The First 48

Does anyone else watch this show?  It’s on A&E and I stumbled on it only a number of months ago.  Since then, I’ve recorded nearly every showing of it, and for awhile, was spending 45 minutes before bed watching a new (to me) episode.  It sucked me in, twisted my view of the criminal mind and helped me see the humanity in a world that is so far removed from my own, I could never comprehend.

But, it was to always remain far removed.  I mean, that just went without saying, didn’t it?

Until I got a phone call Wednesday morning.  It started benign enough; it was my daughter.

“What are you doing today?”

“I have a hair appointment at noon, why?”

“Well, um…Nathan needs a new phone.”

“Oh?  Did his break?”

“Heh.  No.  Um.  You see.  Well…”

“Abby…”

“Yeah.  I’m *audibly fidgets* trying here.”

[non-verbal maternal paranoia]

“So.  Nathan was um…well, you see…Mom.  He, um.  Hewasrobbedatgunpointlastnight.”

And the swirl began.  You know that swirl, don’t you?  That swirl that starts in your throat, goes straight to your gut and then to your heart, spiraling slowly through your body, reaching every corner, taking any loose nerves it can find and sparking them alive but only before promptly killing them.  The warm rush, the cold chills, the 10,000 questions, the blockage from hearing any answers because there is no way an answer will make anything better.

Well, except for one.

“Is he okay?”

“Yeah, Mom.  He’s okay.  I mean, well, no.  But…they didn’t hurt him.  He’s here with me.”

With that assurance, the spiral continues, on a slower path this time, and there is time to ask the questions and wait for the answers.  So, I asked, and she answered and I asked some more and she answered some more and we decided I would head right up there to…

…to what?  I haven’t the foggiest notion, but I’ll be damned if I wasn’t going.  I knew I needed to hug him.  To hold him.  To look into his bluest of blue eyes and find out for myself if he was really okay.  And, I needed to help ease his fear.  He wanted to change his appearance a little because they threatened they’d come back for him.  He wanted a new phone so he didn’t feel any less detached than he did that 90 minutes those evil, greedy, sadistic bastards drove him all over the east side of Columbus making him try ATM after ATM to get all of the money out of his savings account.  He wanted to make sure his accounts were safe and that his nightmare would be over.

Now, we all know that fixing those things wasn’t going to end this poor young man’s nightmare.  But, it was a start.  So, together we started.  And as we drove to my beautician, he told me the details of his evening.  And I held his hand as the intensity of the situation overwhelmed me – he was still in a bit of shock, reporting it all as though he was telling me about his latest Music History lecture.  As the next two days unfolded, he would remember more details, or would be more brave to speak of them.  As we waited for paperwork to process at the bank, only 12 hours after his capture, a news station had arrived at his apartment wanting an interview.  They met us where we were and were so gentle and kind to him, letting him decide how much of himself, how much of the evening, just how much he wanted to tell the world.

“Why do they want to interview me!?”

“This doesn’t happen everyday.  They abducted you, Nathan.”  Shock was graciously protecting him from the reality of the situation.  The reality that with one wrong move, hell, with one right move – one.different.move. we could have been standing over his dead body at a morgue.  He could have been the next victim on The First 48.  The next “fictionalized” story on any of the crime dramas that he hates watching.  While I think he knew, I don’t think he really knew. And, for that, I’m grateful.

We didn’t finish all of the logistical things you fix after a simple robbery on that first day.  So, I took my babies home to me, kept them under my roof for one night.  Just one, but a night I think we’re all grateful we had together.  I had to wake them up from the deepest sleep I think I’d ever seen either of them in.  And, the day pushed forward, and Nathan’s shock slowly slipped away.  He’d fidget as we waited out on a downtown street for his driver’s license picture to process.  He swapped places with me, distancing himself from a hooded African American man walking our direction, harmlessly doing his own daily chores.  His confident gait became a bit more unsure, his steady gaze a bit more shifty.

Oh, he’d smile at funny things and engage in conversation with anyone he needed to.  He struggled through breakfast, but ate a bit more peacefully at lunch.  He’d answer every question I had for him and never showed an ounce of resentment that this woman – this woman who was not his mother – was nurturing him to virtual suffocation.  And then, I had to let him head to a few classes.  He stood on College Avenue, his big eyes still dead, large with a hint of fear.  But, he did it.  He crossed the street and I drove off and he managed.  Somehow.

That night, he was alone at the apartment, and it became a bit overwhelming.  After a few silly emails and texts, my phone rang and we spoke for quite some time about a whole lot of nothing.  He never said he was scared, but we both understood that we both understood.  His girl would be home eventually and their 3rd roommate even later, but in those moments, when he was alone, his mind was his company.  His memory, his imagination, his fear.  And those three things are not good party guests.  Not together.  But, he made it.

And every day, he makes it.  Timing has been a gift because a dear high school friend is home this weekend from his Navy assignment in Japan.  It’s all boy time all the time.  What a wonderful gift for him.  But, there is even a better gift; one we never thought would happen to us…

…if you watch The First 48, you know the theme of the show is just that.  After a crime is committed (murder on that show), the detectives want to find a major lead, a perpetrator, SOMEone to point a finger within the first 48 hours after the crime.  It ups the percentage of closing the case, of making the streets safer, of comforting a victim and helping them heal.

Within the first 48 hours, Nathan got a call from the lead detective.  He had a photo array for Nathan to look at.  Yes, it was for only one of his four captors, but it was one.  And Nathan looked at that piece of paper and without blinking an eye said, “Oh.  Number three.  Definitely.”

Minimum jail time?  20 years.

Nathan is 20 years old.

I’d say that’s pretty fair – a lifetime for a lifetime.

Now, they have to find the other 3, but finding one makes that all that much more possible.  Helps all of us breathe a little easier.  Helps Nathan know that even though they threatened his life, his family’s life, and took away his feeling of security – at least for a time – he did the right thing by coming forward and telling his story.

In the first 48 there was shock and grief and betrayal and fear.

In the second 48 and beyond, there is healing.