Author Reginald Reed Jr.’s mother, Selonia Reed, was brutally murdered in 1987 when he was 6 years old. Thirty-five years later, his beloved father was convicted of the heinous crime.
Though Reed’s story has been widely reported, including in a recent Newsweek feature, he’s telling his own story for the first time in his new book, The Day My Mother Never Came Home.
Part true crime, part memoir, Reed’s book charts his long path from tragedy through confusion, psychological difficulties and disillusionment to healing, finding professional success and starting a family in San Antonio.
Reed is humble when regarding his circumstances. “I’m just a regular person that just really put in the work, that had multiple challenges in life, and continues to overcome challenges and just keep pushing forward,” he said.
A nightmare, then agony
The challenges Reed has endured are nightmarish by any measure. In chapter three of the book, he recounts his reconstructed memories of Aug. 22, 1987, that fateful day in Hammond, Louisiana when his mother never made it home from a girls’ night out.
That lazy Saturday began with her cooking bacon and eggs before a family trip to the mall and a distinctly recalled chocolate chip cookie she bought for her son. While his mom was out, Reed figures he and his father played Nintendo until late before falling asleep together in the living room.
Their lives changed inexorably the next morning with a visit from police, who delivered the horrific news. The investigation that followed turned up insufficient evidence and the case went cold.
Reed moves back and forth in time throughout the book, which is sectioned into four parts. “The Before” section offers details of his lively, loving mother and his own innocence as a young boy.
“The Now” begins with a Mother’s Day call on behalf of his father in Tangipahoa Parish Jail in Louisiana and ends with a nostalgic visit to the old family home. Reed displays deep sympathy for the situation of the man he grew up with, now suffering from abuse and neglect in prison, devoted to the Bible and maintaining his innocence.
Part Three, “The Waiting,” reveals the frank but nearly incomprehensible details of his mother’s violent death in the official autopsy report and a crime scene video that leaves him wretching on the bathroom floor of the courthouse after being shown at his father’s trial.
The final section, “The Trial,” details the agony he and his father endured during the trial that would see a jury convict his father of second-degree murder after three hours and 11 minutes of deliberation, and resulted in a life sentence without parole.
Love of family
Reed readily admits that it remains difficult telling his story, but is resolute that sharing is a crucial part of the healing process.
“Still at times when I tell the story, I’m human, I get choked up, because it’s real. It’s real life. And it’s ongoing,” he said.
In the book, he reveals as much of his healing process as the details of the crime that has haunted his life.
Through self-awareness, he learned that he tends to protect himself by holding in his emotions and keeping others at a distance, which are natural limiting behaviors in people who have suffered childhood trauma. But his determination to love his family has helped him open up to the vulnerability he knows he needs to feel to overcome the challenges imprinted on him by his past.
Asked what coping mechanisms he’s employed when feeling overwhelmed, Reed spoke straightforwardly about remembering to breathe deeply, and that an informal meditation practice, sitting alone in a quiet space, has helped immeasurably.
Reed now works in the pharmaceutical industry, is raising a young son with his wife who practices as an attorney, and the couple recently welcomed a daughter into the family.
The ongoing part of the story is that it remains unresolved. A heartbreaking chapter near the end of the book titled “Dear Dad” is a letter to his imprisoned namesake, an open confrontation with some damning facts that may have sealed his father’s fate. But Reed’s tone is loving, and he states in the next chapter that he takes his father’s collect calls from prison whenever they arrive without question.
At the end of the book, Reed makes plain that the love of family is constantly renewed no matter the circumstance, reflected in the names he and his wife chose for their son and newborn daughter.
Copies of his book will be available during an author event featuring Reed at Barnes & Noble at 321 Northwest Loop 410 on Saturday at 1 p.m., and are otherwise available for order online.
