Scars Will Heal

It was like any other evening. We hugged, we said goodnight, and we retreated to our rooms until the morning. Unlike other nights, however, my sleep was frequently disturbed. I was uneasy, but I didn't know why. At one point I heard a creak and got out of bed to look around: I had to make sure I was alone in my room. And I was. Clearly it was all in my head. So I lied down on my back - alert and very much awake - for what seemed like an eternity before my fear gave way to drowziness. Everything's...just...fine... And it was.

Before long, however, my sleep was disrupted again as I felt a tug on the blanket near my foot. Still on my back (and I never sleep on my back) from the previous apprehension, I reflexively sat straight up and shouted "WHAT THE!!" As my eyes adjusted and I scanned the dark room, I saw that the door was open. "Mom must've come in to close a window," I thought to myself as I drifted off. The steady murmur of the bedroom air conditioner lulled me back to sleep. Everything's...all...right...

But the next time I was awakened from my slumber it was by my parents' screaming:
"Is she in there?!?!"
"Yeah, she's here."

My eyes shot open as Mom joined Dad in the doorway of my room. They spared no time in sharing the news. "Libby, we were robbed last night!!"

My frenzied parents, too, had just gotten up. Waking up in a strangely warm room, my mom realized that their bedroom door was open (and thus allowing the air conditioning to escape), so she got up to close it. But when she stepped out of bed, my mom found her bedside drawer wide open and her jewelry spread all over the floor. She yelled for my dad to wake up, and together they rushed into my room.

Our brains were still asleep, yet our bodies were running entirely on adrenaline as we attempted to figure out what had happened. The morning was a whirlwind. Downstairs, we found that four of the louvers from one window had been removed and thrown in the sand outside. Our light-weight wicker couch had been moved to clear the entryway; and the burglar(s) had also moved my dad's clothes from the floor next to his bed to a chair downstairs. My mom called the police immediately. While we waited, we composed a list of the plunder:

• my four-year-old digital camera
• my mom's broken digital camera
• a carton of grape juice (which was left half-empty outside of our house)
• 1.5 pairs of cheap earrings
• Joe's $5 sunglasses
• the mouse from a laptop, but not the computer itself *

* The laptop was unplugged, and the modem was pulled over on its side. Thus, we deduced that the thief must have made a noise while tugging at the electronics, which caused someone to stir in bed. This probably scared him out of the bedroom before the job was complete.

When the police finally arrived three hours later, they fingerprinted the removed louvers, which were scattered (unbroken) on the sand beneath the entry window. They also fingerprinted the juice carton and the door of our refridgerator. The police reasoned that it was probably two young men, and they explained that burglars usually search bedrooms for valuables while crawling along the floor next to beds. When I heard this, my mind flashed back to tug on my blanket and the open door. There was someone there! The rat-man had crawled next to me...which explains why I didn't see him when I sat up in bed. That was the creepiest feeling of all.

After the police had gathered the evidence, they instructed us to make police reports "sometime today" at the police station. Shortly after they left, my mom found a purple comb with a few tangled strands of black, kinky, wiry hair next to the window. Using tweezers, my dad placed the comb in a baggie.

My parents and I were finally left alone to debrief. We shared the bond of victimization and talked about what had happened, what might have happened, and what we should do about it. I was totally paraniod and kept advising my parents not to make "I can't believe he missed this" comments. After all, you never know who's listening.

My brothers - who were staying in the [more burglar-proof] villa behind our house - were still asleep. We woke them up to inform them of the situation. And once the boys were awake and on the lookout, my parents and I took our purple comb to San Pedro and made our police reports. [The police station itself is a trip. One old man in a cell kept begging my dad for bail money, but that's another story for another day.]

For days, the burglary strongly affected my thinking. Every black man with long-ish, kinky hair was a suspect. And at the sight of such hair I thought to myself, "Are you the one who came in my room while I was sleeping?" I realize that my suspicions were probably all wrong, and maybe I should be ashamed of this...but I'm not. Being burglarized put me - the victim - on the defensive against the entire population of suspects. I was afraid to sleep, afraid to spend a night in that room again, afraid to be alone outside at night, afraid to talk too loud about the burglary, afraid, afraid, afraid...

My family was helpful in dealing with and confronting this fear. We took prayer walks around our yard before going to bed, and Brian even let me sleep in the other bed in his room. I placed plastic cups on each window sill in the villa so that we would wake up if anyone tried to enter; and although my brothers rolled their eyes, they put up with this oddity. In time, the fear lessened. But when the time came to return to the US, I was relieved.

Fortunately, my parents have taken extensive measures to secure our home. I just hope this fear will be a distant memory as I return to Ambergris Caye.