My Little Brother Woke Me Up At Night And Said We Need To Leave Right Now. So, We Did.

Homecoming

Rachel lived in a small town outside Portland in a house that felt enormous after years in our isolated home. She had a guest room ready for me and had converted her office into a bedroom for Caleb, both rooms decorated with welcome signs and new clothes in our sizes.

“I’ve been buying things for years,” she admitted, showing us the closet full of clothes in various sizes. “Every birthday and Christmas, I’d buy presents for the ages you would have been, hoping someday I’d get to give them to you.”

Starting therapy was hard because Dr. Melissa Torres, the counselor Rachel had found, didn’t let me hide from any of the difficult feelings. She made me talk about the good memories of the people who’d raised me and acknowledged that I could miss them while also being angry about what they’d done.

She helped Caleb process his guilt about not figuring things out sooner, about all the signs he’d missed before that last month. We went to therapy separately and together, sometimes with Rachel joining us to work on building new family relationships.,

Enrolling in actual school was terrifying after years of homeschooling, but the principal and counselors had been briefed on our situation and worked to make the transition as smooth as possible. Caleb started eighth grade and I started senior year.

Both of us were completely overwhelmed by the crowds and noise and social dynamics we’d never learned to navigate. But slowly, week by week, it got easier.

I made friends with a girl in my English class who invited me to study groups and didn’t ask intrusive questions about where I’d come from. Caleb joined the robotics club and found other kids who were quiet and awkward and accepted him without demanding explanations.

The trial was scheduled for eight months after our escape, and the prosecutors warned us it would be difficult to sit through. They were right.

For three weeks, we listened to testimony about all the murders our kidnappers had committed, saw crime scene photos and evidence, and heard the family members of victims describe their losses. Some days I had to leave the courtroom because it was too much.,

It was too overwhelming to reconcile these horrific crimes with the people who’d packed my lunches and helped me with homework. The prosecution presented Caleb’s photos as evidence, and his documentation of that final night was crucial in establishing premeditation and intent.

When it was our turn to testify, I stood in front of the courtroom and described hearing Caleb’s voice in the dark, seeing the bloody knife, making the decision to run. I described the chase and the parking lot and the moment Dad had pointed a rifle at us.

I answered every question the prosecutor asked and didn’t look at the defense table where our kidnappers sat with their attorneys. The jury deliberated for two days before returning guilty verdicts on all counts.

Our father was sentenced to life in prison without possibility of parole. Our mother got the same.

Finding Peace as Kennedy and Julian

Standing in that courtroom listening to the judge hand down those sentences, I felt this weird mix of relief and sadness. Justice had been served.,

The people who’d murdered my biological parents and kidnapped us and planned to kill us were going to prison forever. But it didn’t feel like victory; it just felt like the end of something terrible that should never have happened in the first place.

We went home to Rachel’s house and she made us dinner, and we sat around the table—this weird little makeshift family trying to figure out how to be normal. Uncle Thomas had moved to Oregon to be closer to us and came over for dinner twice a week.

We were slowly learning our original names, responding to Kennedy and Julian instead of Avery and Caleb, though some days I still forgot and answered to the wrong name. A year after our escape, Rachel helped us plan a trip to visit our biological parents’ graves.

They were buried in New Hampshire, where they’d lived before being murdered, and Rachel and Thomas had maintained the gravesite for eleven years. We stood in the cemetery, and I looked at the names carved in stone: Patricia Reed and Michael Reed.,

I tried to feel some connection to these people I’d never consciously known. “I’m sorry I don’t remember you,” I said quietly.

Rachel squeezed my shoulder. “They loved you so much. Everything they did was to protect you and keep you safe, and they died trying to do the right thing. They would be so proud of who you’ve become.”

We left flowers and took pictures and drove back to Oregon. For the first time since that night when Caleb woke me up, I felt like maybe we were going to be okay.

Not fixed, because you don’t fix this kind of trauma, but okay. Surviving, learning to live with the complicated grief of losing parents twice—once to murder and once to the truth.

Now it’s been two years since that night, and Caleb and I are different people than we were when we ran. He’s fifteen now and thriving in high school, talking about wanting to study forensic science because of his experience documenting evidence.

I’m nineteen and finishing my first year of college, studying psychology because I want to understand trauma and help other people who’ve been through impossible situations. We still have bad days where the anxiety hits and we can’t function.,

Days when we have nightmares about the parking lot and the rifle and what would have happened if Caleb hadn’t been brave enough to wake me up. But we also have good days where we laugh with Rachel and Thomas and our growing circle of friends.

We feel safe and loved and like we might actually have normal futures ahead of us. The people who took us, who we called Mom and Dad for eleven years, are locked away and can’t hurt anyone ever again.

Kennedy and Julian Reed, the children who were stolen and hidden, are finally home.