“Justin, I’m very disappointed in you.” Dominique spoke to her son for the first time since they’d gotten in the car five minutes ago and begun driving back to the Valley. She glanced over at him and then back on the road. “What were you thinking?”

Silence.

“Justin, I’m talking to you!”

Justin shrugged. “I don’t know.”

“That’s because you weren’t thinking!” Dominique sighed, still unsure of exactly how she was going to deal with the situation. When she’d arrived at Faith’s house, they’d had a little powwow—her, Faith, and the boys. Aaron had reiterated his position before leaving to play golf. Justin’s answers had been similar then: head nods, shrugs, and monosyllabic grunts. Michael admitted that it had been his idea to look at the pictures—something Faith learned he’d done with other friends on a number of occasions. “Everyone does it,” he’d insisted.

“Everyone but Justin,” Dominique had replied.

“And you,” Faith quickly added, glaring at Michael.

Dominique had left shortly afterwards with a head-hanging Justin in tow. He’d barely looked at her at all since she’d stepped in Faith’s house and even now kept his eyes fixed out the window.

“Son,” she continued in a softer voice, remembering Jake’s words and deciding to take a snippet from his point of view, “I know you’re growing up. It’s natural to be curious about girls and... that sort of thing. But you need to go about it in the right way and looking at Internet porn sites is definitely not it. Sex is about more than body parts. It’s about love and respect and a woman’s value. Do you understand what I’m saying to you?”

“Kinda,” Justin replied after a pause. “But I don’t understand why looking at pictures of naked girls is so bad.”

Oh, brother. This is going to be harder than I thought. “Because looking leads to thoughts that you are not yet equipped to deal with, skews your view of women and your idea of what is and isn’t beautiful. And worse, it can lead you to trying to take advantage of some little girl, maybe even getting her pregnant.”

This got Justin’s attention. He turned to her with widened eyes.

“That’s right,” Dominique continued, recognizing an opportunity to instill fear when she saw one. “Are you ready to be a father? Not be able to play football because you have to work as hard as you see me work to support you, to take care of your own child?”

“No,” Justin whispered, his brow furrowed in thought.

“Well, that’s what looking at those types of pictures leads to... fatherhood.” Dominique knew this statement was a stretch but she hoped it was an effective deterrent as well.

After a long pause, Justin asked, “When do I get back my video games?”