L’Chaim

Note from the author: This story contains mature content.

The night before her flight to Sydney, Leah visits Coney Island Beach for the last time. Luna Park is still open for one more week of its summer season, but the beach is surprisingly empty. The moon is obscured by periwinkle clouds and the air feels thick, pregnant with an impending storm. Leah can hear the electrical hum of summer insects between the rhythm of shrieks from the Cyclone and Thunderbolt.

She removes her socks and shoes, and the sand is cold beneath her feet. It’s hard to run towards the ocean with her feet sliding and slipping and scratching against the grains, but she does it anyway. The breeze is salt and fish and a hint of something more pungent and sinister, perhaps a preview of the cold, gray months ahead. It doesn’t matter. She will be all the way across the world, in the “upside-down country,” as she used to call it when she was little.

Leah doesn’t slow down as she nears the Atlantic Ocean. She runs past the “No Swimming” sign, into the tide and inhales sharply as the freezing water shocks her senses. She sees a montage of her future: an outdoor wedding to a smiling figure who looks vaguely like her ex. Her own face on the cover of magazines when her music finally gets the recognition she knows it deserves. A large, modern house with French Windows and a kitchen island. The coldness of the water makes her feel giddy. And in that moment, she fully believes that her fantasies are possible.

A flash of bright white against the night catches her eye from her peripheral vision. There is someone in the water with her, too far away to see clearly. Leah makes her way slowly toward the unmoving figure, dirty water swirling around her toes. As she approaches, Leah sees that it’s a woman in a busy-patterned wedding dress. The dress is long-sleeved, with a full skirt and a giant bow just above the butt. The moving water tugs at the bottom of the dress, idly playing catch with the long train like a kid with a tennis ball. The bride’s hair is rust-colored and done up in a loose bun surrounded by braided crowns. A broken tiara hangs limply from the bride’s hand.

“Are you okay?” Leah calls out. No answer. She rushes up to the woman and examines her face. The woman’s eyes are as dead as last week’s roses. Mascara cuts lines across her face like dripping spray paint on an amateurish graffiti tag.

“Hey, do you need me to call the 911?” asks Leah. The woman turns her face slowly in Leah’s direction. Meets her gaze. She is like a puppet in a horror movie, and Leah feels goosebumps raise the hairs on her arms. But like a punch to the gut, Leah is hit with a realization. It’s Shoshana.

*********************************************************

Shoshana has pictured her wedding night many times over the past several weeks. She was the last one from her graduating high school class to get engaged, her classmates slowly dropping off the map of single life and popping up in similar Orthodox Jewish hotspots like Lakewood, Boca Raton, and Jerusalem. Some are still in Brooklyn, like her best friend, Pessy, for whom she just purchased a set of pink onesies in honor of the first baby girl after two boys.

Shoshana’s first date with Meir was exactly three months ago. He took her hiking in a large park in Queens. Unprepared for the outdoorsy nature of the outing, she wore a collared black dress, sheer tights, and heels. Meir bought her ice cream at a Jewish shop at the end of the date. She got chocolate; he got peanut butter.

“You have chocolate on your face,” he said. He pointed to his lip. Shoshana felt her upper lip, where there was a small, chocolate-colored mole. “Oh, wait, that’s not chocolate,” said Meir. He cleared his throat.

She was hesitant to agree to a second date after the persistent awkwardness of the first, but her mother convinced her to give him another chance.

“You’re not in the position to just say no to good boys for no reason,” said her mother. “You’re almost twenty-five! Did I every tell you about my first date with Abba? I sat on his hat! He left it on the passenger seat!”

“Yes, Mommy. You told me that story.”

For the second date, Meir took Shoshana to a hotel lobby in Manhattan. Shoshana prayed in her mind as Meir opened the car door for her. Please, Hashem, let this be the one. I’m so tired! Please give me a sign. Please give me clarity. Her palms felt sweaty, and she noticed that the ivory nail polish on her pinky finger was chipped. Her belly strained against the band of her gray Hanes underwear.

Maybe it was the caffeine in the Coke Zero Meir bought for her, or maybe it was just straight-up wish fulfillment, but Shoshana enjoyed that date more than she had enjoyed anything in a while. She liked how Meir’s blue eyes widened when she said anything off-color, and how he threw his head back when he laughed. She liked how he admitted an embarrassing secret: When he was thirteen years old, he spotted a pornographic image torn out of a magazine on the sidewalk and stood with his foot over the image until Shabbos was over so that he could carry it home. None of her previous dates had ever spoken about anything besides their families or yeshiva or various Judaism-related topics. His departure from the mainstream made her feel so close to him, a partner-in-crime.

On the eleventh date, he proposed to her in a cute little brunch place over cake and tea. When she said yes, everyone in the restaurant clapped and cheered. She felt a tinge in her stomach, as if she had just chugged a gallon of coffee. Was it regret? Excitement? Nervousness? Was this feeling normal? Things were moving so fast. She pictured herself pushing a stroller, a blue-eyed baby babbling inside. Her whole body felt too warm, the restaurant suddenly tight and warped.

