Page 36 of His for Hanukkah

“Well, as you might expect, there’s no historical accuracy to it. The legend is that when the Greeks forbid the Jews from studying Torah, they would pretend to play a gambling game with tops while actually studying Torah orally.

“It’s actually pretty crazy how people used to study Torah, because there were these guys who’d been trained since they were little children to just memorize the holy texts and then spout off whatever passages the scholars asked for. They’d memorize, like, thousands of pages verbatim.”

While Adam was adorably ranting, Tate settled onto the couch and pulled him onto his lap.

“But back to the story, tops have been used forever, but this particular game went from Ancient Greece to India to England where it became popular in the 1600s. It travelled to Germany by around the 1800s. German Jews who spoke Yiddish started putting Hebrew letters on the four sides instead of, say, English or Latin letters, but it still just meant none, all, half, and put some in.

“And then, retroactively, the Jews decided that the letters for the gambling terms stood for nes gadol haya sham. Which means a great miracle happened there. Jews just love finding symbolism in letters and numbers.”

“That’s fascinating, Little Star. I learn so much from you every day.”

Adam snuggled into his shoulder.

“Now tell me why you don’t want to play dreidel.”

Adam shrugged. “Honestly? It’s boring. Like, it’s a game of complete chance, and you can’t even use any interesting strategies based on probability since all the probabilities are the same. There’s no skill or technique at all.

“People basically buy dreidels for show, but when they actually try to play the game, they stop after about three rounds because otherwise they would die of boredom. Like, call the ambulance, death by boredom. Also, the gelt tastes like wax, so I don’t know why anyone would want to win it.”

Adam was hilarious.

“So how about if we raise the stakes. Which one means that you put something in?”

“Shin.” He turned the dreidel.

“So, let’s say that every time someone rolls a shin, they have to take off an article of clothing.”

“Ooh! I like the way you think!”

“And the winner of the game gets to choose a sexual favor from the other one.”

Adam rubbed his hands together in glee. “I think I can get behind this version of dreidel.”

The game, as Adam predicted, would have been about as boring as dirt without a sexy, mostly-naked boy dancing around the living room every time he won a round.

Naturally, instead of starting with small articles of clothing like Tate had, he’d started with the big ones. He was now wearing two socks and his watch, his shining cage proudly on display.

Tate, who had only lost one sock so far, was going absolutely crazy. And Adam knew it.

Adam pushed under his arm, moving sinuously into his lap. “Can I help you spin, Tate?” he asked, voice breathy.

It was straight out of some movie where the devious sex kitten distracted the big gambler at a critical moment. Except that, as Adam had pointed out, there was no strategy and not even really a way to cheat.

“No, sexy. I will spin for myself, thank you very much. You are going down.” While Adam had lost more clothing, he’d won a good deal more coins. It was unlikely that Tate would win, but he didn’t cut back on the trash talking.

The dreidel raced across the table and then spun right onto the floor.

“Ooh, I’ll get it!” Adam dove for the floor, blocking Tate’s view of the toy as it spun to a stop. “It’s a shin!”

Alright, so apparently there was a way that you could cheat at dreidel. “Hand it over, cheater. I get to spin again.”

Adam pouted, but placed it in Tate’s hand.

Tate was having the time of his life. And it looked like Adam was, too.

Chapter 7.

The Fifth Night