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She was surprised how much she wanted David to stick around, though. She sort of wanted him to ask to watch the shoot.
She’d gotten to seehimwork after all. And she was proud of the work she did. She thought maybe Dani would enjoy it, at least. Of course, that would probably be weird to suggest, too.
Baxter spent the rest of the day in a proper snit, so that was something else Shoshana was going to have to worry about at some point. Her phone pinged with another text message.
Well I told you last night I wanted to take you out. Twice, if memory serves.
Shoshana narrowed her eyes, her thumbs flying over the phone screen. As I recall, you said you wanted to meet for coffee--that’s different than a date.
Is it? So, you’re okay with meeting for coffee, but you have misgivings about a date? For the record I also suggested lunch.
“Jerkface,” Shoshana said to the empty room. While the noodles were boiling, she tossed some shrimp into a frying pan and gave it a good shake. She picked up her phone again. Why do you want to go on a date with me so bad?
The phone rang and she cursed, putting it back on the counter for a moment and pacing the length of her small kitchen. The phone was on its third ring and she made herself answer it. He knew she was there, letting him go to voicemail would just be petulant.
She answered the phone and pressed the button to turn the call to speaker. If he was going to talk to her she was going to keep cooking her dinner.
“Has anyone ever told you you’re surprisingly cagey?” David said, amusement in his voice.
“How am I cagey? I asked a simple question: why do you want to go on a date?” Shoshana said, defensive, but unclear as to exactly why. She was fully aware she was being difficult.
“You did this last night too. The deflection thing, I mean,” David mused. She heard some clatter in the background and his voice was muffled for a moment. She could see him talking to his daughter, maybe cajoling her into eating and it made her smile. “Is it the idea of meeting with people in general, or me specifically?”
“You don’t want me to answer that. Did Baxter put you up to this?” she asked, and his laughter did something to her lower body that she didn’t want to think about.
“Actually, Baxter questioned my intentions and made it very clear that I was not to hurt you.”
“He did not,” Shoshana said, because she couldn’t actually imagine Bax doing such a thing.
“I assure you he did,” David said, then said something else to someone that wasn’t Shoshana. “I apologize, I’m trying to convince my daughter that grape Jell-O is not a food group.”
“Definitely not, blue raspberry is better,” Shoshana said automatically, then wondered when the last time she’d even had Jell-O. She suspected Abigail had been involved.
She checked the egg noodles, then realized she should be whipping the sauce for this dish together before the shrimp was done cooking. If she was out of lime juice, she was going to be very irritated with herself.
“Agree to disagree on that,” David said. “I prefer strawberry myself. But that’s not the point.”
“No? What else is for dinner, then? Also, isn’t it late for dinner for kids? Not that I know that kinda stuff, just, you know, it’s dark out,” Shoshana said, relieved they had abandoned the subject of dating, at least for the time being. She glanced at the clock on the stove.
“Kind of, we were doing other stuff. And the Jell-O had to set. That’s a whole science thing. We’re also having chicken nuggets shaped like dinosaurs, waffle fries, and baby carrots. We had dessert first. That was the grape Jell-O.”
It was criminal how adorable she found this.
Shoshana stood stock still in her kitchen, then she repeated what he’d said silently to herself. She could imagine him in his kitchen, sleeves rolled up, matter-of-factly doling out Jell-O and chicken nuggets and baby carrots while Dani supervised.
“Do you normally eat dessert first?” she managed to ask, because she had to say something.
“It’s a new thing we’re doing, on Saturdays,” David said, sounding muffled for a moment and she wondered what was happening on his end of the conversation, “We had Havdalah and Dani suggested it. I liked the symbolism so I went with it.”
“The grape Jell-O? Like, because of the grapes in the wine?” Shoshana said, cocking her head to suss that one out. Havdalah was a thing her father used to insist upon, even if they weren’t at shul. Aside from the cool candle, Shoshana had never understood the appeal of the service.
“Kind of,” David said, “hang on, I’m going to put you on speaker. Dani, would you like to explain?”
“We had the sweet,” said a thready voice Shoshana recognized as Dani, “and that’s over for the week, so then we have the regular stuff. So we have dessert first because it's sweet, and then we have the regular food.”
“That’s.... interesting,” Shoshana said, though she wasn’t entirely sure the point the child was trying to make, “Dessert before dinner is definitely a special thing.”
“Yeah, that’s right,” Dani said, sounding a little excited, “And so is Shabbat!”
