Brooklyn Love (Crimson Romance)

by Yael Levy

  Daniel shrugged, stepping on the gas. “I work hard. I earn the money. I deserve the best.”

  “I thought God determines what people deserve.”

  Daniel controlled the wheel, leaving Brooklyn behind them, heading for the big city. “What’s the average salary for artists?” he asked.

  “Not much.” Rachel answered. “I do it because I love it.”

  “Guess the average starting salaries for Columbia Law graduates. Starting salaries for this year. It goes up, mind you.”

  Rachel shook her head. “I have no idea.”

  “A lot. Before taxes. Any idea what my salary will be when I make partner?”

  Rachel frowned. “Why is this important?”

  “I’ll be making money.”

  Rachel gazed out the window at the streetlights gracing the West Side Highway. It occurred to her that she wasn’t having a good time. She also knew that most of her friends would give their eyeteeth to be out with a catch like Daniel Gold. She knew her parents had struggled financially for many years of their marriage, and God had blessed them with financial ease at this point in time. But Rachel had always been brought up to know that the cycle of blessings turns, and like everything else, money comes and goes.

  “Money is a blessing from God. To use for good deeds,” she said finally. “You can’t get caught up pursuing it. Worshipping it.” She didn’t expect to challenge Daniel, but somehow she couldn’t help it.

  Daniel turned the radio on. Rachel recognized the song and thought that the timing was uncanny; it was “If I Had a Million Dollars” by Barenaked Ladies. “I deserve the best money can buy,” he repeated. “And I intend to have it. My spouse has to understand that about me.” He turned the volume up, and music blared out the windows. Neither spoke.

  When they got to the West Side, Daniel parked in a garage. He took his parking ticket, and they walked silently toward the comedy club. Creative displays enlivened the storefronts as they walked along West 81st, and pungent aromas emanated from a candle shop. Rachel watched as a cab pulled up to the curb and a man in a tux exited, holding the hand of an attractive blond woman in an elegant evening gown.

  “You S.O.B,” the pretty lady slurred. “If you ever look at her again, I swear I’ll sue you for every freaking penny.”

  The man in the tux turned red in the face.

  “Isn’t this a great atmosphere?” Daniel exclaimed, striding ahead. “I love the sophistication of the city. The power.”

  Rachel shrugged. “I guess it’s okay.”

  “Just okay? This must be the most exciting place in the country. In the world!”

  “It’s nice,” Rachel agreed, “once in a while. But there’s more to life.” Was she out of line?

  Daniel turned back to stare at her. “Like what?” he challenged.

  Rachel met Daniel’s eyes, surprised by the boldness of her response. “Like love. Good friends. Family. Doing nice things for other people.”

  They watched a group of twenty-somethings entering a café. They were all smiling and laughing, all the while avoiding each other’s eyes. It reminded Rachel of the kiddushes in her shul, where a guy would approach to chat, simultaneously glancing to see if there was a better deal out there waiting for him. A prettier girl, a better catch. His true basherte, the one he deserved.

  “Daniel!” called a voice from the crowd.

  Daniel smiled. “It’s Frisch,” he told Rachel. He slapped his old friend on the back. “Happy birthday, buddy.”

  “Who’s the chick, Gold? You always did have the finest taste.”

  Rachel blushed.

  “This is my, uh, friend, Rachel Shine.”

  “Very pleased to meet you,” Frisch crooned with a devilish grin.

  Daniel introduced the group of friends, and they got a table. The lights started to dim, so they quickly ordered drinks. A blond lady in a T-shirt and ripped jeans got on stage and began her routine. Her eyes were bloodshot and she looked tired. But her jokes were funny and Rachel laughed, her mood suddenly elevated. Daniel sat still, showing the emotion of a stone wall.

  “What’s wrong?” Rachel whispered.

  “It’s so low-class, those jokes. I don’t find them amusing,” Daniel answered stiffly.

  “What do you expect at a comedy club?”

  The blond comedienne picked up on the exchange between Rachel and Daniel.

