Stories from the Street

Krissy

Almost 20 years later, it still haunts me
The first time I met Krissy was on clothing donation day at the shelter. We had all been called in to select some clothes. In came this 16 year old girl with spiky platinum blonde hair and a powerful presence.

“Are they ungodly or too godly?” she asked, peering down at the pile. I liked her right away.

We’d hang out on the stoop outside. She’d light a cigarette and we’d share war stories of the life we’d led before the shelter.

She told me that her mother was occasionally beaten by her father, and that her mother never left because she didn’t know where she could go, with two kids to care for. Krissy’s father controlled the money and therefore he controlled her. Krissy didn’t tell me whether her mother ever found out that her father was also molesting her and her younger sister.

Eventually, the two girls ran away, and hitch-hiked from Ottawa to Toronto. They were 13 and 14 years old. She told me how one of the men who picked them up tried to rape her sister. They got away from him. I think her sister eventually made her way back home after that, but Krissy continued.

She found shelter wherever she could, sometimes sleeping on the street, sometimes on someone’s couch.

At one point, she befriended a man who let her stay at his place. The last night she stayed, he suggested they hang out in the back alley to drink beer and drop acid. She didn’t want to risk losing her place for the night, so she obliged. After a few beers, the acid hit him and he freaked out. He pinned her down, tore off her shirt, broke a beer bottle and dragged the glass down both arms and down each side of her chest.

She was 15.

A few days after we met, she decided to go back to Ottawa. I stood with her on the street while she asked for money, gathering enough for a bus ticket home.

We lost contact after that, and I wonder about her still. Almost 20 years later, her story still haunts me.