Chapter 11 The Goyfriend

"Meeting your Goy toy, tonight?" Alex teased her over the cubicle wall. She'd recently told her work friends about Gabe during one of their lunch breaks. Usually they spent a lot of time complaining about work, listening to Alex test his standup material, or making fun of some of the dates the boys had been on. Mark had recently gone on a couple of dates with a girl who was an understudy for a chorus position in a Broadway show. "She can kick her leg up to here!" He exclaimed holding his hand flat in front of his eyes.

"How'd you find that out?" Alex joked back. "Is that why your nose is looking a little swollen today?" Lunch was always full of laughter and Leah had begun enjoying work for the sole purpose of lunchtime. She liked being the girl in the guys' group. She liked listening to their jokes and sometimes chauvinistic opinions. She also liked when they asked her for her input as their token female friend. Should Mark contact the Broadway Chorus understudy again, even if she actually had kicked him in the face? No, well, only if you want to apologize for something , Leah had advised definitively. They took her seriously during lunchtime, which was the only time she felt taken seriously.

At her cubicle, she kept receiving assignments for data entry and number punching, yet she was always included in meetings where people were reprimanded for mistakes. She'd even asked Malcolm's advice on how she could get Tony to assign her a story. Malcolm had smiled politely and curled his finger to motion her closer. "Just keep doing a good job and he'll notice," he had whispered to her. Leah thought it was horrible advice, but she smiled and nodded and went back to her cubicle and financial statements. But there was always lunchtime. Lunchtime was sacred. They took lunch breaks no matter their deadlines or how much Tony yelled at them for slacking off.

That day, when Alex and Mark had asked her whether she had dated anyone interesting, she'd responded that she was dating a goy.

"What the hell is that?" Mark had yelled over pastrami sandwiches.

"It sounds like a fish-guy. Half coy, half guy? Does he have gills? Fins? Did you meet near the pond? How's his kiss?" Alex made a mock fish face.

Leah had assumed that goy was common slang that everyone knew. Everyone she'd previously hung out with would have immediately understood she meant she was dating a non-Jew. Someone who wasn't a Member-of-the-Tribe. An outsider. So she explained the word to her new friends and they got a full kick out of knowing that Jews had secret codes to describe people like them.

"He's not my boy toy," Leah stressed over the cubicle wall. "He's my boyfriend."

"Your goyfriend," Alex corrected.

"Whatever." She giggled, unable to deny that it was funny. She was excited to call Gabe her boyfriend and wanted to say it all the time. The word first slipped a few nights ago when they were at happy hour after work and they ran into one of Gabe's colleagues. Gabe introduced her casually as his girlfriend. Leah smiled like everything was normal and shook the colleague's hand.

"I'm your girlfriend?" She asked once they were alone again.

"Oh, sorry. Is that OK if I call you that? I didn't mean to assume, I mean, I didn't want to call you a friend, because that could be offensive since we've already slept together. And mistress doesn't seem right, since it implies I'm cheating on someone else…"

"Girlfriend is fine, boyfriend," Leah cut him off. And there it was. He was her boyfriend. They had slept together in her tiny apartment after dinner the previous night. He'd walked her home like usual, and when he kissed her, she couldn't take it anymore. She brought him to her bedroom where he ignited her body unlike anything she had experienced before .

It was nothing like sex with Asher. He was the only person she had slept with before. They had lost their virginities together when she was a junior in high school and she had never even considered sleeping with anyone else. Sex was a long-time experiment. An ongoing challenge to find out what was so good about it. Something they hadn't quite been able to conquer, despite the ambition and optimism that teenagers harbor when it comes to sex.

But with Gabe, Leah instantly understood the appeal. She wanted him more the more he touched her. She felt natural and sexy as they made love in her bed and even as they lay together naked afterward. She felt like she should have been self-conscious. She should have been uncomfortable baring her body to someone she'd only known for a couple of weeks. But she didn't. Maybe it was the happy hour drinks (half off that evening), or maybe it was because things with Gabe were just right.

