Settled in business class on a flight from L.A. to Israel, Micha, a successful 39 year-old ghostwriter, remains baffled by the all-expenses-paid invitation from his favorite Aunt Adella. Micha hadn’t seen her in 24 years, though etched into his memory is the first time he met Adella, when she was interrogated as a potential candidate for marriage to his beloved Uncle Moshe.

 

Micha was a precocious nine-year-old when his fiercely-proud Persian family summoned Adella, then eighteen, from the Tel Aviv orphanage for a bride interview. Wearing thick glasses, walking with a limp, Adella patiently endured a barrage of intrusive, and at times rude questions to investigate her suitability to marry Micha’s Uncle Moshe. Micha offered Adella a “candy coated almond.” Micha was the only family member who gave Adella a hug, before she was dismissed and unceremoniously ushered out. A reject! Uncle Moshe remained silent throughout the interview. He was grinning throughout the entire time. His hands trembling, Moshe was a closely guarded family secret. He was mentally challenged.

 

When there were no other candidates for six months, Adella was recalled. She demanded three conditions before she would return for her second interview: To speak one-on-one to Moshe, her intended groom, to have a chat with Moshe’s physician, to speak in private with only one family representative. Conditions met, Adella asked nine-year-old Micha to be her “shoshbbin” - her bridesman.

 

Little Micha approved Adella’s gown she sewed of special material, stitched to perfection with her own hands. She expressed her passion for knitting and displayed to him her beautiful sweater, made of lace, ribbons and cashmere. Micha loved his soon-to-be Aunt Adella’s soft voice, kind words.

 

The wedding was joyless. Without the traditional Sephardic ululations, flowers, music or “sheva brachot.” One aunt grabbed Adella’s glasses. Micha guided Adella blindly toward the chuppa. The family roared with laughter imagining the couple’s first night together. Adella became the family slave taking care of the old grandfather, cooking, cleaning and working in the family bakery.

 

After the wedding, teenaged Micha rarely saw his aunt Adella and Uncle Moshe. However, at age fifteen when Micha got very sick his mother grudgingly granted his wish, to recuperate with them. For three weeks, Adella tenderly, lovingly nursed Micha to health. Shortly thereafter Micha left Israel with his mother, to join his father in L.A. Micha lost touch with his Israeli family only hearing the high and lows of his Israeli mishpacha. Two uncles had heart attacks, one cousin divorced, Aunt Adella and Uncle Moshe became parents to baby Elisha.

 

Now after years of absence from Israel, inside an elegant cab, Micha was mystified why he was en route to the Dan Hotel in Tel Aviv for a meeting with Mrs. Adel. What could possibly be the reason his newly-named aunt sent for him? And why did she abbreviate her name?

 

An affecting novella by Israeli author Savyon Lebrechet, The Bridesman overflows with pathos, warmth and the tenacity of a woman who dares to fulfill her potential.