At the end of winter break, HUC and JTS were joining forces for minimester in a windowless basement auditorium. Jessica saw an empty seat in the circle next to a cute queer person. "Hi, I'm Jessica!" "Hi, I'm Leah." They seem kinda sullen, Jessica thought. Not interested in talking to me. I'll leave them alone. Leah interjects, "I wasn't sullen! I was just tired! It was the first day back and I'd been up until like 2am!" The next day, Leah sat next to Jessica and they had an actual conversation. No one remembers what it was about but it hardly matters.

We were pretending it was a casual effort to meet up, but we'd already gone beyond the minimum polite effort that might be required of new collegial friends. Our schedules were busy, but we kept trying to find a time. We agreed to march together with the contingent from CBST (Congregation Beit Simchat Torah, the queer shul). Despite tens of thousands of others surrounding us, it somehow still felt like a date. Jessica realized, as Leah spoke about watching Spongebob unironically as a child, that they must be much younger than she'd first thought. "How old are you?" Jessica blurted with a bit more feeling than intended. "24". Jessica quickly did the math: half her age was sixteen and a half, plus seven was... twenty-three and a half. Phew. Just under the wire.

Leah remembered that Jessica does not use transit on Shabbat, and thus planned out a whole itinerary: services at Shir Ha-Ma'alot, followed by potluck dinner. Jessica could stay on the futon downstairs. Altshul in the morning. Queer wrestling workshop in the afternoon. Throughout the day Jessica had noticed people seeing us as a couple (and wished it were so). But it was hard to cross the line with someone you'd met in a professional context. After some awkward downtime, we found ourselves playing with Leah's roommate's dog. Leah said, "I think you should go out with my friend R____. It seemed like you hit it off at dinner." Jessica managed not to say "She's not my type"--because the obvious next question would be, "What is your type?" and the answer was YOU and there was no way she was gonna play that off cool. She stammered, "Oh? I didn't get an I'm-single-and-looking vibe from her..." Though it was winter, it seemed like forever until the sun went down. On the train home, Jessica felt devastated. It's okay, she thought. There must be others. She pulled up JSwipe and started convincing herself to move on. Leah appeared on the screen. For a moment Jessica considered swiping left, whether out of spite or self-protection she wasn't sure. But I really do like this person... She swiped right.

Leah really wanted to go swimming. Jessica finagled free passes at the JCC for her and "her partner" to check out the pool facilities. She really was considering trying to join for swim lessons, until she realized the price quoted was monthly and not annual! (Did we mention Jessica can barely swim? That wasn't gonna stop her.) After a few pathetic attempts at laps, they moved to the shallow pool and floated around, talking for hours. Once their time was up they went for burritos and Insomnia cookies. Leah took Jessica's hand. They had their first kiss in the entrance of the subway. The JCC membership department never followed up.

A friend of a friend invited Leah to present as part of a shabbaton weekend for a group called "Jewish Girls Travel." They agreed, and invited Jessica. They discovered that aside from their three roommates, all the rest of the attendees were young ultra-orthodox women from Brooklyn. They weren't sure it was a good idea to be out. Jessica led Kabbalat Shabbat, where everybody sang in unrelenting unison at warp speed. Leah told the story of their journey to Jordan and Abu Dhabi. The first picture of them together was taken at the talent show on motzei Shabbat, where Jessica played guitar and they sang several songs together. They went out for a long walk in the snow, climbed trees, wandered around a church, and almost lost the keys of their borrowed car during a snowball fight that knocked the glasses of Jessica's face! There were separate beds, some sneaking around, and of course mah jongg lessons. Jessica discovered that Leah can absolutely stomp her at Bananagrams.