ZeeZee reached out to touch the stone in front of her. “But I am normal, right? I’m normal me!”

She stood for a moment, feeling the coolness of the ancient stone, absorbing the energy and also the calm.

Suddenly, she felt a tap on her shoulder.

“Excuse me? Do you speak English?”

It was one of the girls from the group behind her. ZeeZee nodded. “Yup. How can I help?”

The girl was holding a folded piece of paper in her hand. “I heard you’re supposed to put these prayers inside the stones of the Wall. But, um, how do you do that?”

ZeeZee pointed out a crack that was already filled with kvittlach.

“Hey, where’re you from?” ZeeZee asked, as the girl stuck in her own note.

“Richmond, Virginia. I’m here with my friends on an exchange program at Hebrew U.”

“Cool! This your first time in Israel?”

“Yeah. Some of my friends were here on Birthright, though.”

ZeeZee stepped away from the Kosel as she continued talking. “So what made you decide to come study here? My name’s ZeeZee, by the way.”

“Candice. Nice to meet you. Well, actually, it’s a bit of a story…”

As the two girls chatted, some of Candice’s friends came to join them, and ZeeZee soon found herself in the middle of a circle of girls. They were firing questions at her, and ZeeZee talked and joked and laughed and felt, for the first time all year, that she was floating high.

Not bad, Zeez, she thought to herself with a grin. Doing kiruv with a bunch of secular tourists — how ixn the world had she neglected to put that on her bucket list?

As Tammy stood at the back of the Kosel plaza, gazing up at the glowing Wall, she felt the heaviness inside her slowly lighten. When her friend Rikki had suggested they meet here tonight and then go out for coffee in the Old City, Tammy had initially been hesitant. Why schlep so far when there were perfectly good coffee shops right near her apartment?

But after spending an entire Shabbos moping on her couch — except for when she was making awful, artificially polite conversation with her husband — Tammy had to appreciate Rikki’s brilliance in forcing her to come to the Kosel.

She waved her hand as she saw Rikki approaching, sleek blonde sheitel glinting in the electric lights.

“Rikki!” she cried, giving her a hug. “How crazy is it that we live in the same city and see each other, like, once a year?”

Rikki smiled. “The last time was at your baby’s bris. He must be so big now!”

“Yeah, he’s already starting to crawl! And your kids, what are they up to?”

They started walking slowly toward the Kosel as Rikki updated her on her four children, Tammy paused to reflect how difficult it would’ve been for her to ask that question a year and a half ago. She stole another grateful glance upwards. How many tears had she poured out in this spot during all those long years of waiting?

Rikki peered at Tammy. “You doing okay?”

Tammy shrugged. “I was just thinking about how stupid I am. I mean, I used to come here with real things to daven for, and Hashem answered my tefillos and gave me my baby. So why in the world am I going to pieces over a little work incident?”

Something shifted in her stomach as she said this. Was this really just about work? She thought about Yehuda’s stony face as he sat across from her at the Shabbos table. And then shook her head. No, you aren’t getting bent out of shape over a normal marital spat.

Rikki shook her head. “What, just because you successfully passed a big nisayon, you’re not allowed to find a smaller one hard, too?”

Tammy chuckled. “My therapist friend. Your clients are lucky.” She glanced sideways at her. “You’re still at that place for off-the-derech teens?”

“Uh-huh. I love it…” Her voice trailed off as Tammy abruptly stopped walking.

Right in front of them was a group of secular girls, chatting animatedly. And smack in the center of the group was — Tammy blinked to make sure she was seeing properly — ZeeZee Keller?

“Everything all right?” Rikki asked.

“Um, not sure. You see those girls over there? The frum-looking one is from my seminary.” She bit her lip. “D’you think I should do something? This doesn’t seem quite kosher, does it?”

Rikki shrugged. “Not necessarily.”

Tammy crept around the circle until she was facing ZeeZee’s back.

“I come to the Kosel all the time. Legit. You can be closer here to G-d than any other place in the world! How cool is that? You want to ask Him something, He’s right here! You guys totally have to take advantage of that.”

Tammy and Rikki looked at each other.

“She’s adorable!” Rikki whispered.

“I think I’ll just walk away,” Tammy said.

But it was too late; ZeeZee had spotted Tammy.

“Hey! Mrs. H.! Guys, that’s a staff member at my school.” The girls nodded hello and Tammy nodded back.

“Don’t let me interrupt,” she said quickly, as ZeeZee started moving towards her.

“Nah, it’s fine, they have to get going anyway.” She turned back to the girls. “It was amazing meeting you all. Candice, you have my number, I’m totally expecting you to call, ’kay?”

As they dispersed, ZeeZee turned to Tammy and Rikki. Her face was shining.

“Wow, that was so much fun!”

Rikki spoke up. “You did an incredible job talking to them. Do you have experience with kiruv?”

“No.” ZeeZee raised her eyebrow at her curiously. “Are you Mrs. Hurwitz’s friend?”

“Yes, I’m Rikki Klein. I was just wondering — you seem like a natural. I was impressed listening to you.”

ZeeZee’s eyes widened eagerly. “Thanks! Yeah, that would actually be cool, doing kiruv. Are there places I could do that here?”

“You’d be great at it someday,” Tammy said carefully, not answering the question. That was all she needed, having it get back to Rabbi Freund that she was encouraging a student to hang out with irreligious students.

She glanced at Rikki, waiting for her reaction. But Rikki just smiled and remained silent.

to be continued…

(Originally featured in Family First, Issue 738)