Stranger Things Did Happen

She woke up from a sound sleep when she heard her mother racing down the stairs. BANG! BANG! BANG! “I’m coming!” she heard her mother shout. There was something different in her voice, she didn’t sound annoyed as she should, for it to be three a.m. and for someone to be banging this loudly on their door. She recognized something in her mothers voice when she spoke those two words, that made the hairs on the back of her own neck stand on edge. She heard fear…..and it scared her shitless. She got up from her bed, careful as she could not to dare make one single sound. She crept over to her bedroom door and turned the knob slowly until the door cracked opened. She stuck her ear to the crack but wasn’t able to hear anything. She pulled the door open wider and stepped out into the hall way. As she looked up, she saw her step father at the back door pulling on his pants and stepping into his shoes all at the same time.

Before she could open her mouth they made eye contact. Not a single word was uttered between the two of them but they never broke eye contact. As he slowly opened the back door he held one finger up to his lips and signaled her not to say a word. He dug down into the brown wicker hamper that sat in front of the back door and pulled out a huge black gun. He tucked the gun down in his pants and quietly disappeared through what seemed like the smallest crack in the door way. As the door closed behind him she made her way over turned the lock back and slid the hamper back to its original position.  It was then that she heard her mother yelling
“I DON’T KNOW WHERE HE IS!”
The distress in her mothers voice startled her again. This wasn’t normal. Her mother was the bravest most fearless person she knew. Her mother taught her not to ever fear anything or anybody so what was she supposed to do now that her mother was the one scared to death?
“Who is up stairs Ma’am?” she heard a male voice say, but her mom was silent. “WHO’S UP THERE MA’AM?” yet another voice spoke but louder this time.
She knew she had to do something. She looked at the back door but she wasn’t about to leave her mother or risk getting her step dad caught.

She stood there and thought as deep as any almost 12 year old could and in a split second she knew she had to act as normal as the situation would allow. Her mom was down stairs falling apart. Her step father was gone leaving the two of them to figure it out and she at 11 1/2 had to be the grown up.
“Its me mom I’m up here!” she shouted out as she made her way down the steps into the living room. Stepping down off that last step it seemed like every thing began to move in slow motion. There were two white officers standing in the middle of their living room in a neighborhood where you never even saw a white person. The two men were both middle aged one of them was balding, and wearing a brown suit. He wandered around their apartment looking at pictures and picking up the nicknacks on the mantle piece as his partner a taller slimmer white man in a dark blue suit continued to badger her mother. He had a brown folder in his had that he kept holding up in her face shouting “Do you see what you’re married to? Is this the kind of man you’re laying next to every night?” Her mother began to sob and she became angry. “Read it Mrs. Anderson!” The officer shouted! ”SHE CAN’T SEE WITH OUT HER GLASSES!” the little girl yelled. She began to feel an over whelming rush of energy and fearlessness.
“You don’t have to yell at my mom she can’t see with out her glasses on!” She ran over and clung to her mother. “Well let me read it out loud for you.” The officer said sarcastically. “Three counts of assault, corrupting a minor, rape of a minor...", he continued but her throat got completely dry. Her little ears began to ring and every thing else he said after that sounded like it was chopped and screwed. Her mother held on to her hand so tight it was actually the only sense of being in that room the little girl had. It was like she was having an outer body experience. She knew in that moment.... that was the end of life as she had known it. She had to grow up a lot that night. That wasn’t the beginning, and she knew it wasn’t the end.