Peep Show by Joshua Braff

Yiddish for a moment and one asks, “Are you Miriam’s son?”
    â€œYes.”
    They both smile and offer their hands. The taller one is called Yussi and the guy with all the questions is Svi. They sit back down and continue their discussion so close to each other that the brims of their hats overlap. They speak in both Yiddish and English. I think they’re talking about a farm animal or a plowing animal and what to do if your animal kills another man’s animal. Some Talmudic thing. Another man, older than Yussi and Svi, about thirty, with freckled skin and a red-haired version of the Hasidic beard,stands alone by the window. He grins at me and takes a sip from his glass.
    â€œ
Shalom aleikhem
, my name is Avram. Stolichnaya?” he says, holding up the bottle.
    â€œNo, thank you.” I can see my mother through the
mechitzah
. She’s talking to Becca and looking my way.
    â€œFriend of Pinchus?” Avram says.
    I shake my head. “Sorry. I don’t speak Yiddish.”
    â€œNo, no, Pinchus, Pinchus, the rabbi, Mr. Danowitz.”
    â€œOh, Peter,” I say, and Svi and Yussi both look up at me.
    â€œWe’ll start in two minutes,” Becca announces from the dining room.
    I look for Debra through the wall but only see Sarah. She is taller and nicer and blonder and foxier than any
baalai teshuva
I’ve ever seen. When I wave to her, she waves back with a smile, a flirty smile. Svi and Yissi are standing now but still talking about the farm animal.
    â€œVerse thirty-five,” Yussi says. “A man’s beast injures his neighbor’s beast and it dies, they shall sell the animal and divide its price. They shall also divide the dead animal. So the lesson here is that because the ox had never shown any tendency toward harming any other livestock, the owner is only obligated to pay half the damages.”
    â€œHalf?” says Svi. “No.”
    â€œIt was an accident, a onetime thing. If the ox had previously gorged another ox or any other animal and the owner didn’t slaughter it or, or, or, or . . . pen it up for doing so, then the owner bears full liability.”
    â€œSo just lie,” says Svi. “If your ox has gorged and gorges again, just say it’s never happened before.”
    Avram laughs like this:
hut, hut, hut
. Like machine-gun fire. He holds his glass against his cheek.
    â€œGive it a rest for a while, boys. Isn’t your life about to change, young Svi?”
    Svi smiles, nods, and pulls the brim of his hat lower.
    â€œDavid,” Debra says and I walk to the
mechitzah
. She puts her finger through the triangular cutouts. I hook my thumb over her pinkie and we laugh a little.
    â€œI’m so glad to see you,” I say.
    â€œShe’s so mad about yesterday.”
    â€œI’m sorry. I shouldn’t have brought you. It was a mistake. I was only thinking of Dad and what he’d want.”
    â€œDena,” my mother says, and our fingers come apart. “Over here now, please.”
    â€œIt’s time,” Debra says. “Shaindee is about to announce she’s a
kallah
.”
    â€œA what?” I say.
    â€œA bride.”
    All of the women and Peter Rabbi come out of the kitchen and to the front hall. Yussi, Svi, and Avram all walk next to me. Shaindee, Sarah’s older sister, is pretty like Sarah but already a snood, you can tell. It’s all behind the eyes and the way she walks, like a waddling, wearisome duck. She sits on a folding chair in the center of the room. Sarah sits next to her and the rest of the family stands around them. Peter Rabbi says a prayer: “
Od Yishama B’arai YehudaU’vchutzos Yerushalayim, Kol Sason v’Kol Simcha, Kol Chatan v’Kol Kalah
. Let it speedily be heard in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem, the sound of joy and the sound of happiness, the sound of a bride and the sound of a groom.”
    Svi now walks around