Rain Soaked Shoes

She never thought homelessness would happen that way.

It wasn’t drugs, or laziness, or even a fight—just a letter. A knock. A warning.

She knew the FBI would come pick her up. No timeline. No answers. Just, “Don’t leave.”

In the meantime, everything froze. Her accounts. Her job, gone. 

No income. No help. No one to call. She was in legal limbo—and then, just like that, she was on the street.

Three months.

She lived like a ghost with an expiration date.

Waiting for the government to come claim her, while the world just…moved on.

Outside libraries. Laundry mats. In emergency rooms just long enough to stay warm before security kicked her out.

She applied for shelters, but the waitlists were months long and the beds filled fast.

She was given pamphlets, advice, and nothing she could actually use.

And no one really understood.

Because in their eyes, she wasn’t just homeless—she was waiting to be arrested.

What do you say when someone asks what you do for work and the truth is:

“I’m waiting for the FBI to take me back to federal prison.”

The street didn’t care about the details. It only asked one question:

Can you survive the night?

And somehow, she did.

Every day without handcuffs became a countdown. Every night on the pavement felt like a punishment that had already begun.

She begged, once. Hated herself for it. But hunger has a way of humbling even the proudest hearts.

In three months, she lost everything—except her will.

She kept her Bible wrapped in a grocery sack under her blanket. Still reminded herself, this isn’t the end.

She told herself that every night.

This is not the end.

And when they finally came, when the system finally moved again and her next chapter began, she stood up from the sidewalk—she sold her last item that was worth two nights at a motel. She attempted suicide. She failed. She called one last person that she believed would help her. She came for her and gave her a night to rest and she would take her to the US Marshal’s Office.