The Runaway

-Kylie Donovan ‘23

I guess it all started when I was in high school and my life finally caught up to me. I grew up in the perfect all-American family. My father was a successful self-made CEO of one of the

largest financial firms in the whole city of Seattle. Needless to say, growing up, I had everything pretty much handed to me on a silver platter. My family hosted huge dinner parties weekly, we vacationed practically every weekend, and my three siblings and I attended some of the most

prestigious private schools in the state. I cannot even recall a single time I did a homework assignment by myself growing up. My father hired the best tutors in my area to come and work with me, but they would get frustrated by my work ethic and end up sweeping the assignment from my hands and doing all the work for me. Unlike the other kids, I never had to experience the discomfort of not knowing how to do a task but still having to work through it. I always had nannies and people to help me. I think that was part of the problem… From a young age, I always idolized my father. Maybe it started the day he taught me to ride a bike. It was a crisp early April day and the buds on all of the bushes

around my house were just starting to bloom. “I am heading outside to the driveway,'' I yelled back as I dashed out the enormous

double glass doors with my dad running behind me, still dressed in his work clothes. I pulled out my brand-new red bike my dad had just bought me. Every detail was perfect. My dad made sure to order the bike

with the latest features, whistles, and the best training tires. I threw one leg

over, and my dad held out his hand so I could hold it while I threw the

rest of my body over the bike. I felt a wobbly unfamiliar sensation tingle throughout my whole body, and my feet against the pedals felt slippery and strange. I gave my dad a look of readiness, even though that was not how I felt on the inside. He smiled

back and gave a slight push to send me on my way. I panicked at first; it felt like I was being thrown into a tank of hungry sharks, but then I relaxed after I heard my dad's voice. Unlike the harsh criticism my father would usually give me for any sort of imperfection, he looked at me and said, “Chris, I’m proud of you.” Those four words were the best gift my dad ever gave me. My biggest role model telling me how proud he was of me was all I ever needed.

My father was a tall man, whose jet black hair was just starting the early stages of graying. I knew this because one day when I went to grab a towel from his bathroom, I saw a hair dye box laying out on the sink counter. I knew it was for my dad right away because my mom had platinum blonde hair that she got done every other day and would

never trust any old ordinary hair dye for her blonde locks. I laughed to myself when I saw this box because it was such a thing my dad would do. He was so focused on appearance. The thought of even having one gray strand of gray hair in a full head of black hair sent shivers down his

back. That summed up his way of life. He fell in love with his high school sweetheart, got an amazing job straight out of college, worked his way up the corporate ladder, had four beautiful kids, and decided to settle in one of the

most elaborate homes in all of

Seattle. I secretly believed he wished the same path in life for me as well.

I went to Deerfield High School, a school that had rigorous academics and a cutthroat

environment. I transferred there

my sophomore year after a fight broke out at my old school between my parents and the school due to a disagreement over my grades. I slacked a lot at my old school, never trying very hard, and always showing up late for classes. My parents moved me to Deerfield so I could start fresh, but in reality, it ended up doing more harm than good. I fell into a group of friends who were slackers like me, using marijuana to help them get through the day. I picked up on this habit pretty quickly and was soon getting high before every class. I used it as a coping skill to get through the hard days at first, but then it turned into a daily habit that I could not live without. When I smoked, the pressure from my family life went away, that's what I wanted the most in life, the pressure to be perfect lifted off of my back. And smoking pot did it for me. Although, the school caught on to it, and it was not long before I got asked to leave. This marked the beginning of my downward spiral. It was also the last straw for my parents. They were not going to save me again. They could not handle the embarrassment. Their high-class worldviews saw college as the only path leading to success. If I did not take the same route as my father to becoming a self-made millionaire, I would be seen as a failure in their

