Every time I have tried to think of a clever hook to draw someone into reading this, I cannot produce anything besides this: I miss Ally.

Ally was not just a coworker. She was someone who made a lasting impact, someone I will never forget. She taught me about herself and, in turn, about myself. Everything she went through — drug addiction or homelessness — she shared with me, and offered advice and a shoulder to lean on, even when she was going through her own hardships. Ally helped me think about the people with whom I surround myself and how I need to have my own back over others.

For a long time, she was the older sister I wanted to protect, and she did the same for me.

I remember how excited she was for me when I returned to school after taking time off. She even helped me make a documentary about her life, something she was not entirely comfortable with, but she believed in me and still helped me do it. Ally also helped me understand that sometimes life just deals you a tough hand, and you have to keep going.

One day, she took me to a place she stayed under a bridge in downtown New Haven. She showed me how she would take showers from the rainwater that fell from the highway.

People who are homeless can no longer stay under that bridge. New apartment buildings went up nearby and residents complained.

People who are homeless have to keep moving to remain invisible to the public. Yale is opening a SweetGreen, a chain popular in New York for overpriced healthy food, right after opening a thrift store called 2nd STREET. It is clear segregation has gone on in New Haven for decades, but will it actually ever stop?

Similarly, West Haven had a tent city before it was raided, where people slept in tents and lived as a community. She told me what places to avoid due to prostitution and drugs.

When I left the job we worked together, I lost her. I have not seen Ally in almost two years. A former coworker told me she had stopped going to work and that he saw her on the New Haven green and anyone who is not tone deaf knows what that means.

I remember driving by a couple months ago and stopping at a stoplight right off the highway. There stood someone in a ski mask holding up a cardboard sign that I could not read. I thought to give the person money but the light changed, and as I drove away, I looked at the person’s shoes and saw this long beautiful hair.I became sick to my stomach. There is only one person I know who would be in that situation and still have the most beautiful hair ever. I hope I was wrong.

I did not drive back.

I blame myself a lot, like maybe if I had tried to keep in contact, maybe if I stopped by more often, texted her like she told me to, maybe things would be different. I like to think of Ally as the Ally from the last time I saw her, happy that she was not living in the motel I used to drop her off at and staying with her boyfriend’s mom.

I think about Ally all the time and I often think about her on my drive to work through the stark disparity between Whalley Avenue into Yaleville. On a two-minute walk from the shops at Yale people are struggling. I go to a beautiful private college where our tuition is close to $60,000 a year, and the tent city was just five minutes away.

What are we going to do? We must show up for the people who cannot show up for themselves.