Sometimes Secrets Need to be Told.

Sometimes evil things happen in good towns, in pleasant neighborhoods, on quiet streets, in unremarkable looking brick houses.  I remember that day like it was yesterday.  I can still feel that pit growing in my stomach, the kind that starts small and builds as more information gets funneled in.  There was my child in his innocent voice speaking the most foul, dirty, and unspeakable things. Things that a little girl told him were being done to her, things that were a secret.  When I taught my child about Stranger Danger and Good Touch/Bad touch, I never imagined he would have to draw from that lesson, to filter through and determine if he could in fact keep that secret for her.  As I stood there looking at my sweet baby, disheveled from a day of school and play, who was blissfully unaware yesterday and today knew the evils in the world, I didn’t know what to say.  The thoughts, “Did he overhear something wrong?” , “Why did she choose to tell my son?”, and “Can I really get involved?” flew in and out of my head before I could finally get the words “We need to tell someone” out of my mouth.  Later that evening looking out the window to see a beautiful little girl playing in the yard with the neighborhood kids and then to watch her be brought back inside by the man who had supposedly done these unspeakable acts, CPS having come and gone, was sickening.

Two days, two days is how long it took before we watched him taken out in handcuffs.  Two days of reassuring a child that the girl would be ok, of wondering to myself if that were true.  It seems like a lifetime when you’re waiting to see someone so young protected from the vile acts that were recounted to you through the voice of your nine year old.  I watched as my little boy took on the role of an advocate and without hesitation retold the events to the school guidance councilor and eventually the state police.

A lot can happen in eight months.  Birthdays came, summer went, holidays passed by, all while the light stayed on in that now tainted brick house down the street.  Then there was a call, the one that came just as we, the bystanders, had put it behind us.  Just as, a now ten year old boy, had stopped asking “What ever happened to that little girl”, and “Why did that man still live down the street?”  It was the call that answered all of the questions and made me very proud to be the mom of a boy who refused to keep that kind of secret. 

While 15 years doesn’t seem like enough time, it was that plea deal that kept my child from having to testify.  I wonder if someday he will realize that he was the catalyst, the hero, that helped to stop an atrocity, save a little girl, and put a monster behind bars.  I hope all of you take away from this a reminder that we need to teach our children to be advocates for others that feel they have no voice. That we as the bystanders, neighbors, parents need to hold ourselves accountable, to get involved if something feels wrong.  Listen to your gut, listen to your children.  Encourage no boundary, no judgement, everything on the table conversation.  I still wonder what would have happened if my son had kept that secret or felt that I wouldn’t listen.  Worse, if I had ignored it.  But this situation has an ending that can hopefully allow that little girl to heal and to always remember that she was believed.