A friend of my 18 year old son was stabbed to death, whilst at a mutual friend's house party, during this summer just gone. He'd stepped outside for a smoke, looked at the wrong car driving by, the lads in it (all between 16 and 19 years old) took offence and followed him into the house - where a 16 and 17 year old stabbed him to death in the hallway, in front of a load of terrified party-goers. He died before Paramedics could get to him, although his murderers were caught within 12 to 24 hours. The victim wasn't into drugs, didn't drink much, didn't carry a weapon... and died because he'd looked at the wrong car, probably thinking it was a nice set of wheels, or something like that. His family are devastated, as are the friendship group (known one another since either nursery or primary school, and they're a close knit group, to be fair). The police have said that it was a racially motivated attack, as friend was black and his killers were white. It may well have been. No one at the party knew this group of lads who'd followed friend into the house, but a neighbour had heard the screaming and taken down the car's registration plate number/a description of it, and the police were apparently able to stop them in the next town over.
My son was supposed to have been at the party. He cried off at the last minute, because he didn't feel well - but woke me up in the early hours when he started to get texts from traumatised friends telling him what had happened. Bad news travels fast, unfortunately. My son and his friend were just 17 years old at the time, and perhaps not as close as they once had been (ie, after school, they went to different colleges), but it was the first time in years that I have held my child as he sobbed like a baby at his friend's murder. It took me a while to actually understand what was wrong, as he woke me out of a deep sleep, literally wrapped around my duvet clad form, sobbing his heart out to the point where he was snotty and incoherent. I thought something had happened to his older sister, or to him, or my elderly parents to start off with he was crying so much. When he'd calmed down enough to tell me that his friend was dead, that he'd been murdered at that party, I felt relieved that my son hadn't been there. Grateful, even, that he'd felt unwell. And then crashing guilt, because friend's own mother - a lovely woman who I knew enough to exchange "hellos" with in passing, who helped out at Sports Day in primary school and who listened to the boys' class read every other week (my son was very fond of her) - would never get to hold her youngest child, alive, ever again. Never get to nag him to pick up wet towels off the bathroom floor, or tell him off for putting an empty milk carton back in the fridge... I still feel that guilt, to some extent, alongside the relief that my son (whose mouth and bravado gets him into a few scrapes) wasn't there. Wasn't the one who'd been outside, looked at that car, inadvertently caused offence to those lads inside of it. My son is, to a lesser extent than those friends who witnessed the murder happening/its aftermath, still traumatised. He, and they, all clung to home for weeks afterwards.
It took a long while for me to be happy with him going out with his mates - every parental instinct screams at us to protect them, even when it's from random tragedies like a young person being stabbed to death at/walking home from a party, even when they're grown adults who can technically take care of themselves... we worry. But rationally, we can't keep them safe from the horrors of the world, without ruining their confidence/lives. These days, that just isn't possible. Too much violence, random attacks, knives and guns polluting our streets, never mind the drug culture that's rife... All we can do is hope to anything we hold holy in this world, for them to be safe. To come back home to us, full of tales of their teenage bravado (within reason) and ready for their next adventure(s). All we can do is be grateful that they do get to swagger through the door at 1 or 2 in the morning, making too much noise, possibly inhaling the contents of the 'fridge, drinking the last of the milk, leaving debris in their wakes... Because we're the lucky ones whose children do come home to us.