My mind keeps wandering back to the family at the center of Thursday’s horrible hostage situation on Fort Hill Drive.

I’ll bet you’ve been thinking a lot about them, too.

Thank God they are safe.

I can’t imagine what they went through, can’t imagine the depth of courage and calm under pressure it took to come out alive.

I can’t imagine how their lives are changed, perhaps forever. And their young son, what is he thinking? How can this community help them?

I don’t know them, have heard very little about them, only that they moved to Vicksburg from the Midwest only about a year ago.

I know from police reports they are a young family: he is 30, she about 24, their son only 5.

A law enforcement friend explained what this family is likely going through now, based only on his experience with others who have been in similar situations. He said after being terrified for their lives and their son’s life, when it was over and they were free and their assailant incapacitated, they were likely experiencing feelings of elation and joy.

Then, he said, the fact that they took another’s life likely set in.

Regardless of Rafael McCloud’s past crimes or mental instability or sheer evil, he was a human being. We are left to wonder what in his life made him capable of such horrific violence. What, if anything, can we do to prevent it in others?

It seem pretty obvious McCloud had help from one or more people in order to stay hidden from law enforcement during what was a truly massive, 24-hour, week-long search effort. The work of Warren County Sheriff’s deputies, Vicksburg police officers, U.S. Marshals and officers from other agencies to capture McCloud was nothing short of heroic.

In my mind, anyone who helped Rafael elude law enforcement is just as responsible for this family’s terror as McCloud. They are also responsible for McCloud’s death.

I truly hope police are able to find those who helped him avoid justice and hold them accountable. They deserve to be punished for their crimes.

This family needs time to decompress. They need time to heal, of course. But I find myself wanting them to know their community cares about them.

While we don’t know what will become of the $10,000 reward money from Crime Stoppers the city and the county, the GoFundMe account honoring the victim McCloud was accused of murdering — Sharen Wilson — has been opened back up for contributions and that money will go to this family who were the last McCloud would ever terrify.

The site — gofundme.com/justiceforsharen — had raised a little more than $18,000 of its $20,000 goal by late Friday afternoon.

Contributing to this family seems the least we can do to show them we care.

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Jan Griffey is editor of The Vicksburg Post. You may reach her at jan.griffey@vicksburgpost.com. Readers are invited to submit their opinions for publication.