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18-1508. LEWD CONDUCT WITH MINOR CHILD UNDER SIXTEEN. Any person who shall commit any lewd or lascivious act or acts upon or with the body or any part or member thereof of a minor child under the age of sixteen (16) years… shall be guilty of a felony and shall be imprisoned in the state prison for a term of not more than life.
One count of Lewd and Lascivious. Two counts of Sexual Battery. Like a mantra, those two sentences are marching through my head at a steady beat, marking the pace at which I need to walk. One and Two, One and Two, over and over as if keeping time. Those are the charges against the man who molested my daughter last weekend. Those are the charges against a man whom we have allowed to become part of our family over the last six years, the charges against a man we have grown to love and to trust. He has been there for holidays, for birthdays, been there to help us retrieve bouncy balls sucked down bathtub drains and clotheslines needing tightened. He has been there to help us recover from a broken marriage and a shattered life, and none of us knew, none of us had any idea, that he was both far more and far less than what he portrayed himself to be.
One and Two, One and Two…these are the spaces between heartbeats, the sound echoing over and over in this part that isn’t just shattered but gone. It isn’t just in me, not just in my daughter, but in the entire family who learned to trust, slowly but finally, and had that thrown back in our faces a thousand-fold. There are the counts between breaths, as each one of us tries to figure out how we are supposed to move forwad, how we can ever look at anyone the same way again, even those in our lives whom we truly love. Because, you see, we loved him, and were horribly misled, and what if we are again?
One and Two, One and Two…I can’t get those out of my head. They are the sounds of throbbing anger, the kind I haven’t felt in years, the kind that makes me know well that it is a good thing that he is locked up-not for his sake, but for mine. I could kill him; I want to kill him. I want to hurt him so badly, I want to taste his blood. This isn’t anger, this isn’t even fury; this is a hot, burning, insane rage that wants to carry me away on a tide of red.
One and Two, One and Two…this is the sound of my breath in the night, when I wake up in a panic because I have these kids that no matter how hard I try, no matter how vigilant I am, I cannot always protect them, I prowl through the bedrooms, watching them as they sleep, my heart breaking over and over again because unbeknownst to me, I brought someone into their lives that set out to hurt one of them. I know it is not my fault, I know it is not my daughter’s fault, I KNOW that; but it doesn’t make me feel any less hurt and worried and afraid that soon, they have to go out into the world and face dangers every day, and there is nothing I can do to prevent that.
My daughter is okay physically; he did not get as far as he would have liked, because she is smart. She is physically okay because she had the presence of mind to go outside where people could see them. she was smart in that she told me; despite her fear and shame and uncertainty, she told me, and she knew I would believe her. What a blessing that is, even now. Because of her willingness to be forthcoming, no matter what, we have been able to prevent this, hopefully, from ever happening again.
So he is sitting in jail, and we found out on Friday that there are priors; apparently from a time before they were required to register as sexual offenders, but they are there. This makes me feel even doubly sick, but at the same time a little better. Less duped, I suppose, and also of course if thy will admit it in court, he will be more severely punished.
All I know at this point is that he is in jail with a $100,000 bond, and I don’t think he has the resources to come up with $10,000 cash to get out. I know that no matter what happens, by believing my daughter and taking action, this may well prevent anything from happening to someone else, but it definitely protects my daughter from being in further danger from him. I know that we are grateful that it wasn’t worse (though God knows it was bad enough), and that with some counseling and a lot of support, my daughter is going to be okay. Maybe not tomorrow, or two week, or two months from now, but yes, in time she will be okay.
One and Two. One and Two. This is the rhythm of the week past and the weeks to come as we cobble together a way to get past this with the least amount of damage as possible. This is the rhythm of our steps as we move forward through each new phase of the process, the thoughts between hope and reality, the sounds of sobbing late at night and the dawn of grace in the mornings.
One and Two.
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