**Where Do You Sleep**
Emily didn’t know why she was drawn to train stations. Maybe because trains never lingered—they left on time, whether you were ready or not. Or maybe because the noise, the movement, the strangers made it easier to breathe. No one looked too long. No one asked questions. Everything was fleeting, as if life here was only a layover. And there was something comforting in that transience. Nobody knew who you’d been before this morning. Nobody asked why your eyes were red or your hands shook.
Three times a week, after her shift at the hospital, she stopped at King’s Cross. Bought tea in a paper cup, took a pastry, and sat by the window in the waiting area. Sometimes she just sat there, the warmth of the cup the only steady thing in her day. Sometimes she scribbled in a notebook—not thoughts, just words, to prove she could still string them together. Sometimes she watched the departures board—not to leave, but to remember she could. She could walk away. She could come back. She could be someone else. Or at least herself, but not the person she’d left behind.
A year ago, her brother vanished. Walked out of their flat and never returned. No calls. No notes. No CCTV. Nothing—like he’d been plucked from existence. The police shrugged: “Happens all the time. Men walk away.” They filed the paperwork, nodded, forgot. But she knew—he hadn’t walked. He’d disappeared. Like a switched-off light. Instant. No warning. No explanation.
After that, her mother shut down. Stopped speaking, barely ate. Her father retreated, spoke through gritted teeth like the house itself had turned foreign. Only Emily remained—left with photographs, the faint smell of him in an old jumper, questions no one cared to answer. The house filled with echoes. Everything that had once been alive rang hollow.
For months, she searched. Called hospitals, morgues, volunteer groups. Plastered missing posters on bus stops. Stared into the faces of rough sleepers, half-hoping one would turn and it’d be him. Then—she stopped. Not because she gave up. Just because hope, like a fire, dies without fuel. She learned the only way forward was to keep breathing. Without purpose. Without certainty. Just breathe.
At the station, she first noticed the boy—maybe seven, drowned in an oversized hoodie. He sat against a wall, gnawing a pastry, eyes fixed on the floor. His face was pale, lips thin, dark smudges under wary eyes. A stray cat’s gaze—sharp, untrusting. The next day, he was there again. Then every time. She brought him juice, a notebook, a scarf. He never spoke. Just nodded. Sometimes stared, as if waiting for her to reveal why she bothered. Like he had an alarm inside: *Don’t let anyone near.*
Two weeks later, he sat beside her. Slowly. Uneasily. The way people do when closeness feels foreign.
“You lost someone too?” he asked, eyes forward.
Emily startled. First at the question, then at how easily he’d seen it. She sat beside him, silent for a long time. Afraid to voice what she’d carried for a year.
“My brother. You?”
“Mum. Three years ago. I was asleep. She left—that’s it.”
He said it flatly. Like stating the weather. No pity. No anger. Just fact. Then he stood and walked off. No goodbye. But not pushing her away—just how people act when they’re used to being forgotten.
After that, they sat together. Mostly quiet. Sometimes he sketched—pencil on the edge of a newspaper. Sometimes she read—silently, eyes tracing lines with soft focus. Sometimes they just watched trains leave. One after another. Steady, unhurried, like life itself moved to the rhythm of departures.
Occasionally, he asked short questions: “You a doctor?” “You always alone?”—then looked away the second she answered. Emily never pressed. Never invaded his silence. She recognized the fear in him—the kind that perches like a bird on a wire, ready to flee.
She never asked where he slept. Not because she didn’t care. Because she knew: if he wanted her to, he’d say. Maybe trust was just that—sitting beside someone, asking nothing but their presence.
One day, he didn’t come. Or the next. She searched the station, scanning crowds for the shape of his hoodie, the way he hunched his shoulders. Asked security, showed his photo on her phone. They brushed her off. “Lots of boys like that. All got stories.” As if he were a number, not a person.
A week later, she found him. In an underpass. Curled on cardboard, wrapped in the scarf she’d given him. Eyes open but glassy. Skin pale, lips cracked. He was breathing—barely. And the sound of it, ragged and shallow, tore something inside her. Because no one, not even the strongest, should breathe like that. Alone.
He spent four days in hospital. Unconscious at first, an IV in his thin arm, blankets always slipping off. Nurses said his fever held, but his heart was stubborn. Emily barely left. Read to him, though she knew he couldn’t hear. Or maybe he could, but couldn’t answer.
Then his eyes opened.
“Thought you wouldn’t come,” he whispered, voice rough from disuse.
She squeezed his hand—maybe to steady him, maybe herself.
“I’ll always come,” she said. “Even if you don’t call.”
A month later, she filed for temporary guardianship. Not lightly. She doubted, hesitated, reread documents, called friends. Watched him asleep on her sofa and wondered if she had the right to decide for them both. Then she realized—he was her chance. Not accidental, but earned. Not to fill the emptiness, but to make meaning. He didn’t replace her brother. But he was the one who looked at her expectantly now. Who said, “Morning.” Who asked, “Did you smile today?” like it mattered.
Two years on, he went to school. Lived with her. Carried a rucksack with sandwiches and spare pencils. Had a bear-patterned blanket, a chipped favourite mug, a sketchbook where he drew trains or shaded corners when deep in thought.
On its first page, he’d written: *”Don’t know where you sleep, Mum. But I know where I wake up now.”*
Emily kept that book like a letter. Read it often. And every time, she felt something real return—the kind that stays, even when everything else falls apart.
**Lesson learned:** Sometimes the people who need us most appear where we least expect. And sometimes, saving them is how we save ourselves.
