12. Brooke #2
I tried to act unrattled as I brushed past him again and went to track down Lisa.
A few minutes later, the three of us were sitting around the small conference table in her office.
After a few quick pleasantries, Mark folded his hands together and said, “I spoke with Dylan’s mother on my way here.
I reminded her of the release she and her husband signed, allowing me to discuss certain aspects of Dylan’s counseling sessions with you. ”
“So, you were able to get through to him?”
“Yes and no.” He let out a deep breath. “I think I have a better idea of why Dylan has been so withdrawn and afraid… During our Saturday afternoon session, he finally opened up about Jimmy.”
Lisa’s eyes narrowed. “The neighbor?”
“Yes.” He looked over to me as he told us, “For the past few months, Jimmy has been inviting Dylan over to his house. He lured him with snacks and new video games, and once he was there, he took him down to the basement.”
The basement.
I felt the hairs on the back of my neck stand tall.
“At first, Dylan thought it was fun… He looked up to Jimmy. He thought it was cool that an older kid wanted to hang out with him, but that changed when Jimmy showed him a handgun.”
“What?”
“He believes it belongs to the boy’s father.”
“Oh no.”
“Jimmy told him that his father drinks and often gets violent… and one day he might need the gun if his dad comes after him again.” I could hear the concern in Mark’s voice when he said, “Dylan was frightened, and rightly so.”
“Of course he was.”
“He didn’t do a great job of hiding it, and once Jimmy noticed, he told him not to tell anyone. But he didn’t stop there. He told him that if he said a word about it, people would get hurt.”
My chest tightened.
Dylan was a sweet kid with a big heart. I knew that the first time I met him. I had no doubt that he would be horrified by a threat like that, especially if it was against someone he cared about. My heart ached for him when I asked, “Did Dylan interpret Jimmy’s threat to include his parents?”
“Yes, he did.” Mark grimaced. “He referenced his mom and dad specifically… his little brother, too.”
“He’s ten.”
“Yes, I know.”
“He’s carried this around by himself for months.”
Every appointment. Every visit. Every drawing and conversation.
It all came to this.
He’d been trying to protect his parents, not hide from them. I leaned back in my seat. “I knew something wasn’t right.”
“You were right,” Lisa replied with a sympathetic smile. “You kept saying there was a missing piece, and this was it.”
Mark leaned forward. “I don’t believe Dylan thinks Jimmy is a bad kid… He actually felt sorry for him. Said he was sad.”
“Because of the father?”
“Yes. He said he yells at him all the time, and he was covered in bruises a couple times he saw him.”
Silence settled over us for a moment, then Lisa lowered her pen and said, “Here’s what we’re going to do. I will get with Daniel, and we will take things from there.”
“Daniel?”
Daniel was one of our senior case managers.
He had twenty-plus years in child welfare, and if there was a difficult case, Daniel was usually the one they sent.
I shouldn’t have been surprised that Lisa wanted to bring him in on this, but I had been working with Dylan and his family from the start.
I wasn’t ready to just step aside, so I told her, “And what about me? What will I do?”
“You will step back… At least for the time being,” she responded firmly. “The information Dylan disclosed raises concerns about both child safety and access to a firearm in the home. This is a volatile situation. Daniel and I will conduct an immediate home visit with Jimmy and his father.”
“You will need to coordinate with law enforcement before any contact is made there,” Mark warned. “We don’t want anyone walking into something they aren’t prepared for.”
“Of course,” Lisa answered. “This isn’t the first time we’ve handled a case like this.”
“Well, it’s a first for me, and it’s a first for Dylan and his family.”
“I will reach out to them,” I offered.
“No,” Lisa snapped. “We will handle it from here.”
“But I’ve worked with this family from the beginning.”
“I’m fully aware of the work you’ve done.”
“I think Dylan would respond better if…”
“Brooke,” she cut me off. “You’ve done well by Dylan. But this isn’t about your relationship with him or his family. This is about maneuvering through a potential situation with a juvenile and a firearm, and experience matters.”
I hated that she was right, but she was.
I knew it when she added, “We don’t know what we’re walking into with this. This is a child’s account of events. We don’t know how skewed they might be. And I’m not putting one of my newer social workers in the middle of that, no matter how good they might be.”
“I understand.”
“You’ve done good work on this case, Brooke. You earned Dylan’s trust and got him to a counselor who actually got through to him. And because of that, you may have saved his life.”
I felt tears sting my eyes. Not from sadness, but from relief. Dylan would be okay. After Lisa dismissed us, Mark and I shared a bit of small talk at my cubicle, and I told him how much I appreciated his working with Dylan. Before he left, I promised to call him as soon as I got any news.
I went back to my desk and tried to keep myself busy. I checked my email, returned phone calls, and updated case notes that should’ve taken ten minutes but somehow took over an hour because I kept rereading the same sentence.
My eyes drifted to the clock and then over to the window. They would’ve been at Jimmy’s by now, and just like that, every horrible possibility came rushing through my mind.
Jimmy could’ve had the gun. He could’ve tried to shoot them when they came into the house. Jimmy’s father might have been hostile and fought them. And then, Jimmy could’ve gone after Dylan.