Chapter One: The Intake
The phone rang at the emergency shelter just after 3 p.m., its shrill tone slicing through the quiet hum of the office. The worker picked up, the motion familiar, almost automatic by now. On the other end, a woman’s voice, soft and unsure, broke the silence.
“Hello… do you have space for me?”
The worker straightened in her chair. “What’s your name?” she asked, pen hovering over the intake form.
“Casey.”
“And your last name?”
“Davidson.”
There was a pause — not from hesitation, but something else. A pause that didn’t ask for permission, didn’t explain anything, didn’t feel the need to. It was the kind of pause that felt like a habit.
The questions continued, a routine dance of necessity — date of birth, reason for seeking shelter, any known restrictions. Unlike many calls, Casey answered each question without resistance, without emotion. As though she was reciting a script that had been written a long time ago and rehearsed silently in the spaces between exhaustion and surrender.
The worker ran her name through the system. No red flags. Clean. She gave Casey the usual instruction: there was one bed available. If she could make it within two hours, the space would be held. Shelter policy.
“I’ll be there in half an hour,” Casey replied quickly — too quickly. No questions, no hesitation. Just that same unnerving ease, like she’d done this before.
The worker added, almost as an afterthought, “Please don’t bring more than two medium-sized suitcases. We don’t have much storage space.”
Thirty-five minutes later, Casey arrived. A single suitcase in one hand, and in the other — oddly — a few worn baby toys. Their colors faded, the plastic edges dulled with time and touch. She clutched them with a strange casualness, like someone holding onto something they no longer recognized but couldn’t quite release.
She was small, thin, with eyes that darted around but never settled. Her face, pale and stripped of expression, seemed to carry both youth and weariness. She looked too young to be this tired.
The intake began. Forms were passed across the desk. Casey signed each one without reading them, without blinking. Her hand moved mechanically, as though her body remembered what to do even when her mind was somewhere else entirely.
The worker asked, gently, “Do you have any children?”
Casey didn’t flinch. She didn’t smile either. “Yeah,” she said plainly. “Five.”
The worker’s pen stopped. “Five?” she repeated, her voice betraying a hint of disbelief.
“Yeah,” Casey confirmed. “Ten, seven, five, two… and the baby’s six months.”
There was no pride in her voice. No sorrow either. Just… emptiness.
The worker hesitated, unsure how far to go. She had learned, over time, to read silences — when to step in, when to hold back. She asked, cautiously, “Do you see them?”
Casey smiled. Not a warm smile — not a sad one either. It was more of a reflex, a twitch of the lips that didn’t reach her eyes. “Not since December.”
That was four months ago.
The worker tried to keep her tone neutral. “Why not?”
“Alcohol,” Casey said simply.
No explanation. No shame. Just a single word, delivered like a line she’d said too many times to feel it anymore.
“And… how are you coping?” the worker asked.
“Got diagnosed,” Casey replied. “Back in December.”
The word hung in the air. Diagnosed with what? She didn’t say. She didn’t have to. The worker could piece it together — bits of mental fog, addiction, isolation.
“Who’s taking care of the kids?”
Casey’s expression shifted, just slightly. “They’ve got three different dads,” she said with a laugh, the kind that came from a place far from joy. “So it’s not that hard. They’re with them.”
The worker said nothing. She didn’t want to push. Casey looked fragile — not in the way of someone who might shatter, but more like someone already broken into too many pieces to notice another crack.
Casey noticed the pause. She tilted her head, almost amused by the silence.
“I signed up for a recovery program,” she offered, like it was a casual update, not a turning point. “Drug and alcohol. It’s about three hours from here.”
That, at least, stirred something in the worker — a flicker of hope. “That’s good,” she said warmly. “That’s really good. You have five reasons to finish that program.”
Casey nodded, though her eyes remained distant. Like she was watching a version of herself from far away, someone else’s life playing out on a stage she didn’t belong to anymore.
The worker hesitated, then asked, “Do you have a sponsor?”
Casey shrugged. “Not yet.”
The worker didn’t know much about sponsors, only that those who had them often had a better shot. But she wasn’t sure if Casey believed in “shots” anymore.
Still, she smiled, steady and kind. “Maybe you’ll find one. Someone who can walk with you through it.”
Casey didn’t answer. Her silence wasn’t resistance — it was deeper than that. A kind of numbness that wrapped around her like armor, keeping the world out, keeping herself in.
The intake ended. The forms were filed. Casey was shown to her room — a small, quiet space with a single bed and a worn blanket.
And the baby toys? She set them on the shelf, carefully, without looking at them again.
To be continued…
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inspired to aspire 