He’s Invincible.
Leo
He/Him
Leo dreams of having his own car, a job, and a little house.
Leo dreams of having his own car, a job, and a little house.
He is 19 and has been married for about a year to his 18 year old wife.
They live at her mom’s house.
As long as he makes $1000 a month, and contributes, they can stay.
Leo doesn’t have an ID and he has some legal issues to deal with, such as arrests for prostitution.
He knows what it’s like to be homeless.
So, he does what he can to avoid it.
He doesn’t talk to his family at all.
The streets were family until he met his wife.
Leo’s mom is schizophrenic and no one knows where she is.
She left when Leo was about 2 months old.
Leo has no idea who his dad is.
Leo’s older brothers have another dad who is gone, too.
When Leo was born, he went to live with his grandmother who had issues of her own.
When Leo was about 6, his brothers started giving him weed and alcohol while they watched him.
The memory of those early years is foggy.
Grandmother kicked them out eventually because they were selling drugs out of the house.
He hasn’t heard from them since.
Leo was often kicked out at night by his grandmother.
She thought that he was “nothing but trouble,” too.
He had to find ways to get by during those nights.
By the time Leo was 12, he was stealing beer and selling it to get enough money for the metro and for food.
Then, he started selling weed.
By the time he was 14, he was selling cocaine.
His grandmother kicked him out, and he moved to Boston.
Shortly after, Leo was diagnosed with schizophrenia
but he didn’t have the money for medication.
At this point, he had been living on the streets for a while.
He believes that if he could get some counseling and maybe undergo mental health treatment, he would be okay.
He really liked this one counselor who helped him go to detox a few times.
Leo thought she actually liked him as a person and not just as part of her job.
Leo met his wife on the streets because they were both using cocaine and trading sex.
He met her in the park where kids would wait around for guys to come by looking for teens to come to sex parties or go to their house.
She was there to sell sex, too. Her boyfriend had been making her do it for a year.
She was being beaten up by her boyfriend, and Leo fought him off.
They have been together ever since.
He says she saved him.
She says he saved her.
She is very sick though.
He’s worried he is going to lose her.
They hate living with her mom because she sells drugs and there are all these men coming in and out of the house.
He has violent thoughts. He’s been arrested a few times for assault and battery.
He worries the voices are getting stronger and he might hurt others.
Leo started having sex for a place to stay, drugs, or money.
He says it pays better than selling drugs, but it’s just as dangerous.
He can make $40 to $300 each time and often have food and a place to stay.
The first time Leo had sex with a man for a place to stay, he hated it.
He felt degraded, scared, and didn’t know what to do.
During the day, he would go to a drop-in center for food and a place to stay.
He doesn’t want to do the sex parties anymore or get into dudes’ cars.
He just wants to be safe and be a good husband to his wife.
He does need the money, though.
And the drugs made everything easier to cope with.
Deep inside, he still hates it each time.
Leo dreams of being a better man than his father.
He wants to have a child and take him to the beach.
He has never been to the beach, but he has seen pictures.
It looks like the perfect place to take his family on vacation.
He wants to be the kind of guy who takes his wife on family vacations.
For now, he just lives day by day, meal to meal.