My car and my son got egged tonight by a 16-Y-O kid I had tried to help.

Maddy McCall

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Mon Oct-31-05 04:58 AM
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My car and my son got egged tonight by a 16-Y-O kid I had tried to help.

Here's the story. I am a volunteer at the volunteer fire department in our hometown. My brother is a firefighter,too, our dad was a fireman, and we were raised around the place. For many years, nothing went on there, but after Katrina, it became a kind of center in the community...when all of us are there, the doors are open, the lights are on, and people stop by, hang out, eat whatever we've all cooked on the grill, etc.

Many of us are there many afternoons, and it has become a kind of a hangout for some of the kids that live nearby.

The kids hang out there because there is nowhere else in town to hang out. They help wash trucks and do other chores around the fire house. It's good for them--it gives them a sense of civic contribution, and that's why we let them come by and help out. And we order pizza, and let them drink Cokes for free...you get the idea. In a town that has absolutely nothing for teens to do, it's somewhere they can come and meet up with other kids and hang out. The hope is that when they are 18, they will join the fire department and be upstanding citizens in our town.

Well, tonight, a couple of us were in the fire house, and the side door was open, near where we park our cars. My son walked out to go to my car to get my cell phone, and he was hit on the arm by an egg. He saw who threw it. It was one of the kids we help. He had egged two cars, mine included. My son SAW him.

This kid comes from a troubled family. His stepfather is a hotheaded who is middling wealthy and his mother is a silent, submissive wife. We have been so good to this kid. He had been by the fire house earlier in the day because tomorrow is dress-up day at his school, and he borrowed some fire gear (turn-outs, helmet, boots) to wear to school. We were glad to help him. And he repays us by egging our cars and my son?

I called the cops. I know the two policemen who were on duty and they know us. They eat with us at the fire house when we cook on the grill or whatever, and we all have a good working relationship. They are nice guys.

Well, one of the cops went to the boy's house and told his parents what he had done. He denied it. So the policeman, the parents, and the kid all come over to the fire house, and the stepfather comes off as hostile to me from the beginning. He says that there is no way his stepson egged our cars, and that my son must be lying. He says that his stepson has told him that I drink beer and curse around him. (!!!) And he says that he can't raise his son to be an adult when his son hangs around with adults who act like children. (!!!!!!)

So, the policeman who was kind of moderating this (and who told me I should press charges) had to go on another brief call. While he was gone, the father starts yelling at me and the other adults there about the stupid police, and how he's going to have them arrested for harrassment, and a corvette always drives by the house at 90 MPH and they never arrest them, and the policemen came to his house and smoked in his yard and he doens't allow smoking in his house. I mean, this guy turns read in the face, ranting about the police.

Then he starts saying how he's a hard working man and works hard for a living for 25 years and he doesn't have to put up with this, and he knows that the fire department and police work together and his kid hasn't done anything wrong.

So I'm standing there, with my jaw dropped. I just can't believe it. Oh, and the kid is crying. :eyes: And he is screaming at me saying, "You lie about me and you drink beer up here and talk dirty!" Well, the cop had just come back, and was standing there, and he asked me, "Maddy, do you drink beer up here?" and I said, "no." and he turned to another fireman and said, "Does she drink beer up here?" And the other fireman said, "No." So he told the kid, "Sounds like you are lying, because no one says she drinks beer up here."

So the kid turns around, and screams "Bullshit! This is BULLSHIT. Everyone is lying on me and they can't tell me where I can go and what I can do!" (And I'm the one who taught him to curse? :shrug: )

So, I said, "Kid, you need to go get the turnouts we loaned you and just bring them back, and stay away from the fire house, and I won't press charges on you." And the father looks at the kid and and says, "What is she talking about? You have stuff from here?" And I said, yes, we loaned him gear from here for dress-up day from school." So dad goes ballistic, hands the kid the keys and tells him to run home and get the gear and bring it back to the fire house.

Well, the kid tells his dad that he can't get the gear, because he hid it about two blocks down the road in a ditch. (So, kid lies and hides stuff from dad. Go figure.)

Again, the cop steps in and tells the father, "I don't know why you are being so defensive about this. If I my kids had done what your kid did, I would want to know so that I could tend to it. But you come up here and attack the people that your son damaged. Now, if Ms. McCall doesn't want to press charges, I think it's best that you go home, and just keep your son away from here."

I said, "No, I don't want to press charges, and I never did. I just wanted his parents to know what he was doing. We tried to help him, and hit hurt me that this is how he treated me."

So the father said, "Oh you can bet he won't come back over here, and if he does he'll be grounded for six months."

And I said, "Well, if he comes here, it won't be you I tell, you can bet on that."

(So after the parents leave, both policemen are at the fire house, and they told us that they have to go to that house all of the time for 911 hang-up calls, domestic violence calls, and even the man fighting in his yard with his sister. Neighbors who have never complained to the police complain about them--in other words, the father is a hotheaded trouble maker. And I am sure that, as defensive of the son as the father was, it was more about appearances than about the kid, and he probably beat the shit out of the kid when they got home. The kid has often told us how he hates his step father.)

Sorry for the long post...I'm angry, hurt, pissed, mad. In a nutshell, a kid in our town, who needed help the most, turned on the people who had helped him, and then his father attacked us.

It's been a crazy Sunday night.