This story is about a parent’s dedication to her son even as he’s living on the streets with addiction issues. It’s super heavy and sad and deals with suicide, so if that’s not your thing, skip this one.

Every year on May fifth, Marilyn combs the industrial streets near the Iwalei methadone clinic looking for her son so she can buy him lunch. She drives slowly, examining the broken people passed out on bus stop benches, squatting next to filthy tents, rooting around in the scraggly bushes doing who knows what. She recognizes Chad’s limpy gait crossing an empty lot and parks quickly so he can’t get in her car.