Chapter 3
The next five nights do nothing to help alleviate my crush.
My family is immediately overfamiliar with Cal the minute he steps through the door each evening, and he’s seemingly game to let them pull him in whatever direction they want.
He helps teach my dad how to properly marinate meat.
He listens to Nina and Jenny complain about their garden’s invasive bamboo.
My mom ropes him into peeling potatoes for latkes that she decided I’d be making after she became sick of the store-bought ones.
Ethan and the girls even insist on letting him light the menorah one night—something they’ve never let anyone else do since they’ve been old enough to take over.
But night after night, he never gets pulled enough that he forgets to be attentive to me, checking in, looking over, silently commiserating whenever someone says something off color.
He also seems to somehow always find the right moment to hand me some cheese. Pathetically, this might be the most romantic thing anyone has ever done for me.
And my brain stubbornly refuses to stop lingering on the way his hand felt brushing my hair back behind my ear on the first night.
I’ve willed it to happen again every time I walk him to the door at the end of the evening.
His eyes stay on me, and I’m almost convinced he’s reliving it too. But he hasn’t let it happen again.
And reliving the “almost” for five nights in a row has only made the want more potent.
So I’m grateful that for the seventh night of Hanukkah, we’re getting out of the house.
We head to Marion Square—a palm tree–lined hub for cultural events like food festivals, a farmers’ market, and art fairs.
I always get nostalgic about the former library on the corner that now, like everything in Charleston lately, is a fancy hotel.
Tonight, though, the park is decked out for Hanukkah in the Square, an annual festival with food, games, bouncy houses, speeches, music, and a whole lot of people standing around kibitzing.
When we arrive, my youngest niece, Cara, sees Cal first and runs over, begging him to put her on his shoulders.
His ever-present smile melts so much of the tension that’s built up all afternoon.
I’ve spent the last five hours on the phone after some of our shipments didn’t get delivered this morning.
“How was your day?” he asks, lumbering over with a giggling six-year-old hanging on. Sarah’s arguing with her two teenage daughters behind me, but somehow Cal’s presence blocks out all the noise.
“Annoying,” I admit, then proceed to tell him about the delays that turned my afternoon upside down. He listens intently, never interrupting. But of course, my family does.
“Just don’t worry about it,” Sarah says behind me, shrugging off my dilemma like it’s as minute as her teens’ disagreement.
Normally I’d ignore it. But there’s something about Cal’s instant look of disapproval that makes me want to not just roll over.
“Oh my goodness, thank you,” I deadpan. “I’ll pass that along to my head of operations.”
I grab Cal’s hand and walk toward the tent while he snickers behind me.
I pull him into a line for the doughnutlike perfection that is sufganiyot so it doesn’t look like I left Sarah to be huffy—I have to take baby steps on standing up to my family, and that little burst of well-earned pettiness already feels like a giant leap.
“She was not expecting that,” Cal says, amused. But all I can focus on is the way his thumb circles mine, like we’re holding hands for real. I stare at it for a moment, words catching in my throat. But he continues. “It’s amazing how your family really doesn’t see you.”
“‘Amazing’ is one word for it,” I scoff. But he just shakes his head.
“No, I mean . . . even after watching it for a week, I still can’t believe they don’t see everything I—”
“Cal! Cal! Cal!” Cara’s run over, and I hate how immature my internal reaction is, wanting to shove a six-year-old away so a man can finish his sentence. “Can you get me sufganiyot, too, please? Please? Can I have five?”
“Oh, you’ll definitely have to ask your mom about that many,” he says with a chuckle.
We’re next in line, and he turns to the woman at the front and says, “Four, please.” He hands two over to Cara with a wink and then one to me.
Then he bites into his and closes his eyes at the powdery, jelly-filled concoction.
“Holy crap, this is delicious,” he says, his words mumbled through fried dough, my mind desperately failing at not imagining him in other places.
“Wanna see something hilarious?” Jeremy says, popping up in front of us. I swear, no one in my family is ever this attentive when it’s just me. But I guess I’m not the only one ensorcelled by my charming fake boyfriend.
We follow Jeremy, and it’s immediately clear where we’re going.
It’s the most insane part of this festival.
It is hilarious, if you enjoy watching kids scramble and make fools out of themselves.
The fire department does it every year—a big fire truck is parked, and they extend the ladder all the way up.
At the end, the firefighters have a whole basketful of chocolate gelt that are attached to little parachutes.
They throw them off the top, and then everyone scrambles to try and catch the prizes.
Some overeager parents inevitably get involved in helping their kids, which makes it even more chaotic and competitive.
