When the Unexpected Happens

Did I make the Right Decision?

What started as a typical day on our way to a cleaning job turned into something I’m still thinking about. This isn’t just another story—it’s a real event that made me question if I did the right thing. Let me tell you what happened.

Last Friday, we were already running late to one of our favorite clients' houses. They're such great people, so we knew they would understand when we explained. But just as we thought the day couldn’t get any crazier, something made us stop in our tracks.

At a stop sign, we saw a little boy—maybe about 3 years old—walking down the middle of the street, his messy brown hair blowing in the breeze and his well-worn clothes looking way to big. He looked like he had no idea where he was headed. He was also pulling a book bag behind him, and we couldn’t see any adults nearby. We watched him through the rearview mirror, then glanced again through the side mirror, trying to figure out what was going on. Why wasn’t there an adult around? Where were his parents?

We watched as the boy bent down and picked up a McDonald’s bag that had been thrown out of a passing car. I kept looking around and noticed an older boy on a bike, riding back and forth down street. He didn’t seem like he was with the little guy. Then I saw a car parked across the street, and the people inside didn’t look like they had the best intentions. Tye and I exchanged a glance, and that was all it took—mom mode kicked in. Tye jumped out of the car, and I pulled over to the curb. We couldn’t just sit there and do nothing.

We got out and tried talking to the boy, asking him basic questions: Where are you going? Do you know where you live? But each time we pointed to a house, he’d shake his head or give a barely audible “I don’t know.” It wasn’t that he was shy—it seemed like he hadn’t quite learned to talk very well yet. We walked almost a full block, hoping someone would come out looking for him, but still, no one did.

Ten minutes passed with no sign of an adult, so we felt we had no choice but to call 911. Just as we were explaining the situation to the operator, a man came out of a house, tucking in his shirt, and a woman followed, looking completely out of breath. The little boy’s face lit up, and he ran straight to the man, shouting, “Dad!” The funny thing was, we had already passed that house, and the boy hadn’t even recognized it as his own! (Just sayin’, my granddaughter is two, and she knows which house is hers!)

The man mumbled, “I just went inside to use the bathroom—I was only in there for a couple of minutes,” but Tye and I both doubted that was true. The boy had been out there far too long for that to be the case. The man picked him up and quickly whisked him up the driveway, the little boy waved back at us as they disappeared inside.

We were both relieved for a moment, but as we got back in the car to head to our cleaning job, that feeling changed to self-doubt. As soon as we closed the doors, we both spoke at the same time: Maybe we should have had the police come . Obviously, the dad wasn’t just using the bathroom. We couldn’t stop thinking about it—him tucking in his shirt, the woman out of breath ( the boy didn’t even acknowledge her ). We started guessing all sorts of things about what might have been going on. Maybe she was a hooker, a trick and dad was having some fun time not even caring about his son at that time.

Did we leave that boy in a bad home situation? Should we have stayed and filed a report? If we had, Children Services might have been brought in on this too , and that could have opened a whole can of worms for that family. After a few minutes of silence, both of us thinking about what had just happened, we drove off to work, unsure if we had done the right thing.

What would you have done? I’ve shared this story with a few people, and some of them said they would have still had the police come. Would you?