Two decades earlier, Marissa had spent Shabbos at Rebbetzin Grossinger’s home in Mattersdorf. She could still conjure up the smell of fresh potato kugel and cinnamon cake that had embraced her the moment she’d walked in.

“You’ll be staying in the girls’ room,” Rebbetzin Grossinger said, leading her down a narrow hall. “Chani, Esther, here’s our guest. Can you pull out the bed and get it ready for her?”

Marissa watched, bemused, as the two smiling teenagers pulled a bed out from under their own wooden bunkbed and expertly draped it in fresh linen.

“Here,” one of the girls said with a wide, welcoming smile as she opened the closet door. “You can hang up or put away whatever you need — there should be some room on the shelf. And then we’ll get you a plate of kugel, so you won’t starve until the Shabbos meal.”

Marissa put down her backpack and peered inside the closet, where two stacks of neatly folded shirts shared space with a box of tights. Six or seven dresses and a few skirts hung on hangers on the rack. That meant each girl owned three or so dresses, no more.

Now, standing on Rechov Yirmiyahu with her teenaged daughter at her side, she looked at the chaotic traffic, the street lined with glass display windows, the streams of humanity grasping their shopping bags of more and more and more clothing, and mentally compared it to that scene: the spare wardrobe in the Grossinger girls’ closet, the aroma of potato kugel filling every crevice of the apartment, the beams of sunshine on the wooden bunkbed. The wholeness of that simple lifestyle spoke to her. It was everything she had wanted.

Of course she wanted Tamar to have beautiful Shabbos clothing. And shoes. And probably another batch of weekday clothing, if she knew Tamar.

Still… after all those years Marissa had spent seeking, discarding, negotiating with her parents and her conscience to remake her identity — to get this?

“Good Shabbos, see you later,” Perri said as Chaim headed to the door with Shloimy and Dovid. Yechezkel was still looking for his missing Shabbos shoe, of course.

“Good Shabbos, everyone,” Chaim said.

Perri found the missing shoe and sent Yechezkel out to shul. She shut the door gently and sank into the couch, joining Simi and Miriam. “Here, come join us, Chaya Rivky,” she said, patting the couch.

Chaya Rivky needed no urging. She plopped down next to her cousins.

“Tell us all about seminary!” Perri said. “Anything exciting happen this week?” Chaya Rivky was her first niece to come to seminary in Yerushalayim, and Perri was enjoying her dramatic reports of dorm life, tiyulim, and amaaaaazing classes.

“Yes! The craziest thing happened to my friend Rikki,” Chaya Rivky answered obligingly. “She wanted to visit this aunt of hers on Rechov Petach Tivkah, so she hailed a taxi, and the nahag started driving, and suddenly she realizes that they’re on the highway, which is a little weird, right? After like, I don’t know, maybe twenty minutes?, she asked the driver, ‘eifoh atah holech,’ you know, like, where’s he going? Rechov Petach Tivkah is right near Shefa, isn’t it? And the driver’s like, don’t you want to go to Petach Tikvah? And she totally did not get that Petach Tikvah is the name of an actual city. Isn’t that the craziest?”

Simi laughed. “Seminary girls are so funny,” she said.

“Wait, girls, is someone knocking?”

Miriam went to check. “It’s Mrs. Markowitz,” she said, as she opened the door for Marissa.

“Marissa, good Shabbos, so good to see you. Why don’t you sit down?” Perri said, motioning to the gray loveseat. “This is my niece Chaya Rivky. She’s in seminary here in Yerushalayim for the year. Chaya Rivky, this is my neighbor Marissa Markowitz.”

Marissa and Chaya Rivky traded smiles.

“How’s seminary going? Is it a hard adjustment?” Marissa asked.

“Not so hard,” Chaya Rivky said. “It basically feels like camp. You know — tons of girls staying up late, singing, sharing clothing….”

“At some point you have to learn and study, no?” Perri asked.

Chaya Rivky shrugged. “Yeah, I guess. Maybe my seminary is just not so intense.”

“Is it hard to have to keep finding Shabbos meals?” Marissa asked. “When I went to seminary, that part was a big deal for us.”

