Lies

When it comes to telling lies, the days of innocent oblivion are gone with my lot. I first discovered this just before Christmas last year. 

Innocent oblivion

It was round about the time all the chocolates in the advent calendars began to mysteriously disappear. Their wide-eyed innocence was so believable I actually pulled the calendars to bits thinking the chocolates had merely slipped down the back. When it became apparent they had truly gone AWOL I simply couldn’t believe that a child of mine could pull off a lie with such apparent ease.

Butter wouldn't melt

Although I guess it shouldn’t have come as a shock: growing up with my mum, whose true calling, I believed, should have been as a detective, you had to be pretty sneaky to get away with anything. As a result, I thought I’d become a fairly deft detective myself until I couldn’t, for the life of me, figure out which one was lying.

Then one day after lining them all up against the wall in the midst of yet another grilling, I had a brainwave.

“Right,” I said beyond frustrated. “If you won’t tell me the truth, I’ll phone the police and they will find out who the liar is.”

And as I marched to the phone their combined muteness suddenly burst to life behind me.

“No mummy!” they shrieked chasing after me and clawing desperately at my clothes in an attempt at halting further progress towards the phone.

I ignored them and, trying not to laugh, reached for the phone, which was subsequently knocked from my hand.

I turned to face them and was astonished to see all three in tears with Miss Four doubled over clutching her stomach gasping and sobbing.

It seemed my threat of phoning the police had truly put the fear of god in them and I was actually starting to feel a little sick myself from causing them such distress.

“Well then who was it?” I demanded.

“It was me mummy, but don’t tell the police,” wailed Master Four, wide-eyed with fear.

“Yeah Mummy please don’t call the police on Jai,” begged his sister (whose chocolates he had eaten) still grasping her tummy.

Although I felt awful that I’d scared them so, it was nice to see they cared for each other. I let him off with a warning that if it happened again I would be calling the police.

It only happened one more time. This time I did “call” the police. Master Four and his siblings were beside themselves but I had to “follow through” with my threat.

While we waited for the police to come I tried to calm him down and have a talk. Eventually we agreed that it would never happen again and, as I claimed to hear a siren in the distance, I hastily made another “call” to tell them it was a false alarm.

That evening I went on a girl’s night out. My friend’s babysitter was having trouble getting her five-year-old to bed. She was constantly on the phone trying to cajole her and it was ruining her night.

“Have you tried “calling the police?” I leaned across the table and whispered.

Finally she threw in the police threat while one of the others in our group began wailing like a siren. Apparently her daughter whimpered and went straight to bed. She didn’t get another call that night and visibly relaxed.

Following that, a collective light bulb went off amongst the mums at our table and I almost began to feel guilty for being the instigator if their kids reacted the same way mine had.

Anyhow, as I tell myself, the world is a better place without liars and thieves and if it’s going to stop them in their tracks, so be it.

At my house, the chocolate thief is no longer and, as far as my re-tuned detective skills can pick up, no one has lied since.