“Smart Enough To Avoid Abuse.”

A story of two girls and a mother.

Photo by Or Hakim on Unsplash

She had two girls. One was assaulted by a local chef, and the other was not. He had, apparently, tried to ensnare both, but the other started walking the long way home.

Her younger daughter didn’t follow him into the kitchen to try a new dish. She didn’t go back after the first time, because she felt like she had to. She didn’t believe the lie that she had to keep that secret.

Whenever it came up, she thought about her little girl who was smart enough to avoid abuse. Why couldn’t the other one pick up the signs? Why didn’t she walk home the other way?

Now, neither of them ever came home. They didn’t like to walk around the neighborhood. It made no sense. Nothing bad would happen to them now. They were grown.

There was also the fact that neither of them told her when it happened. Why not? She could have done something about it. How could she protect them, if she didn’t know?

All of this pressure was unfair. How could she prevent something that she didn’t even know was happening?

She had tried to warn her girls. She had told them that men only wanted one thing, and that they shouldn’t be alone with them. Her younger daughter knew how to read between the lines. But the older one was…