Safe Harbour

And for most of the night, she and Bob moved as one. He didn't need to tell her what to do. All you had to do was follow your heart. The rest was obvious. Where sleeping bags were needed, you gave them, or warm clothes. Jeff and Millie were dispensing the medicines and hygiene supplies. And when they found a camp of runaways near the loading docks far South of Market, Bob wrote the location down. He explained to Ophélie that there was another outreach program for juvenile runaways. He was going to give them the address in the morning, and they would come out and try to talk them in. Only a few were ever willing to leave the streets. Even more than the adults, they distrusted the shelters and programs. And they didn't want to be sent home. More often than not, what the young ones were fleeing from was worse than what they encountered on the streets.

“A lot of them have been out here for years. It's safer for them most of the time than where they've been. The programs try for reunification with their families, but a lot of times no one gives a damn. Their parents don't even care where they've been. They come here from all over the country, and they just wander around, living on the streets till they grow up.”

“And then what?” Ophélie asked with a look of despair. She had never seen so many people in such desperate need, with so little means for relief. They were almost, or appeared to be, a lost cause. The forgotten people, as Bob called them. And she had never seen people so grateful for the little help they got. Some of them just stood there and cried.

“I know,” Bob said once, when she got back in the van in tears. “I cry sometimes myself. The young ones really get to me… and the old ones… you can't help but know that they're not going to be alive out here for long. But this is all we can do for them. It's all they want. They don't want to come in. It may not make much sense to us, but it does to them. They're too lost, or too sick, or too broken. They can't exist anywhere but here. Since federal funds got cut back years ago, we don't have the mental hospitals anymore to house them, and even the ones who look relatively okay probably aren't. There's a lot of mental illness out here. That's all the substance abuse is, a lot of selfmedication just to survive. And who can blame them? Shit, if I were out here, I'd probably be on drugs myself. What else have they got?”

Ophélie learned more that night about the human race than she had in the whole rest of her life. It was a lesson she knew she would never forget. And when they stopped at McDonald's for hamburgers at midnight, she felt guilty eating them. She could hardly swallow the food and hot coffee, knowing that in the streets around them were people starving and cold, who would have given all they had for a cup of coffee and a burger.

“How's it going?” Jeff asked her, as Millie peeled off her gloves. It had gotten cold, and Ophélie was wearing hers as well.

“It's amazing. You really are doing God's work out here,” Ophélie said in awe of all three of them. She had never been so moved in her life. And thus far, Bob was impressed. She had a gentle, compassionate way about her, without condescending to them or being patronizing. She treated each person they encountered with humanity and respect, and she worked hard. He said as much to Jeff on the way out, and Jeff nodded. He knew what he had been doing when he asked her. Everyone had said she was great, and he wanted her for the outreach team before she got bogged down in a lot of paperwork at the Center. He had sensed almost instantly that she would be a valuable member of the outreach team, if he could get her to sign up. The risks they dealt with every night, and the long hours, were what kept most people out. And most volunteers and even staffers were too scared. Even the guys.

They headed for Potrero Hill after their break, and into Hunters Point after that. And the Mission was going to be their last stop. And as they approached it, Bob warned her to stay behind him and be careful. He told her that among the aggressive and the hostile, dirty needles were the weapon of choice. And as he said it, all she could think of was Pip. She couldn't afford to get injured or killed. It reminded her, even if only for an instant, that she was crazy to be out here. But being there was like a drug. She was already addicted to it before the night was out. What they were doing was the single greatest act of giving and caring that she could imagine. These people were putting their lives on the line every night. Unaided, unarmed, unsupported, they went out there on a mission of mercy that in turn risked their lives. And yet everything about it made sense. She was surprised that she wasn't even tired when they finally drove the vans back into the garage. She was energized, and felt totally alive, maybe more so than ever in her life.