Photo: Sue Vincent
“Where did you find it?”
The boy’s face reflected his struggle: to tell the truth would be to admit he’d been doing what he oughtn’t, but to withhold the truth could mean that what needs to happen, won’t.
The woman waited. Integrity was best cultivated by one’s own appreciation of the internal equilibrium that is restored by accepting the inherent benefit of right versus wrong, and not by shaming or attempting to compel it via fear of punishment.
She knew, of course, that he’d been out of bed, and on a night when he’d already been grounded for breaking his sister’s carpentry project. All the more reason, she thought, to let him find a place to dig himself out of a hole of misdemeanors.
Some children tended to break rules all the time. Her son did not. Or at least not without what one could usually understand as good reason. That the nine-year-old had refused to say why he’d demolished Liz’s contraption, and that he did not argue when he’d been sent to his room, told her there was already more to the story than what he was willing to tell her.
The moment lingered. She let it stretch.
“Outside,” he said. He lifted his eyes to her, having crossed the Rubicon.
Displeased as she was that he broke curfew, she was proud of him for finding the courage to admit it.
“I see,” she nodded and raised an eyebrow in direction of his cupped hands.
“I had to save it.” Timidity was gone now that truth was set in motion. “Liz said she was going to put it in her new cage and keep it. But it is not a pet, and it is hurt and it cannot fly and something was going to come and eat it.”
The boy’s eyes were bright with tears of righteous defiance. “I don’t care if you ground me till I’m, like, a hundred. He needed help!”
The bird wriggled clumsily in the boy’s palms and the child’s young face crumbled in uncertainty. “But … um … before you send me to my room for forever, can you please please drive me to the vet?”
For Sue Vincent’s WritePhoto prompt
Na'ama Yehuda 
Oh, I do like this, Na’ama. With sons of my own, this reminds me of moments long ago, when sometimes, doing the wrong thing for all the right reasons is the way to go.
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So glad you liked it! And glad that it resonated … Because yep …oftentimes it is better to let the reasoning surface rather than be assumed or vilified … For all behavior is communication … Sometimes desirable, sometimes less so, sometimes immediately understood, sometimes not so … 😉
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And sometimes, we have to go where the heart leads, without understanding it ourselves. 🙂
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Yep! And stop, and listen, and trust … and avoid shaming and try really hard to not jump to conclusions … 🙂
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We can but try 🙂
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Indeed! Try is all we can do, and it is a lot and it is often good enough … (or has to be …) 🙂
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As long as we really do try our best 😉
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Truth, this! 🙂
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Ah, I could hug him. Lovely story.
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Thank you! Quite huggable, yes! 🙂
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True hero.
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Children often can be! 🙂 Glad you thought so, too!
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His heart is in the right place. That’s a good start.
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It sure is! 🙂
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How wise, that mother, quietly and patiently allowing her son to explain himself. And how compassionate that son is, breaking his sister’s project and suffering punishment to save a bird. I love this. ☺️
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So glad you liked this!
I can think of other options to protecting the bird that do not include breaking his sister’s project, but I can appreciate his heart is in the right place and that he’d done what he thought was the right thing even if it meant he knew he’d face consequences for it.
🙂
May we all be as patient and as wise with all children (and adults who used to be children… ourselves included …).
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Very true. Sometimes, we do the wrong things for the right reasons and I think that is an important part of life which should be demonstrated in fiction. And you have done it really well 🙂 Sometimes you teach the children, but sometimes you can learn from them too
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Exactly! 🙂
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This brought back so many memories of all the needy creatures my children brought home…
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🙂 Kids can be wonderful this way (and clumsy and cruel sometimes, too, but mostly wonderful…) – like the child who brought home an earthworm in his back pant pockets … (ahem, more mush than worm but … perhaps the thought that counts? – he wanted to give them some of his dinner salad … “because worms like vegetables…”)
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I have had some strange requests over the years…
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I bet! 🙂
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Reblogged this on anita dawes and jaye marie.
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Oh I so like this story. Both writer and little son are already my firm friends. Thank you! x
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🙂 Yay hurray! 🙂 Thanks, Joy!
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Thank you, Sue! 🙂
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A sweet tale!
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🙂 I’m glad you thought so, Eliza! Thanks for reading and commenting! 🙂
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Thank you, Sue!
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