"It's a farkakte idea," Grandma Ida declared. "It's meshugge."

Grandma Ida's words stung, bringing fresh tears to Julia's eyes. She'd always associated Yiddish words with warmth and affection and family ties-but they could also be weapons. She'd thought her grandmother might object to turning over her residence to such a big party, having strangers taking over her kitchen and arranging guest towels in her bathrooms. She might have complained about the inconvenience, the risk to her furniture, the noise. But farkakte? Meshugge? Those words weren't aimed at the idea. They were aimed at Julia.

"I think it's a good idea," she argued, struggling to keep her tears out of her voice. "Where did you get married? In your parents' home?"

"In the shul, of course. The rabbi was there, we stood under a chupah, Isaac, may he rest, smashed a glass and we broke bread and drank wine. And the next day we were back at the pushcart, selling knishes. No honeymoon. No caterer. None of that stuff."

"Well, Ron and I are going to have a honeymoon. And a caterer."

"So have your wedding in your mother's apartment. It's as big as mine."

"She would never let me," Julia explained. "She wants to have the wedding at the Plaza Hotel because her brother's son had his bar mitzvah there."

Grandma Ida clicked her tongue and shook her head. "Your mother," she muttered. "And Martha is an idiot, so you can't have your wedding at her apartment. Uncle Jay's apartment-"

"Isn't as big as yours," Julia completed the sentence. "The Plaza won't let me use Bloom's to cater. Central Park won't let me serve liquor."

"What? No wine at a wedding?"

"Obviously Central Park is out." Julia sighed. "There are venues-places," she corrected herself, "that rent out for weddings, but they aren't necessarily bigger than your apartment."

"And, what, you want to set up a chupah here? A canopy big enough to get married under?"

"We can have the actual ceremony in a synagogue. This would just be for the reception."

"What synagogue? You belong to a synagogue?"

"There are eleven synagogues within ten blocks of here," Julia assured her. A person couldn't walk more than a few steps on Manhattan's Upper West Side without stumbling upon a synagogue. Ron had promised he'd call the neighborhood temples and find out what they'd require of him and Julia in order to hold their wedding there. If they had to join a congregation, they would. But that was his headache. They'd divvied up the headaches: he'd won the service and she'd won the reception.

"So, the synagogue doesn't have a basement room?"

"I don't want to have my reception in a basement room," Julia protested. "Basement rooms have no windows."

"And I've got windows, so you want to have the reception here."

"I want to have it here because you're my grandmother." Julia hated her plaintive undertone, but she couldn't swallow it down. Her wistfulness was unjustified; she couldn't have hoped for Grandma Ida to magically turn into one of those plump, doting grandmothers eager to spoil her grandchildren with home-baked cookies and lavish indulgences. Grandma Ida had never once opened her arms to Julia and said, Bubbela, whatever you want. She'd never said, You are gorgeous, or a genius, or perfect, the way grandmothers were supposed to gush over their grandchildren, the way Grandma Ethel, on Julia's mother's side, did. Grandma Ethel would have been the exemplar of grandmotherliness-plump and overflowing with indiscriminate compliments-except that she'd moved down to Boca Raton three years ago and now spent more of her time playing golf and bleaching her hair an ever lighter blond than spoiling her grandchildren. But when she'd lived in Riverdale, she'd always lavished unwarranted praise on Susie, Adam and Julia, as well as Travis and his sister, Corinne.

The greatest praise Grandma Ida had ever given Julia was when she'd said, "You remind me of me." Which could have been as easily interpreted as an insult.

So Julia shouldn't have expected her to say, Of course you can have your reception in my apartment! I would consider it an honor!

"All right, never mind," Julia said briskly, refusing to let that whimpery undertone filter into her voice again. "I've got to get back downstairs. I have to iron out a problem with one of our yogurt suppliers."

"Gonefs, all of them," Grandma Ida grunted. "So I'll think about this idea of yours. It's tsadreit, but I'll think about it."

Should Julia be grateful? Was Grandma Ida really going to think about the idea, or was she simply stringing Julia along, coming as close as she'd ever come to Bubbela, whatever you want? It almost didn't matter. Julia felt drained and glum, as if Aunt Martha had left her cloud behind when she'd departed and it had settled just inches above Julia's head, poised to spit rain on her.

Suppressing a sigh, she stood and bent over to kiss her grandmother's cheek. "Don't let those yogurt people steal you blind," Grandma Ida warned, as if Julia needed such counsel. She was tempted to retort, in a sweet voice, that she hoped Grandma Ida would enjoy the book about broads versus God. But she held her sarcasm and faked yet another smile. Grandma Ida did say she'd consider Julia's farkakte plan, after all.

Lyndon had disappeared somewhere in the nether reaches of the apartment, so Julia let herself out without saying goodbye to him. She was so edgy she actually contemplated climbing down the twenty-two flights of stairs to her office rather than taking the elevator, but she was wearing shoes with clunky heels, and if she took the stairs she'd be farschvitzed by the time she got downstairs.

Twenty minutes in Grandma Ida's company and she was thinking in Yiddish.

