Chapter 17
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Leo thanked his lucky stars that even with the power outage and Andie distracting him in the best possible way, he still remembered to grab his gelt for the day. Granted, the small pile fit easily in his coat pocket, so not nearly the challenge his niece—aka current champion—enjoyed.
Which led him to a much bigger conundrum: how to count Andie into this game. He reached out and snagged her arm as the family moved into the dining room, her big brown eyes large and questioning back at him, and equally as enticing. Dreidels and gelt and family slipped from conscious thought and his focus became Andie’s lips and beauty. A slight bend and her lips could meet his. Christmas had never been a thing he wished to call his own, but what he wouldn’t give for the excuse of a mistletoe.
“Everything okay?” Andie smiled brightly up at him, not helping his brain getting back on track.
Get it together, Dentz, your baby pictures are on this wall .
“My family takes dreidels very seriously.”
“I gathered that.”
“And plays with real gelt.”
“Real as in …?”
“Not candy.”
“I might have some loose change in my purse.”
Leo chuckled, unable to hold it in. At Andie’s furrowed brows, and how adorable were her furrowed brows, he held up a finger and made his way to the front entry hooks that housed all their coats. Before Andie could reach for her purse he pulled out the felt bag he’d stashed there. “Hold out your hands.”
Andie did as directed and Leo dumped the one dollar coins into the palm of her hand. Her eyes grew wide, followed by a laugh escaping her plump lips. “Oh my.”
Leo nodded. “Yup. Let’s go see the ringmistress and figure out a plan.”
The gelt went back into the bag and he placed a hand on each of Andie’s shoulders, steering her into the dining room. The family had all gathered around the round table, bags of gelt and favorite dreidels making their way to the surface. Voices rose over each other, always creating a challenge for him to hear, and Leo prepared to use his lungs to get important details settled.
“Oh Millie,” Leo called out, “how are we going to incorporate our newest member?”
Millie glanced up from counting her stash, a finger tapping against her lip. Leo realized then with no small amount of horror the ditch he’d stepped into. There he stood, hands on Andie’s shoulders, presenting her to his family for the first time, incorporating her into their long-standing game—as though she’d be a bigger part than this single day.
His thoughts veered off course when Millie hopped up. “I’ve got it. Shin rules.” She glanced around the room as though this made perfect sense to anyone else but her. “Everyone, put two in to help Andie get her start.”
Millie sent Leo a wink and he winked back.
But Andie backed out of his grasp. “I don’t need to take your money, maybe I have a few ones I could use.” She tried to escape, but the only one who garnered more attention and control than Millie spoke up.
“You will do no such thing. Millie’s idea is perfect and hardly a challenge for most of us.” His mother deposited two coins into the center, giving his family a look that challenged anyone to be a chazir.
Leo grasped Andie’s hand. “Come. Enjoy. This is mostly for fun. Cutthroat fun, but fun.”
Andie’s tight shoulders relaxed away from her earlobes and she gave his hand a squeeze. “Okay. I guess I’m starting with fourteen coins.”
Possibly more than he had in his pouch, but he’d let her take the lead from last place.
Everyone settled in around the table, dreidels being tested and chosen. Gayle brought over a bowl of chips and a tray of Christmas candies.
Millie clapped her hands once for attention. “Standard rules. Shin means two in. Every round you add one to the center pot. We spin to see who goes first. Last gimel standing wins.” She held her dreidel in front of her and everyone followed, Leo nudging Andie to join in. Then they all spun, dreidels bumping into each other like bumper cars, his father’s dreidel going off the table.
“Default! Spin it again, Grandpa.”
Glen’s chair squeaked and he let out a groan as he collected his dreidel. “It landed on gimel.”
“Nope, we’ve got to see it.”
“Gimel shimel, that was a nun,” said Dean, who sat next to him. “You need glasses.”
“Maybe you do, you’re the one in expensive contacts,” Glen muttered, spinning again.
“Nope, got my eyes checked just last month.”
Glen landed on a hay, not joining Andie, Millie, and David with gimels.
“Non gimels are out. Gimels, try again!” Millie bounced and sent her dreidel into a loopy spin, where it collided with Andie’s, both sputtering to a stop. David’s kept going, and he held up a hand blocker to keep it from falling off the table.
The end result yielded no gimels.
They all spun again, this time all three dreidels meeting in a miniature rave, before wobbling, landing on a shin, nun, and gimel.
“Andie is our first winner,” Gayle said.
Andie blushed, but didn’t back down, taking her dreidel and spinning it one more time. It bumped into the center puddle of coins, before falling with hay up.
“Half, not bad,” Millie said.
Andie collected the pile, her tiny stash growing. “I’ll take it.”
