Evil Has an Innocent Face

The warm spring sun gleamed down from the azure blue sky, striking the girl’s caramel brown locks. She shimmered with youthful exuberance as she jumped and splashed and played in the shallow waves. Her childish giggles rippled across the sand, as a cold early spring wave lapped at her ankles and she ran away up the sand.

Her energy and carefree innocence filled him with wonder and he couldn’t tear his eyes away…..

We have been lulled into a false sense of security, living in Japan. Especially in the area we live in, the crime rates are low and people in the community still know each other enough by sight to occasionally nod in greeting.

Japan is a “safety country”, or so I’ve been told. I’ve laughed this off, in the wake of learning that there are vending machines that sell school girls’ used undies. I’ve laughed this off, as groups of drunken salary men have grouped around me in hopes of scoring themselves a Russian prostitute for the evening. I’ve laughed this off, after being followed home, groped and assaulted by a stranger who took my passing glance his way as an invitation.

But yet, from day to day, I can send my kids over to the neighbourhood park without much concern, other than strong admonishments to “NOT GO ANYWHERE ELSE” and “LOOK BOTH WAYS BEFORE CROSSING THE STREET”. I can go out for a night out with the girls and walk back to my car alone without much concern.

As the years have gone by, I have been lulled into a false sense of security.

During the recent long weekend, we decided to take the kids south to camp and reunite with friends we haven’t seen in the past two years.

The warm sun, the clear blue sky reflecting on the gentle ocean waves and the long stretch of white sand gave us the illusion of a real get away.

Idyllic

We pitched our tent at the end of a long row of tents and set up our home for the weekend. The license plates on the cars around us were from all over Japan. Calls of greetings were loud and joyful and none were muffled by the usual “facial adornments” we’ve become accustomed to seeing. Smiles were plentiful and there was a sense of community amongst the campers.

Thing One and Thing Two were overjoyed to have the space and freedom to run and play. I even felt relaxed enough to occasionally take my eagle eye off them momentarily to talk with friends or read a few pages of my book.

“Good morning!” a booming voice called out cheerfully. They stopped and turned to greet the friendly stranger. As she turned to say hello, her daughter ran over to the man and gave him a big hug.

“Errr, is she hugging me!?” he asked incredulously.

“It would appear so,” she laughed. “Thing Two! Don’t hug people we don’t know!”

As they continued on to the toilet block, she quietly admonished her daughter about not talking to strangers and especially not hugging them.

“But Mummy, he looks like Daddy…”

“I don’t care if he looks like Daddy. Do not hug strange men please.”

The toilet block was one area of the beach that I was not comfortable having the kids go to alone.

To reach the secluded toilet block, one had to ascend a short flight of stairs, and pass through a shady tunnel of trees…

Mummy! I need to do a pee pee! I want to go by myself. Can I go by myself Mummy?

Thing Two is going through an independent phase. She wants to do everything by herself. As a mum, I struggle to relinquish my role as caregiver, and give her the freedom to grow and explore.

I had absolutely no intention of allowing her to go off to a public toilet alone, but to give her a sense of freedom and independence, I let her go ahead of me a little bit before I got up to follow her.

Watching her daughter skipping and dancing across the footbridge towards the tree tunnel, a sense of foreboding came over her. It was if a shadow had suddenly passed over the sun, and she was chilled.

A man she’d not seen before was walking behind her daughter. As the little girl slowed, he slowed. As she sped up, he sped up. It was as if he was making sure to keep the same distance between himself and her precious little girl.

Something was not right. I felt it in my gut. I increased my walk to almost a run. If you know me, you know I never, ever run.

As she dashed through the end of the darkened tree tunnel, she could hear her daughter singing and talking to herself in the family toilet room. She rounded the corner, the man was standing just outside of the toilet door. Just out of sight of her daughter.

“Thing Two!” I called out loudly. The man started and moved quickly away from where he’d been lurking. He moved over to the wall overlooking the beach and acted as if he was looking at the ocean.

Not wanting to alarm Thing Two, I didn’t say a word to him but if looks could kill, that man would be dead a million times over.

Thing Two quickly finished up and we headed back to the beach.

As we walked, Thing Two skipped ahead of me, completely unaware of the danger she may have been in. The man had walked past me and kept turning to glance at me. I kept my face stony and kept my eyes firmly fixed on Thing Two.

As we sat down again on the beach with our friends, I watched that man head back to his campsite. I took note of where he was and who he was with.

He was alone. And by that evening, he had packed up his tent and left…

Once Thing Two was settled down to build an escape tunnel to Canada with Thing One, she left them under the watchful gaze of their friends and went to find Hubs. Explaining what had happened, they agreed. Neither child would be going anywhere unsupervised. Especially not to the toilet block.

Perhaps it was innocent coincidence… Perhaps I’ve watched too many episodes of Dateline on YouTube… But I am unsettled by that experience. My instinct tells me that man was up to no good. I am forever grateful that the childish innocence of Thing Two was not stolen from her that day.

My beautiful princess

Was this a brush with evil? Or was this a sign from the universe warning me not to continue living within the illusion of Japan being a “safety country”?

Thank god I’ll never know for sure.