She pressed the elevator button and commanded her brain to clarify itself. No matter that Grandma Ida had tossed her a scrap and said she'd think about it-Julia couldn't count on having her wedding on the twenty-fifth floor of the Bloom Building. She had to find another location.

She'd telephoned a couple of boating outfits. A wedding party on the Hudson River would be delightful, assuming none of the guests suffered from seasickness, but the companies had all insisted on supplying their own caterers. Maybe her cousin Neil could find her a more open-minded yacht-rental service. He ran a sailing charter business in southern Florida, but half of southern Florida was transplanted New Yorkers like Grandma Ethel, so she shouldn't discount the possibility that he knew some boating firms in the city.

She'd check with the Cloisters again, too. So what if the place was full of medieval Christian art? At least it was beautiful medieval Christian art. The last time she'd spoken to a representative there, he'd informed her of the museum's formidable deposit-"in case an irreplaceable artifact gets damaged," he'd explained, and she'd flashed on a vision of Adam gesticulating too broadly and smashing his hand through a priceless stained-glass window-and the museum also banned alcoholic beverages.

Which meant she was back to the loft and townhouse venues, all of them exorbitantly priced and prepared to fight to the death over who would do the catering.

If she'd realized planning a wedding would be so complicated, she would have purchased two tickets to Las Vegas and had an Elvis impersonator marry her and Ron in a ticky-tack chapel on the Strip.

She emerged from the elevator on the third floor and strolled through the broad hallway, past the open doors to her office. "Julia," Dierdre Morrissey shouted through her door, "Melvin Slatnik from Galicia Cured Meats called to discuss our pastrami order. He wants you to call him back immediately."

Julia rolled her eyes. Everything with Slatnik was always an emergency.

"Also, one of the cash registers is down. I phoned the service company. Also, our bel paese delivery is going to be delayed a day. Don't ask me why. The guy on the phone didn't speak English. Also, Morty Sugarman from the bagel department wants a minute with you sometime before the end of the week."

So many crises, so little time. "Thanks," Julia shouted through Dierdre's open door. Through her mother's open door, adjacent to Dierdre's, Julia heard the phone ring. She prayed that whoever was on the other end of the line had a crisis her mother could handle without her help.

She clomped into her office, sank into the oversized chair and punched the speed-dial button for Ron's office. Whatever Melvin Slatnik's problems with pastrami might be, they couldn't be more important than Julia's impending nuptials.

"Joffe here," Ron answered his phone.

"It's me," Julia said, cringing when she heard the whine creep back into her voice. "My grandmother was extremely lukewarm about our using her apartment for the reception."

"How can someone be extremely lukewarm?" Ron asked. "Lukewarm, by definition, isn't extreme."

"Don't argue semantics with me," Julia snapped. He was a writer; he cared about the connotations of words. Julia ran a deli and she didn't give a damn about connotations. "We have to find another place to hold the wedding. Maybe we should look outside the city. Brooklyn, maybe."

"Brooklyn? You want to get married in Brooklyn?" He sounded as if she'd suggested Spokane, or maybe the dark side of the moon.

"No, I don't want to get married in Brooklyn. I don't even know what I want-except for life to be easier than it is right now."

"Here's an idea," Ron said, sounding as amiable as she felt bitter. "How about NYU?"

"NYU?"

"You got your law degree there. I got my MBA there. Your cousin graduated from the film school there. Maybe we could rent a classroom or something."

"Oh, a classroom," she grunted. "A nice chemistry lab, perhaps. All that counter space, built-in sinks and those little Bunsen burners we can use under the chafing dishes. What a fabulous idea."

"They've got reception rooms, Julia," he said patiently.

They did. Some very nice ones, in fact. Grandma Ida would kvetch about having to schlep all the way down to Greenwich Village with the beatniks, but big deal. Julia could arrange to have a car service bring her downtown. Or maybe Susie could rent a van from Truck-a-Buck and shuttle all their uptown guests to the party. In her maid-of-honor dress, she'd make quite a glamorous chauffeur.

But NYU...Hell, she wasn't even a lawyer anymore. She'd gone there, made Law Review, passed the boards, gotten a job with a major firm-and left it to run a delicatessen. The law school might not even allow her to show her face in the buildings, especially since as an alumna she'd ignored all their plaintive mailings requesting donations. "NYU won't work," she said.

"Oh, you're right." It was apparently Ron's turn to be sarcastic now. "What could I have been thinking? Giving you a good idea. My mistake."

"I'm trying to be serious, Ron."

"You're trying to be fatalistic. You sound like someone died."

"Someone is going to die if he doesn't take this more seriously. It's our wedding I'm talking about."

"Maybe we could rent a warehouse in Jersey City," Ron suggested.

Julia groaned. "You are an asshole. I'm hanging up now."

"I'll see you tonight," Ron said cheerfully. "Wear something sexy so I can tear it off you with my teeth."

She hung up. Through her open door she heard her mother shriek, "Julia! What's this about your getting married in Grandma Ida's apartment?"

Before she could respond, Uncle Jay materialized in her doorway. "You're getting married in my mother's apartment?"

"Or on Neil's boat."

"Neil's in Florida," Uncle Jay reminded her.