Play continued clockwise around the table, personal piles growing and shrinking. Luck was not on Leo’s side this Chanukah, as his pile faced imminent extinction. He spun with one final hope of remaining in the game.
The dreidel sailed right off the table, streaking in between Dean and Glen.
Dean glanced down from his leaned back on two chair legs position and shot both hands in the air. “Gimel!”
Cheers rose up and relief filled Leo. He leaned forward, ready to collect his winnings, stopped short by his father’s voice. “It landed out of bounds.” Glen glared at Dean. “And was not a gimel.”
Dean’s chair banged back to all four legs. “I know you need reading glasses, and gimel and nun can be confusing, but that,” Dean flung a hand toward the ground in between them. “Is a gimel.”
“Which is still out of bounds. You always did anything to cover for your brother, didn’t you?” Glen said.
A hush fell over the room. Leo’s jaw clenched hard enough to break a filling. The tightness of Dean’s jaw telecasted the same. Leo was the perpetual troublemaker. Dean, on the other hand, was only good for being Leo’s shadow. They had equal blame in the issues they’d had with the store, and yet it was all Leo’s fault and Dean needed to extricate himself from the issue.
Leo had been the older one, and in charge. He’d already spent years trying to get rid of the negative self-association.
“Glen, it’s Chanukah.” They all turned to where Gayle gave her husband a not-so-friendly glare.
“Rules are rules and need to be followed.”
Andie shrunk in her chair next to Leo and more than this age-old issue being brought up any chance his father got, he hated the timing of Andie being here. He had hoped the novelty of bringing someone home would have his father playing nice. He should have known better. It wouldn’t have lasting effects on Andie, she’d be moving soon after all, but the odds of him ever bringing home another date dwindled. If he managed to fix his craptastic dating record.
Across the table Millie sat extra quiet, her bottom lip stuck out by a hair, shoulders squared back. Millie had a good relationship with her grandfather, and yet he knew that look in her eyes—she planned to step into the fray, for her uncle’s sake.
Leo unclenched his jaw. He didn’t need his ten-year-old niece fighting his battles, even if her negotiating skills were beat by no one. “Dean, toss me my dreidel. I’ll spin again.”
“But Uncle Leo—”
Leo held up a hand, cutting Millie off. “It’s okay. Good sportsmanship is always worth it.” He finished his words while looking at his father, a sneer slipping through that he couldn’t quite tame.
Dean bent and tossed the dreidel. Leo caught it easily and spun it again, eyes on his father. Glen looked unphased, another moment in his life where his sons disappointed him.
Everything always Leo’s fault, right down to his hearing loss.
The dreidel clunked to a stop and the room remained silent. Leo tore his gaze from his father to his dreidel by the center pile. Shin. He took his remaining two coins and tossed them into the center. “It’s taken a few years, but you all have finally beat me. Deal me in again sometime.” He scraped his chair back and headed away from the dining room, with the need to get away from dear ole dad.
“Well done, Dad, that was just epic.” Dean clapped. “You can’t even hold it in for one Chanukah, not even when he’s brought a date.”
Andie’s cheeks burned. She hated family conflict, hated that most of her memories of her extended family involved a fight, or two. She’d never forget the last time she’d been around them, before her father had died. She’d caught him in a heated conversation, hidden in the corner with her uncle. He admonished her father for working with the homeless. Proclaiming that he’d failed his daughter, and that was why Andie worked in a preschool. She’d feigned sickness shortly thereafter so they could leave. Her father had been saddened by the encounter. He always held out hope for others. In Andie’s mind, they’d done nothing to earn that hope.
Leo’s family had been so warm and open and welcoming. She’d known there were issues with his father, but knowing it and witnessing it were two different beasts.
“Rules are rules,” Glen said. “Something you two boys need to learn.”
Dean placed an elbow on the table, leaning into his father. “Rules are meant to be broken. And we know the rules. We’ve been punished for longer than the recommended jurisdiction.”
“You nearly folded the business.”
“And here it is, still standing all these years later, even with the two of us working there. Yet, you’d rather sell or, in your words, fold it, than give us a chance.” Dean stood, bumping the table, jostling the contents, and heading out of the dining room. Andie wondered if he was going after Leo, but Dean went out the front door, opposite of his brother’s direction.
“Excuse me,” Andie said in her soft teacher voice. She didn’t need to be here for this. But she could go after the reason she was here in the first place.
“Oh Glen, you are going to make those two leave and never come home. Learn how to let people grow from their mistakes,” Gayle said as Andie left.
“Those two haven’t learned.”
“Dad, the only person who hasn’t learned is you. Come on, Millie, let’s give Uncle Leo some gelt to play with next time.”
