‘I’d rather die than leave my mom.” He was seven years old. And he meant it. Five minutes earlier, the first officer on scene, Lisa, sent out a broadcast — the boy was going for the balcony. Maybe to jump.
My partner and I raced across the city. Lights flashing. Sirens blaring.
We arrived to relative calm. Mom in the living room. Distressed. But no longer frantic.
The boy, and Lisa, on the floor in the tiny bedroom. Talking.
A family in crisis. The night before, that boy watched an adult in his life get arrested. At gunpoint. What does that do to a seven-year-old? And now, less than a day later, another 911 call.
Lisa and I switched places. Lisa knew the mother, the background and the complexities that brought the police to this small apartment on a beautiful summer’s night in Victoria.
The boy never cried. But he was frightened. And frenetic. Terrified he’d be put in foster care. Certain his grandparents and mother would die before he saw them again.
I didn’t know what to do. Or say. I knew I couldn’t fix the problem — not the fundamental one.
But maybe I could help the boy feel a little better. For a few minutes. The family had a dog. A pug called Blue. So ugly it was cute. He joined us in the bedroom, flipped onto his back, and revelled in a tummy rub, while I sang: “Blue, Blue, Blue. What are we going to do with you?”
The boy smiled. A little. Stopped talking about death. And started talking about Pokémon.
Then he drew for me. More Pokémon. Which led to Lego. Before long he had my flashlight as we launched a very unofficial police search for a missing toy underneath the bed. We worked together, using a coat hanger to improvise the rescue of the missing action figure.
In the living room, Lisa and my partner Mike spoke with mom. At length. Calming. Reassuring. Working toward a solution. Not a forever solution. But a get-through-tonight, and hopefully through the weekend, solution. More adults arrived. Family friends. A social worker.
Lisa and Mike were doing the heavy lifting. I got to play with a child. What a privilege in an awful situation.
Which is often the paradox of policing.
I’m back in uniform after six years as a detective. Six years of complex cases. Six years away from the realities of day-to-day policing.
Those realities are sobering.
A city, famous for its beauty, is ravaged by homelessness. Addiction — both booze and drugs — runs rampant among the street population. So do mental-health issues. All of it fuel for hundreds of individual tragedies. And also fuel for crime. Thefts. Break and enters. Robberies. Stabbings.
Some get off the streets. Or never live on them in the first place. But they are still on the margins. Of society. Of health. Of the lives that many of us take for granted.
Police aren’t the answer. Not to the main problem. Or problems. We put bandages on gaping wounds. We respond to crimes and crises. We find temporary solutions, which usually mean giving someone a ride — to the psych ward, to the sobering centre or to jail.
Every morning, we wake up the homeless, rousing them from what must be fitful sleeps in alcoves and parks. We send them on their way, wherever that might be. The homeless shelter that serves thousands of meals a week. Or the drug stores and thrift shops where security guards arrest the same people, day after day, for shoplifting.
It’s dispiriting work, virtually devoid of any job satisfaction. It’s not uncommon to hear cops at the start or end of their shifts, joking about going out there and “making a difference.” We joke about it because we so rarely feel as if we do.
The paradox of policing.
I sprawled out on the floor with the boy, in my uniform, sweating in a room where sunlight poured in and fresh air did not.
We played Risk now. His version of the game. A brilliant version. Conceived in his vivid imagination. Blue horsemen with ice swords. Red cannons firing lava. Green rifles shooting snot.
He immersed himself in the game. In attacking me. In setting up force fields. In crushing my ragtag army with his growing legion of warriors.
It was great.
Then we took a break. He shared his candy with me. He needed a pen. I showed him my handcuff key that looked like a pen. So, of course, out came my handcuffs. He cuffed me. And, then raced out to the living room to handcuff my partner. How cool was it for that seven-year-old to handcuff a policeman and show his mom what he’d done?
Mike and I left a few minutes later. Lisa stayed behind. Still looking for resolutions.
Before we left the bedroom, the boy gave me the drawing. He had signed it for me.
I will keep that drawing forever.
Playing Risk with that child in that room was the most rewarding thing that’s happened to me since returning to uniform. A few minutes of not just job satisfaction but actual fun. Of seeing a joyful little boy. Of maybe making a difference. For a few minutes.
How terrible. How truly awful. To experience fulfilment at work because a child suffered.
The paradox of policing.
Daryl Baswick is a police officer in Victoria. His personal essays and short fiction have appeared in Canadian Running and Island Writer.
