Page 19 of The Dating Contract

He sighed, crossed the room to stand by her and took the frame off the mantel. “You know the blank space, in the middle,” he said, pointing to it.

“I see it.”

“That’s where the ketubah goes. The text,” he clarified. “I mean.”

“So why did you call it an untold story?”

“Because it is,” he said as he tried to figure out how to explain this to her without talking down to her. “Someone’s going to turn this into the frame that holds the story of their lives. Now, it’s just empty space. Not a ketubah, just a frame.”

There was a pause as he watched realization dawn on her face, her eyes focused. “An open playing field. Victory after crossing through the brambles and thorns.”

He looked closer; he hadn’t really thought about more than just the drawing; it never helped when he went into a ketubah session with an interpretation of his own after all, and this frame was eventually going to be a ketubah. But he didn’t tell her that. What he said was: “I could see that.”

She nodded, and so he took it as an invitation to continue interpreting with her. “Couple had bumpy moments in the past, figured them out and entered into this blank space where they had the freedom to choose their path, whatever that is.”

“Don’t say it.”

Her tone held a note of reprimand and he wasn’t sure where it came from. “What?”

“You need a better poker face. Because that isn’t us.” She pointed to the frame. “Going through the brambles requires emotional work I don’t have time for, and I’d imagine with everything going on—as a sofer and angling toward more comics work and all of the publicity you’re getting, you don’t have that kind of time either.”

He wanted to tell her that he had all the time in the world, but telling her that now, even as she’d just arrived, and was still holding the bagels she’d brought, was a horrible idea. Instead, he reached for the bagels and turned toward her. “How did you get into agenting?”

“What is this?” she said with a laugh that didn’t ring true. “Twenty questions? Then again, these are things you…we’re going to need to know for the contract, and the party tomorrow night.”

“Right,” he said, the words pulling him back down to earth, which meant he crossed the room into the kitchen, grabbed a knife and his cutting board. “Why contract though?”

Risky question with a knife in his hand to be sure, but he figured he’d ask it as she headed toward the coffee maker.

“Protection,” she began, removing the pot from the coffee maker and sounding as if she’d pre-rehearsed a speech. “Making sure we know what’s expected of us and for how long.”

He nodded, smelling the coffee as she poured herself a cup. “Is this going to have an expiration date or?”

“It’ll last as long as our list of appearances does, I guess,” she said, as if she needed to tick the mental boxes off the check list before opening her mouth. “I need a significant other to bring to tomorrow’s cocktail party.”

“Right. And I need to bring someone—” he wasn’t going to be specific and tell her his mentor had actually asked for her “—to a party my mentor is throwing. And I have both a comic con signing and a crowd control problem.”

“And you asked me about the Unicorns for info purposes, which means I can get you to a have a way of getting you first-hand knowledge and soft-launching you with my family.”

“How?”

“One of my clients is one of the founders, and my niece is taking part this year. So you’ll come to her trial practice.”

“Right.” This was dizzying. Suddenly there were events and a soft launch of their relationship?

Wow.

But he had to be neutral. “That’s four. Anything else?”

“Maybe we do Shabbat? One and one, making it an even six?”

“Six events—an option to renew?”

She looked at him, surprised. “I don’t know why we’d renew it.”

“If things go well,” he said, trying to be neutral, trying to keep calm. “I mean if we end up with more events, if we like how it’s going…”

“If it goes well, you and I are going to have less time,” she pointed out.

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