“Lets go out for some air,” she said. They took a walk on the boardwalk by the harbor.

In the weeks leading up to the wedding, Shoshana went to her neighbor for kallah classes. The kallah teacher’s job was to teach her the Jewish marital laws in preparation for Shoshana’s Torah-abiding future with Meir.

“The goal of niddah laws is not to limit you, but to free you,” said her neighbor, Mrs. Feigenbaum, in the carpeted living room crowded with photos of Mrs. Feigenbaum’s many grandchildren. The all had the same too-small eyes as Mrs. Feigenbaum. “When you have time away from your husband, you feel more excited to be with him again. The time that you have your period is for building a powerful spiritual bond with your husband. You do this by taking a break from indulging in physical relations. You know it’s time to get to the mikvah to purify yourself and get ready for relations after there is a full week with no blood stains in your underwear. You will wear white underwear in order to see if you’re still staining. If you have discharge but you are not sure if it’s blood--”

Shoshana tuned out at this point, distracted by a wave of nausea that radiated from her throat to her belly like a leaping frog. She had never even seen male genitalia before. She pictured large, protruding purple organs, like the tentacles of an octopus. She had tried not to think about it during her dates with Meir, but right now it was impossible not to confront the stark ugliness of married life. A married life that revolved around counting the days when she could have sex again, the whole community knowledgeable about her cycles and sex life based on her visits to the local mikvah.

It was too late to change her mind. Cream-colored wedding invitations were mailed out to Shoshana’s cousins, aunts, uncles, family friends, high school classmates, seminary friends, co-workers. To Meir’s rabbis, relatives, yeshiva friends. A total of almost four hundred guests. Shoshana bought the first dress she tried on. It was hideous. A mocking ode to virginal beauty.

“You look gorgeous! I’ll have it tailored to be a bit smaller,” said the saleslady. “Kallahs usually lose a few pounds before the wedding.” This felt like a suggestion more than a considerate gesture. What did her weight matter? Her friend Pessy’s body had been lean and smooth before childbirth. Now Pessy was cycling from diet to diet, trying to lose the “baby fat.” Who was Pessy trying to look good for? Her absent-minded husband whose primary concerns were learning Torah and spotting local sales on tuna cans? What was the point?

The wedding day arrived with the speed of a bullet train. Late summer, a cloudy night. Shoshana recalled the superstition that if you opened an umbrella indoors, it would rain on your wedding night. The wedding was at a hall in Boro Park.

“OMG, you look stunning! Mazal tov!” said Pessy, kissing her on the cheek as Shoshana sat in a large decorated throne. Shoshana forced her lips to turn upward.

“Stay with me,” said Shoshana, her throat hurting from the strain of holding back tears. “Don’t leave me.”

Pessy cupped Shoshana’s chin in her palm. “What happened?”

Shoshana was overheating in the glow of a metaphorical spotlight. She blinked rapidly. Her mother hovered nearby, moving ever closer like a homing pigeon.

“Can you help me go to the bathroom?” she said to Pessy. “This dress is so long.”

“Of course!” Pessy helped Shoshana out of the chair and hailed Shoshana’s other close friend, Miriam. Miriam grabbed Shoshana’s arm, and they escorted her through the crowd towards the women’s bathroom. Some older ladies in identical modest skirt-suits stopped them on the way to congratulate Shoshana. She received ten Mazal Tovs on the way to the bathroom. She felt like punching every one of her well-wishers.

Pessy and Miriam helped Shoshana lift her dress so she could pee.

“You know what, guys? It’s okay. Go back to the wedding and enjoy,” said Shoshana. “I’ll be okay.”

“Are you sure?” asked Pessy. Shoshana nodded for them to leave. Once her friends were out, Shoshana looked at her own underwear again, her gut sinking. A blooming bloodstain the size of a silver dollar marked the center of the white cotton. Her period on the night of the wedding. She knew what would happen now, as per Mrs. Feigenbaum’s dutiful instructions. She would not be able to spend the night with Meir. They would have to notify the rabbi. She was impure. It wasn’t as if she had ever wanted to have sex with Meir in the first place. The thought carried an unspeakable repulsion. It was the continued involvement of strange men in her intimate affairs that really spiked her blood pressure.

“I AM SO SICK OF THIS BULLSHIT!” she shouted. There was no one in the bathroom to hear her. Her voice echoed hollowly in the enclosure of beige tile. The wedding music boomed outside the bathroom. She had never said a bad word before. It felt foreign on her lips, like a new flavor of gummy candy.

A breeze came in from the window near the ceiling of the bathroom. Shoshana was petite and flat-chested. She could easily fit through that window. Maybe even in a wedding dress. Her mother had tried to discourage her from wearing sneakers to the wedding, even though the dress would cover them. Now she was glad she had not listened. Shoshana hoisted herself onto the counter, careful not to step into the sink. In a rush of adrenaline, she pulled herself to the window ledge and wriggled out. Her dress snagged and tore on the window.

