For any Hopkinton resident who remembers the news a decade ago, the image of Lillian Entwistle will remain forever as a murdered infant - shot in cold blood by her father and clutched in her murdered mother’s arms, the Milford Daily News reported. If the tragedy had not occurred and the Entwistles had remained in Hopkinton, Lillian today would be 10 years old. She might be among the 539 students at the Hopkins School, studying punctuation and long division and getting ready for the MCAS tests on March 31.She might be taking her first lessons on the clarinet or saxophone in the Hopkins beginning band; Rachel and Neil, if they stayed together, would be among the proud multitudes who crowd the high school athletic center each year for the elementary school concert.On the school bus home Lillian might be popping in her ear buds to listen to Pentatonix or One Direction. When she is not doing homework she might be learning to paint at the Hopkinton Center for the Arts or learning ballet, tap or jazz at HCA or at one of several local dance studios. She might have been among the earnest, fresh-faced Girl Scouts selling cookies downtown last month.And Lillian would be an age that is precious to all of us who’ve parented girls: old enough to assert her independence and young enough to be herself, not yet pressured by peers and boys. Nearing adolescence yet still far enough from its shoals.Some local mothers spoke of this preciousness in their own daughters.“She is really into Star Wars,” says one Hopkinton mother of a 10-year-old, “but she still loves to hug her teddy bear.”“She is already mature enough to appreciate the love and the care she receives from her family and environment, but not old enough to think she's smarter then everybody else,” says another mom, who added that her daughter still clings to her favorite blanket.At age 10, Lillian would be a few years away from the most challenging periods for young people in Hopkinton. Youth risk behavior surveys here and elsewhere show that middle school is when many children try alcohol for the first time. Those same surveys show that students at Hopkinton High School feel stressed out by demands placed on them by parents, schoolwork and their own drive to achieve. But most of Hopkinton’s teens survive these pressures, then move on to college and the rest of their lives.Lillian never had the chance to experience the joys of being a child, the pressures of being an adolescent, the hard work of growing up.Equally sadly, she was robbed of the chance to live in a community that rallies for families in trouble like the Entwistles. Hopkinton protects its own, whether they are small children, families reeling from illnesses or layoffs, or elderly people in need of companionship. We do so privately and sensitively, ever mindful of the pride that makes hard times even more painful and embarrassing for the formerly well-off. Despite Neil’s financial disasters, Rachel and Lillian would have found allies.Project Just Because, the Hopkinton-based charity, runs a food bank that quietly helps hundreds of local families, many of them struggling to hang onto their homes. The Hopkinton Police Department includes officers like Phil Powers, who provide both protection and hugs to traumatized families. A full-time town employee, Denise Hildreth, helps direct troubled children and families to resources that can help them. A post on the “Real Hopkinton Housewives” Facebook page about someone in need unleashes a string of offers from local women willing to help a stranger.Had the Entwistles lived in town longer than 10 days, they might have made connections and tapped into this caring network. But they did not stay long enough.We could not save Lillian. But in Hopkinton and elsewhere, other Lillians are living among us, perhaps at risk not of being murdered but of being damaged by a family’s bad luck or bad choices. No matter where we live, our role as individuals and a concerned community is to continue to be alert for these young souls and their troubled families, direct them to people who can help, and let them know we care.