So here I was. Doing the same thing I always do when I have nothing to do. Standing on a chair, looking through a minuscule hole in the top of my kitchen. Trying to figure out what to do with my young niece. The only one I have; the one that doesn’t know I exist, the one that has been trapped her whole life.

I have been “spying” on her, as my sister calls it, for a couple weeks now and she looks desperate. I can’t believe how sad my little Joe is. It’s depressing, and I hope I could do something to help her.

This thought made the decision for me. It was clear in my mind that I had to help her. I would walk straight to my sister’s house and “steal” my niece for a while. I would take her for a walk. Just show her the world and then help her persuade her mom to LET HER LIVE!

As I walked to the door my heart started beating loudly. I felt my face turning red. My hand was shaking by the time I turned the doorknob to open the door.

Joe, my little niece was sitting there, just inches away from me. Playing innocently with her dog. She turned around and looked me straight in the eye. She was beautiful. It was unbelievable how much she looked like her mom. Her eyes were green and her hair all curled and with a pink bow near her ear.

I didn’t know what to do, so I just ran to her and hugged her. For the first time in my life, I was with my one and only Joe.




-------------***-----------


“Come here darling. I want to show you something.”

She looked at me with her hazel eyes. I could see a light of faith in them. I could feel her desperation to go out, to discover the unknown. When she saw my hand moving to reach the door and open it, a small grin appeared in her delicate face.

I opened the door and the bright light shone in her beautiful face. Her eyes were wide open; trying to look at everything at the same time. A tall woman passed by in a hurry. Joe looked at her amazed. She had never seen anyone besides her mom, and me.
Then, a small group of children passed by. They were talking about school and how much fun they had together. That amazed her even more. She felt an urge to talk to them, to see how it was like to have a friend!

Joe looked suddenly sad. I knew what was going on. She hasn’t ever had a friend. That’s when I decided we should go to the park. Maybe we would be lucky and she would meet a few kids. All that was in my mind then, was to make her happy. I wanted Joe to never forget that day and to like me even though I had just appeared in her life.

I thought I was doing the right thing. I was changing her life, making my one and only niece enjoy her time in this world. When I saw her eyes, admiring the world for the first time, I felt happy, like I was someone important. I was helping someone. And I don’t even know how to explain how good it felt to know I was finally doing something generous and kind in my life.

We passed by some stores and she looked amazed at the view of so many people around her. After walking for a couple minutes, we finally got to the park. There, we saw a ton of kids. Most of hem looked about her age. Joe first looked scared so I took her chubby hand as if saying that everything was going to be all right. Suddenly, as if she realized that nothing was going to happen, she slid her hand away from mine and ran to the kids.

She climbed up to the tree house, and as if she had always been with other kids, she started playing with them. I was so happy that a huge smile grew in my face. If anyone had been there to see me, they would have thought I was crazy; but the truth was, I was actually crazy. I was crazily happy.

------------------***----------------

Her heart was beating so loudly that I could hear it. I turned the doorknob and slowly opened the door. She was there, sitting on the floor with a box filled with Kleenex and there were a lot of them crumbled all around her. She was crying loudly, I felt bad for her and almost ashamed of what had done.

She jumped when she heard us coming, and turned around to see whom it was. When she saw Joe’s little face, she started walking to us and crying form relief. She thought she had lost her little girl. When she looked at me, her face turned red with rage and starts screaming words that Joe shouldn’t have heard.

“Why in the world could you have done such a thing? Joe is just a little girl! She can’t go outside, it’s too dangerous for her. She could have died, or gotten sick, or many other things could have happened to her. Maybe a car could have ran over her, or a crazy man could have taken her, and raped her, or done creepy things to her. I could have lost her. I love her too much to loose her! I can’t believe it.”, she said.

