People always assume that if you have a job, you have a home. They think homelessness is something that only happens to people who have given up, people who don’t work, or people struggling with severe addiction.

Back in 2011, I was the living proof that the line between having a normal life and living in your car is frighteningly thin.

I was working forty hours a week. I wore clean clothes, I smiled at customers, and I made casual small talk with my coworkers in the breakroom about television shows and weekend plans. But the second my shift ended, my stomach would drop into my shoes. Because while everyone else was driving home to a warm living room, to families or pets or even just a quiet empty apartment, I was driving to a dark, hidden parking lot behind a small local church. My rusted old sedan was my bedroom, my dining room, and my most fiercely guarded secret.

It didn’t happen all at once. Homelessness rarely does when you’re working class. It was a slow, agonizing slide. My rent was raised, my roommate moved out with zero notice, and a sudden, massive car repair completely wiped out the tiny emergency fund I had managed to scrape together. Within two months, I was facing eviction. I tried to find another place, but without a deposit or a co-signer, doors slammed in my face one after another. So, I packed whatever I could fit into my trunk, handed over my keys to the landlord, and drove away. I told myself it would only be for a week or two until my next paycheck. That week turned into a month, and that month bled into half a year.

I had a survival routine down to a science. I found a small brick church on the edge of town that had a rear parking lot shielded by a thick row of pine trees. It was quiet, unlit, and secluded. I’d arrive late, well past midnight, park exactly where the streetlights couldn’t reach, recline my seat all the way back, and pray nobody would notice the condensation forming on the windows. I learned the hard way that you have to crack a window to let your breath escape, otherwise the glass fogs up and gives away that someone is inside.