The Vacant House

The house had been vacant for months. As I drove by it everyday, I couldn't help but notice it's creepyness as it sat in a heap of aloneness. There was a mattress on the driveway and the biggest spider web and spider stretched across the open garage. I looked at that house every day. I wondered about it...How does a house just end up empty with nothing but a mattress in the front yard? I couldn't drive by that house without feeling strangely scared and uneasy. I just didn't like the feel of it.

One day I noticed a difference in the house. The spider web disappeared and soon enough the mattress disappeared too. Gradually I stopped getting the spooks as I drove by that old house. I began seeing a family. Two little boys who rode their tricycle in the driveway and a woman who worked hard to get the weeds from the front yard. I saw the man of the house taking many smoke breaks, in fact everytime I drove by. The vacant house had become a home, and I felt peace about that old house...Until tonight.

As I drove home, a police car whizzed by me with deafening sirens and I pitied the person he was after. As I drove down the road that leads me home I saw the bright lights and knew it had stopped at the house I had grown strangely fond of. What was going on that needed a police officer's attention? I'll never know, though I'll never forget what I saw. As I drove by the cop was jumping out of his car. That woman, who spent many hours in that same yard was standing with her two little boys at the bottome of her driveway. The smallest boy, only a toddler was wearing her sweatshirt. The older boy, porbably around 7 was only wearing his underwear. What happened in that house tonight that resulted in the woman rushing her half dressed children to the road? And where was the dad? Did he do something to those boys? I couldn't help but stare as I drove by, looking at that boy with no clothes on in 50 degree weather. My mind rushes through all the possibilities of what may have happened. I lift my prayers tonight to that family, to those children, that mother, and the house that I have ultimately cared for.