It’s not easy to think clearly with a hysterical wife nearby, I guess. Avi asked me to move a few steps away. I obliged by going around to the back of the neighbors’ houses to rap on kitchen windows. No answer.
Suddenly, I remembered something and came running back. “Avi, the bedroom window is open! I unlocked it to air the room and I didn’t close it when I went downstairs, even though I was kind of nervous, because it was really stuffy.”
I took my husband’s place, crouched in the porch reassuring the children, while he went to check out the back of the house.
“The window is above the flat sukkah roof,” he reported. “I could definitely climb in, but I need a ladder…”
Avi went over to the closest neighbors, attached to our house on one side, to confer with them.
I spoke to my scared kids through the door. “Mommy’s here. Soon we’ll come inside and give everyone a big hug. Motty darling, don’t worry, soon you’ll get a treat. Sarale, Mommy’s coming. Daddy and Mommy are coming in …”
Avi was back, relief written all over his face. “Riki, their sukkah roof adjoins ours! I’m going to climb out of their bedroom window and into ours. They offered one of their boys to do it but I think I can make it.”
I was in tears. “Okay. Be careful!”
It literally took a minute. I heard a thump-thump, the sound of Avi taking the stairs three at a time, and then, still in his jacket, even before opening the door for me, he scooped up the kids. When I came in, we hugged them together, enveloping pajamas and tear-stained faces in a tidal wave of gratitude and relief, as baby hiccupped away her tears.
After we had calmed down, found Motti his treat, nursed the baby and taken a sweet drink to steady ourselves, I thanked the kind neighbor, and we sat down to a late but delicious lunch. I was shaky and weepy for a couple of hours, but the irony sank in only later.
I had had such a fear of open windows and burglars and flat roofs and spooky intruders all the time I was in that house. I locked each window and I locked each room from the outside when we went out. In my frantic efforts to secure the place, I had even subdued my natural desire for fresh air. But leaving the window open saved our little family from a very sticky situation and from chillul Shabbos. Because, infinitely mightier than locks and bars and alarms, it is Hashem who protects us. We just have to relax enough to feel it.