“Hi,” I call out. “Who’s there?”

“Brachi Rosenfeld.”

“Leah Rosenfeld.”

The Rosenfelds. I never really got to know Sara Rosenfeld well, but she seems like a nice person, if not exactly my style. She’s very involved in, well, everything, and has an opinion to match. I actually really enjoy picking her brain on things like laundry catastrophes and babka recipes.

“Hi, Rosenfelds,” I say cheerfully. “How are you? How come you girls aren’t in camp?”

“We don’t go to camp,” Brachi says from her perch atop the monkey bars.

“Oh.” Yes, Now that I think of it, Sara told me she doesn’t believe the kids need day camp for both months. I know the Rosenfelds have a special-needs child; I imagine that already brings extra summertime costs. Had I invited her kids to play on the swing set when she said that? My postpartum brain doesn’t recall.

“Our mommy said we could play here.”

Oh. Well, then, who am I to get in the way?

Okay, that was mean.

“Okay, sure, cuties, but my kids aren’t home, so just play quietly, okay?”

I make a mental note to buy extra freeze pops for the outdoor ice chest. Let the Rosenfeld girlies enjoy a traffic light pop while playing. Hey, if it helps their mom make it through the summer with her sanity intact, I’m more than happy. I just need the girls to play quietly while I bask in my Vitamin D.

For the most part, they keep to their side of the bargain, which I’ll be honest, I wasn’t really expecting, especially from the Rosenfelds. I don’t like to say this, but we’ve had a few run-ins with them using my kids’ bikes and being mean at the bus stop and things like that.

Brachi and Leah are still in the backyard when my children come home from camp. Which is weird; they’ve been here at least two hours, but it’s fine, with the hullabaloo of my family, two extra neighborhood kids are not a big deal, and I give them ices along with everyone else. They leave, finally, when I call my children for supper. I hope it was a break for Sara.

The next day, Brachi and Leah are back. I notice them from the kitchen window where I’m preparing an iced coffee to go. I have a well visit with the baby this afternoon, and between the last-minute feed and diaper change, I’m suddenly going to be late. How does that always happen?

I think for a second about telling the Rosenfelds they can’t be in the backyard when I’m not home — what if there’s an emergency or something? — but I decide against it. For one thing, I’m running late. I literally do not have two seconds to call out the window. For another, it’s not like they asked me if they could come in the first place. Sara probably hasn’t thought of it and I am definitely not their mother.

I make it to the appointment on time, find out that everyone in the office agrees: There is nothing cuter than baby Levi, and pull into the driveway just as the camp bus is depositing Eli at the curb. We go inside for some cold drinks and are about to make our way to the front porch for Rena’s and Malka’s bus when I notice water on the kitchen window. What?

I look out into the backyard. It’s the Rosenfelds on the trampoline, a ring sprinkler bouncing up and down with every jump.

It takes me a minute to register.

Brachi and Leah Rosenfeld, in my backyard, on my trampoline, using my hose. The sprinkler must be theirs, because it’s not mine. They’re having a party and what they’re doing looks fun, but — really?

I open the door to the deck and call out, very sweetly, “Girls? Rosenfelds?”

They look at me like I’m the rude one, interrupting their fun.

“What is happening here, cuties?”

“Our mommy said we could use the sprinkler,” Leah says, her lip jutting out.

Oh she did, did she? Well, maybe she meant at their house.

“Okay, girls, it’s time to go home. Bye!” I say this last part a bit too cheerfully and forcefully.

They jump off the trampoline, rolling their eyes. Oh, are they lucky I’m not their mother.

My kids peek out.

“Ma…” Rena says. “Can we…?”

“Why not?” I sigh.

A minute later, my kids are jumping up and down on the trampoline, shrieking with laughter.

Why do I feel like an ogre for shutting down the Rosenfelds’ fun and then encouraging my own children?

