The Matzo Ball Heiress (18 page)

“The
kreplach
are excellent, Jared, don’t you think?” Sarah pronounces the end “chh” with an authentic-sounding guttural tone. Years of Hebrew school? “But tonight, the two of us are going to split a tongue sandwich,” she continues.

I’m not so intimidated by her striking beauty anymore. Away from the sunlight you can see her enviable multicolored eyes are flanked by premature crow’s-feet. And I can see why Jared bristled when she saw us in the street; her icy personality brings her way down the appeal index. And this is her trying to be on good behavior. She motions to her fiancé to get up and say hello to us.

“This is my ex,” she says to Uzi.

Uzi fixes the bobby pin securing the
yarmulke
to his hair so that it sits farther back on his head. Most women would call him attractive, but to me his forehead is so high and his teeth so large and bright that I can’t help thinking of his uncanny resemblance to Donny Osmond. “Nice to meet you,” he says to both of us after an uncomfortable but huge smile.

“Jared’s a cameraman for the Food Channel,” Sarah says.

“Do you know Emeril?”

“Different network,” says Jared. I get the feeling he gets asked that a lot.

“Oh,” Uzi says, disappointed. “Well, can you answer a food question for me?”

“I can try.”

Uzi clears his throat: “I was thinking about this yesterday over pizza with anchovies. We gut big fish. When we eat little fish, are we eating the guts too?” Amused with himself, he flicks out his long pink tongue as he awaits Jared’s answer.

Jared pauses uncomfortably. “I’ve never thought—”

A humiliated Sarah quickly starts stroking Uzi’s shoulder. “You’re such a clown. This is Heather. What did you say your last name was?”

“She didn’t,” Jared says.

“Greenblotz,” I say.

Sarah raises her eyebrows.

“Like the matzo?” Uzi says.

“Yes,” Jared answers for me.

“Well, isn’t that perfect,” Sarah says.

“Uzi’s a doctor,” she adds quickly, before I have a chance to think too much about her cryptic words.

Uzi looks at Sarah with a curious expression on his face.

“Well, that’s a bit of a stretch, Sarah.”

“What sort of doctor?” Jared asks.

“He has a Ph.D. in trombone. He’s a…musicologist.”

“A trombone doctor? That I never heard of,” says a husky voice. Up periscope. We have an eavesdropper: a sixty-something man seated diagonally from Jared and me with a comical Einstein shock of gray hair and a huge gut bulging out of his blue sweater.

Sarah turns to our uninvited guest with considerable venom. “If you’re going to butt in on our conversation, at least you should know what you’re talking about. Uzi got his Ph.D. at Juilliard, so he has every right to call himself a doctor.”

Our nosy neighbor waves his hand as an apology to Sarah, but facing us smiles with a definite glint of glee. Then he smiles broadly to the waitress bringing a can of cherry soda and a glass of ice to his table. “With you, sugar, I always get good service. On a scale of one to ten, always a ten.”

He turns to Jared and whispers loudly, “With the other one never more than a two.”

The elderly waitress, whose name tag says Diane, smiles and taps Uzi on the shoulder. “You ready to order, honey?”

“Excuse me,” Uzi says after another blinding flash of his overbleached teeth, as he flies back to his seat. “I’m starving.” The waitress plunks down a plate of pickles and a basket of bread on Sarah and Uzi’s table. Uzi’s lips move in prayer before he lunges for a green pickled tomato. He downs it in two fast gulps and then reaches for a roll. “I’ll have the stuffed cabbage as an appetizer. And we’re going to split a tongue sandwich and one order of fries.”

“There’s a surcharge for splitting, honey,” waitress Diane says.

“Yes, I know.”

Jared points out another customer’s lime-green can of soda. “That’s deli champagne. Cel-Ray.”

“I vaguely recall my grandfather used to drink that.”

It’s incredible—Sarah is still trying to hear what we’re saying and not at all discreetly. She leans back and says with a dose of acid, “Having fun?”

Jared puffs his cheeks out and lets the air out of them before addressing her. “What’s in the Bendel’s bag? Big sale?”

“God, how you want to know everything!”

“I’m trying to be polite here. What did you score? Ten pairs of sandals?”

“Was that facetious?”

“Not at all.”

“Borrowed tools,” Sarah says curtly. “I’m taking them back home.”

“Tools?”
Jared says cuttingly. “Who borrows tools?”

