Betty bet Nannie would have done anything to get her parents to stay in South Haven.
Not Betty.
She learned one thing from her parents—the one thing she’d never do: abandon a child. She gulped a mouthful of air and scolded herself.
“Self-pity isn’t pretty,” Nannie would have said.
Nannie, inspecting the rosebud-embroidered challah cover, was right: Betty couldn’t really pity herself when she had full-time doting grandparents and a revolving door of quasi aunts, uncles, and cousins three months a year.
Mrs. Goldblatt pulled off her right glove, finger by finger, revealing a double-strand iridescent pearl bracelet with a diamond clasp. Her wrist, as slim and fragile as a chicken wing, didn’t seem strong enough to support it, belying Mrs. Gallbladder’s reputation. Then she smoothed her napkin between her thumb and forefinger, no doubt planning for her evening snack. A few tables away, Betty noticed Marv in a fashionable black suit with narrow lapels, looking more dapper than she’d have expected. He stroked his chin. She looked at the Teitelbaum table to avoid his gaze, rather than be rude should he glance her way. She’d dodged crossing Marv’s path since he’d trailed off after Eleanor on the beach two nights ago. How easily boys were distracted.
A reverent hum swirled around the room like a distant swarm of bees. Soon all the adults had settled in their seats and the children had been shushed. An anticipatory silence signaled the start of Shabbos as brashly as cymbals.
Nannie and Betty stood.
“Good Shabbos.” Nannie turned to greet all her guests. Betty’s grandmother was as at ease in the spotlight as a pinup on a poster.
“Good Shabbos” reverberated through the dining room as the women and girls at each table pushed back their chairs and stood to say the prayer over the candles set out for each family. This was one thing the men couldn’t do. Oh, there were other things, of course, but women striking matchsticks on the surfaces of matchboxes distracted Betty. Flames glittered. Nannie struck a match and set the wicks aglow on their smooth white candles. She circled her hands over them three times, and then shielded her eyes.
In faux contemplation, Betty squinted at the basket chandelier hanging above the table. Her thoughts had already skedaddled to the kitchen, where Abe, in his waiter’s white tails, would be gathering soup-filled bowls for his table and balancing a silver tray on his shoulder with his hand. The flickering candlelight rebounded off the crystals like a pinball, from praying to playing and back again. The female voices blended to bless the Sabbath. As Nannie recited the ancient prayer in Hebrew, Betty lifted her palms to her face and whispered along in disobedient unison.
Dear God,
If you could possibly have Abe waiting
the way he did last night,
I’ll take it
from there.
And let us say amen.
As dinner dishes were cleared, Betty lifted the edge of her glove to uncover the coral-gold face of a wristwatch that had once belonged to her mother. The color reminded Betty of apricot and strawberry jams mixed together—more orange than pink or more pink than orange, depending on the light. She couldn’t deny its beauty and hadn’t the strength to decline the gift. She’d admired it each time she’d seen Tillie wear it over the past decade. Her mother must have noticed. The watch had arrived special delivery the day before Betty’s graduation with a note that read, “Time flies. Happy graduation. Affectionately, Tillie and Joe.” Her parents weren’t known for their sentimentality, yet Betty preferred to think of the Hamilton as an heirloom rather than a hand-me-down, something she could show off.
The minute hand suspended between the X and the XI. One, maybe two minutes had passed since the last time she’d looked, and it would be a lifetime until she was excused from the Shabbos table. As Betty bounced her knee like a jackhammer, the napkin on her lap slid toward the floor. Nannie whisked it away before it fell.
“Abe is working,” Nannie whispered. “And shaking us all won’t change that.”
Heat rose all the way up Betty’s cheeks. Abe set plates of apple cake and cookies onto his table on the other side of the room. It was the same table he would serve three meals a day, all summer.
For the first two weeks Abe had waited on the Mason family, and when they departed for St. Louis tomorrow morning they would be replaced by the Tisch family. The Tisches would stay through July Fourth.
“Maybe the girls want to play a game of hearts with you after dinner.” Nannie nodded once toward the twins. There was no music, no skit, no scheduled entertainment on Friday nights, so the guests played cards and board games or headed back to their cabins earlier than usual. Zaide said Shabbos was reserved for family time. Unless you were a waiter.
“I have plans tonight, Nannie. You said it was okay.”
“You have plans?” Zaide placed his hands on his hips, and even while seated it was an imposing stance. Or it would have been if Betty didn’t know he was a big pussycat who cherished her. “Does that mean I get a rain check for our Friday night Scrabble game?” he asked.
“Oh, Zaide, I’m sorry.”
Betty should have asked to be excused from the table while everyone devoured their apple cake. She remembered Marv had said it was his favorite. Betty whispered to their waiter to wrap a big slice in wax paper and hand it to him before he left the dining room. It was something Zaide would