Every year it’s mayhem, and every year I wonder how they haven’t yet found a better way to do this.
But it’s too late to wonder about that now, because the polite hip checks have already turned into slightly off-color shoves.
Everyone is reaching wildly at candy they could buy a hundred-pack of for five bucks, and yet, there’s something about the thrill of winning it that makes everyone overly competitive.
Sarah’s girls are in the melee, holding their own despite being as short as some of the elementary-age kids.
I look around and see Ethan standing behind me. “What’s up?” I ask him. “Get in there! Go nuts over the same chocolate you’d get at home.”
“No, thanks.” His gaze is on his sneakers. “It’s stupid anyway.”
“I agree,” I say. “But I’m an adult, and you’re supposed to think flinging your body into a sea of other kids and some questionable grown-ups is fun.”
I watch his face, surprised by the lack of even a hint of amusement. I’m wondering what’s going on when Cal kneels right next to him.
“Did your dad tell you what my job is?” he says to Ethan, who nods ever so slightly.
“I block people for a living.” At that, Ethan looks up.
“I’m so good at blocking people, they pay me to do it.
I like doing it. I’m competitive about it too.
But I’ve been sidelined with this knee injury, and I’ve been really missing it.
So I was wondering if maybe you’d let me block some people for you? ”
A mischievous grin takes over Ethan’s expression, like the sun coming out after a storm. All that hesitation and nervousness is suddenly replaced by determination. Cal takes Ethan’s hand and draws him into the crowd.
They’re the most unlikely duo—my asthmatic, bespectacled, vertically challenged nephew backed by a hulking pro football player.
But Cal moves with him like he’s got eyes on exactly what Ethan needs.
When a tiny parachute starts drifting a little to the left, Cal seamlessly glides Ethan over a few feet.
When a couple of other kids (and a few nosy parents) try to shift to be right under it, Cal doesn’t let them by.
And when a parent is about to reach up over Ethan’s head and grab the parachute, Cal lifts Ethan up like he weighs nothing, making him the tallest person in the crowd.
And Ethan nimbly wraps his hand around the little packet of gelt.
Ethan starts cheering, and Cal hoists him up even higher, whooping with him as though they both just won the Super Bowl instead of simply grabbing a bag of waxy off-brand chocolate.
The celebration goes on for a full five minutes, with Ethan eventually succumbing to giggles.
When Cal finally puts him down, Ethan runs over to his mom, beaming, leaving behind the rest of the crowd still jockeying over the next little parachutes.
Cal sidles over to me, sheepish for some reason.
“What’s with the face?” I ask.
“Was that too much? I think I genuinely knocked over a couple adults.”
I chuckle. “No, honestly, it was perfect. Any adult joining in on actively blocking small children for the sake of their own tall-enough children probably deserves it.”
His laugh always arrives like it’s a surprise to him, booming out louder than he intends.
He leans over to catch his breath and puts a hand on my shoulder, as though my small frame could possibly steady him.
But it warms me from the inside—big sound, big touch, and yet all so gentle it makes me shiver with want.
“Well, it made Ethan happy, so that’s all that matters,” he says, his hand still unmoving, weighing down my shoulder with all the what-ifs I’ve mentally piled on top.
It’s confusing me to outwardly get to act as if I like Cal, when between us I’m supposed to respectfully know the difference.
But in reality, I desperately like him. It’s getting so damn hard to not read into, to not want.
“You can’t really be this perfect,” I sputter, as though I have to find the flaw in this game he’s playing. I have to be reminded that he gets paid to play games. He’s competitive. He’s trying to win at this gauntlet we’ve set up for ourselves, and nothing more.
But I’m surprised at the cloud that takes over his expression at my words. “I’m far from perfect,” he mumbles, his eyes leaving mine for the ground. He looks smaller, like he’s channeling Ethan’s hopeless gaze from earlier.
I instantly want to take back whatever I’ve said that’s lost me that boom of a laugh. “I just mean . . . you’ve been so good with my family. You’re the best buffer a girl could ask for. I’m not sure I can live up to the standard you’ve set when I go to Christmas with your parents.”
He glances back up to me, and I breathe a sigh of relief at the small curve of his faint smile. “You’re already buffering for me too,” he says.
I don’t know what he means. But I also don’t want to burst the bubble of this day. I want to earn back everything that makes him expansive and bright. So I link my arm with his and say, “Come with me for more sufganiyot?”
And while we spend the evening side by side, I never get the courage to ask him the real question that’s lingering on my mind: What could a guy so perfect possibly need a buffer for?