  “Are you guys Jewish?” she started. “I see that beanie on your head. So either you’re Jewish or the Pope. And the way you’re looking at that girl, I’d have to say you aren’t the Pope!”

  Daniel’s friends laughed, taking the jabs good-naturedly. They were religious, too, and were having fun listening to a great comedienne. Daniel’s face reddened with humiliation.

  “My ex-husband was Jewish,” the comedienne continued as everybody chuckled.

  “It’s time to leave,” Daniel commanded. He stood up and briskly walked out the door. Rachel shyly said goodbye to Daniel’s friends, who were howling with laughter at the jokes, and then ran after Daniel.

  “What’s going on?” She followed him into the cold air.

  “I was not going to sit there and be mocked,” Daniel replied stiffly.

  “She wasn’t mocking you. She was just telling jokes. That’s her job. Everybody else found her funny.” Rachel stopped to catch her breath.

  “I didn’t,” he said. “Let’s go,” he insisted, hurrying away from the club.

  Rachel clutched her purse and scurried after him in her heels. “If you don’t want your Judaism singled out, why go to a club and sit near the stage wearing a yarmulke?” she contested, keeping up his pace.

  “Do you always have to be so damn self-righteous?” he snapped.

  “Who’s being self-righteous? You didn’t even say goodbye to your friends.”

  Daniel stopped walking and glared at her. “I’ve had enough. Let me take you home,” he said flatly.

  He did not utter one more word as he sullenly drove Rachel back to her narrow Brooklyn home.

  • • •

  Leah’s eyes glazed over as Chaim Nudle described the perfect way to make his favorite dish — mashed potatoes. She wanted to bang her head into the wall. The longer he droned on, the more she felt like banging his head into the wall. They sat in the lounge of New York’s Hilton Hotel, surrounded by tourists and other Jewish kids on dates, dressed in their finest, drinking sodas and wondering about their futures.

  “So where do you want to live?” Chaim asked, pausing as if to take notes on her answers.

  “I want to live far, far away from Brooklyn. Very, very far.”

  “So, like, Monsey?”

  “That’s only an hour from New York. Farther.”

  “Where else is there?”

  Leah thought about Rachel’s yetzer hara. “Somalia.”

  Chaim gasped. “The matchmaker never said you wanted to live in Somalia.”

  “I do. I’ve always wanted to live on another continent.” Poor Chaim. He looked positively stricken. But he seemed to consider the proposition.

  “I don’t know if I can live in Africa,” he finally said.

  “I guess I should also tell you that I really don’t want to be a computer programmer, either. I want to be a doctor and set up a health clinic.” At least some of what she said was true.

  Chaim nodded thoughtfully, taking in the news. “Aren’t the conditions in Somalia a little … remote?”

  The view beyond the hotel held the glamour of New York: imposing buildings, bright lights, and harried pedestrians. But for all intents and purposes, Leah felt like she was in jail. Her sweater was making her feel itchy all over, and when Chaim asked her how many kids she hoped to have, she hurriedly excused herself to the bathroom.

  It was now their t
hird date. Maximum for a Brooklyn match was six. Nervous kids took eight. Out-of-towners ten, maybe even twelve. But in Brooklyn, you had to know by the third date which way the relationship was going to go.

  She knew which way she wanted to go: home.

  She tried not to hyperventilate. She knew how much her mother wanted this Chaim because he’d learned Talmud for a year, and her mom could tell everybody that they were respectable. They’d tried so hard to impress him! Later Chaim would go to work — but there was no way Leah could live with him. He was like a metal fork on a chalkboard, irritating to the point of no description. But she also knew that Zusha was waiting in the wings. With his ukulele.

  “Dear God,” she prayed in the foyer near the bathroom, “I don’t need my basherte. I don’t even want him. I don’t have to wait around for the right guy. I’ll do fine without him. But please, God, I need a guy that my parents will let me marry who doesn’t make me want to vomit. Please!”

  She asked a girl waiting on line if she could borrow her cell phone for a minute. Without thinking, she dialed the number she had already memorized. “Jacob? This is Leah.”

  “Hi there. Can I help you?”

  “Yeah. Uh, no. It’s me, Leah.”