“My sister,” Sarah says.

“And how is Shira?”

“Not that you ever liked her, but since you asked, she switched her master’s degree to concrete sculpture, so she won’t be done for another year. She’s working on a lifesize interpretation of Lot’s wife.”

Jared signals to the waitress that he is ready to order. “Give her my regards.”

Our waitress shifts her attention to our table. “What are you having?”

“One brisket sandwich on seeded rye, two matzo ball soups.”

“Gotcha. Anything to drink?”

“A Cel-Ray for me. What about you, Heather?”

“Diet Coke, please.”

Sarah will not look away. “I didn’t know you had such a
stockpile
of tools,” Jared says finally.

“Under the kitchen sink,” Sarah says, “there’s a little
stockpile
. The little
tool
area.” She turns to me. “And what do you do?”

“I’m a documentary maker,” I say as neutrally as possible.

“What have you documented?”

“Sarah—” Jared says.

“My company was just filming a new HBO movie at the natural history museum.”

“That must be fun.”

“It’s fun, though it’s tough work.”

“I’d love to leave my office for a little
jaunt
to the American Museum of Natural History.”

Jaunt you
, I think.

Uzi says, loudly, “Sarah, are you going to eat?”

“In a minute.” She looks straight into my eyes. “So what is the number-one place you’d really like to document?”

“I’d like to get the scoop on heaven,” I say.

“Oh? Even if Jews don’t believe in heaven?” She raises an eyebrow.

“No?” I say.

“You don’t know that?” she says incredulously.

Jared rushes into rescue mode. “Heather, what do you think would be waiting for you in heaven if you could go there?”

“A lot of pillows and mattresses,” I say. “Lots of chocolate cake, but no repercussions—no feeling sick, no gaining weight.”

“Is heaven then instant gratification?” Jared asks.

“No,
no
,” I reply. “I guess that would just be the environment. There would be stimuli too. Lots of books.”

“Who would be there?” Uzi puts in, looking genuinely interested in the conversation now that his stomach has been tended to.

“Interesting people,” I say.

Sarah is bored. She is not getting the reaction she wanted, whatever that is. She grabs a sour pickle off her table, and suggestively takes a bite. “Did you hear Gordon Katz is marrying Mandy?”

“Who’s Mandy again?” Jared is visibly impatient.

“Mandy with the big jaw.”

“Oh, her. What do you have against her? Her jaw is not that big. I liked her a lot. And last I heard, she was learning how to teach ballet under Baryshnikov’s tutelage.”

“You can’t get cooler than that,” I pipe up.

Jared smiles toward me. “Yes. You’ve gotta kiss the ring.”

Uzi laughs despite the risks.

Sarah’s head is a bobbing ball of anger. “There’s nothing cool about the situation. She’s not converting—their children will grow up
nishkin
here,
nishkin
there. They’ll light a Hanukkah candle or two and spend their days eating
traif
. And his father is a famous cantor. It gives me the shudders.”

“What does
nishkin
mean?” I say to Sarah a bit sadistically.

“Neither here nor there,” Jared answers for her quickly.

Sarah looks at me again intently with her magnificent eyes. “Are you really from the matzo family, or just have the same name?”

“My cousin who runs the factory is kosher,” I white-lie. I’m not sure why on earth I just volunteered that. Nervousness? To piss this bitch off? I take a small gulp of air and say, “But I’m not.”

My Russian-roulette gamble on honesty comes back and shoots me in the face. “With your bloodline? That’s terrible.”

Jared looks right at his ex as he says to me, “Heather, would you like anyone to go to a traditional version of hell?”

“No,” I say. “I’d want them to go to oblivion.”

Sarah talks past me to the gefilte fish that got away: “This is who you are dating? You with your speeches about the need to preserve our culture. ‘The
yiddishkeit
is dying.’ Ring a bell?”

“Sarah, you are way out of line.”

They stare at each other, at daggers drawn. This time I keep mum. I’ve poured enough fuel on the fire, and this fight between ex-lovers is way out of my province.

Our nosy neighbor’s cell phone rings to the tune of “Hava Nagilah,” which even I know is the basic issue Jewish song for family get-togethers. “Yeah?—W?—eight letters?—Who diddy—nah, don’t worry about it, you got me in with the internist. He did a good job by the way, stretched my ball bag out like a square, got right to the root of the problem—okay, see you at the
bar mitzvah
.” He hangs up and sees me looking at him and says, “Everyone calls me for the puzzle. I should start charging.”

