quote:

My daughter Lucy’s friend — let’s call her Maleficent — gleefully told her this story: She and some other kids spent an afternoon hurling snowballs at passing cars. One driver was so surprised by the attack that his car jumped the curb and hit a tree. After the accident, instead of checking to make sure the driver was OK, Maleficent (then 10) and her pack ran away. “It was so funny!” she told Lucy.

Now, Maleficent might have been lying. She’d been known to exaggerate to get attention. But I felt horror at the possibility that her story was even a little bit true. Lucy, for her part, didn’t quite know how to respond. Was the snowball ambush cool — or criminal? I imagined a scenario in which Maleficent seduced Lucy into joining in. “Come on,” she’d say, handing Lucy a snowball. “It’s fun!” Shudder.