A few bearded men headed to the wedding stopped in their tracks and stared at her. She froze, then lifted her dress and took off at a run. She boarded the Coney Island-bound N train after rushing into the exit gate past a woman who was pushing out a stroller. She ignored the stares of the teenagers and the elderly Russian ladies. The dim light of the train had never felt brighter. She was free. No money and nowhere to go.

*********************************************************

Leah and Shoshana stay frozen in the ocean for several minutes, the churning water nipping at their legs.

“Hi Leah,” says Shoshana weakly. She pronounces it the old way, the Hebrew way, like “Lay-uh.”

“Hey, Shosh.” Leah reaches out, takes Shoshana’s hands in her own. Shoshana doesn’t pull away.

“I’ve got you,” Leah’s shiny eyes say in the dark, though her pale lips remain tightly shut.

“I’m lost and scared,” Shoshana’s eyes say back.

“AAAAAHHHHHH!” say the roller-coaster riders from a distance.

Gurgle, gurgle, says the ocean.

Shoshana crumples, sits down in the water. Leah sits next to her, the chill awakening her senses like a stimulant. The waves knock them around, and Shoshana lets out a shrieking laugh before getting dunked fully underwater by the tide. The dress billows over the head, and she emerges, coughing. A fine spray hits Leah’s face as Shoshana splashes her, laughing and crying.

Eight years, Leah thinks. It’s been eight years. She remembers the day in eleventh grade when she was called into the principal’s office and kicked out of school after having been caught smoking weed with a group of non-Jewish kids on Shabbos. What the principal never knew, what no one at school ever found out, was that Shoshana was also there that Friday night in the park. She was the one who had rolled the joint, clicked the lighter near Leah’s mouth, the fingers of her left hand grazing Leah’s chest. The had both worn ripped Gap skinny jeans, the ultimate mark of rebellion. A couple of the boys had whooped when Shoshana pressed her lips against Leah’s.

Leah never found who ratted her out to the school, or why Shoshana was never found out. On the Monday morning following the kiss in the park, Leah caught Shoshana’s eye after exiting the principal’s office for the last time. Shoshana’s red hair was two French braids, and she wore a Hebrew necklace above the collar of her uniform shirt. She looked so beautiful. Did she even realize her own beauty? Shoshana quickly looked away and turned back to her friend Pessy, her smile wavering for just one second. Leah left the building. Got a job as a server in a cafe. Enrolled in public school. Dated girls and boys. Had three serious relationships, ended them all. She never saw Shoshana again. Until now.

“Do you go to this beach a lot?” asks Shoshana. Even with her hair matted to her head, she looks beautiful, Leah thinks. A beautiful stranger.

“Yeah. Most days. I live nearby,” says Leah. “But I’m moving soon. I got a remote job, and I’ll be in Australia for a while.”

“Oh.” Shoshana’s face betrays nothing.

“I never knew that I was starving till I tasted you,” plays from from the direction of the boardwalk.

“You like Hailee Steinfeld?” asks Leah.

“Who?” says Shoshana.

A beat of silence.

“I’m starving, ” says Shoshana. “I haven’t eaten all day.”

“I’ll buy you a hot dog.” Leah puts her arm around Shoshana. The promise of non-Kosher food brings a spark into Shoshana’s eyes that reminds Leah of the night they smoked and kissed in the park in Midwood. Shoshana has no shoes or socks on. The planks must feel so rough against her feet. Leah lifts Shoshana, light and swift.

Shoshana giggles. “You’re crazy!” she says. “Put me down!”

A passing couple smiles at Leah and Shoshana.

“Congratulations,” says the dyed-blond woman with a thick Russian accent.

They think we just got married, Leah thinks.

“Thanks!” says Shoshana. “Wooooo! My wife!” She hops down and lets Leah twirl her around.

Leah’s flight will be leaving in less than twelve hours. She will start a new life far away. No more Coney Island. No more Brooklyn. No more Shoshana. But for this moment, in the embrace of the night air with the kiss of the ocean salt still clinging to her tongue, Leah can live the life that could have been. If Shoshana had made a different choice. If Shoshana had not told on her to the principal. Because deep down, Leah knows it was Shoshana who ratted her out, who got Leah kicked out of school for being a “bad influence on the other girls.” There is no other logical explanation. Leah will never forget that terrified look on Shoshana’s face the night of the kiss. That look of desperation to reverse time and return to familiar territory. She has already forgiven Shoshana for her betrayal. That was easy to do.

Leah and Shoshana share three hot dogs from Nathan’s, strolling down the sidewalk. The ocean has made them hungry.

“So you’re leaving,” says Shoshana.

Leah says nothing. Waits.

“I’m sorry,” says Shoshana, her voice wavering. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry.”

“It’s yourself you need to be sorry for,” says Leah. The roar of the train passing overhead drowns out her words.