Shelly Oria - New York 1, Tel Aviv 0

Once, the waitress was rude to me — the same waitress who was always asking Sophia out. Being rude by way of hitting on the woman you’re with when you’re peeing is different from being rude to your face, from saying, No you didn’t say provolone, I’d remember. Sophia said, If you don’t like it here anymore we’ll find somewhere else, Boon, and I knew then that something was different.

* * *

Saturdays at Curly’s we put salt on our curly fries like powder. Every time Sophia would say, It’s not good, we’re dehydrated as it is, but she said it like you say I know, I know when a friend says something true you don’t want to hear. Because Saturdays at Curly’s we didn’t want to hear that salt is bad for you, that alcohol dries you up, that other women can come on to your woman when you’re looking away, that in love sometimes you blink and when you open your eyes there’s change.

Saturdays at Curly’s it was warm, then cold and then snowing, and always people were waiting outside or by the radiator, and always we didn’t have to wait, because the thing about Sophia is, she doesn’t like to wait in lines, and mostly the world agrees she shouldn’t have to.

Saturdays at Curly’s we always stayed for hours — long after we were too full, long after we stopped feeling the pain of stretch in our stomachs — and played checkers or drew on white paper mats with crayons. Saturdays at Curly’s I would look at the people crouched over the radiator, being pushed against the small door every time someone entered to add her name to the list, to ask about the wait. Saturdays at Curly’s I felt privileged, and guilty, and sometimes I would look at Sophia and see that she felt neither.

Saturdays at Curly’s, looking at the people outside, sometimes this is what I wanted: to be one of them. Saturdays at Curly’s, when Sophia was suddenly flexible about where we brunched, she looked like she was trying on a new dress that didn’t fit her, and it made me sad, like reaching the end of a good novel. The thing about Sophia is, you love someone like her, it’s for good, it becomes part of your body, an organ. But Saturdays at Curly’s sometimes I would think, maybe I can take this organ and leave, go to a place where I can wait with the rest of the world by the radiator, feeling the chill of icy wind every time the door opens, because maybe that’s what life is about: waiting your turn.

I’m sure they have things in common, yes. But not a whole lot. Not a whole lot. I’m sure they have things in common, Ludvig and Henrietta, but I’m not sure what these things might be. To be quite honest, if someone asked me to guess — just venture a guess as to what these two people could possibly have in common, what it is that got them to suddenly “fall in love” at such a late point in life — I would have to say, “I’m sorry, but I have absolutely no idea.” And then maybe the person would say, “Of course you have no idea, that’s why they call it a guess ” and I would say, “I’m truly sorry, sir”—or madam; perhaps it would be a woman saying these things to me—“but I couldn’t even guess .” It brings to mind that expression “to save my life”; as in “I couldn’t guess to save my life.” That’s how I feel about them. Or not about them, really, just about their relationship; they are very nice people, kind people, both of them. Especially him.

He used to collect seashells. Years ago, I am talking about years ago. Back when they were both married to other people and didn’t even know each other, back when my Saul was alive, that’s when Ludvig collected those seashells. He would show me, every time we had one of our gatherings. Look at this special one, Yolanda, he’d always say, and always away from the gang, waiting for me outside the kitchen or by the big window in the hallway. Look at this special one. I used to wonder back then if he ever showed them to his Judith, and I had a feeling he didn’t. Certain things you only share with certain people — nothing wrong with that. And why me, I also wondered sometimes. Because he knew I understood, was my answer. And I really did, I understood. It’s only a man with a soul who does something like that — collect seashells. And what a rare thing that is, a man with a soul.

And Henrietta? Once, years ago, at one of the big parties we threw — I am fairly certain Ludvig wasn’t there, because I tried to think back after they got together and I don’t think they ever crossed paths, not in those years at least, and not through us — my husband announced to all our guests that he was going to get rid of his pipe, quit smoking. He was drunk. It’s both the best and worst of us that comes out when we drink, isn’t it? He didn’t want to quit; he wanted to have quit. And I think everyone understood that, saw the moment for what it was — an inebriated man saying Oh how I wish life was something else, something better. But she is not everyone; she is a special woman. Very special. At the end of the night, she handed me seven pipes. I didn’t know my husband had so many. “He’s going to need all the help he can get,” she said. Apparently, her uncle had died of throat cancer. Or it might have been her brother. I didn’t know her well at all then — I don’t think Saul Keningstein and my Saul were even in business yet, I think they had only just met, and we invited him and his wife to the party. So I was a little surprised. “The first step to beating addiction is removing the abused substance from the household,” she said. It was a caring gesture, I suppose. Of course she did sound a bit like she’d memorized a brochure. Who in their right mind would memorize a brochure? I’ve certainly never felt inspired to memorize a brochure, and Lord knows I’ve seen my share of them in my seventy-nine years. And one could argue, I suppose, that she shouldn’t have gone through our belongings looking for pipes; no one asked her to do that. I certainly didn’t ask her, and I was the only one who could, because it was my house. Mine and my Saul’s, of course, but why would he ask her to look for the pipes? He knew where they were, he was the one who put them wherever she found them. And he didn’t want them gone. It would have been quite a perverted little game for the two of them to play. And my husband was never like that. There were times when I wished he’d be a little more like that, in fact. Playful . But it wasn’t his nature. A man’s nature is not something you can change. Women who think otherwise end up divorced.

So my husband certainly didn’t ask her to do it, and I didn’t ask her to do it, and so, yes, you could say, I suppose, that it was presumptuous of her. Nosy. Ill intended. But I didn’t think that at all. I appreciated it, and I thought: What a caring gesture. I thought: Isn’t Saul Keningstein lucky, to have such a lovely woman for a wife. Truly.

* * *

It was towels, when they first got started, Saul Keningstein and my Saul. To be honest, I thought it was nonsense. I never liked Saul Keningstein much — he was a hustler, if you ask me. Every time he opened his mouth it was Let me tell you something. Let me tell you something, Yolanda dear . And I always wanted to say Maybe every once in a while you should ask a question, Saul Keningstein. But he knew everything, so why should he ask? I remember I said to my Saul, I said This is nonsense. You are a doctor. What do you need to be selling towels for? But these were special towels, soft and airy like clouds in the sky, something America had never seen. I said Saul, you have been here your whole life almost and still you think like an immigrant. He was always trying to prove that he had the right to be here, that America made the right decision letting his family in when he was seven years old. What can you do? Being a doctor wasn’t enough. He had to do something new , a first in America. Even if it was a towel. So I said, Fine, fine. Just be careful, don’t invest too much. But I didn’t worry; he was responsible, my Saul. So responsible. And what did I know, anyway? Saul Keningstein was right, the towels did very well.