Within days, the landlord was banging on the door demanding rent I could never pay, and I knew I could not stay there alone.
I went to the school counselor, told her everything, and within hours a social worker arrived with a clipboard and calm eyes.
She documented the empty fridge, the note, and the unpaid bills, then told me they had contacted a relative.
That was the first time I heard his name spoken like it mattered to me.
Elliot, my father’s older brother, the one they always described as cold and disconnected from real life.
When he arrived, he did not hug me or ask how I felt.
He looked around the apartment once, then looked at me and said, “Pack what you need, anything you actually use, we are leaving today.”
I grabbed a bag with clothes and school notebooks, and followed him without knowing if I was being rescued or simply moved somewhere else.
The city he lived in felt unreal compared to everything I knew.
Highways stretched endlessly, glass buildings rose into the sky, and everything moved faster than my thoughts could keep up.
His house sat in a quiet suburb with clean streets, trimmed lawns, and homes that looked untouched by the kind of chaos I came from.