06/30/2025
HE FELL ASLEEP IN A POLICE OFFICERāS ARMS š“ BUT THATāS NOT WHY PEOPLE STARTED WHISPERING
We were at the Juneteenth festivalāmusic playing, food trucks everywhere, kids laughing and running through the streets. I looked away for just a second to pay for a funnel cake, and when I turned back, my nephew Zavi was gone.
Panic hit me like a wave. I dropped everything and started yelling his name, checking every bounce house, every face I passed. I was seconds away from calling 911 when I finally saw himāfast asleep in a police officerās arms.
The officer stood off to the side, calm, like this was nothing new. When I ran over, breathless and scared, he just nodded and said Zavi had wandered off near the snow cone truck and got tired.
āDidnāt want to leave him alone,ā he said, like it was no big deal.
I thanked him, scooped Zavi up, and tried to move on. But then I noticed people staring. Whispering. A few had their phones out. Some were smilingābut not all of them.
One woman near the food stand shook her head and said, āMust be nice to get that kind of response.ā
At first, I didnāt get it.
Then it hit me.
They werenāt whispering because Zavi had fallen asleep. They were whispering because of who was holding himā
And what it might have looked like if just one thing had been different.
Now I canāt stop thinkingā¦
Would he still be safe if he didnāt look so small, so tired, so harmless? ā¬ļø Read more in Comment or Most relevant -> All comments š