  “Right. Leah?”

  “Leah Bloom. You know, from college.”

  “Oh, right. That’s a great class, eh?”

  Leah sighed. “I’m the girl with the curly red hair.”

  “Oh, right. I know who you are — Leah Bloom. With the curly red hair.”

  “You have no idea who I am, do you?”

  “Uh, no. Not really. No. I’m sorry.”

  “It’s been almost a semester and we share notes. What more do I have to do?”

  “Okay, I think I missed something. Wait — you’re in my chemistry class?”

  Chaim Nudle came looking for Leah, clucking and jerking his head like a hen.

  “Oh, blast it. I have to go,” said Leah.

  “Right.” Jacob hung up. Leah handed the girl her cell phone and thanked her. Clearly she’d been listening to Leah’s conversation, but Leah didn’t care.

  “Are you okay?” Chaim asked. “I was getting worried about you.”

  “I’m fine.”

  “That’s good.” Chaim giggled, ending with a little snort. “I wouldn’t have wanted to search for you inside the ladies’ room.”

  “No, you wouldn’t.”

  “I mean, I thought maybe you got swallowed by the toilet!” Chaim guffawed at his own joke.

  Leah let herself be escorted back to their table. She looked around at the other dates and wondered if they could all just switch. It would make the whole dating thing a lot easier.

  Chaim kept laughing at his toilet joke.

  At least someone is having a good time, she thought.

  • • •

  Hindy Goldfarb was spending her Saturday night after Shabbos like she spent every Saturday night. Alone. Although she lived with her parents and seven younger siblings, even among this boisterous crowd, she always felt alone. For the past three years it had been the same routine. All week she worked as a bookkeeper in Manhattan, then she came home and helped her mother with chores: cooking, cleaning, bathing the little ones and putting them to bed. Hindy didn’t mind the work. She just wished it were for her own home, her own children.

  After the house settled down at night, Hindy would volunteer her time at different charitable organizations, like tutoring kids in math when they couldn’t afford one. Visiting the sick. Sewing gowns for financially challenged brides. Cooking meals for the elderly and infirm. Checking in on her own grandparents daily. And twice a week after volunteering, she’d go to lectures on Jewish Ethics, given by her rabbi.

  She was a twenty-three-year-old bookkeeper with every minute accounted for. She’d be completely satisfied if it weren’t for the lack of a husband. And while she felt the pangs of loneliness, she always had support from her family and friends, which was more than many others had in life.

  But this Saturday night she felt terribly lonely. Most of the girls from her high school class were already married, and now the younger crop was all getting married, too. Her sister Shayna was on her first date tonight. Rachel was seeing somebody; she would be getting engaged soon. Leah was on a date, too. Not that she was jealous, but she was anxious for herself. The pretty girls always went first. Most of her friends were already married and pushing baby carriages. Would she ever have a turn?

  She finished putting her younger siblings to bed and realized that what she needed was a good soak in a hot bath.

  She studied herself in the mirror for the second time that day, this time in the bathroom. No, she didn’t look cute like Rachel or spunky like Leah. She was short, she was fat, and she was balding. Hindy noticed a red zit breaking through on her stubby nose, unsure of why she was still getting acne. It was the last straw. She burst out crying and ran to the bedroom that she shared with her two younger sisters. Alone in the room, she sobbed into her pillow. It hurt to be so alone, with no hope.

  While Shayna was on her date, her other little sister, Freidy, was at a lecture on Psalms in Borough Park. Freidy was very religious, often reciting Psalms. Maybe that’s what I should do, too, Hindy thought. She took out her white leather-bound book of tear-stained psalms, and though she was filled with pain — grief that she was ugly, getting older, and had no hope for a husband — she recited each word. God help her. There was nobody she could turn to, nobody who could fully hear her despair, and nobody who could help her other than God.

  Shayna was three years younger than Hindy, and their parents had just agreed to let her start dating. They’d held Shayna back as long as they could, hoping Hindy would get married first. But even they were realizing that Hindy’s opportunities were limited. At least Shayna should get married. Hindy wanted her sisters to marry, but she also knew how embarrassing it would be should Shayna marry first.

