Fear

Sam has school on Monday nights, so last night the kids and I went through a drive through for dinner then went to the park. We ended up staying at the park pretty late. The kids where running around burning off energy and I called a friend. While I was on the phone I noticed Bryce running behind the tennis courts with his friend. He knows that he is not supposed to leave the play area with out permission and I usually don't give permission because the little kids always want to follow the big kids. Any way, there he went behind the tennis courts. I yelled for him but he didn't hear me so I just let it go and decided that I would just talk to him when he got back. I kept talking on the phone and it started to get dark and I realized that Bryce had not come back. I got off the phone and started gathering all of the kids. Still no Bryce. The main road going though our sub-division is right in front of the park. there is a tunnel that goes under the road. Nate and Abby told me that the last time they saw Bryce he was going into the tunnel with his friend. By this time it was totally dark and I was starting to worry. I put all of the kids in the car so that I wouldn't loss any more of them, and I started looking for Bryce. I was walking around the park yelling his name, expecting him to show up at any moment. There's no way that he would leave the park, right? Wrong! I couldn't find him anywhere. There were some older boys at the park that had been playing with my kids earlier and they got on there bikes and started helping in the search. Sam was home by this point so I called him and he came to look. I started stopping strangers walking through the park and asking them to help look. By this time I'm in full panic mode. I'm imagining the psycho hiding in the tunnel just waiting for some stray child to come along. I was freaking out. I almost dialed 911 a dozen times then I would think I should keep looking for just one more minute. Then I saw him running down the side walk with his friend. I couldn't even be happy that he was okay because all I could think about was how I was going to kill him.
Apparently his friend asked him to go to his house to meet his parents, a house that I've never been to and parents that I've never met. He knew that I would say no, so of course the only option he had was to just go without telling me. He crossed a busy road in the dark to go to a friend's house and see people that I know nothing about. Really, I could have strangled him right there in the park. He very well may be grounded for the rest of his life. Not only as a punishment for what he did but also because I might not ever let any of my kids out of my sight again. Lossing one of your kids, even if it is only for 20 minutes, is the most horrible feeling ever.