Going Too Far?

One of my short-short stories describes a moment of cruelty towards a child, and how a bystander deals with it.  I feel troubled by the story...almost feel like I should get rid of it.

I wanted to describe an event where the level of cruelty is ambiguous...did the abuse really happen or not?  We've all had those experiences, in a park, at a rest stop, in some other public place, where a parent, grandparent, adult figure, is borderline-abusing a child, and we're not sure what to do.  We want to respect privacy, and we want to protect children.

When we were living in San Francisco, we lived next door to a woman who started running a "daycare center" in her one-room apartment.  Up to twelve children were being kept in a room where the useable space was about ten by fourteen feet; there was also a patio where the "play area" was just miniscule--about the same size as the room.  And we lived on a steep San Francisco hill--there were no parks within a safe walking distance.

We called child protective services for San Francisco, and they cited this woman, basically shutting her down.  It's amazing that parents--most of them pretty wealthy, as this woman was also a part-time teacher at an elite private school--would willingly allow their children to be kept at such a place for up to eight hours.  Working parents are backed into corners sometimes, I realize; but this daycare just defied common sense and common decency.

In my short-short story, the woman witnessing the event acts immediately; but the result of her actions is unclear, and the image of the child being abused haunts her for the rest of her life.  I also wanted to indicate, in this story, how quickly we can be scarred by random events.

There is no happy outcome in the story, or any resolution, period; and that's true for many of the stories.  I don't think there's anything wrong with a lack of resolution...but it's more unsettling than usual in this case because of the subject matter.

But what can I do?  If I didn't write the occasional story that made me uncomfortable, I'm probably not doing it right.