Page 57 of Hot Rabbi

She turned her head into the touch, catching his mouth with her own. The kiss was over too quickly. When he lifted his head his eyes were dark, like cobblestones after rain.

“Or should I speak as the man who just made love to you?”

“I’ve never understood that phrasemade love,” Shoshana said, her brow furrowed. “It sounds so antiquated.”

“What would you call what we just did? To me it felt like a lot more than just fucking.” His eyes were serious, his expression tense. She wondered if he thought she thought that. That it was just fucking. That this was just a way to pass the time.

As though she would tell anyone what she’d just told him.

She wanted to bite him. She felt the sudden, unexpected urge to lash out, because she’d been in a relationship with Kirstie for eight years—eight years of her life with cohabitation besides—and she’d never gotten the strength to explain to her about this. Howdarehe imply this was nothing to her.

She made herself breathe.

“Fair enough,” she said finally, because she didn’t have anything else to say and she didn’t want to pick a fight. She considered him for a while. Taking in every part of him that she could see.

There was a look in his eyes she’d never seen. He’d never looked at her in quite this way before. She wondered if it had been a mistake to tell him everything. Maybe she should have left it atI don’t talk about my family.

“I never talk about this. Baxter doesn’t even know most of it. Abi and Leah only do because they grew up across the street.”

“How do you want me to answer you, Shoshana,” he said, his voice low, almost a whisper. His fingers tightened on her jaw for the briefest moment. “Right now, am I the rabbi? Am I the father? Or am I the man?”

“I mean, I hope you’re all of those things,” she said, trying to speak lightly, but it fell flat. She cupped his face in her hands. “David, I would never ask you to be less than everything you are.”

* * *

David Freedman, if you fuck this up, chas v’shalom, you will never know a moment’s peace,Moshe’s voice thundered in David’s mind. He clenched his jaw, because in this moment, Moshe’s voice was his voice. If he fucked this up, he would never forgive himself.

There was a time in his life when he would look at her, at the way she was looking at him, at the raw emotion on her face, when he would take her firmly by the shoulders and explain that he couldnotbe all of those things for her. That boundaries existed for a reason. He was not her spiritual advisor. It was wholly inappropriate for him to be posing such a proposition to her now.

But this was a very different time, and she wasn’t looking for spiritual counsel. She was looking at him as a person looked at the one, they--well... better not to consider that too closely. This wasn’t about him. She’d just made it clear she shared with him the parts of herself she locked away from everyone. And the pressure to say what she needed to hear most was overwhelming.

Not because he wanted to fix it for her--of course he did, but it didn’t work like that.

Because he believed that one could only honor truth with truth. It wasn’t possible to make the world better if a person could look at injustice and only offer platitudes and well wishes. It didn’t work like that either. He turned his head, kissing the palm of her hand as he pulled away from her enough to sit up on his elbow.

He traced her face gently with his fingers.

“I am so sorry that your father failed you,” he said, and something inside him tore when her eyes started to shine. He wasn’t afraid of tears, but he absolutely did not want to be the reason this woman wept. He swallowed, searching for the right words before he continued, “I’m trying to imagine how I would have coped if something happened to Mariam when Dani was that age and… I have to say, I would have been devastated. I can’t even think about all the ways I would be scared out of my mind to suddenly be the sole caregiver for a two-year-old child. I know you know I’m Dani’s primary, but it’s a different thing when the other person suddenly isn’t there at all, you know? That feeling of being alone and responsible for a life--and then to have all that grief besides? Because that’s a huge loss, to lose a spouse. And that’s--all those things are completely normal. That’s how a person responds when something devastating happens.”

Shoshana had gone very still. He said a silent prayer, asking for the words that she needed most to hear, and knowing he was probably going to get it wrong.

“Grief is a multifaceted bastard. It’s part of the reason why we have so many rituals for death, you know, to help people through that cycle. But that’s--that’s me talking as an adult. To an adult. Your dad was grieving, and he coped by trying to follow those rituals. But that’s not enough when you’re a parent. You also have to be the person your kid needs you to be, and that doesn’t always come naturally. You are an incredibly complex, fascinating woman and I suspect that as a child you were infuriatingly precocious.”

She snorted, rolling her eyes at the compliment, but allowing him to take her hand. David chose to take that as a good sign and pressed on.

“There’s a teaching--I know you don’t care about the attribution, so I won’t bore you with it, but the lesson is that we don’t pray for God. We don’t do the rituals for God. If we accept that there is a God, God is meant to be an omnipotent being. If God exists, God doesn’t need the prayers to know God’s greatness. We do these things forus. So that we can learn. So that we can grow. It doesn’t matter if you believe someone is listening or not. In fact, if you doubt, or you have no faith, you should do the rituals anyway. Because they’re a kind of anchor. And humans need that, we need to believe there’s purpose.”

“So, you’re saying my dad was doing the right thing,” she said. She didn’t sound angry, just disappointed. As though he wasn’t telling her anything surprising. David winced.

“I’m saying he did the right thing forhim. Mitzvot are not intended to be punishments. He may have been honoring your mother, and I think that’s beautiful, I really do. But as a father, it was also his duty to see that you needed something else. And you have every right to feel angry and betrayed that he didn’t do that for you.” David was very aware that Shoshana was holding her breath. He watched her face as she processed what he was saying, felt the tear that slipped from her eye like a physical blow. Shoshana blinked, staring up at the ceiling for a long moment, until she had to let out the breath and take in another.

“What about me?” she said finally, turning her head on the pillow just the smallest bit, but it meant she was looking him more fully in the eye. He lifted his hand, still entwined with hers, and wiped the wetness from her cheek because he couldn’t help himself.

“What do you mean?”

“I closed myself off from the community. That’s the opposite of everything you just said, right? I’m a shanda.”

“Did he tell you that?” The look on her face said everything. David felt his heart twist for her, then felt an anger in the pit of his stomach like he’d never experienced before. He found it interesting that she only ever wiped her eyes when she wasn’t actually crying. When she did weep, she let it happen. Her eyes were wet now, and she only tightened her hold on his hand. He forced himself to speak as neutrally as he could, because Shoshana wasn’t the person he was angry with in this moment. “Tell me.”

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