“It’s called boundaries,” Raf says emphatically when I ask him this very important question. “You can encourage your children to have fun on the trampoline, because it’s their trampoline. For other children to make themselves at home, with our garden hose, is just plain weird.”

A sound of dissonance from outside brings me hustling: The Rosenfelds have come back for their sprinkler and are furious to find my kids using it.

Oh, the irony is so thick, I could use it as a weighted blanket. I diffuse the situation by handing out a round of freeze pops, stuff the sprinkler in the Rosenfelds’ hands, and wave them out of the backyard and into the dusky evening.

I’m almost afraid to sit out on the deck the next afternoon, but thankfully the Rosenfelds do not show up. What does is a ring sprinkler that I ordered from Prime during Levi’s 11 p.m. feed last night. We set it up when the kids come home, and I invite Chevy Baum and her children to join.

Chevy is a doll, just an easy breezy person to spend time with.

“This idea is hilarious,” she says, watching the children bounce around to avoid getting sprayed.

“Isn’t it?” I ask lazily. Then, feeling generous in the face of warm sun and iced coffee, I add, “It was the Rosenfelds’ idea, actually.”

Chevy looks at me. “Oh! So nice. I heard Sara kept the kids home this summer. You know, she sent her Shmulik to an in-house program that costs an arm and a leg. I think she just really needed a break, but it costs triple what camp does.”

Oy vey, poor Sara. I hadn’t realized she was so run down, I should’ve sent her food or volunteered to take Shmulik out…. Okay, no, I was postpartum, but I should’ve done something.

Well, I was now, right? Hosting her kids every day?

At supper that night — barbecue on the deck, baruch Hashem the kids haven’t gotten bored yet — everyone’s favorite part of the day is sprinkling on the trampoline and we make up to do it the next day as well. And the next and the next and the next and every day forever and ever.

“Go for it,” I tell my sister Dina on the phone that night. “It’s a water sport that you don’t have to lifeguard and kids enjoy.”

And they do. The next afternoon the entire neighborhood is in my backyard having a party. I snap a picture and send it to Raf. Worth every penny.

Later, I’m at the grill, flipping chicken skewers — the Golds are living dangerously tonight — when a fight breaks out. Girls against boys, is it? I lean over the deck to investigate. It’s Rosenfelds and the Golds, it seems. Well, that’s just not okay.

“Rosenfelds, time to go home,” I say brightly. “Gooood night!”

The kids come rushing up the deck.

“MA!!! Don’t just ‘good night’ them!” Eli shrieks. “They’re crazy kids! They came and asked us to get off our own trampoline! It’s ours!!! And then then start imitating us and copying us and they’re such stupid—”

“Hey!” I cut him off. “That’s not how we talk.”

“But they are!” my gentle sweet Rena cuts in. “They can’t come anymore, I hate them.”

I turn around to find Raf standing there, eyebrows raised. I make a “what should I do” gesture and look back at my irate children.

“Guys, I hear you, I really do. Daddy and I are going to figure things out. But just remember that we are the parents, and you cannot say who can and cannot use the backyard.”

I’m not sure if that was terrible chinuch or not, but it felt right.

But then we come out one morning to find the tire swing broken.

“It was those stupid Rosenfelds,” Eli grouses.

I privately agree with him, though we have no way to prove it. Only, yesterday, my sister-in-law Chaya made a pool party, and we’d been gone from right after camp until 9 p.m. Which other children come to the backyard when we’re not home?

“Guys, it’s just a swing,” I tell them, hustling them back inside for breakfast. “We can’t get too attached to things. It’s nice to have nice things, but if they break, we move on. We take care of our things, because we need to be mechabed them, but we don’t get bent out of shape if things get broken. Okay?”

Raf finds the whole thing bizarre; he can’t imagine what sort of moms just allow their kids to use another person’s property without asking.

“And they just show up?” he keeps asking. “Why don’t you say something?”