“Our culture is our marrow,” Sarah continues after more scary head bobs and an equally disturbing staccato laugh. “In ten years the whole language will be dead. Isn’t that what you said?”

I have to shut this loon up. “I think you’ve made a wrong assumption, Sarah. We’re not dating. Jared and I are friends. We’re working on a documentary together.”

Under the table Jared touches my knee in appreciation.

Our waitress arrives with our soup.

Finally Sarah turns away and focuses on her own food. Praise be! Hosanna!

“Did you know this is a bona fide Greenblotz of the matzo clan?” Jared crows to the waitress. “The great-granddaughter of Izzy Greenblotz.”

The waitress nods in appreciation. “I knew your grandfather. We still use Greenblotz matzo meal to make the matzo balls.”

“That’s terrific,” I say.

“Jack!” she calls to a man behind the take-out counter stocked with knishes and beef salamis. “We’ve got royalty here! Greenblotz girl, from the matzo.”

“Yeah? Meal on the house!” the man behind the counter announces. “Abe would have done that, don’t you think?”

The waitress rips up our bill on her pad.

“Please tell your owner that’s so kind of him,” I say to the waitress.

Jared explains in a whisper: “That’s Abe Lebowohl’s brother.”

“Who’s Abe Lebowohl?”

Jared points to a smiling chubby middle-aged man in a set of photos on the wall over our seat. In one he has his arms around Jerry Seinfeld and, in another one, around Muhammad Ali. “Abe Lebowohl started this place. He was legendary even before he was killed about ten years ago in a drive-by murder.”

“Who killed him?”

“Never solved. My pop knew him. Very sweet guy. A real
mensch
. Gave buckets of money and chopped liver to the disadvantaged and Jewish charities.”

Our food arrives.

“Can I try the Jewish champagne?”

“The Dr. Brown’s Cel-Ray? I’d give you a sip, but it’s not for the uninitiated.”

“What exactly is it?”

“Soda from celery.”

“I can handle it,” I say. Until I taste it. It’s weird and dry, almost dusty. “I don’t mean to be rude, but I’d rather drink crab juice.”

Jared laughs. “Like I said, it’s an acquired taste.”

The soup, however—a delicate chicken stock with little square noodles, parsley and one big perfectly fluffy matzo ball—is sublime. I’m proud it’s my family matzo meal in the recipe.

As we eat, Sarah keeps craning her neck back from her conversation with Uzi. I’m half tempted to lean across the table and give Jared a kiss to give Sarah something to look at.

Outside, Jared shakes his head and touches me on the shoulder. “A million apologies that you had to go through that. What did you make of Sarah? A little scary?”

“An honest assessment?”

“Please.”

“I’d say the only person more disturbing in the universe is the toothless woman who sat next to me last year in the number 6 train, the one who poked me and pointed at a terrified mother and infant across from us and wanted to guess the baby’s age by his tooth count.”

My comic timing’s getting better these days. Jared brays. When his laughter finally levels off, he says, “At least you liked the soup.”

“I loved the soup, I’ll deconstruct the soup later, but back to Sarah—why did you ever go out with her to begin with?”

“The truth? I met her at a party. She wasn’t wearing a warning sign, and I thought she was pretty hot at first.”

“She’s stunning. I’ll give her that. But when you spend five minutes with her—”

“She’s—please, don’t make me say this—”

I squeeze his wrist. “You’re obligated.”

“She’s double-jointed and—”

“And?” I just don’t get that answer.

“In bed she was a pretzel. It was kind of thrilling as a spectator—”

I cough and laugh at the same time. “And as a participant, I hope.”

This time we both laugh loudly.

“Now that you know too much about my personal life, I have to whack you.”

I catch his eye again. “Did you really say all that to her about Jewish culture dying out? That’s some pretty heavy guilt.”

“All out of context, but yes.”

“So you’ve never dated a non-Jewish woman?”

“In college I did. A Catholic French exchange student named Cathou. She was a gorgeous blond
shiksa
who had me over to her off-campus apartment for an Easter dinner with a big pink hock of ham and plenty of hot cross buns. I ate it all with a smile because she was sexy as hell and I was sowing my oats.”

“But now you just want homely Jews?”