“Well, I have been looking at her for a couple weeks through the tiny window near your kitchen, and she wants to go out. She has been trying to look outside through the space between the door and the floor, trying to see what might be out the door. She has also tried a couple times to open it and cried when she couldn’t. I felt bad for her. I couldn’t stand looking at her crying every day and not do something. So I took her out for a walk, we ate some ice cream, and went visit mom. Joe actually liked it a lot. She said she loved me for making her dream come true.”- I said.

“You know Mildred, I don’t care a flying piece of cr*p if she enjoyed it or not! Joes is my daughter and I decide what the h*ll she does and what she doesn’t. You can’t just go around, spying on my daughter and taking her away. As I said, she could have gotten hurt! I don’t want to loose her! So you go ahead, and walk outside that god d*mn door and get LOST!” –she said.

“Don’t make me walk out that door! If I do, I will go stright to the police and tell them how you keep your poor little 5 years old in a d*mn house and don’t let her go out. And I don’t care how scared you are because a stupid incident that happened to you some years ago. I don’t care how hurt you got. That happens to one person in a million; and I am pretty sure that nothing will happen to Joe! Especially if she is with me, with mom, or with you. Please, consider letting her go out. We could make a deal. Maybe we can let her go out but with a couple rules to it.” –again, I tried to make my sister reason.

Suddenly, there was silence. She looked down, a lock of her dirty blond hair fell to her face. We stayed like that for a while. She gazed at me, then to her daughter, then and me, and back again at Joe. Nobody said a word. The spring wind in from the opened window. The sweet smell of lillies from my sister’s backyard. The one with the little green bridge, and the different kinds of flowers that bloom making the house look colorful, content, tranquil; hiding what really was happening inside that house on the corner of the street.

“Ok. I will do it. I will aloud Joe to go out but only with either you or me; never without us. And perhaps mom can also take her out. She will be able to go out only from 10 o’ clock in the morning until 5:30pm; and every single time she is going out, I have to be informed and asked for permission to do it. No more of you secretly taking her and making me worry. I will be informed before Joe is taken out of that door. And yes I… I will-“. Her voice broke. She couldn’t say it. I knew she meant getting help, a therapist. Someone that would help all of us, by helping her to overcome her own problems. “I will get help. I will get someone that will help me. You know what I mean, Mildred.”


“I understand. I compromise myself to do as you say and we will both talk to mom. I will get you a therapist and we will make an appointment all together, even with Joe, and then you will work on your own problems. I think my job here is done for today.”

Suddenly, there was a calm air in the house. Little Joe smiled. It was a modest smile, but she knew it was the first time she really smiled; the first time she smiled for herself and not only to please her mom. The dog came in from the backyard. It felt as if he knew what just had happened. He just silently sat besides my crying sister. The dog somehow knew she was sad and the dog started rubbing his fur against the pale, recently shaved skin. Laura slowly turned to face the dog and started scratching behind his ears. Her face started turning pale again and getting rid of all the red she had gotten by crying. Her emerald colored eyes were still humid but no more tears were running down her well-blushed cheeks.

She then turned over to face Joe and softly called her. Joe came in a matter of a second and sat on her mother’s lap. Laura ran her fingers through Joe’s dirty blond curly hair over and over again. Joe looked happy but it felt like she was hiding her real feelings at the moment. She put her tiny face against her mom’s chest and started crying. We both wanted to calm her but after many efforts of doing it, we realized that we should instead just tell her about her new life. We spent only some minutes explaining her all we had discussed her mom and I before. Then, she started doing the talking.

“I like the idea. I have been waiting all my life to know what was outside that door. I have wanted to open it since I was 3. And when I was even younger, I felt inside of me that there was something I was missing. Not a daddy, or anything like it, but a whole family, or also a whole other world. I want to go out. And I want to do it with mommy.”
The three of them hugged each other and tears came down their cheeks. They stayed like that for the rest of the evening. The sun came down and the stars came out. After a while, Joe had fallen asleep on Laura’s laps. She slowly picked her up and took Joe to her room. She turned the light of and laid Joe on her bed. Joe slowly opened her eyes, and while being between sleep and awake, she said with a tranquil voice:

“I love you mom.”