"Nickie, I'm too tired to think. I just cannot think anymore. I want to go home, just go to bed." Carlos bowed his head, pulling his cap over his eyes, hoping to steal some pseudo-sleep.
"Cmon, Carlos. We need a plan. If we don't come up with a plan..." With school term starting up, Nickie realized most of their energies and attention would be drawn elsewhere. They had to have a plan, in place, working, soon. "Cmon guys. Sophie?"
Sophie was not tired; she was seldom, if ever, tired. But still, no bolt from Heaven had struck her brow with a thunderous idea. They were stuck, and they all knew it. Nickie was just more stubborn than the rest of them.
"I'm sorry," she shrugged.
Nickie visibly sagged. She pulled her petite frame farther in her voluminous pullover, hoping to find knitted shelter and comfort. She seemed close to tears. None of them were feeling particularly good about what was going to happen.
"We have no choice," Debbie finally said, surrendering to the inevitable. "They are just going to have to take their chances with City Services. We did our best."
"That's not good enough!" Nickie rallied once more to the battle cry. "You know what that means. City Services didn't do shit for them before. In a week, they will be back where they were, out on the street, kicked around by cops, chased out of the homeless camps by the other homeless - or dead. For Christ's sake, Debbie. We are talking about fucking kids!"
No one said anything. There seemed to be nothing to say.
Nickie sighed. "Alright, let's go over the drill. We raise at least two thousand by this weekend. We have the charity auction. We got a hundred bucks donation from Aldo Pesto. Carlos, there is more of that money out there, I know it. We'll work the streets. You canvas University and I'll work California this weekend. Don't take no for an answer. Sophie, can you help run the auction?"
Sophie shook her head. "No, sorry. I can't put my parents off again. They need me at the restaurant."
Nickie snapped her fingers. She pointed at Sophie. "Sophie! Do you think your parents..." She stopped. Sophie was shaking her head.
"My parents have already put my two sisters through college, are putting me through Stanford, and my brother Kevin is going to Berkeley next year. They are not rich. All their money is going to our educations."
"What about a small donation?" Carlos asked. "Anything would help."
Again, Sophie shook her head. "Whatever is left over, they give to the Church. And believe me, people like my parents, people like the ones at my parents' church, if I they knew what the money was for, they wouldn't help anyway. People like my parents figure that people at the shelter did something to deserve what they got."
"Cmon guys!" Beth railed. "This is defeatest. Look, we do the auction, Nickie and Carlos do their thing. I'm going up to the City to pawn some jewelry and stuff. I think we can come up with two grand, somehow.
"Yeah, but that only buys us a month," Carlos pointed out. "We need a permanent solution."
Nickie spoke. "Well, unless you got fifteen grand in your back pocket you have been holding out on us, that isn't going to happen." Nickie got up. The meeting was over. "Let's get some sleep. We have a busy weekend to get ready for. Sophie, you maybe help out Carlos by calling on the phone and we'll see where we are at when you get back."
Sophie got up and gave her friend a hug."Sorry, Nickie."
"That's O.K, babe. I know you got the family thing to deal with." Nickie patted Sophie on the back.
On the way out, Sophie grabbed a sleepy Carlos and gave him a hug.
"Hey, babe. I'm going to bail on the phone gig tomorrow. Beth gave me an idea. I' ve got some stuff. Maybe I can pawn something and come up with some money."
Carlos nodded and hugged her back. "K - good luck then."
Sophie waved good-bye. She would do what she could, but it wouldn't be enough. All of them knew it. Debbie was right. The shelter would have to close. The kids and famillies, they would have to take their chances with City Services. And that was a death sentance for some of them. No one wanted a bunch of H.I.V. positive kids in their neighborhood. It was a modern leper colony. They would have to take consolation that for the year and half they had kept it going, having a shelter in the closed factory had at least been a reprieve for those people. For a year and a half, they were not hunted, they were not beaten up, they were not robbed, they did not go hungry, and people treated them like human beings.
On the way to her car, Sophie spotted a license plate on a jaguar. It had had one of those frames that people bought, with stupid catch slogans. This one said Angels Are Watching Over Me. Sophie shook her head. Maybe if those kids could afford jags, they wouldn't need angels. And she doubted they had any anyway.
story by Solanio