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Sorry, he says, throws down a weatherworn, handling splintery slugger, rushes up the steps, next to her on the stoop, to behold the light suspended, the candles framed in the window.

They knock, ring repeatedly as if to get in sooner, almost to make as if they’ve been waiting a while. A single unlock, and a stranger opens the door, a woman with real presence, which means impolitely fat as not pregnant, Hanna, can’t be: her hair colored too brightly and the makeup reddening errant over lids and lips, Wanda sloppy in a shiftlike kimono and hurried along. They kiss her anyway and hug her surprised at how forward they are, how intense and excited to please; not stopping to kiss the mezuzah, they step inside by stepping around her, each to a flank and further to what has to be Hanna now next to Israel, his boss and bread changed into casual slippers but into new pants and a shirt, too, just as formal as the suit he’d been wearing; they’re holding each other, these guests, her head on his shoulder as if she’s suddenly tired, and how he tries to shake her hand off to shake Israel’s then say sorry to Hanna; apologies — that’s what I’m good for.

Wanda had Shabbos off, ostensibly, their Sabbaths and not hers, if and only if during the week she’d somehow or other satisfied Hanna, which satisfaction was often as difficult as proving to the most redoubtable of doubters the existence of an omnipotent God: though this can be done, God’s history tells us, there’s nothing impossible; Hanna’s particular brand of cacoethes carpendi, otherwise known as obsessive/compulsive not a disorder, an order, and that’s the idea, a mania known Developmentwide — tempered by only her optimism, her famous can do, oftabused.

On Friday nights, Wanda had to serve, that was it: upon Shabbos eves rare in Hanna’s happiness, her having plucked no fruited fault from the tree whose boughs, pruned daily, would overnight, over eves, branch into all species of tasks, errands, resentment. It was Hanna’s elected responsibility to prepare their family dinner — duty, the Schedule, just doing her part, hauling her own pregnant weight — and then, how she’d sit in the shade of accomplishment, accepting compliments heaped into her cups, bowls and plates, blushing the rose of an apple and eating all the courses from the challah on down to dessert even and drinking her wine, too, and Israel’s as well, though not while with kinder while Wanda would serve. As for those cups, those bowls of fruit and plates — though it was always the responsibility of these kinder, rotating, to set the table, each week, they would groan to their mother, shouldn’t Wanda do this?

I mean, every Friday, what do you pay her for anyway?

As if, to decrease your inheritance.

In any defense, though, Israel offering his with professional husbandry to Hanna’s constant complaint — I might want to fire her but I can’t (I have my reasons), I’m not strong enough and how that calls everything else into question, I might not even want to at all — Wanda did offer to help do this setting as regularly as such offers would be refused, and so today, as every Friday in its late afternoon with the female half of her employment situation upstairs and clattering at cooking, Wanda would lie on her understuffed futon and smoke a filtered menthol or vanilla into her wardrobe, adjacent, her head pillowed listening to the dull slipper and sneakerfalls from the kitchen directly above her room underground, one floor up. Until called for — her smoking complained about despite how much she’d spray even sunscreen and insect repellent and scent with candles and burn incense for hours. After she served, which was a responsibility mostly for show, she would return to her room and sit listening to the kinder haul everything into the kitchen: three steps to a thud, four to a shatter. After Shabbos, a sink full of dirty pots, pans, dishes, and silverware would be waiting, plates and bowls, a pile of shards to be superglued. And leftovers, to scrape to the trash, the disposal, or else refrigerated or frozen for Sunday’s reheating.

Dinner! Hanna shouts, Wanda echoing her way upstairs-upstairs, in that accent of hers fearsome, and yet so endearing her to the kinder flooding their ways down the stairs screaming:

Dinner.

Dinner.

Dinner.

Dinner.

Dinner.

Dinner…

one flight from rooms the floors of which angels and archangels bump their halos and heads upon if heads or halos they have. The stairs take their feet, as if the bent backs of older guests — the Singers hunching their ways to the table, each being the other’s crutch. Batya, the last one though nearest the diningroom, stumbles in from the room living, family, den, her eyes smiling through sniffle, her mouth shaped as if the last teardrop, toothless. Israel blesses her nose wiped with a tablecloth corner, kisses her head; Hanna sighs. Tonight is one of the last dinners — one of the last linners or dunches, not many more of them left, combinations, recipes of the blend, before meals vomit themselves into omnipresence, that voraciously forever cyclical course; into our eating and drinking through not just an appetizer or entrée to late time — as if the arrivals, the youngest the latest among them, were afraid they’d missed everything with even dessert already served until Hanna had said and loudly what would sound like the name of a God and then in that accent of Wanda’s that renders everything foreign and so authoritative, such sense of importance mitigated only in its echo of echoes amid the high giddy swoops of the girls: they’re so excited, forgive them, it’s almost as if they, the guests, had been early or punctual after all; though it’s not them that’s been so long expected, their company, conversationally muktzah their dwelling on business and workaday cares, it’s what their presence finally, ultimately, means to them, to the daughters: the dinner, the dinner, THE dinner…

Hanna turns to straighten Israel’s tie he’s still in, the same tie from the day’s suit retained — to tuck it under a collar again, button it in again, tighten; he holds her hands in his to resist.

How thoughtful, she thinks, he’s wearing it for his partner: set an example, if you love him so much…

There’s a great gathering at table, each to a place and its set — every meal’s mishegas at their settling.

Cork, who has the cork? they ask.

I want to smell the cork, I want to taste it, to suck.

Israel raises his cup and remembers: first to wash ’n’ dry, to bless the bread he’d bought not an hour previously, half that, broken into two loaves and covered over then uncovered and blessed — kneaded asunder, they’ve risen to the occasion, so high. She didn’t bake? rise newly arrived eyes around the table, again, mouthy whispers falling silent, assuring: she didn’t bake. Salt then dinner ensues now with talk, the stir of the soup, conversation never indexed under any number Oxyrhynchus, as it’s all too well known. Why? Save your questions to sweeten the coffee, the weakening steep of the tea. Because everything can’t be forgotten, that’s why we remember, and anyway, guests, they shouldn’t ask too many questions, am I right…be pleasant, host polite, elbows off the table, shoulders straight, no fulling while your mouths talk to rumor, to gossip, or talking to answer while your mouth’s full, I mean — you come from a good family, they can tell…the Who’s? maybe…O any relation to the who’s on the Mainline, of one of the Five Towns, figuring that’s a twenty percent shot, odds are you’re favored? what street, what number, asking, just asking, a daughter’s at, hymn, and a son who’s her husband, the Muttershtups, the Ladlefarts him the surgical judge how he does operations on minorities at risk and for nothing, takes requests, no, on second thought maybe you wouldn’t, but at least you brought a bottle, how thoughtful, how kind, a few flowers for her, a bouquet of bees, an arrangement: isn’t it about time you got married, and so maybe you’d bring your kinder, too, if you have them the two of you you’re so cute together or if not, next time, then what’re you waiting for?