A Mess, brought to you by Capitalism

While Liam was born in East Vancouver, his parents were recent immigrants to the country, who had come to raise their family in Canada. Neither immigration nor Vancouver was cheap in any respect, however, and his family settled on the east side. Liam spent his entire childhood dirt poor, struggling through ESL and trying to fit in with the other kids in a tiny, underfunded, innercity school. His father was often back in China for work, leaving his mother to watch after and care for him and his older sister, who was eight years older than him and acted as the third parent in the household. Culture wasn't really the issue - most of the kids in his neighbourhood had stories and origins similar to his - he just... lacked the social skills to get along with everyone else. He didn't have many friends, and the ones he did have were usually situational. He spent most of his free time wandering the streets - sneaking onto the skytrain, free-riding the bus, getting dragged home by cops when it was too late at night. Even when his parents would take him on family trips, or back home to China to visit family for months during the summer, he was never quite comfortable anywhere as much as he was in the streets of his neighbourhood.

When his stockings came in, at 18, it was quite the scandal within his family - Vancouver?! All over your legs!! Are you serious?! It drove a deep enough wedge that he found himself moving out early, just to get away from it, and in the vain pursuit of independence. He moved into a tiny apartment near a university with a few highschool friends. By the second semester, he'd already dropped out - this wasn't going to happen. He hated every minute of it. His parents were disappointed, but still supported him, offering to let him move back in. Besides - college was expensive. He refused, however, not wanting to admit defeat just yet. Able to work fulltime, he started faring slightly better money-wise, paying off his two semesters within a year of working.

As time went on, however, he grew more estranged from his roommates - the apartment was too tiny, he was too far from the parts of Vancouver he loved, and he and his friends really had nothing in common anymore - it was time for him to move on. A few Craiglist ads and he finally found a new apartment that was vaguely bigger, and moved in with--

"Uh. Shouldn't you be with your parents?" Liam asked, looking quizzically at the sixteen year old kid standing beside him.

The kid didn't reply, just stared at him with a mixture of determination and desperation. He assured Liam that he could work - if he just gave him a chance! Liam finally agreed (if he keeps an eye on the kid, at least he knows the kid is alright, right? Some weird people in this city-), and the two settled down on the east side. A good few months later, a third joined - Liam's least favourite roommate, as it made way more noise with it's soundcloud career - but at least it actually knew how to cook. The three of them settled into a rhythym, and things slowly became tolerable.

Being in a better home situation was great - and work wasn't that terrible, in all honesty. Cleaning the lobby of the nearby fast food chain during nightshifts was pretty zen, as it turned out - some nights you had idiot drunks who left disgusting shit everywhere, but usually - it was just him and the lobby, and his cleaning implements. After 4am, the elderly regulars would come in every morning, ordering coffee and chatting amongst themselves in the seats, which he had, by that point, cleaned. One elderly woman in particlar, Rose, would talk to him every morning. While it was basic customer service platitudes at first - Rose eventually grew on him. She was so kind, and reminded him of his grandma back in China. Every morning he would look forward to her coming in and chatting with him, sharing whatever banal events were occurring in their boring, regimented lives.

One morning, she didn't come in, though.

It took a while, a few days, and desperate asking around to find out what had happened - she'd had a stroke in her home, and since she lived alone, no one was able to help her. She passed away. Her family was now sorting out her estate. Liam couldn't comprehend why this was -- so devastating -- they were just acquaintances, right? But every morning, he would stare at the table where she always sat, feeling an indescribable amount of pain.

He quit the job via a I'm not coming in phonecall.

Liam's roommates supported him through a few unemployed weeks - pestering him until he finally got money from his parents to visit a therapist. Equipped with a new diagnosis of depression, some medication, and biweekly therapy appointments, he was finally feeling ready to start working again. That was a lot of new costs, however - time for two jobs. And one of them was at a Cat Cafe - give him a fucking break!