Tasha’s Overdose and Eric’s Murder

“Tasha overdosed “, were the first words out of Ramone’s mouth when I answered the phone.

Ramone is one of our most fervent volunteers, who checks in regularly with one of the homeless camps near his house. He often brings me up to date on the latest. I could have gone all day without hearing this.

Tasha is 19 and frustrating to no end. She has been on her own for the last three years after running away from an abusive home. She quickly discovered street smarts she did not know she had, enabling her to morph from popular 10th grader to crafty street urchin.

It does not hurt her cause a bit that most men think she is beautiful.

Unfortunately, along with not finishing high school, she also picked up a drug habit with no means to pay for it. So, she swaps sex for drugs.

Her drug of choice is heroin, but occasionally, like she did this time, she speedballs, mixing crack and heroin. And like most users, she can look you right in the face and tell you whatever you want to hear.

Like when I went and visited her in the hospital. She hugs me and, with a tear in her eye, tells me she almost died.
“I don’t want this life anymore,” she says.

I want to believe her. But I don’t.

I want to believe her because, with her poor judgment and track record, she is a sure candidate for HIV or Hepatitis C. Or ending up with a bad trick. I really wish she wanted to quit. But she doesn’t.

Honoring people’s choices is hard. Loving people when they choose poorly is even harder.

Four days later, she leaves the hospital against medical advice because she is healed, she tells me on the phone the next day. She thanks me for the shampoo and snacks I brought her in the hospital, and asks me to pray for her.

She refuses to go to NA meetings. She says they are for losers who want to whine rather than take control. Instead, she tells me she has quit on her own. Willpower, she says.

I want to believe her. But I don’t.

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A lot of you have heard about Eric’s murder in Moore Square a few weeks ago. For those who haven’t, the short version is that we were serving biscuits when another man walked up to Eric and stabbed him. Eric died and the police arrested the other guy. I wrote a blog post about it here, and NBC17 interviewed meabout our response.

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