My friend Sarah saw him pull up and immediately called the police while locking the doors.
I grabbed my phone and started recording video from inside the living room window. Conrad was pounding on the door, screaming that Tommy was his son. He said the safety plan was illegal and he had parental rights.
Tommy was hiding in the bedroom closet crying and my son was trying to comfort him. The police arrived within 10 minutes, but Conrad had already kicked the front door hard enough to crack the frame. They made him leave, but said without a restraining order, they couldn’t arrest him. Sarah had to pay for a new door and install security cameras that same day.
Casey filed emergency paperwork for a protective order, but the judge wouldn’t hear it for another week. Every night, we’d hear cars slow down outside and wonder if it was Conrad coming back. Tommy started wetting the bed and having nightmares about Lauren coming to get him. My son stopped eating properly and lost 12 lbs in 3 weeks.
The stress was destroying both kids while the legal system moved at a snail’s pace. Casey kept saying we were building a strong case, but I could see my children falling apart. The phone records finally came back showing Lauren had never received any calls from my number, but her lawyer argued that didn’t prove anything since I could have used a different phone.
The prosecutor called a meeting 2 days later at the courthouse where he laid out my son’s options while Casey sat next to us taking notes. He pushed papers across the table showing the assault charges could mean juvenile detention, but mentioned something called a diversion program. Casey leaned forward and started talking about counseling alternatives while my son sat there silent and pale.
The prosecutor kept checking his watch like he had somewhere better to be. Casey pushed for therapy instead of any formal charges. And after 40 minutes of back and forth, they agreed to consider it if my son completed a written statement about everything. That night, my son sat at the kitchen table for 4 hours writing page after page about what Lauren did to him.
His hand cramped up twice and he had to stop to shake it out. I made him hot chocolate, but he didn’t touch it. When he finally finished, he had 12 pages front and back, describing every single thing she’d done. He wrote about how she’d come into his room at night and touch him while he pretended to sleep. He wrote about the photos she made him take and how she said nobody would believe him.
He wrote about catching her with Tommy and how he knew the wedding was his only chance to stop her. Reading it made me throw up twice in the bathroom while he slept on the couch. The next morning, we drove Tommy to the Children’s Advocacy Center for his interview. The building looked like a regular house from outside with toys in the waiting room and bright paintings on the walls.
They took Tommy back to a special room with cameras while I sat in the lobby watching other parents stare at their phones. The interviewer was trained to talk to kids about abuse without making it worse for them. I could hear Tommy crying through the door, even though they said it was soundproof. After 2 hours, they brought him out and he wouldn’t look at me.
