I did not have a bedroom

My grandmother lived with us, and we always had people living with us.

Once my mom brought home a woman she worked with, her two kids and her 80-year-old mother. The husband had been beating them.

I remember we turned my bedroom into their room. My dad got bunk beds, and the women slept in my double bed and I slept with my grandmother. We only had one bathroom, but it worked out.

I remember that night, my grandmother told them to take hot baths and she would fix some food. I will never forget my grandmother holding the older woman and telling her, it was safe now, that my dad would make it right.

They lived with us about 3 months. My dad found and fixed an old car for her. The ladies from our church and neighbors made and got them clothes, and the church found a cheap apartment close to her work. I remember missing them when they left.

We always had someone living with us. It got to be a joke that I didn’t have a bedroom. – Melissa Vaughan