Probably. I’d experienced homelessness through all the seasons by then but beyond that I couldn’t say exactly how long it had been. The days all blurred together into one long string of pain and survival.
Sitting in the tent, holding that newspaper, I could suddenly see my whole future stretching out before me. There were people in the tent city who’d been homeless practically their whole lives. They were a part of the city streets, no different than the dust and refuse that collected in the corners of alleyways, and they were the lucky ones. They survived. There were many who lost their lives to the streets every year.
If nothing changed those were the two possible futures that awaited me. The streets became my permanent home, or something would eventually catch up with me, and my life would be cut short.
Shortly after this revelation, fate delivered me my first blessing. I was scheduled to meet Smith again for another “exchange” but this time he didn’t show up. Breathing a sigh of relief, I enjoyed a night free of pain and didn’t even dip into my stash of powder. It was the closest thing I’d ever had to a vacation, but I assumed it wouldn’t last.
However, the next night Smith still didn’t show. And the next. And the next. I never learned what happened to him. If his cruelty had finally caught up to him, or if he was just busy and had temporarily forgotten about me. Either way, I finally had a chance to be free of him.
I couldn’t risk waiting around for him to show up again. Selling what few items we had, Nadine and I gathered every penny to our name and bought one-way bus tickets to the farthest city we could afford.
Baton Rouge.
Nadine apparently had a friend there who had made it out of this life and was willing to put us up until we could get on our feet.
I knew nothing about the place, and nothing waited for me there, but it had to be better than what I was leaving behind.
My only regret was that I didn’t tell Eli I was leaving. I wanted to, but if Smith came looking for me then Eli would be in danger. He’d already done so much for me, I couldn’t repay his kindness by painting a target on his back. It was safer for both of us if he knew nothing about my plans or where I was going.
My new life in a new city was… much like my old one. Nadine’s “friend” ended up more like an enemy, someone else who was looking to take advantage and pimp us out. I hightailed it out ofthere after the first night. I had no clue what happened to Nadine after that.
Without a penny to my name, I couldn’t afford a downpayment on even the cheapest apartment, so homelessness was once again my only option. We’d had to sell the tent to afford the bus ticket, so my first week in Baton Rouge was spent sheltering under an old bridge as I got to know the city.
Luckily, it was warmer there, so at least the nights didn’t get as cold.
Another silver lining was that I could no longer afford to supply my drug habit and sobriety was forced on me by necessity.
Things got a little better over time. Using the skills I’d learned on the streets of Maryland, I managed to keep myself fed and eventually managed to find a more permanent shelter in an empty warehouse with a group of other wayward souls. A forgotten shipping container became my new home. I’d learned my lesson with that cop, Smith, and didn’t risk turning tricks for money anymore. Instead, I spent my days hitting every food bank and soup kitchen in the city and running odd errands for anyone I could in order to make some cash.
It wasn’t a thriving life, but it was enough to keep me alive and didn’t hurt too much. That was really all I could ask for. I even managed to acquire a few small luxuries, such as some clothing that I didn’t completely hate, and an old, battered copy of Peter Pan. I remembered my mother reading me this book when I was little. As a child, I’d been delighted by all the magic and the ability to fly through the skies at will.
Looking back at it with the eyes of an adult, I realized my mother probably favored the story because she liked the idea of childrenthat never grew up. I didn’t know how to feel about that, but the book was still a fond memory, and I didn’t have many of those. So, I clung to it, nonetheless, flipping through its pages by distant firelight before going to sleep each night.
When Eli took me under his wing, the first thing he taught me was how to survive, but the second thing he taught me was the need for safety. We lived dangerous lives outside the safety regulations of polite society. If we didn’t regulate ourselves, then we risked being the cause of our own destruction.
For example, Eli insisted that I should never start a fire unless I was prepared to stay awake and watch it the whole time, and that water should always be kept nearby just in case. If I did need to sleep, and it was too cold to put out the fire, then I needed to pair up with someone so we could take turns watching the flames.
Unfortunately, none of the other lost people living in that Baton Rouge factory had someone like Eli to teach them this. They weren’t as careful as the residents of the tent city we’d left behind. Most people just kept to themselves despite living under the same industrial roof, and they didn’t appreciate being told what to do.
I never found out who lost control of their fire. There were plenty of possibilities. People living in the warehouse often started fires in the metal barrels for warmth only to then fall asleep while the flames were still burning. It was easy to imagine one of these makeshift fire pits accidentally getting knocked over when no one was paying attention and by the time anyone noticed the fire it would be too large to put out. Even if they did notice it quickly, without water on standby they may not have been able to do anything about it anyway.
I was only alerted to the fire when I awoke to find my storage container filled with smoke. Stumbling to my feet, I’d tried to flee, but I didn’t get more than a few steps before I was overcome. My lungs were already filled with smoke and ash, and the heat made my head spin. I fell to the floor still inside the door of the storage container, barely conscious as the whole warehouse went up in flames.
That storage container was probably the only reason I lived. It protected me when the building collapsed and kept me from being crushed under the falling beams and concrete, but it couldn’t protect me from the heat.
A small part of me was still conscious when the rescue workers pulled me from the debris. I was as limp as a broken toy and I couldn’t move a muscle, but I still felt the agony in my burned flesh as I was manhandled from one person to another and finally dumped on a stretcher.
Like a movie viewed only through the flash of a camera, I caught brief snatches of what was going on around me.
Someone placed a mask over my face. Then everything went dark.
Later, another person was inspecting my wounds. Then everything went dark again.
Much later and in a different location, even more people cut into me, scraping away burnt flesh to in a search for the healthy living tissue underneath.
As the doctor’s removed the pieces of me too damaged to be saved, I wondered what they saw beneath my skin.
Did I look the same as everyone else?