I tell him I really don’t mind, for the most part. And I really don’t. Besides, what will it help if I charge Sara for the cost of replacing the swing? She has so much going on in her life.

The Rosenfeld girls and I settle into a routine, sort of. They come and go in the backyard as though it’s theirs, and I give them a wide berth. I don’t mind that they’re there, but I can’t have them knocking on the kitchen door and demanding to use the bathroom or asking for more freeze pops when the ice chest runs out. Better that they think I’m not home.

It works for a few weeks, until we arrive at The Incident.

I’d offered my backyard to host my mother’s surprise 60th birthday party. We planned a whole shebang, spent a lot of the summer working out the food, the games, the activities for the children, and here we were.

The one thing off my head was the setup. My mother’s best friend, Evie, loves party planning and she offered to create the celebration.

She comes in the morning once the kids are safely at camp, and I help her schlep boxes of paper goods and string lights before baby Levi starts fussing.

I feel bad leaving her alone, but not worried. Party planning is what Evie does best. Which is why I’m surprised when I see her name on my screen.

I listen to her voice note.

“Atara, I feel terrible bothering you. Truly. But there some children on your swing set who are determined not to leave, even though we’ve started setting up.”

Ohhhhh boy.

I finish up with Levi, burp him, and place him gently in his swing, where he gurgles at me. Then I go out to deal with the Rosenfelds.

“Hey, cuties, I need you to go home now, okay?” I try asking nicely. “My friends are setting up a big party here.”

“We’re just staying on the swing set. We’re watching.”

“Kids, I need you to leave now—”

“It’s okay, we won’t touch anything. We’re just watching the lady hang up the lights. Why do you have so many?”

I ignore their question. “Kids, you need to leave now. Right now.” I give them a Look, but they just stare back at me. Finally, I threaten to call their father if they do not leave, this minute.

They march off, muttering mutinously.

The party is a gorgeous success, a garden party at its finest, and I am in my element. The adults are schmoozing, the kids are playing, the slideshow depicting photos from over the years starting with Ma as a baby is as cheesy as we thought it’d be, but in the best kind of way. All is right in the world.

And then the Rosenfelds show up. I say nothing — really, what are two more children in this crowd? Let them enjoy.

But then I hand out the “Sixty and Sparkling” cake miniatures. They are so gorgeous and actually pretty tasty. But at three bucks a piece, I’d ordered exactly enough. And even if I’d wanted to donate mine, there weren’t enough for both Rosenfeld girls. I decide better to just not offer any.

“I’m sorry, cuties,” I say, not feeling very sorry at all, “But I ordered just enough for each guest.”

The truth is, watching them walk off dejectedly, I really do feel very sorry for them. When you’re six and eight, cake miniatures are a very, very big deal. I still remember that, even though I’m… well, it’s not important how old I am. But I remember!

So when Sara Rosenfeld calls me up smack during my morning nap the next day to explain that her girls were quite crushed to have been left out of the dessert that everyone else seemed to have received, I, quite frankly, lost my cool.

“Sara,” I say, my voice shaking with indignation. Or maybe just exhaustion. Hosting a garden party bash seven weeks after birth might not be the best course of recovery, as fun as it was. Every bone in my body feels like a giant has stretched it out and then smashed it back together.

“I have hosted your children every single day of August so far. They are in my yard and on my swing set every single day. They are not quiet. They make messes. They fight with my kids. They don’t always leave when asked. And you know what, I was fine with it. They’re sweet and we’re growing very fond of them. But they have zero right to crash my mother’s birthday party and then complain that I didn’t order enough dessert for them when they weren’t invited.”

And chatty, brash Sara is absolutely silent for a full minute.

“I understand,” she says at last. And hangs up.

I put the phone back on my night table feeling like the world’s absolute worst person. But what else could I have done?

Contribute to this column as a Second Guesser! Email your response, including your name as you want it to appear, to familyfirst@mishpacha.com with Second Guessing in the subject.

(Originally featured in Family First, Issue 956)