We Could Be Heroes - But Would We?

Someone tried to attack my family last night.


It was around 8pm, and I was having a shower just after getting back from the gym. Our home has a lower level which serves as my dad's office and has a separate entrance that opens onto the driveway, and my bathroom is very close by. My dad was working late when suddenly, I heard some commotion, and my dad was shouting and calling out to my brother, asking if Mom was outside the house or inside. I heard his heavy footsteps on the stairs and more commotion upstairs in the main house. After a few minutes I got out, dried off and headed upstairs myself to find the family all worked up. Apparently, while my dad was working there was a loud noise at the entrance to the office, and when my dad looked up he could see that someone was furiously trying to turn the handle and force the door open. He quickly put the outside light on and headed upstairs to check on everyone else.


We searched the area outside the office but it was much too dark to make out where the intruder had come from or where he had escaped to. There are several gaps in the low rear fence and we suspect that he may have sneaked in from there as the front is well lit.


This was no random incident though; we have been stuck in a drawn out court case over a large plot of land that has been going on for more than 10 years now, and the other parties in the case have very strong underworld connections. We have already seen them display their influence, with a fair share of 'missing documents' and false testimonies from bribed locals, yet we finally had a minor breakthrough yesterday with the judge issuing a ruling to the cops telling them to take the main culprit into custody for questioning. Within 12 hours of that ruling, we have 'visitors' at our door - quite a coincidence, no doubt. I have no idea what the intruder had planned on doing had that door been unlocked, but my dad says that acid throwing is quite common with the kind of people we were dealing with.


It was a rather strange and unnerving experience to say the least; and after we had finally settled down and locked our doors and gates securely, I stopped to think about what I would have done differently had I not been in the shower when this happened. Would I have tried to open the door to confront the man? Would I have grabbed a weapon and chased him? Or would I have simply stood there and done nothing, choosing instead to peer out the windows with bated breath while the rest of the family huddled together?


Every now and then, you meet guys that act like they know what they're doing, even when they don't. They have this know-it-all look on their face, and they mouth off on every topic under the sun, telling us how they would do it and how they would change things. It's all very amusing, and usually when I bump into those people I just smile and sit silently as they try to convince me how suave and slick they would be if their girlfriend caught them cheating, or if they were ever in a fight, or in a plane crash. Because I know that in reality, the boy has probably never been in a fist fight in his life, is probably afraid to fly, and instead of throwing back some clever one-liner at his angry girlfriend, is most likely going to be licking her feet like the pet chihuahua he really is.


But what would happen if one of those hypothetical situations you so meticulously described during an evening out with your friends comes to pass? Would you really try to outsmart a thief that has you at knife point? Or single-handedly chase off a group of roadside perverts that were leering at a girl? Would you really risk your life for the lives of others? Would I?


I wonder.