The wedding had been … messy, to say the least. Uriel had come around in the end – but their grandmother was not writing to either of them since. Letters from their mother had become terse, obligatory.

Their father wrote, once. It was bad enough that their father had bothered to write just to haltingly attempt the tradition of staying in contact. Chaim had missed it entirely and still sent glowing updates about his kids, his wife, and all around how great his own damned life was.

Penina and her family had come. Ruth had, too, and handed out tickets to her next concert in Germany.

Nesah … well, Nesah was Nesah.

He saw the baby, and his mouth formed a line. Right. Zechariah had popped in and out so fast that he never even got the kid’s name. Unlike Penina and Chaim’s brood, Zechariah barely even looked at this one. His gaze fell to the child, comparing the face to Uriel’s to gauge just how much he blamed it at a glance.

Uriel’s face. Zechariah blinked, frowned. There was … less of Uriel than there used to be. A lot less. Life had been hard on him, clearly.

“Uriel – are you ill?” came out before he could even greet him properly.