“I always find it fascinating how people can find pleasure in things I loathe,” her mother-in-law finished

“Faulkner said that the work of an artist is ‘to create out of the materials of the human spirit something that did not exist before.’ ” —John Green, The Anthropocene Reviewed, Episode 36

Eva sipped at her potato leek soup and looked around the hall. All the attendees seemed very enthusiastic, pointing at the serving ware, the gold circular fixtures — Eva had never even seen that bulb shape before — and admiring whatever fresh feature caught their eyes.

It was really nice for Chicago to finally have a local wedding hall, with Lakewood-style packages. Although unless one of her sons married a Chicago girl, it wouldn’t make a difference to her.

A lump formed in her throat. She’d made two weddings so far, one in Brooklyn, one in Lakewood. Her friends had shown up, community leaders too, but the actual community hadn’t. She understood that then, but only now was she realizing that she’d likely never have the whole community at her wedding. And that she’d always be the boy’s side, second tier on her side of the mechitzah. She’d never hug her sons and dance with them the way she’d seen kallahs and their mothers embrace at the first dance.

At her sons’ weddings, she’d hugged her daughters-in-law when the time came, but the embrace never extended past the arms and chest, there was always a gaping chasm that she never seemed to bridge. She swallowed hard. She had no use for these thoughts and feelings, not now, not ever. She turned to talk to Miriam.

“Did I tell you about my newest project?” Her voice projected an enthusiasm her body didn’t feel yet.

Miram looked up from her soup and raised her brows in a “tell me more” way.