Protected

Of course, no one believed young Tommy when he told then he had been saved from drowning by his dead father. But Tommy insisted that was what really happened on the day he went to the park for a picnic with his mother. Tommy and his Mother often came to this park in the outskirts of Seattle. They packed Tommy’s favorite peanut butter and grape jelly sandwiches that he had been eating for lunch every day for the past two school years. Tommy’s mother, Lucinda, brought yogurt for herself and since they only lived a half hour drive from the park it was still cool by the time they would start to eat. They spread their food out on Tommy’s old bedspread that was now too small for the “grown-up” bed Tommy had graduated to when he turned nine years old this year. Tommy still loved to look at the embroidered pictures of the firemen and policemen going about their duties on his old bedspread. Lucinda still responded warmly to the memories of Tommy telling her as a young child, “Mom, that’s goina’ be me when I grow up. I wanna’ be helping people when they in trouble.” Lucinda understood what it was like to be in trouble; and then have no one who could really help. Maybe Tommy would make a difference in someone’s life one day. Till then, he made a huge difference in her life. After they finished their lunch, Lucinda would lean against a tree, reading a paperback mystery she had taken out from the library, while Tommy explored the banks of the stream that stretched alongside the picnic meadow. Tommy remembered that his science teacher had told the class that since it was the beginning of spring it would be a good time to look for tadpoles. Tommy had brought a net and a glass jar to the park and planned to bring the tadpoles he caught into school the next day. But the stream was running fairly quickly and deep from the winter runoff and Tommy couldn’t spot any tadpoles in the rushing water. He moved further and further downstream hoping to find something to catch with his net. Lucinda was used to Tommy exploring the park so she didn’t look up from her book. If she had, she would have noticed that Tommy had followed the stream deeper into the wooded area behind a thick growth of trees. He walked bent over, peering into the rushing stream. And then finally he saw something in the water. In the middle of the stream, protected by a near circle of large rocks, Tommy saw a pool of calmer water. Despite the shade caused by the overhanging branches Tommy thought he saw a school of tadpoles. He stepped out onto one of the rocks in the center of the stream but the rock was slippery and as he tried to bring his other foot over onto the rock he fell into the rushing water. The water was far colder and deeper than Tommy would have imagined. He started to shiver as he reached out to grab hold of one of the rocks but the swift water started to carry him downstream. Tommy realized that he was in big trouble. His movements became more frantic as he splashed and turned towards shore hoping to be able to pull himself out. And then his head smashed into a rock that jutted out of the stream and he started to go down. He couldn’t keep his head above water and he closed his eyes as he went under for the second time. And even as this was happening, Tommy thought of his Mother reading under the tree and wondered if she would find him. And then a hand with a rocking horse tattooed on it reached out for Tommy. He was grabbed by the collar and pulled gently out of the water and carried to the side of the stream. Tommy lay there panting, not thinking… just feeling the solid ground supporting him. He turned and looked up to see the face of the man who had saved him just as he walked away from Tommy and back into the woods. Lucinda walked along the stream calling Tommy’s name. When he didn’t answer she broke into a run looking for signs of him on either side of the water. She found him standing at the side of the stream staring out towards the woods. As she got closer she realized that he was soaking wet. Lucinda dropped to one knee and turned Tommy so that she could look in his eyes. “My God, Tommy! What happened?” The boy stared back at his Mother. Despite what he had been through he was remarkably calm. “I was looking for tadpoles and I fell in the water. But I’m O.K. He saved me.” “Saved you! Who saved you?” “It was Dad. Dad saved me.” “So, please sit down while I take a look at your file, Miss Benson. Hmm, so let me see, Lucinda. Is it alright if I call you Lucinda?” “That‘s fine, Officer Washington.” “So, you put in a Missing-Person report on your husband, Cal, about two weeks ago.” “That’s right, but he’s not my husband. He’s the father of my child, Tommy. We were living together until a year ago but we never got married.” “Not so unusual a story these days, is it, Lucinda. And he just disappeared one day?” “Not exactly, we were having problems and we’d talked about the possibility of us separating for awhile.” “But you said that was a year ago. Why’d you wait till now to put in a Missing-Person?” “It was better for us, Tommy and me, that he was gone. It all goes back to Cal’s father. He was dead before I met Cal, but he gave Cal this notion that we’re each responsible for helping other people when they’re in trouble. That’s a nice concept, but I always thought your biggest responsibility should be to your own family first. Cal seemed to have a lot of trouble living his life that way. Instead, he involved himself with a group of marginal-type people. Drugs were a big part of what was going on. He was trying to help them, said it was his calling, but things got out of control. When they started to use our house as a meeting place, with Tommy sleeping upstairs, well that was more than I could tolerate.” “I can understand you feeling that way. So what made you change your mind two weeks ago?” “I saw Cal…I mean Tommy saw him… in the woods, down by the park. Tommy said he pulled him out of the water, maybe saved him from drowning. I guess he’s still around. Maybe he does care about us. I’m worried about him. And I’m also scared that he’s following us…I thought that it’s time I let you try to find him and maybe he can get some help..” “You did the right thing Lucinda. But the trace on him just came back and whoever that was who helped your son in the park, it wasn’t him. I’m sorry to be the one to tell you this, but our records show that Tommy’s father died of an overdose six months ago.”