Jane was trembling. “Have you ever heard of anything like this happening?”
The officer frowned noticeably. “Not with a babysitter. Ma’am, I’m sure everything will be okay. The first twenty-four hours are the most important, and they’re telling me that she was pretty sloppy with her getaway.”
Jane knew that he was just trying to make her feel better, but for some reason the response felt patronizing. He obviously did not know how things were going to turn out. The part about Brenda being sloppy could have been a fabrication as well. She wanted to snap at him, but stopped herself. The truth was that she just wanted to be with Kyle, and before long, her husband arrived.
Jane ran into his arms and cried her heart out. She pressed her face to his chest and whaled, “Oh, God, why did this have to happen, Kyle?! Why?!”
Kyle rubbed her back softly and answered, “I don’t know, honey. Hopefully, everything will turn out okay. Just let the police do their jobs.”
“You should have seen her, Kyle. She was crazy. She wants to hurt my baby!”
Kyle shushed her and held her tighter. “It’s gonna be okay. Calm down. They’ll find him.” The two continued to embrace for a very long time.
*****
There was very little in way of news until around ten o’clock. Officer Bilkins took a phone call that felt, to Jane, like it lasted forever. When the policeman had finished, he looked at the couple solemnly. “They were knocking on doors and asking questions all night. There were a lot of people that heard the car and a few who saw it. They tracked her down to an old dirt road west of here. There’s a condemned building down there that just never got torn down. They spotted her car just outside.”
Jane gasped when she heard this but was unable to speak. Kyle requested, “Can you take us down there?”
“I can, but you need to stay with the car. They’re planning on sending a team in.”
The husband nodded. “I understand. Just take us there.”
*****
The room was old, dusty, and falling apart. Most of the windows were broken, and the place creaked with every gust of wind. Brenda sat on an old stool and was barely moving. She looked like she was in deep thought. Despite the pain in his rear, Timothy sat right across from her hugging tightly to Mr. Grizzly. He was sad and confused.
Brenda had been quiet for some time, but she suddenly started to speak. Each word was soaked in melancholy. “I am not a good person, Timmy. I never really thought about it until now, but I am absolutely positive of it. I am not a good person.” The boy frowned but said nothing. The woman continued, “I don’t know what I was thinking. I thought that we would go somewhere safe, and I could give you what you truly wanted. I must have been insane.”
Brenda turned away from the boy and covered her face. Timothy thought that she might be crying. She said with a wobbly voice, “This whole thing has been about me from the start.”
The boy asked, “What do you mean?”
“My uncle raised me. He was a horrible man who hit me for no reason. He even laughed when he did it and called me names. The worst part of it was that I had no one to turn to. I couldn’t go to anyone. I just wanted someone there to hold me. I wanted to feel the warmth of another human being as they held me and told me that everything would be okay. I just wanted to feel that.” She broke down into tears that dripped from between her fingers.
Timothy could not fully grasp what she meant, but he understood enough to know that she felt terrible for what she did. He said, “I still like you, Brenda. You don’t have to cry.”
She looked at him. “You have two loving parents, Timothy. I had no right to do the things I did with you. They care for you far more than I ever did.”
“But they don’t hug me like you do.”
“They also don’t hurt you.”
“I don’t mind being hurt if you hug me afterwards.”
She snapped, “Timmy, just stop it! I’m not going to do this anymore! It’s over!”
He held back the temptation to cry when she yelled at him. “But Brenda, we can just explain to them that it was an accident. We can still be friends! Then we can do it all the time, and nobody will mind.”
Brenda stood up and yelled at him, “Shut up! I’m not your friend!”
Timothy hid behind Mr. Grizzly. “Why are you yelling at me?!”
“You’re just a stupid, little kid! You don’t even know what you’re doing!”
The boy held up the bear like a shield. “Stop yelling at me!”
In a sudden rage, Brenda snatched the bear away from the boy. “I’ll show you pain! I’ll show you how much I care!”
Timothy jumped at her trying to grab his bear back. “My mommy gave me that!”
Brenda grabbed both the head and arm of the bear and pulled so hard that the stitches started to pop. The sound terrified Timothy and he screamed, “No! Stop it! Stop it! Not Mr. Grizzly! Stop it!” The bear suddenly came apart, and fluff puffed out of the severed neck as the head was detached.
Timothy gasped in shock but soon started hitting her out of anger and heartbreak. Brenda kicked the boy down to the floor just as the front door burst open. She got a glimpse of an armored man holding a pistol right before a bullet struck her arm.
The woman dropped to the floor screaming in pain. The policeman shouted, “She attacked the boy! Get him out of here!” Several other men rushed in, and a bawling Timothy was quickly carted outside to safety. The men checked on Brenda and an ambulance was called in.
*****
Timothy was sobbing as hard as he could into his mother’s bosom back at the patrol car. The event had been so terrifying that it was all that he could do. Jane embraced him tightly as Kyle rubbed his back. Both of them were saying whatever they could to comfort him. “It’s going to be okay. She’s gone. It’s all right. We love you, Timothy.”
It felt warm. It felt wonderful. It was everything Timothy wanted, and he found it with his own parents at just the time that he needed it. He did not want it to end. Through the mass of sniffled and hiccups, the boy managed to say, “I… love… you... Mommy… and Daddy!”
They both hugged him tighter and replied, “We love you too.”
Over near the abandoned house, the sounds of screaming could be heard. It was Brenda being carried out on a stretcher. “It hurts! Oh, God, make it stop! Somebody help me! Just make the pain stop!”
Mother and father peered over at her with contempt. Even Timothy did for a moment, but the boy also felt sorry for her. There would be no bosom for her to dry her tears.
The end.
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