  Shayna was short like Hindy, but instead of being fat, her figure was full in a curvy, voluptuous sort of way. Her features were more defined than Hindy’s, and she had pretty blond hair. Where Hindy was gentle and simple, Shayna was gregarious, boisterous, and flashy. Where Hindy was sweet and kind, Shayna had always been as selfish and as spoiled as a poor girl could be, and even a little nasty at times. But Shayna was pretty and Hindy was not. And on this lonely Saturday night, Shayna had a date with a Brooklyn boy, and Hindy did not.

  The phone rang. Hindy let it ring. Someone else would pick it up, and she needed to bare her heart to God. She cried and prayed until her energy was spent. Then she collapsed, falling asleep on her bed.

  • • •

  “Hindy? Are you in your room?” She heard her mother’s voice gently call as she awoke, still a bit dazed from her slumber.

  Chaya Goldfarb knocked softly and entered her daughter’s room. She was wearing a fuzzy blue robe and a kerchief covering her hair. Her cheeks were flushed a deep pink, her eyes aflame. Hindy sat up, wondering why her mother seemed so excited; nothing ever ruffled her.

  “Hindy,” her mother said, “I was looking all over for you. I have some news.”

  Short and round like her daughter Hindy, Chaya Goldfarb had put the weight on after having a few kids, and she hadn’t started to lose her hair until she was already married. Hindy was almost a clone of her mother; besides appearances, they shared the same pragmatism, and the same sweetness and capability.

  “Hindy, you got a call for a match!” exclaimed Chaya Goldfarb as she sat down on Hindy’s bed. “From Rebbitzen Kaplinsky!”

  Hindy burst into a smile and blushed a deep red. The boys were always approached first for a match, so that meant that some yeshiva boy somewhere had agreed to see her. She was going to have a date!

  “I met the rebbitzen in the hospital,” she told her mother. “She said she wa
nted to set me up, but I never dreamed she would call so quickly. I never imagined she’d have somebody in mind for me!” Or that whomever the rebbitzen had in mind would actually agree to a date, given that once he’d checked her out, he’d find out that she was fat and ugly and poor. Maybe the boy had some major impediment. Maybe he was handicapped, or mentally ill. But if the rebbitzen was behind the match, she didn’t care if he was a zombie — she would see him.

  “How’d they check us out so fast?” Hindy asked.

  Her mother leaned over on a fluffy pillow, her face beaming. “The rebbitzen said she didn’t need to check. That she met you, she knows you. She heard we are a nice family, and that was good enough checking.”

  Bewildered, Hindy fingered the Psalms she had used to pray from.

  Her mother continued. “You see what happens when you are kind and go to visit the sick? God rewards you. Your marriage might come from all this — just because you are a sweetheart.”

  “What are the boy’s details? Do you have to check him out?” Hindy asked, clutching her Psalms. Her heart pounded. What could be wrong with him that the rebbitzen thought they should meet? Who would the rebbitzen consider to be her basherte?

  “No. We don’t need to check,” replied her mother.

  Hindy frowned. Was it so bad that checking wasn’t necessary? Was the boy an ex-convict?

  Her mother continued. “He’ll be calling you tomorrow. His name is Shimshon Kaplinsky.”

  Hindy laughed. Her mother could be so funny.

  Her mother held her hand. “He’s twenty-three. He’s the grandson of the rebbitzen.”

  “Mama, please. I got the joke.”

  Hindy’s mother gazed at her daughter; the one she had always said had a beautiful soul. “Oh, but Hindy, I’m not joking. I think the rebbitzen truly sees you for the person you are.”

  Hindy paled. Could this really be true? Everyone knew of Shimshon Kaplinsky. He was handsome, he was brilliant — and out of all his many relatives, he was the one being groomed to be the next head of the Kaplinsky Yeshiva. He was from real yichus, a famous and honorable family. He was the biggest catch in the sea. He could ask for any girl in the community. The richest, the prettiest. The rebbitzen knew many girls and had chosen ugly Hinda Bracha Goldfarb for her precious Shimshon.