eyes. I would not live up to their high level of expectations; the bar was set too high for a kid like me. So they kicked me out of the house and left me with no other option than to live on the streets at the Being homeless in Seattle is an experience. You see lots of different kinds of people. People with nice big families, teenagers shopping with their friends, people walking around with AirPods in, and my favorite of all, people who look like they have a little money in them. Walking home from a long day of collecting money, I explained to a friend who had just recently found himself homeless, “I have been living on the streets for seven years now. I know the lay of the land, every alleyway, all of the tricks to stealing money, and how to look for the people who look like they have money.” I have developed many friendships with other people who also live on the streets that I can call my family. Together we work on the streets of Seattle to gather all of the loose coins on the ground, steal money out of people's bags, and convince people to fork over some extra cash to us by writing persuasive words and drawings on pieces of cardboard that we hold up. Money is not always guaranteed, but we can usually make around four dollars in total altogether if we work hard and all pitch in. This is the usual for me: wake up, scavenge for money and food, see my friends, think about my past, and go to bed. Except on this one day near the train station.

I was walking by the train station, one of the best places to look for money when I excitedly grabbed what I thought was a one-dollar bill. I then saw through the lens of my cracked glasses the number 50. This was twice the

amount of money that I had ever had or even seen in cash form

while living on the street. I immediately picked it up and stashed it in my pocket before anyone could see what I was doing. My whole body was riddled with excitement, but at the same time, I did not know how to react. It felt like another lifetime

ago that seeing 50 dollars was normal. Growing up, that amount of money would be nothing to get excited about. I can remember one

time in fourth grade when I was struggling in my Spanish class despite having the best tutor in Seattle. Minutes before the test, I pulled out the reference sheet my tutor had been studying with in order to review it. When the

teacher told us to put everything away, I tucked it in the sleeve of my Brooks Brothers shirt. By cheating on the test, I got a 100, which was the first time I had ever skeptical of my improved grade. However, they were elated and so proud of their son. When I walked up to my room to change, I saw that my dad had left me a 50 dollar bill

laying on the desk in my bedroom. I felt guilty because I knew I had cheated my way to get it. I did not have the heart to buy anything with the gift I had earned by cheating, but I thought it would make a good bookmark for my Spanish textbook. Now that I was

homeless, I knew that 50 dollars was worth much more

than a bookmark. I felt terrible

for the person who had just lost their money but convinced myself that it was a gift from God and I should not feel

guilty.

As I was walking back to my home base, a few ripped pieces of cardboard with a ragged yellow blanket an old lady had given me draped around the top, I thought about what I might possibly buy with my newfound fortune. Maybe a nice dinner, a fancy new watch,

some scratch cards, or even a board game! But no, I wanted a bike. Even though I knew it was a waste of money that could be spent on more practical things, the fond childhood memories of riding a bike with my dad saying he is proud of me overrode my rational thinking to the point where I could not think of using the fifty dollars in any other way except for buying a bike. I knew exactly what store to get it from. The Metal Pedal was a trendy bike store that had opened six months earlier. I had walked past it one time when I was looking for money on the streets and remembered it due to the bike tire that

hung from the door as a decoration piece. That night when I went to bed, I tucked my precious money in between myself and my ratty blanket, just in the perfect way so that if anyone tried to steal it, I would be right there to catch them in action and grab my money back. When I woke in the morning, I was relieved to see that my beautiful money was still where I left it. I grabbed it, crumpled it up into a ball that I shoved into my hole-filled pocket, and excitedly walked to go make my new purchase. When I arrived at The Metal

Pedal, a few blocks from my home base, I was surprised to see how busy it was. “Must be a popular time to buy bikes,” an old woman said to me as

walk into the shop. As I looked around the store, I heard a familiar sound: a deep, loud, yell that I recognized from my childhood. I could not clearly make out every word, but it was something along the lines of being unsatisfied with the quality of the new bike that he had just purchased. It had started to create a scene in the

store and the worker was

noticeably more upset by the minute, but the man in the Brooks Brothers suit continued

to yell on. After glancing around the store a little more, I realized that 50 dollars was not

going to be enough to buy a bike, so I looked around to see if there was a bike that I could

grab while everyone was distracted by the yelling. As I silently browsed, I caught a glimpse of the man who had been causing the scene, but he did not notice me. My father kept going on about the broken bell on the bike, I turned around and ran as fast as I -Anna Lucia Staiano ‘25