Andie was tempted to stay and hear what came next but let the voices fade to the background as she tried to figure out where to find Leo. Following his path led her to the kitchen. The open space with island and table for the whole family to fit at didn’t give many additional escape options. Only the backyard, which held no pissed off and hurt man stomping around, and a hallway.
The hallway brought Andie to a half bath and then a worn room that at one point must have been a playroom, and perhaps still was for Millie. On the tan couch sat Leo, elbows on knees, head in his hands.
Her heart went out to him. Cracking a tiny bit on his behalf. To live under that much pressure, she couldn’t fathom it. The man she was beginning to know tried his best to do good. And yet he’d been held in place, stuck in a past that no longer defined him.
“I’m sorry you had to witness that,” came his rough voice.
Andie hadn’t realized she’d been seen. She ventured into the room, sitting beside him. Leo straightened, though his face remained strained. “It’s all right. Families are families. They are complicated and sticky and don’t always know how to be there for each other.”
Leo scoffed. “That’s an oversimplification of the truth.”
Andie shrugged. She didn’t want to get into it, saw no point. She might have missed the warmth she’d witnessed earlier, but she also didn’t have to deal with the theatrics. Life was too short for drama, especially from those you loved. She’d rather keep her circle small than welcome in that kind of animosity on a regular basis. And did just that after her father’s death, when greedy hands came stretched out with false claims of promises of property, rather than offers of support.
Perhaps she asked for too much; it’s not like Leo chose his particular baggage. She’d had this dream of family for so long, amplified with her father’s death. She had time, youth still on her side. No sense giving up a dream unless she met a person who made her forget about the rest.
Leo let out a sigh and placed his head on her shoulder. It tugged at her, deep down, beyond organs and atoms. For a moment she could envision it, putting up with the bad for the good. Putting up with the conflicts to be the one there to soothe the aches and stings. That’s who Leo needed. His family still had some of the balance hers had lacked. He needed someone to help pick him up and dust him off when others pushed him down. Beyond the rest of his family caught up in the mess. An urge deep inside wanted to be that for him.
She’d unpack that another time. She angled her head, leaning it against Leo’s. The thought emerged, of accepting potential opportunities. The temple preschool job, and Leo in her life. It meant staying, turning down Ohio but keeping the area she’d called home, her local friends, and places where her father’s memory still lingered.
Yes, there would be conflict, but also love, so much love. Did she really need to judge Leo’s family based on one bad seed? No. She didn’t. Especially as, somehow, she wasn’t running. Imagine that.
“What can I do to make it better?” she asked.
Leo’s soft chuckle vibrated against her shoulder. He shifted and they both straightened. “I’m amazed that didn’t send you running for the hills.”
How odd, his words mirroring hers. “I’m no stranger to drama.”
“Yeah, but you don’t like it.”
Had she mentioned as much? She couldn’t remember. Either his memory worked better than most or he read her with ease. Both notions somehow soothed her usual responses. “You’re right, I don’t like it. Doesn’t mean I can’t support my date for the day when he needs it.”
Leo leaned back, hands going into his hair. “I’ve done everything I could to prove myself to that man, to make up for my teenage misdeeds. None of it makes a dent. He’d rather sell his father’s business to someone else when both his sons want it than to let bygones be bygones.”
Tension rose back in Leo and Andie tried to work it out. “His loss.”
“Sure. His loss. But come January, Dean and I may be looking for new jobs or careers.”
“And your years of experience won’t count for something? Or how about your customers, I’m sure you each have some that prefer to work with you.”
He looked her way, the first sparks of hope flickering. “What are you saying?”
“Life is never black and white. It’s scary when a door closes, but sometimes that door has to close in order to open up something new and better. Look at me, I’m losing a job I love in an area I love, yet a new opportunity has presented itself, and I know this journey will be an experience.” Two new opportunities, the inside voice whispered, but Andie left that locked up tight. One offer was official, the other was not. She would not count chickens before they hatched.
“I suppose you’re right. I wanted Dentz Antiques.”
“I’m sure you did. And while the outlook is certainly murky, it’s not a done deal yet.”
The twitch of his eyebrows suggested hope wouldn’t be easy for him. “You’re saying to have hope? After that?”
“I’m saying that life has been known to throw more interesting curveballs than that.”
Leo stared at her, eyes wide and incredulous. And then, a slight shake of his head, a laugh, and a relaxing of his furrowed brow. He hauled her to him before she could react, chest to chest. “I’m so glad you’re here,” he said into her hair.
She wrapped her arms around him, holding him close. The “same” stayed in her head, but from her heart beating against his, she suspected he didn’t need to hear it.