15-05-2021-052358It-Ends-with-Us

room, I saw his stuff in one of the corners. His backpack, plus the backpack I’d
given him. There was a little pile of other stuff I’d given him, like some of my
dad’s clothes. And then there were two towels on the floor. One I guess he laid
on and one he covered up with.
I put my hand over my mouth because I was so horrified. He’d been there
living like that for weeks!
Atlas put his hand on my back and tried to walk me back out the door. “You
shouldn’t be over here, Lily,” he said. “You could get in trouble.”
That’s when I grabbed his hand and said, “You shouldn’t be here, either.” I
started to pull him out the front door with me, but he yanked his hand back.
That’s when I said, “You can sleep on my floor tonight. I’ll keep my bedroom
door locked. You can’t sleep here, Atlas. It’s too cold and you’ll get pneumonia
and die.”
He looked like he didn’t know what to do. I’m sure the thought of being
caught in my bedroom was just as scary as getting pneumonia and dying. He
looked back at his spot in the living room and then he just nodded his head
once and said, “Okay.”
So you tell me, Ellen. Was I wrong letting him sleep in my room last night?
It doesn’t feel wrong. It felt like the right thing to do. But I sure would get in a
lot of trouble if we had been caught. He slept on the floor, so it’s not like it was
anything more than me just giving him somewhere warm to sleep.
I did learn a little more about him last night. After I snuck him in the back
door and to my room, I locked my door and made a pallet for him on the floor
next to my bed. I set the alarm for 6 a.m. and told him he’d have to get up and
leave before my parents woke up, since sometimes my mom wakes me up in the
mornings.
I crawled in my bed and scooted over to the edge of it so I could look down at
him while we talked for a little while. I asked him how long he thought he
might stay there and he said he didn’t know. That’s when I asked him how he
ended up there. My lamp was still on, and we were whispering, but he got real
quiet when I said that. He just stared up at me with his hands behind his head
for a moment. Then he said, “I don’t know my real dad. He never had
anything to do with me. It’s always just been me and my mom, but she got
remarried about five years ago to a guy who never really liked me much. We
fought a lot. When I turned eighteen a few months ago, we got in a big fight
and he kicked me out of the house.”