People Who Shouldn't Reproduce

This morning, or afternoon... about Noon, anyway, a Sheriff's deputy knocked on our door.  He looked confused and very hopeful, and he asked me if anybody at our house by any chance maybe had a couple boys... maybe 4 and 5 years old?  I told him unfortunately not, and his face just fell, and he explained that a couple boys had knocked on our across-the-street neighbor's front door.  They thought their grandparents lived at our house (not sure why they didn't knock on our door?), and he asked if I would take a look and see if I recognized them?  I explained that I had just moved in but that I would ask my roomate, who has been here for about a year.  I fetched Amber and, since I had semi-obliged her to get involved, plus I'm nosy, I went out with her.

We met a couple of happy, unconcerned, lost little shirt- and shoe-less boys, with bug bites or scabies or something all over their backs. Amber didn't recognize them, as I had suspected she wouldn't.  We all asked them some questions... their story was that their mom had sent them out of the house while she tried to get a younger brother to sleep or something.  They claimed not to know where they lived, how they had gotten here, their mother's name, what school they went to, their teacher's name... Any question that involved a number got a silent response wherein the older one would hold up both hands with all his fingers splayed out.  The neighbor said she had gotten a "5" earlier, but with the same hand gesture, when she asked the older one his age.

They did know their own names, which I won't include.  The (incredibly nice) deputy told me at one point that he was doing everything he could not to get CPS involved.  Somehow, somebody got a description of two cars they said their parents had, so the three of us (neighbor, Amber, and I) kept an eye on the kids while the deputy drove around the neighborhood, looking for the cars the boys had described.  He eventually came back, having been unsuccessful, and asked us if we knew what reverse 911 was... he had put in a request to call all the houses in our neighborhood and ask if anybody was missing a couple boys.  At that point, we decided to leave the kids with  him and go back in the house.  As we did, we saw the boys, each holding one of the deputy's hands, take off down the street.  I guess he was going to try to retrace their steps. I wish I had gotten a picture of that, it was cute.

 Later on, Amber told me that the deputy had given up and called CPS... apparently they knew the boys pretty well already.  From what she heard, mom is going to jail and the kids are going to be taken into custody.

So, that was a thing that happened today in Baywood.