“And did Batya have anything to say?”
“She did,” Naomi replied.“She wanted to talk to Jason and Abe wanted to talk to me.A few other worlds sprinkled around just for good measure but, that was most of what happened two nights ago.”
“Do you think you have time for Shabbas?”
“I don’t know,” she said.“I’ll talk to Jason, but I don’t know what he’s planning.”
“Which tells me that you may have made decisions about things?”
“Maybe,” Naomi said, suddenly reminded of the fact that she hadn’t updated her sister on the state of her relationship with Jason.
And yet…
At the same time, the conversation reminded Naomi of something.“Though Abe did, in fact, make a bit of an interesting comment.”
There was a long silence between the end of Naomi’s statement and what Liv was going to say; Naomi wondered if Liv was going to respond or ignore the question.
“I wondered if he’d say anything,” Liv finally said.“I mean…I don’t know what’s going to happen, but I do know that it’s entirely possible where something may.”
The indication that Abe had that Artur could propose was more correct than he’d thought, as was her response.She said, “I take it to mean that Shabbas should happen with the four of us sooner rather than later?”
“I do think so,” Liv said.“I think that might be a good idea.”
Which was interesting enough that she wasn’t going to question the ‘four of us’ comment.But there were more things she needed to know.“Speaking of words and ideas,” Naomi wondered, “any words about Judith’s bachelorette party?”
“Weekend in Rockliffe Manor,” which was the irony of ironies considering that she’d just come back from there.“We’ve got a loose set of plans—a spa, a bakery tour, all that kind of stuff.Decadence.”
“Excellent,” she said.“What about the bachelor party?”
“Some cabin somewhere.Maybe in Michigan, maybe in Ontario.I don’t know.”Liv laughed.“Less I know about the bachelor party, the better.”
Naomi laughed; her sister and what she needed, or didn’t need, to know, sometimes amused the ever-loving crap out of her.“Very well.If they want to go that far away for a weekend, it’s their prerogative I guess.”
There was the kind of noise that accompanied a smirk on the other end, and Naomi could see Livvy smirking as her sister spoke.“Very much so.”
But as she ended the call, Naomi found herself looking forward to telling Jason that he had an incoming Shabbat dinner on the calendar.
Chapter Twenty-One
Zero day: Greenblatt New York meeting
Wedding minus six days
Friday, May 9th
He had donehis best to try and keep calm, but as he moved closer to this meeting, he started to get nervous.
Really nervous.
His father arrived from Michigan the night before, reminding him of the location, the need to be punctual, and that he was loved no matter what he did.
His brother sent him recipes that he wanted to make together; cooking had always been their love language, and if anybody knew he needed recipes, it would be his brother.
And then there was Naomi.
“You don’t have to come,” he’d told her.“Really.”
Most likely because the last thing he wanted was for her to get caught up in whatever nonsense the New York family genuinely had planned behind the façade of this meeting.He’d fall on a sword for his brother if he needed to, but he’d planned to do his best.
