not dead yet

not dead yet: news from the front

I was on TB Common a couple of weeks ago and I met a woman I hadn't seen before. It's surprising I hadn't seen her before because she'd been going there years and knew all the people that I had known. I won't give her name but I shall refer to her as J.

J. told me that she was friends with C. and D., and had lived with .. It was Denise who told me a couple of years ago that N. was pregnant and was giving up prostitution. She thought that N. would be able to give up her crack addiction but I remember having my doubts.

When I asked J. about N. she told me that N. had given up drugs and prostitution. Then she told me something that I didn't know. She said N. has got her daughter back.

I asked J. about K.. She told me that K. doesn't come to the Common any more, she goes to Brixton Hill at night. She said that K. had been in prison. I wish I had asked J. what K. had gone to prison for, if she had been imprisoned for breaching the conditions of an ASBO or something more serious.

A while ago I put my photo of K. on this blog (I have since removed it). When I first started this blog I didn't even use her name only an initial. I didn't want to identify her because it would have been unfair to her. After a while I decided it wouldn't matter because I thought she could well be dead, considering how she lived her life. So I started using her name and showed her photo. Now I know that K. is still alive I regret identifying her, not that it matters much because not many people will see this blog.

The last time that I saw K. I thought that there is little that I can do to help her. I thought there was one thing I could do for her. I don't think I ever told her this but I thought that if she kept my number then one day after she had had rehab we could meet up and I could buy her a coffee or something to eat and we could talk. I think she's had rehab a number of times but obviously it hasn't worked. One of the problems with people like her is that they don't know anyone in London who isn't a drug addict. I would have liked to have seen her when she wasn't on drugs.