Volunteering

A Story from the Streets - Kelly and Aisha (Continued)

As the crowd cleared, she locked eyes with a young man in a wheelchair wearing no shoes, either afraid or unable to approach us.  She quickly remembered her fear, remembered that she was in the toughest housing project in a city known for tough housing projects.  But, she realized, it was her job that night to reach out.  She took a gulp and slowly walked towards him, reminding herself to breathe. 

“Would you like some juice?  My name is Kelly,” she said, offering him her hand. 

He got right down to business.  “I have a friend who needs help.  Can you help her?” 

“Yep,” she said, “just give her this card and tell her she can come to Covenant House anytime.  Is there anything we can do for you, though?”

The young man sitting alone in the wheelchair with no shoes said, “Nope.  I’m fine.”

After her shift, she told the Outreach staff to expect a visit from him.  She rode home the same route she came just eight hours earlier, but changed forever, thinking of nothing but the young man in the wheelchair and how fortunate she has been.

The next day, our Outreach team walked in to find a frightened young girl seated next to, yes, the young man in the wheelchair.  We invite them both to eat breakfast and ask how we can help.  It turns out that Aisha never knew her dad and her mom is an addict.  She’s regularly abused by the men who come to her apartment to give drugs to her mom.  She has dreams, though.  Like Kelly heading off to Princeton that week, Aisha also dreams of going to college, she tells us.  We ask her if she wants to come stay with us, and she says, “yes” before the question is finished.  We ask if she has anything at home that she wants to go pick up.  She looks down and gently shakes her head ‘No.’  Aisha hugs the young man in the wheelchair, and one of our workers takes him home.  We offer to help him too, but he refuses.  “I got done what I needed to do here,” he says.  We never see him again.  Not yet, anyway.

This was last August.  Today, Aisha and Kelly have a lot more in common than they did last summer.  Like Kelly, Aisha now joins the Outreach team on rides throughout the city…often reflecting thereafter on how fortunate she too has been.  They both think often about the young man in the wheelchair, grateful for the change he’s made in both of their lives.  And, like Kelly, Aisha will be heading to college this fall, moving into the dorms of William Paterson.