Page 17 of One Night, Two Holidays

Slow down, Nessa, I scold myself. The last thing I want is to scare Jack away by going way overboard and doing too much—my usual MO. I should just focus on the here and now, making the best of the situation we’re in. Making lemonade out of lemons. Or, in this case, latkes out of frozen potatoes.

An hour and a half later,we’re sitting on the couch about to dig into our latke-like objects and watch Jack’s favorite Christmas movie, which is apparently controversial.

“What do we think?” Jack asks, looking down at the plate of fried potato goodness in front of us.

“Well, they look like latkes—but the real measure will be in how they taste.”

We put the ingredients Jack brought into ChatGPT, and it spit out a recipe for us: equal parts mashed potatoes, finely chopped French fries, and pre-cooked hash browns, plus a few other things we had in the apartment—eggs, flour, salt and pepper. And of course, the condiments.

“Which do you recommend?” Jack asks, nodding toward the two bowls I put on the table.

“That depends what team you’re on.”

Jack quirks an eyebrow.

“You see, there are a lot of different kinds of Jews. You may have heard of some of them—like Sephardic or Ashkenazi. Orthodox, Conservative, or Reform. But…” I pause for effect. “The one thing that really divides us is the question: do you put sour cream or applesauce on your latkes.”

Jack nods as if he’s filing the information away for a future trivia contest. “I should probably try them both.”

“Good decision.”

I watch as he cuts a latke in half and puts one of the toppings on each piece. He’s taking this seriously, and I both appreciate it and find it hilarious.

“Gotta cleanse my palate,” he says, taking a big sip of water and swirling it around his mouth.

The sour cream one is first. “Crunchy, creamy, tart.”

Another sip of water. Then, the applesauce. “Sweet, but not too sweet.”

“So?” I ask. He kept his expression stoic, so I couldn’t tell which one he liked better.

“I didn’t dislike either of them,” he says. “But if I had to choose one….” He takes another bite of each. “I’d have to say I’m an Applesauce Gentile. The sweet and salty just does it for me.”

“I knew I liked you.” I heap a spoonful of applesauce and an extra dash of salt on my own latke. “Now let’s get into the Christmas spirit by watching Bruce Willis try to stop some bad guys—which sounds oddly Jewish. Most of our holiday stories involve a tragedy and how we persevered.”

I tell him abridged stories of several Jewish holidays—including Passover and our escape from slavery in Egypt, and Purim, where an evil man was stopped from annihilating the Jews in Persia—and by the time I finish, he’s staring at me, mouth open.

My cheeks flush. “Sorry, that was a lot. Sometimes I get excited and don’t know when to stop.”

“No, I love it.” He taps his temple. “Can never have too many factoids stored up here to bust out.”

I laugh, relieved.

“And never apologize for getting excited,” he says, knocking his shoulder into mine. “It’s cute.”

My cheeks flush again—this time, from pleasure. His words can’t erase all the times I’ve been told I’m “too much,” but they nudge some of the ache aside. For the first time, I wonder if someone might see my quirks, my enthusiasm, everything I’ve tried to tone down—and think I’m just right.

“You know who else is cute?” I say, and Jack’s eyebrows do a little dance. “Yes, you. Obviously. But I was thinking about Bruce Willis.”

Jack laughs and throws his arm around my shoulder. I’m thrilled—until he grabs the remote and hits play. Apparently, he actually wants to watch the movie.

Oh well. I snuggle into his side and pull the blankets up around us. We can Netflix now, then do the “and chill” part after.

Something to look forward to…

CHAPTER 13

December 25, 4:46 pm

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