He was desperate to go to Lakewood, to walk in to Glantz’s and hear his own song on the speaker, to see bochurim in the streets who might have heard the song, to get feedback from the real world

Shuey Portman went home Monday night, even though he usually waited until Tuesday, telling himself that he needed to stop in at Blau’s bar mitzvah. Henny seemed delighted that he was coming home, which was nice, but also surprising; she was usually pretty good at seeing his real motivations and she was never shy about pointing them out.

At this point, three days after the song had been released, it was clear that it was a hit. The downloads had shot up, from hundreds to thousands. The Israeli websites and radio shows had gotten into it as well, and even though they all managed to mess up Shuey’s name, it was worth it, especially since one of them had done a deep dive into all of Shuey’s music, pulling up the old hits of a decade earlier. Shuey spent most of the morning in his office, shaking his head in wonder at the fact that people were pressing play and hearing his song, his voice, his composition, and his boys.

There were texts coming in: old friends, his cousin Levi, even Gershy who drove the truck for Three-Star, but the message he was waiting for hadn’t come yet. He heard that Benny Balsam had talked the song up on the radio, and he spent an hour listening to archived shows until he found the right installment. Benny Balsam was a newcomer on the scene, so it was nice to hear the popular radio host crowing about “the return of a legend…yeah, I can say legend, Portman was a big deal when we were in yeshivah… and is this the start of a comeback? You guys listen, you guys decide…heeeere we go….”

Shuey didn’t think the “when we were in yeshivah” bit was necessary, it made him sound like from another era, like a Rabbis’ Sons reunion, but whatever.

Henny had worried that Shuey’s name being out there as a singer wasn’t the greatest thing for Malka’s shidduchim, and he resisted the urge to remind her that she had made the same point about working for a yeshivah and before that, about being a snack salesman.

He was desperate to go to Lakewood, to walk in to Glantz’s and hear his own song on the speaker, to see bochurim in the streets who might have heard the song, to get feedback from the real world. Modena was great, and the boys hadn’t stopped singing the song in weeks, but he was looking for something else.

There was some paperwork to take care of, and he decided he would pull out after Minchah. The roads were dry, the sun was shining, and the idea of driving up the Thruway listening to his own song appealed to him.