleb.
Which is why I decide to do something that’s entirely out of character, and that I’ll very possibly end up regretting.
* * *
I slap my hand down on the counter and say, “Bruce, my man.”
Bruce startles and knocks his head against a display shelf. “What,” he says, whirling around, “are you doing here at,” he glances at the clock, “six in the evening?” He rubs his head and mutters, “I thought evenings were safe.”
“I’ve had an epiphany,” I say. “And it involves you.”
“I’m not going on any blind dates, Ashira, and that’s final. Please don’t make me have to get a restraining order on you. It’s too time consuming.”
I nod and put up my hands. “I’m glad to hear you say that because I don’t have time for that either. And I won’t bring up the blind date thing again. Besides, I’m not a matchmaker anymore.”
“Why?” Bruce lifts a large metal bowl and sifts flour into it. “What happened?”
I shrug. “Eh. A lot of stuff. But that’s where you come in.”
“Oh yeah?” he says, glancing at me over his shoulder as he runs the faucet.
“I’ve got two options for you.”
“I already hate both of them.”
“The first option is that I work for you,” I continue, undeterred. “And the second option is that we get married.”
He turns off the faucet and tilts his head. “Can you repeat the second option? Because I don’t think I heard you right.”
“The second option is that we get married.”
Bruce clasps the ends of his hair. He inhales and then lets out a breath that sounds more like a growl. “That’s never going to happen.”
I nod. “It won’t be a love match, I know, but at least it will one based off mutual understanding and respect.”
“We don’t have that either.”
“That’s not true. I respect you plenty.”
“That’s where it ends.”
I sigh. “Be reasonable, Bruce.”
“You’re telling me to be reasonable?” He points his finger at me. “Ha!”
“What exactly is the problem here?” I ask, spreading my hands wide. “Let’s get married, have kids—”
“I’m not attracted to you.”
My hands drop. “Okay. Wow.” I pause. “I feel like that could’ve been said a thousand times more gently.”
“It’s not personal, really—”
“I get it—no sex. It would be more of a business relationship.” I pick up the broom and start sweeping to show him how very capable I am. “I could help you run the bodega. I’m a fantastic cleaner. You’ll cook, I’ll clean.” How would we have kids?
“I’m gay, Ashira.”
I stop my vigorous sweeping and blink. “Huh?”
Bruce steps around the counter and takes the broom from me. “I’m gay. It isn’t exactly a secret, but with me running a kosher bodega . . .” He shrugs. “I don’t see the need to advertise it, that’s all.”
“Oh.”
“It isn’t personal,” he repeats, softer this time. I nod and sink onto a chair. How is it possible to be this clueless? “Are you hungry?” he asks.
I shake my head.
“You seem . . . not okay,” he says, taking a seat opposite from me.
“I’m not.”
He nods. “Is there anything I can do for you?”
“No.” I stare at my hands.
We sit in silence for a bit. It’s surprisingly soothing to just be near someone.
“It’s my turn to play matchmaker,” Bruce says, breaking the silence. He takes out his phone and starts to type.
I glance up at him, confused. “You want to set me up?”
“Yes. I’ve got someone you need to meet.”