"If he loves me, he'll sail to New York," Julia said.

"Julia!" her mother bellowed. "You can't get married in Grandma Ida's apartment!"

"Is she getting married in Ida's apartment?" Myron shouted across the hall to Sondra.

"I'm sure Neil loves you," Uncle Jay said, "but asking him to sail all the way to New York-"

Her phone rang, giving her the opportunity to swivel away from Uncle Jay, who was now lounging comfortably against the doorjamb. "Julia Bloom," she said, hoping it was Ron with a brilliant idea for their wedding.

No such luck. "Julia? It's Susie," her sister said into the phone, her voice filtering through static and what sounded like the Doppler effect. "Listen, we're including a six-foot lobster in the movie. I just wanted to warn you. Don't worry-it's going to be fabulous."

A lobster in the infomercial. A mother having conniptions. An uncle loitering in her office when he ought to be getting his work done. A grandmother with a will of iron and an intellect of flypaper twisted into Mobius strips. An asshole fiance who wanted to tear her clothing off with his teeth.

Given the train wreck that was her life, she was awfully grateful for the asshole fiance.

Twelve.

Susie's cell phone chirped.

She and Rick had just returned from dinner at the hillbilly restaurant across the parking lot from the motel. Susie's fried chicken had come with a side of grits, and after one bite of the gluey white mush, she resolved to persuade Julia never ever to allow grits onto the shelves of Bloom's. Rick had ordered a rack of ribs, and he had a smear of rust-colored barbecue sauce on his T-shirt, right below the bright green K among the letters stretched across his chest to read, Take Direction.

He'd insisted on bringing Linus into the room for the night. Susie had argued that no one would steal a six-foot-long plastic lobster, and Rick had pointed out that he'd stolen the six-foot-long plastic lobster, so she'd relented and let him lug the creature inside. It lay on the floor between their two beds, looking more comfortable swimming in the green shag carpeting than she felt sprawled out on the spongy mattress of her bed. Rick sat cross-legged on the other bed, a map spread open in front of him as he plotted their next move.

The phone chirped again and Susie dug it out of her purse, assuring herself that her momentary breathlessness was nothing more significant than an emotional hiccup. She was not hoping Casey would phone. She did not wish to speak to the man. She did not want to hear him make pronouncements on marriage and commitment and other unpleasant topics.

Retrieving the phone, she vowed to herself that if she heard Casey's voice on the other end she wouldn't be thrilled. She flipped it open and said, "Hello?"

"Susie? It's Anna."

The hell with her vow; she had to fend off a major twang of disappointment. "Hey, Anna, what's up?" she asked, falsely cheery.

Rick's gaze jerked away from the map and he stared at Susie. "Is it Anna?" he whispered, his eyes unnaturally bright.

"It's Anna," Susie told him, then said into the phone, "that was Rick. He wanted to know if it was you."

"Tell him it's me," Anna said.

Susie obeyed, although she felt kind of silly relaying trivial messages back and forth between the two. "So, what's up?" she repeated into the phone.

"Not much. Caitlin says she's in love with these guys she met at a rave last night."

"Guys? How many is she in love with?"

"Two. Identical twins. You know Caitlin."

Susie sighed. She couldn't believe Anna had telephoned her all the way in Maine to tell her about Caitlin's latest infatuation-or infatuations, plural.

She was right. Anna had telephoned her all the way in Maine to tell her something else: "You'll never guess who I ran into this afternoon on the corner of Avenue A and East Fourth."

"Who?"

"Casey."

"In our neighborhood?" What would he have been doing there? It was such an onerous trip for him, after all. That was why he'd initially asked Susie to move into his apartment in Queens, before he'd gotten carried away and introduced the subject of marriage.

"Can I talk to Anna?" Rick called over from his bed.

Susie glanced at him and realized he'd tossed the map aside and was blatantly eavesdropping on her phone conversation. He had a fleck of barbecue sauce at the corner of his mouth, too. If Anna saw him as he was right now, sauce-stained and tousle-haired, his feet smudged with soil from traipsing around farms in his sandals and that idiotic tuft of beard adorning his chin like a scrap of drier lint, she'd sure be turned on, Susie thought sarcastically. "No," she said to him, then cupped the phone closer to her ear and stared at her knees. "What was he doing?"

"This is so weird, Susie. He wasn't alone. He was with a woman."

Susie tried to pretend her heart wasn't contracting into a tight little wad of pain at Anna's words. So Casey was with a woman. Big deal. Susie had broken up with him, hadn't she? They'd had explosive sex on her sister's office couch and then said goodbye. She had no claim on him. He had no claim on her. She didn't, didn't, didn't care that he was strolling around her neighborhood with a woman. "Did he introduce you?" she asked, struggling to rid her voice of emotion.

"Yeah. I don't remember her name. I do remember that she was black."

Maybe she was a friend of Mose's. Susie and Casey had gone out with Mose and his girlfriend, LaShonna, a bunch of times. Maybe Casey was with LaShonna herself.

And maybe Susie was some kind of racist for assuming that just because Casey was with a black woman, it would have to be someone he'd met through Mose.