She had a funny look on her face when she asked me another question. “Did he touch you？”
“He only held my hand.” I wondered why she seemed so upset.
I had to repeat the story to my father when he got home. I kept the same lies going， never changing my story. We ate dinner that night with me chattering as usual， my baby brother banging a spoon on his 9）high chair tray and my parents talking only through looks passed across the kitchen table.
Grade school and junior high years slipped by， and even though I thought about the horrible lies I’d told， I’d reached a point where the guilt proved easier to bear than the thought of 10）confessing. Finally， when I was sixteen， Mom and I were doing dishes one summer evening. We were chatting and laughing as she washed and I dried. Why I suddenly decided to confess that night， I don’t know.
During a 11）lull in the conversation， I said，“Remember the day the man took me up to Roosevelt Road when I was coming home from school？” Even all these years later， my heart beat harder as the memory of my lies surfaced. My mother stopped 12）scrubbing the potato pan.“How could I ever forget？ Your dad and I worried ourselves sick. We didn’t know what to do so we called the police， and they had a police car follow you to school every day for about two weeks. They never found the man， but it was a terrible time.”
I never knew that I’d had a police 13）escort. I nearly swallowed my big confession right then and there， but I went on. “Mom， I 14）made it all up.”
“You what？ But why？” Her face turned red and her hands were shaking as she dried them on the tea towel by the sink.
I could barely get the words out. “You hit me before I had time to explain that Lois told me a shortcut to go home but I got lost.” I started to cry and so did Mom.
When we both gained some control， I said， “I didn’t think you’d get so angry ten years after it happened.”
She sank onto a kitchen chair and put her hands on her cheeks. “I barely slept for two weeks. I couldn’t walk to and from school with you every day because your baby brother was sleeping then.”