Shaindele’s whole body seemed to exhale a sigh of relief.

“But the next time, you should let me know. I was beginning to worry,” Leah said.

“I’m sorry. I’ll try to remember.”

“Sit down, eat something,” Leah said generously, overcoming her disappointment over their lost privacy. It would just have to be put off.

“She ate already. A pizza,” Yaakov said mildly but pointedly. “Your stepmother and I need a little privacy, Shaindele.”

Shaindele looked from one to the other, surprised. Her father had never before even used that word! “I’m going to my room.”

“Thank you,” Leah called after her.

Shaindele closed the door behind her, leaning her back against it and exhaling like a mountain climber who has just navigated a treacherous rock wall. Such luck! They were busy with each other. Otherwise, she might have been facing questions that were difficult, if not impossible, to answer. Questions she hadn’t even asked herself.

What am I doing? she thought, looking into her eyes in the mirror that hung over her desk. Her cheeks were flushed, even more so than usual, the high color deepening into a blush of red. Her pupils were dilated, and her lips seemed soft and vulnerable. After two weeks of sitting by the counter, Duvie Halpern had finally noticed her. He smiled! He didn’t do that often. She should know. She only saw that smile twice in the two weeks she’d become a daily visitor to Moishy’s: once when his boss had dropped a few boxes of pizzas ready for delivery, splattering tomato sauce and hot cheese everywhere, and another when a friend from his yeshiva days had told him his former rebbe had broken his arm on the way to shul.

While the other smiles had had something mean in them, the smile he had given to her was perfect, she told herself, all flashing white teeth and warm brown eyes. It made her tingle all over.

“I guess you must really like our pizza,” he’d said jokingly.

She’d sat there stupidly, tongue-tied.

Moishy had given Duvie a dirty look. “Don’t talk. Work.”

But just before he’d reluctantly turned away, Duvie had whispered, “Or maybe there is another reason?” And then he winked.

She’d looked down at her trembling hands, gripping the counter. When her pizza arrived, she’d fled.

Now what will I do? She could never go back now that he’d noticed her coming so often! But when she did (how could she pretend otherwise even to herself, even in the privacy of her own bedroom?), the next time, she’d have to think of something to say to him, something clever, so he wouldn’t think she was just some silly Bais Yaakov girl who fainted if a boy ever looked at her.