Ryan

Today I met Ryan, he is 18 years old and has been homeless for a few months because his mom passed away, and he has autism and no one to look after him. 

I walked up to him and before I could say anything he asked if I had a spare Oyster card as he was trying to get to West London. I told him I didn’t have one on me but that I’d have a look at home. Meanwhile I offered him some doughnuts and he asked me if he could pick a drink from the Tesco’s he was sitting in front. We walked in and I immediately saw the security guard giving me a very dirty look. Ryan picked a Gatorade and as we walked to the till asked if he could get a scratch card, “I may be lucky” he said. He picked the one in box 11 because his birthday was on the 11th of November. While walking out, I saw the security guard unloading a full can of Febreze around the store while giving me the death stare (which I found quite curious, I realised then that we choose who to segregate, I could tell from his accent that he wasn’t English and thought to myself, he too must have been subject to neglect at some point as a foreigner in a new country, we all have at some point).

I asked Ryan to wait as I ran back home. I turned a few bags inside out and found an Oyster card, so sprinted back to make sure he hadn’t left. 

I turn around the corner and see he’s still there, he threw his arms in the air with joy when he saw I found one. I had to sit down for a minute as I was completely out of breath. He kept telling me how tired he was, and how he was hoping to make it to this shelter today as he could stay 14 days. We spoke a bit more and then as I left, I remembered, him and I had met before.

In October, I was walking the same way back from Shoreditch High Street to go home, and I saw a young guy wrapped in a duvet standing in front of Pret a Manger asking people walking by for some food, with little result. I got him some food and we briefly spoke before he ran off.

Then I realised something that really upset me, his 18th birthday happened while he was alone, living in the streets with nobody to care for or wish him a birthday or just acknowledging he exists.



by Céline Mercier