“Well, I have Tante Perri and Uncle Chaim,” Chaya Rivky said.

“Right! You can always come to us!” Simi said.

“And it’s great,” Chaya Rivky agreed, “because the zemiros sound the same, and the food is basically the same, and half the kids’ names are even the same — it’s almost like I’m at home. That’s, like, the dream, no? To be in Yerushalayim but still have Shabbos meals that feel like you’re back home.”

Marissa half-smiled. “Not for everyone,” she said. “I don’t have the same background as you, so when I went to people for Shabbos, they showed me something completely different from my mom’s version. Believe me, it was a huge improvement! A real Shabbos! Not just lighting some candles, a quick dinner, and then back to the TV. It felt like magic to me, this whole different existence where the family was the focus, and the meals just overflowed with so much meaning and warmth. You can’t imagine.”

Chaya Rivky’s eyes went wide. “I— I can’t,” she conceded.

“Is someone knocking again?” Perri asked.

Miriam went to the door. “Mrs. Markowitz, it looks like Yosef Shalom is here to get you.”

Marissa rose from the loveseat. “I guess my husband got home a bit earlier than yours,” she said. “Good Shabbos.”

“Good Shabbos,” Perri said, rising and walking her neighbor to the door. “Thanks so much for dropping by. Maybe we’ll get in a visit tomorrow.”

A few minutes later, Chaim and the boys came home from shul and launched into the familiar routine of Shalom Aleichem, Kiddush, and challah. From the corner of her eye, Perri watched Chaya Rivky. Was her family’s Shabbos meal really just like the Weiss seudos in Monsey? Did they serve the same dips? Did Chaim’s brother Yechiel also struggle to keep his kids at the table?

“So, Shloimy,” Chaim said when he finished his slice of fish. “What happened in yeshivah this week?”

Shloimy shrugged. “Nothing really.”

“Yechezkel, Dovid, who knows the parshah this week?” Chaim tried again. “Do you have some questions from your rebbi?”

Dovid sighed. “Can’t we just wait for Avos U’Banim?”

Chaim nodded. “Okay. We can. So here’s a vort that one of the guys in the kollel told me. It says in the parshah….”

Perri watched her family while Chaim spoke. Shloimy’s fingers were beating out a tap-tap-tap on the tablecloth; he was probably singing silently to himself. Yechezkel had wandered off to the couch and pulled a book out from behind the cushions. Simi and Miriam seemed to playing some sort of game that revolved around a napkin they were passing back and forth. Perri remembered Marissa’s description of the Shabbos meals that had spoken to her, back when she was first becoming frum. This whole different existence where the family was the focus, and the meals just overflowed with so much meaning and warmth.

Her Shabbos table felt very far from that ethereal vision.

“Ma, where’s the soup already?” Dovid asked.

“Tatty’s saying a vort!” Perri snapped. Then she caught herself. “You’re hungry, tzaddikel, I know. Tatty will finish and then I’ll go get the soup.”

With her eyes, she tried signaling to Chaim to speed up a bit. He kept going.

Finally, she headed to the kitchen with a stack of fish plates in her hand. Chaya Rivky followed.

“Here, let me help you,” she said, taking the stack.

“Thanks,” Perri said appreciatively as she removed the big pot of chicken soup from the hotplate. “Can you take care of those while I ladle out the soup?”

“Sure,” Chaya Rivky said. “Your soup smells heaven. By the way, who’s that lady who was here before? Melinda, Miranda, was that her name?”

Perri felt slightly defensive. “Her name is Marissa Markowitz. She’s been our neighbor for years. The nicest people.”

“I know!” Chaya Rivky said with a fervor that surprised Perri. “She was legit inspiring! Like, the way she talked about Shabbos… she should totally come speak in seminary! People like that — they really know what it means to appreciate Shabbos. They’re, like, so authentic, right?”

“Mm-hmm,” Perri agreed as she ladled out the hot soup.

Not like us, she thought. We’re just a facade.

To be continued….

(Originally featured in Mishpacha, Issue 1036)