Dassi wasn’t answering. Not her texts, WhatsApps, emails, or even — gasp — regular phone calls

IT boiled down to this. This moment, right here.

Akiva rolled his sleeves up, then pulled them down, and tried not to look too dramatic. Or nervous. Or really anything except cool, calm, and experienced.

“You need to move in soon?”

Akiva looked at Home Inspector Bob through hooded eyes.

“Nah, it’s not for me, gotta flip it.”

“Tight timeline?”

“Kind of. What gave it away?”

Bob was a grizzled older man who hadn’t smiled in around an hour. He gave a little mouth twitch and pointed with his chin at Akiva’s left hand, which was drumming incessantly against his thigh. Oh. Stupid drumming habit.

“So. How we doing?” He thought that sounded pretty relaxed.

Bob raised his heavy eyebrows and continued examining the gutters silently. Akiva sighed and began to murmur a perek of Tehillim.

He’d put a lot into this. If he was being honest, he’d put everything into this. Financially, emotionally, physically. He had a major advantage, having been in the construction market all his life, but still. There were times over the past few months when he’d thought he wasn’t going to make it. Yet here he was. And here was Bob, with Akiva’s fate in his hands.

Good thing he wasn’t being dramatic.

“Done.”

“Done?” Akiva parroted.

Bob raised his eyebrows again.

“And?”

“Passed.”

Passed. This was it, he’d made it. He strode forward, shook Bob’s hand effusively, and, pumping his fist in the air, ran off to share the news with Libby.