This past Tuesday was the first night of the year where everything outside was snowy and beautiful, so despite being exhausted from working all through the previous night and having just finished a training ride, I convinced Bobby to come walk the dog with me. It was just after 11pm when we finished getting ready to go out. I was the last one out the door, and as it slammed shut behind me, I realized I hadn’t checked to see if the bottom lock was unlocked.
[Bobby maintains that I wasn't just a passive victim of the door; he thinks I flipped the lock out of habit and let it shut before I could fix my mistake. Honestly, I was going on three hours of sleep and twenty hours of almost non-stop working, so I could have burnt the house down without realizing it. How the door got locked and shut will just have to remain a mystery, although I'm certain it is one Bobby is happy to solve for anyone who asks.]
I immediately froze in horror and with one glance, Bobby knew what was wrong. (Or as he explained a moment ago, “I knew by the look on your face that you’d just locked it.”) Being locked out of our house was bad enough, but the fact that it was after 11pm made our only solution – calling my parents to come let us in with their spare key on a frozen night with icy roads – deeply unappealing. We also did not have a phone or any money, and Bobby was only wearing a sweatshirt while I was wearing bright blue, polka-dotted fleece pajama pants.
The following is a timeline of events. The times are estimated, with the only certainties being the point at which I peered in our window and saw a clock and the point at which we re-entered the house.
11:05: The three of us are locked out. Kobe is excited to be outside. We are not.
11:10: My attempts to open the sliding window around back are thwarted by the security bar I am so careful to always keep in place. Bobby is anxious to get to a phone so we can call my parents; I consider that possibility and am anxious to avoid it at all costs, including the cost of replacing a broken window.
11:12: I am more cheap than I am cowardly, so I give in and we walk to 7-Eleven.
11:15: I am more cowardly than I am dignified, so I convince Bobby to make the phone call while I wait outside with the dog. “But honey, I have a warm coat, so you should really get to go inside. And my parents won’t be as angry with you…”
11:20: Nobody answered the house phone or my father’s cell phone. Bobby left messages telling my father to call the 7-Eleven or just come let us in. We are left to stand outside and wait, while pondering the possibility that our messages will never be heard and we will die outside 7-Eleven.
11:24: Bobby goes back into 7-Eleven to use the phone again after I insist that he call the house several times in a row to get an answer. The helpful 7-Eleven clerk tells Bobby something about the police that is completely masked by a thick accent; Bobby is able to interpret that it is not a friendly, helpful suggestion.
11:40: We discuss the idea of calling a cab, riding to my parents’ house to get the spare key, and then riding back to our house and paying the cab driver once we got inside. This idea has a lot of holes (what if nobody answers the door at my parents’ house? what if the cab driver won’t take the dog in the car? what if we don’t successfully make it to the part where we are reunited with our wallets to pay the driver?), but then the heavenly lord intervenes and a cab pulls up in front of us. Bobby and I are excited by our good fortune.
11:44: The cab driver is not currently working and is not currently very nice. He hesitantly agrees to call for another cab to come before driving away. Bobby remarks on his feeling is that no cab is coming.
12:05: Bobby is right. The dog begins to shiver, so I pick him up and hug him and his dirty, slushy paws to my white down jacket. Nobody is very happy or very warm.
12:09: Three police cars arrive. Evidently the 7-Eleven clerk does not share the cab driver’s philosophy of all talk, no action. The police, however, ignore us and walk into the store.
12:15: Three people have rejected Bobby’s request to use their cell phones. I guess a clean-shaven guy, a girl in pajamas, and a cold dog are very intimidating. I would ask myself, but I am exhausted and therefore likely to burst into hysterical sobs before finishing a sentence.
12:20: Bobby goes into 7-Eleven to talk to the police. They suggest we go to the office at our condo complex, which would be helpful if the office had a copy of our key. They don’t. I have refused to provide it because I’m afraid somebody will come in during the day and steal my cookbooks and dirty bicycle shoes.
12:39: We walk back to our house and peer in the sliding glass door like lost children. The house looks warm and inviting. Two sets of keys are on the kitchen counter. I want to lay down in the snow and die. The dog looks at us as if to say why are we not going inside, it is cold, I am bored, this walk is no longer fun and I already pooped.
12:42: It turns out that I have left my car unlocked. This will not help us get into the house or drive anywhere or call anyone, but it will at least provide a place to sit and contemplate how much the whole situation sucks.
12:44: I leave Bobby and the dog in the backseat, huddling for warmth, while I cook up a brilliant scheme to get inside. I break a CD from my car and use the jagged edge to slice open the corner of the window screen. I then pull the screen out and manage to open the sliding window just enough that I can fit a few fingers in. The security bar keeps the bottom of the window panel in place, but the top tilts almost two inches open. If I could only knock the bar out of place somehow…
12:50: My attempts to grab the bar with a stick and then a flexible vine that I’ve knotted a loop in at the end have failed. I can get the loop around the screw that is fitted into the bar (enabling us to pick it up easily), but I cannot get enough leverage from where I’m standing to actually remove the bar. Bobby comes to see what I am doing and is not impressed. (Five days later he still seems to be unimpressed by my ingenuity. Evidently locking us out trumps almost getting us back in.) He insists that we go back to finding a “real” solution.
12:55: He stops someone in our condo complex parking lot and that person miraculously lets him use their phone, at which point Bobby actually reaches my father. I respond by crying over my failure at breaking in, my failure at enjoying the snow, my failure at getting sleep and functioning like a human. Bobby stares at my failure to behave appropriately and decides that we’ll wait for my father in the car.
1:00: Bobby mentions that my father said he would “try to come.” He is concerned that this means there is a chance my father won’t come at all. I explain that I am an only child and that my parents would not want to risk losing their only offspring to hypothermia outside of her condo, but Bobby is unconvinced.
1:10: The dog is cold and his rancid breath is making the car smell. We are all soggy from the slushiness outside and the car is not warm. Bobby and I wait in silence.
1:25: I can no longer recall a time where I was not balled up in the backseat of my car with Bobby and my dog. The night feels very long and my toes feel very cold. Bobby is still unconvinced that my father is coming. I have joined him. Perhaps I have overestimated my parents’ concern about their only offspring. I mentally note to buy them more extravagant gifts in the future.
1:35: Bobby announces that he has to pee and is getting out of the car, at which point I panic about losing the minimal heat we have trapped and refuse to let him leave. He mentally adds “Refuses to let me relieve myself” to the list of reasons he secretly wants to stab me and goes back to shivering in silence.
1:45: He
adlights appear; it is my father and he has brought his key. We don’t talk much. Bobby and I thank him as profusely as two people can when their lips are frozen and their souls are crushed. He declines our offer to come in and quickly leaves.
1:49: Bobby runs to the refrigerator to eat a spoonful of peanut butter. “I’ve been wanting this the whole time,” he explains. Really? THAT’S what you’ve been hoping for over the past three hours?
1:55: We go to bed wearing everything we own. I dream of giving everybody we know spare keys to our house; Bobby dreams of strangling me in my sleep.
