Page 63 of Dear Daddy, Please Want Me

Levi shook his head. “That doesn’t matter. We can do all of it in English. One of my podcasts is English only, and there’s definitely a good email that one of my friends gets. I’ll have to ask her which one it is.”

“So you listen in Hebrew?”

“No, not fully. The discussion is in English, but when they quote the text and references it’s in Hebrew.”

Yeah, Saul was going to be way out of his depth. But he could see how important it was to Levi. And honestly, he figured that talking about Talmud with someone so clearly passionate about it was going to be a very different experience than his death-by-boredom Hebrew school lessons as a kid. It would be a different kind of doing something special together.

“So, tell me about Pesachim.”

“Well, in the most recent one I read, 14a, I think, the rabbis were arguing about whether meat and oil that were made ritually impure by touching someone who had touched something impure could still be used in sacrifices at the same time.”

Phew. Right. Talmud. People were still studying this hundreds of years later, even though temple sacrifices hadn’t been made in two thousand years. “So what did they conclude?”

“They didn’t. Or at least not that I’ve read so far. I believe the oil can contaminate the oil, but the meat works differently. At any rate, what I take from it is actually pretty much what I was saying before. That you should be thoughtful when you eat. Or at least when you make sacrifices. Like, the details are important and everything is connected.”

Huh. That was a lot to think about. “What does this have to do with Pesach?”

“Oh, it all kicks off with something weird about watching oxen to see how long they can plow to know when to start cleaning the chametz”–that was the raised bread that people ate during the rest of the year–“out of the house to get ready for Passover. Then they’re like… speaking of oxen, remember this unrelated thing about meat? OK, go.”

Saul chuckled. Fine, so Daf Yomi was probably going to be intense, but Levi would at least make it fun. And probably surprisingly insightful.

“I think I could commit to… maybe once a week? On Shabbat, maybe?”

Levi bounced out of his chair to cover his face with kisses.

He was just so… joyful. So amazingly easy to delight. Saul could already imagine days and weeks and years of this exhilaration in his life.

While Levi was already close, Saul pulled him down onto his lap. “So… speaking of Passover… Were you serious about having me meet your family, too?”

Levi shone and the sloppy, enthusiastic kisses began all over again. “First night with my family and second night with yours?”

“My mother would love that, if you’re willing to drive up to Seattle.” Maybe it was too soon to say such things. God, it sounded so domestic. Like they were married already or something.

But they’d known each other for most of a year, and, well, Saul had a pretty good feeling that they’d still be going strong come spring. Everything that Saul found out about Levi as a sub and a boyfriend, if that’s what they were, and, well, a Talmud scholar, just made it better.

They eventually settled back down to eating dinner, giving each other silly grins across the table. It was just… he’d never taken anyone home for Passover. Well, college friends, of course. But never someone he was dating. Some of them hadn’t lasted long enough and some of them hadn’t been Jewish.

His mother would be thrilled to meet Levi.

Another thought occurred to him. “Levi, what does neshama mean?” He pronounced it like most Hebrew words, with the accent at the end.

“Hmm? Oh, it means soul or spirit or breath. Like you’ve probably heard Kol haneshama tehallel Yah is let everything that has breath praise the Holy One.”

“That sounds vaguely familiar. And how about motek?” He made the first syllable soft and gentle, more like mah, with the accent on the second.

“Awww… are you thinking about nicknames for me?”

“Um, yeah. My grandfather called my grandmother those names. But I didn’t know what they meant. Like, it could have been something weird or derogatory, too.”

“No, those are both adorable. Matok means sweet, and motek is a variation that’s like sweetheart or honey or sweetie. And neshama sheli would be my soul. Of course, in English it sounds really dramatic and poetic to call someone ‘my soul.’ In Israel people kind of toss it around casually. Like, you could call your neighbor’s kid that or say it in your wedding.”

“So it’s still special?”

“It would be very special.” Levi promised. He propped his head on his folded hand and just looked up at Saul adoringly. It was a little bit posed and very Levi.

“I was also thinking about simcha.” He mangled throat-clearing sound on the ch, but he felt like he got it close enough. “That means joy, right? And people use it as a name?”

“I’m your simcha?” Levi practically fluttered out of his chair.