The anxiety rises in Rivi, the certainty that something is wrong. “You can tell me now, and then we can discuss it further on Monday”

“Has this been as bad as you expected?” Ezra’s voice is pitched low so Suri, on the couch opposite, can’t make out what he’s saying. Suri shoots a suspicious glare at them and Rivi smiles enigmatically back.

“Surprisingly, no,” she admits under her breath. Her sisters-in-law have all been on their best behavior this weekend. The snow has been perfect — just beginning to accumulate now, after Shabbos has ended, but scheduled to go on overnight and then stop in time for the kids to go sledding and snow tubing in the morning. The house where they’re staying is stocked with winter activities and toys for the kids, enough to keep them happy and busy all Friday and Shabbos.

It had come with a steep price tag for Rivi — especially when she’d also quietly paid Suri and Avi’s share — but it had been worth it for the happy, flushed faces of her children and the cheerful contentment that had suffused all of Ezra’s family today.

Even Rivi has relaxed, a tiny break from the nonstop rush of day-to-day life. “It’s almost Shimmy’s bedtime,” she remembers, but it takes her a moment to move, to set her book down and pull herself up from the couch. Havdalah has come and gone, but there is nowhere to go, no everyday life to throw themselves into. Rivi’s phone is still in her room, her laptop with it, and she doesn’t have the energy to interrupt this idyll with work.