That morning, she'd gone to work a new person. She was someone's girlfriend. She had a boyfriend and a newly heating up sex life. Two things she had been hoping would be part of her New York life. In fact, she was meeting Gabe that night. And Maya. And even Malcolm, who was constantly trying to convince her to come out salsa dancing. A few days previously, he'd pulled out his phone to show her some pictures and videos from the club. She watched the dancers shake their hips in the magenta light with a roar of music and shouting in the background. The women were beautiful, all wearing ruffled dresses that swiveled as they turned, with slick hair pulled back in buns surrounded by flowers. And they were sexy. The way they moved was sexy. Everything about it was sexy.

Leah was intrigued by how Malcolm fit in and she thought it would be a fun activity for her and her new (sexy) boyfriend. Maya had wanted to come along and was bringing a friend to dance with. Malcolm had assured Leah that it was fine for women and men to come on their own, there would be plenty of people there to dance with and it was fun for the regulars to dance with new partners. If they came early enough, there was even a short dance class for the first-timers. Malcolm wouldn't be there that early, he didn't need the class, but he highly recommended it to Leah and she had planned on getting there right on time.

She'd mentioned to Alex and Mark that she was meeting Malcolm at his salsa club. Did they want to join? Her single friend was coming, she said, trying to convince them. They both laughed and told her to have fun. Sneak a few pictures of Malcolm for us! Alex pleaded. I'm dying to see him in a tutu!

When work was over, she quickly packed up her things and ran to the subway. She had just about two hours to commute, shower, change, meet Gabe, and get to the club if she wanted to learn the moves during the free class. She shoved her way through the train platform and onto the car as though she'd been living in New York her entire life. She was no longer intimidated by the crowded station. She could easily scan the platform, plot her path, and slip into the car without making anyone too angry. Personal space was just nonexistent if you wanted to commute efficiently.

If she were lucky, she could even get a seat on the train, since this was the stop where most commutes uptown started. And on this day, she was lucky, extremely lucky because she managed to plop down in a lonely seat that had no one next to it. She pulled her bag on her lap and took out the library book she'd recently picked up. With her boyfriend. He'd gone with her to sign up for a library card. Maya had thought that was the epitome of a "nerd date," but Leah had appreciated it. She wasn't sure she'd figure out the system on her own. She had barely even used the library at her university and was used to just ordering on Amazon if she ever wanted to read something. But now, she was on a budget. A tight salary. An overpriced apartment. A library card.

As the train lurched forward, she tried to concentrate on reading—it was contemporary fiction and she was enjoying it!—but her mind wandered, daydreaming about salsa dancing that night with Gabe. She couldn't wait to have his hands on her. To dance with him in public and then continue the routine in her bedroom. It would be every bit of New York magic that she'd hoped for. Instead of reading, she stared off to the side of the train tunnel and waited rather impatiently until her stop. She almost ran home, and then jumped in the shower without even saying hello to her roommate who was already in her room.

Sadly, that had become the norm. Instead of gushing about their days together on the couch as Leah had hoped for, they avoided each other, only moving around shared spaces when the other was closed inside their room or out. The TV they didn't know where to place was still sitting on the floor, plugged into an outlet and positioned at a very uncomfortable angle to watch from the couch, but neither moved it. Both just craned their necks whenever they watched alone and pretended that it was something that would be resolved one day.

Leah put on a low-necked red dress that was the closest thing she had to a salsa costume. She put on red lipstick and dark eyeliner and blew dry her curls so that they hung wildly around her face.

Her phone buzzed with a text from Gabe that he was outside. Right on time.

Her phone buzzed again. She assumed it was Gabe, or maybe Maya who was also on her way, but it was her mom. Hey honey! Did you know the Rosenbergs have a cousin your age in New York? I gave them your number and he is going to call you to set up a date for drinks. He works in business! Sounds like you'll have so much to talk about!

The Rosenbergs were a family from their synagogue. Leah knew the mom who was famous for her kugel, which she brought to every function. Leah did not know they had a cousin in New York. Nor did she care. She didn't need her mom setting her up with some random guy! Even if they had so much in common, such as…being Jewish! And working in "business," although Leah was still hoping that was temporary for her.

Leah hadn't told her family yet about Gabe. Aside from Shira, who had shown cautious enthusiasm when Leah told her they were now official. Her parents would be less understanding. They'd never be able to see that Gabe was an intelligent, kind, and handsome man. All they'd see is a goy.

She gave a last look to the mirror, tossed her phone in her purse, and headed out the door.