Unlikely

Directly after I explained to my 4-year-old how unlikely it is we would have to call the police, of course, I had to call the police.

My next door neighbor asked me to collect his mail and newspapers while he and his wife traveled South to her eldest son's school. It's "March Madness" and he's a team captain. He was very excited about the trip. He said, in his drawl, "Well, I just thought we shouldn't have a stack of mail and newspapers advertising we were gone so that someone came and stole the stereo."

I noticed as I was washing the dinner dishes that there were several lights on in the house that weren't on when I'd served dinner. I was surprised to see a male figure walk across the darkened kitchen. I hesitated though. They have 4 kids between them. I had no idea if one or more were staying in the house, or if someone was over perhaps to feed the cat. I decided that the neighbor probably wouldn't have asked me to collect mail if someone were feeding the cat or if his kid(s) were there, and called the police.

There were 3 cruisers outside in 2 minutes. I saw the police walk around the perimeter of the property, and then it was quiet for a long time. Forty minutes passed, the cruisers still on the street. So I thought, well something must've been going on...

After I tucked Lindsay into bed, and in the middle of Lauren's story, an officer arrived at my door. He'd set two bottles on my porch. "Good evening, Ma'am. Did you call about the neighbor's house?"

"Yes, Officer." I replied. "I was concerned that I was sending in the police to bother my neighbor's cat sitter."

"Oh, no, Ma'am." he answered. "There were quite a lot of teenagers there with a couple of kegs of beer and bottles. I guess that their son had decided he'd have a party."

I nodded. "Oh."

"So we ended it a little early."

"I see. Well, thank you, Officer. You have a good night."

I went back upstairs and explained to Lauren why I'd called the police, because I didn't know if it was safe for me to go over there. I called the police and they checked it out, and they found that the neighbor's son was at the house when he wasn't supposed to be.

"Oh." said she.

"And Lauren?"

"Yeah?"

"Probably when you're a teenager, this is a bad neighborhood to try and have a keg party when your parents are away."

"Ok, Mom."

Riiight.