The Candidate

Three elevator trips later the Schoens were enjoying Taster’s Choice in Chevi’s modern chrome kitchen steadily working through the beautifully glazed Bundt cake sitting on the table. “I’ll never understand what Israelis have against skim milk — do they think fat is good for you?” That was Ruchi standing the red-and-white-checked milk bag upright in its gray pitcher. “Ma be happy with the 1 percent — my Israeli babysitter thinks I’m starving my baby by not buying the whole milk. She would never drink this — she says it makes her nauseous.” “Go figure. Chev I love the apartment you found us! A mechayeh one flight up from you. And so clean! Tatty couldn’t get over the penthouse view.” “I know it’s a stunning apartment. I’ll show you how to figure out the air conditioning and everything when you’re ready to go up again.” “Great. I think I’m ready to crash right now. By the way I hope you didn’t make a big supper. Tatty and I eat very little these days — your parents are old fogies. If you want you can use the steaks I brought from Shloimie’s. He vacuum-packed them fresh the day before we left. They’re in the blue freezer bag. Just smear on a little barbecue sauce and broil them.”Mr.Schoen walked into the kitchen setting his empty coffee cup on the fleishig counter. “Chevala do you know if Yossi did what I asked him to do? Did he find me a candidate?”