Between Aleph and Tav

Purple Suede and Pita Crumbs

The fluorescent lights hummed overhead, buzzing in that way Hillel always does—too bright, too loud, too familiar. I tuned it out somewhere around the third round of Guess Who?, pretending I didn’t already know all the faces. Someone brought kosher-for-Pesach marshmallows, which felt deeply wrong. It was Thursday night, April 10th—barely 48 hours until Pesach—and the air in the room was full of forced cheer, half-packed luggage, and chametz jokes that weren’t really jokes.

I hovered near the snacks. Not hungry, just... occupying space. My fingers brushed a bag of kosher potato chips, but I didn’t open it. I’d already stopped eating chametz, not halachically, just emotionally. A pre-Pesach spiritual cleanse. A ritual of restraint.

And then I saw him.

Leaning over a chessboard like he knew what he was doing, sleeves pushed up, curls falling into his eyes. His kippah was purple suede, stitched in white, perched off-center like he’d placed it there once and never fixed it. When he looked up and met my eyes, it felt like he’d been waiting.

“You play?” he asked.

I stepped closer. “Only when I want to lose.”

He grinned like I’d passed some test. “Sit down.”

His name was Eitan.

I learned that after the first round, which I lost. (Not on purpose. I’m not that humble.) We ditched the game pretty fast—he said it wasn’t fun winning if I wasn’t trying. I told him he was annoying, and he smiled like I’d flirted.

He asked if I was going home for Pesach. I said no. My family’s in Israel, and the last six months have made everything feel impossible. I didn’t want to explain all of that, so I just said, “It’s complicated.”

He nodded. “I’m staying here too. My folks are in Toronto, but I’m doing seder with a friend’s family. Outremont. Chassidish.”

I laughed. “Good luck. Don’t correct their Dvar Torah and you’ll survive.”

“Thanks for the warning.”

He didn’t ask why I wasn’t going home. He didn’t ask why I hadn’t touched anything on the snack table, or why my sleeves were long despite the heat in the room. He didn’t stare at my face the way some boys do, like they’re trying to solve a puzzle they’re too afraid to admit they don’t understand.

He just talked. About cinnamon challah and weird Sephardi-Ashkenazi blends and how Montreal drivers are terrifying. He made me laugh. Not in a lightheaded, dizzy way. In a real way.

I hadn’t realized how much I missed that.

After most people had trickled out and someone started sweeping the floor with a surprisingly loud broom, I stood near the coat rack, debating whether to bolt or linger.

He showed up again. Of course he did.

“A few of us are doing a bedikat chametz thing tomorrow morning,” he said, like it was no big deal. “Candle, feather, flashlights. A little serious, a little ridiculous. You should come.”

I hesitated. Not because I didn’t want to. But because I did. And wanting is always complicated when you’ve built your life around restraint.

“I’ll think about it,” I said.

He nodded like he understood. Like he really did.

And then he turned to leave.

“Eitan,” I called.

He looked back.

“Your kippah’s falling off.”

He laughed and reached up to adjust it. “Better?”

“Not really,” I said. “But it suits you.”

The night air outside was sharp, damp with melting snow. My boots made soft crunching sounds on the sidewalk. I didn’t bother pulling on my gloves. I liked the sting of cold on my fingers—it made everything feel more real.

In two nights, I’d sit at a seder table alone-but-not-alone, singing the same songs my bubbe sang in Jerusalem, dipping parsley into saltwater, whispering my own private Mah Nishtanah to no one in particular. I’d smile politely. I’d carry the weight of freedom and its price.

But right now?

Right now, I had this: a crooked smile, a purple kippah, the ghost of a chessboard, and the feeling of being seen—not perfectly, not fully, but gently.

And for once, that was enough.

— Chaya Feldstein