Chapter 12 Jewish guilt on turkey
“Just make sure your mom doesn’t ask if my mom buttered the turkey,” Leah said with a wink. It was supposed to be a joke because that was what Gabe had asked the first time he had visited Leah’s family for Thanksgiving. That question was how Leah’s family discovered Gabe was a goy and it hadn’t gone over well. Leah didn’t want to hear her parents explaining to Gabe’s parents why butter could not be used on turkey. It wasn’t kosher. It didn’t matter that it was milk and meat from different species.
“My parents have been fully prepared on what is on and off-limits,” Gabe responded. “Are we ready?”
Gabe and Leah were off to Penn Station for their train upstate to Leah’s parents’ home for their annual Thanksgiving. The holiday had been less eventful every year since the first year Gabe had attended, but this year promised to be even more climactic.
Gabe’s parents were coming. Leah wasn’t sure it was a great idea, but her mom Savannah had insisted. “You’re getting married to him! We’ll have to meet sometime! Why not on Thanksgiving?” Savannah reasoned and Leah didn’t know how to argue. Sure, the parents had to meet, but couldn’t they just meet at the wedding? Or just say hi to each other once in passing? Did they have to have a long-drawn-out-highly-emotional meal together?
“It’s important for us to know our in-laws!” Savannah insisted. “And besides, Thanksgiving is the only holiday we can actually celebrate together.” The Jewish guilt was being laid on thick. Leah couldn’t decide if the invitation was an endorsement of her relationship or an attempt to somehow end it, but Leah couldn’t believe her mom would actually try to sabotage her relationship.
So that’s how the Russos and the Rosenbergs were going to meet for the first time. Given Leah’s mom’s track record for emotional outbursts at holiday gatherings, it was sure to be eventful. But hopefully Savannah would be able to reel it in for her in-laws.
The train would arrive upstate around noon, after Savannah had already prepared the sweet potatoes, turkey, and stuffing. She’d have just enough time to take a break from cooking to have coffee with Leah and Gabe before she needed to get the pies in the oven and start chopping salads. Savannah had holiday meal prep on a strict schedule that started early in the morning. Everything was planned to the minute. Should anyone enter the kitchen at the wrong time and delay something entering the oven by mere seconds, they’d feel Savannah’s wrath.
Leah and Gabe took a cab from the train station to Leah’s parents’ house and arrived to the smell of poultry seasoning and cloves.
“Just in time!” Shira greeted them at the doorway. “Mom was just saying if you didn’t arrive now, you wouldn’t be able to get coffee in the kitchen until she finished the salads.”
Leah hugged her sister, whom she hadn’t seen in the few weeks since Shira had visited her in the city during Leah’s break with Gabe. She noticed that her sister’s cheeks were a little fuller, her chin rounder. Her breasts were a little larger. While they’d discussed Shira’s pregnancy a few times, Shira’s preferred method of dealing with difficult situations was to ignore them. Usually, they’d go away on their own. But Shira’s too-tight shirt over her bust proved this one wasn’t going anywhere.
“They’re here?” Leah heard her mom yell from the kitchen. She and Gabe put down their bags and walked with Shira into the kitchen where dishes piled up next to the sink and steam escaped the oven.
Savannah hugged both of them. “Hurry, make yourselves coffee!” she said. “Soon I’ll need you out of my way so I can finish up! But first, Gabe, what do I need to know about your parents?”
Leah grabbed coffee pods to slip into the machine while Gabe immediately gravitated toward the sink and started washing things. It was one of the things Leah—and Leah’s mom—liked about Gabe. That he was always looking to help.
“Put that down, Gabe!” Savannah insisted. “Clark will do those later! You come sit with me while I take a break!” Gabe smiled and dried his hands after putting one clean pot in the drying rack. He sat on the second barstool next to Savannah and Leah brought coffee for the three of them.
“Your family,” Savannah reminded. “I don’t think you’ve told me anything about them.”
Gabe spent the next few minutes telling Savannah about his parents—nothing too out of the ordinary, they liked to travel, his mom had taken up painting in retirement. Then he did what he always did with Savannah, asking her about the latest gossip at the synagogue. While Savannah had seemed interested in Gabe’s parents, she was significantly more interested in relaying who was getting divorced and who had to delay their child’s bar mitzvah because he just couldn’t understand the Torah tropes!
“It would be such an embarrassment to his family for him to make an Aliyah to the Torah like that!” Savannah insisted and Gabe nodded in agreement even though Leah was sure he had no idea that it was called “make an Aliyah” when you read the Torah during services.
“All right, it’s time for the pies,” Savannah said once she finished her coffee. She stood up from the barstool and banished Leah, Gabe, and Shira, who had been quietly listening, from the kitchen.
While Gabe brought their stuff to Leah’s old bedroom, Leah followed Shira into hers. “Have you told them yet?” she asked, closing the door behind her.
“No! Jesus! Leah! Keep your voice down!” Shira snapped.
“Don’t they think it’s weird you’ve been home for so long? They haven’t asked any questions? They don’t notice…” Leah pointed to her sister’s bust.
Shira tsked and rolled her eyes while slapping Leah’s hand away. “They think I quit my job. And they are happy I came home! They keep talking to me about grad school now and they think that my being here will lead to that!”
“You understand they are going to notice soon?” Leah retorted. “And it’s going to be impossible to ignore it when the baby comes. Have you even gone to see a doctor?”
“Of course I saw a doctor!” Shira whispered. “I’m not a complete nut case! It’s a girl, by the way.”
“A girl!” Leah’s tone changed. “Wow, congratulations.” She paused. “So I guess you are keeping it.”
Shira shrugged. “Maybe it will be fun,” she said.
“You have to tell Mom,” Leah insisted.
Just then Gabe knocked on the doorframe. “My parents are almost here,” he announced. They were driving from Long Island and planning on staying with friends nearby. Savannah had offered to let them sleep over after Thanksgiving, but they declined—something Leah was extremely thankful for that year. Having the parents meet for dinner was one thing, having them all sleeping under one roof was a whole different thing.
Leah felt her heart pound a little faster as she nodded to Gabe. “Do we need to prepare anything?” she asked Gabe and Shira, although she wasn’t sure they would have the answer. How could anything prepare them for this meeting? Her mother was downstairs still working in the kitchen. Her father was hiding out in the office until he’d be summoned to help with dishes.
“It’ll be fine,” Gabe insisted. “My parents are easy-going. They’ll be happy with a cup of coffee.”
Leah tried to take a deep breath. She didn’t know his parents very well, but she wasn’t sure they’d be fine with a cup of coffee. She wasn’t sure a cup of coffee was all they would get.