Brianna Zani

I got word of Zani’s dissapearance through a facebook message. Yunique, a mutual friend, was wondering if I’d heard from her. Her roommates hadn’t heard from her since she called to disclose her plans of suicide. Her wallet, keys, and all of her belongings had been left behind. The next day, her father came to the city to organize a search effort, featuring stacks of homemade flyers, shuffled “repeat tweets” on twitter, and a “Where’s Brianna?” site on blogspot.

I’m not going to say that Zani and I were incredibly close at the time she disappeared. She was, however, one of the people I’d call from my back porch last winter when I needed a friend to talk to. This time a year ago, the two of us had been evacuated from the city, so we’d stay up at night, chainsmoking, bitching about our comparable Suburban towns and how much we missed New York. She was there whenever I needed her to be. On the train home from Harlem that Thursday, all I could think about was her lonely blonde hair in the bottom of a trashcan, and how she must’ve felt at that moment, and how no one was there to hear about it. I cried.

I found out later that Zani had been picked up by the NYPD- they found her sleeping in a Brooklyn alleyway. She was checked into a Bushwick hospital, but walked out three hours post check-in. She was seen in the Williamsburg area a few times during the days thereafter, but the search didn’t end until she decided to walk home and make herself guacamole.

I’m hoping that the ending of the story is a happy one, that Zani gets proper treatment or consideration from here on out, and that maybe soon I can re-thank her, in person, for those late-night phone calls, for giving me her fake ID on her 21st birthday, and for the Blue Moons she bought me when I had no funds for drinking.

I hope I never forget what I learned. When Zani was on the streets in Brooklyn, described as “possibly disoriented” on her Missing Person’s flyers, my relationship with homeless people and those who could pass for “possibly disoriented” changed. On Sunday, a shoeless man with dreads and bloodshot eyes was mumbling undeciferably in the middle of a subway traincar. Surely, it was late, and no one wanted to recognize how painful it must be to walk on pavement barefoot, while its raining, when you’re possibly hungry and/or disoriented. Their indifference didn’t bother me. What did, however, was how surprised the two passengers across from me seemed that I’d give him a five dollar bill. Charity is incredibly rare in New York City.

I can only hope that passers-by made Zani’s stay on the streets a little more comfortable by offering her money or food. It’s easy for New Yorkers to pay no mind to those who beg, but it’s important they remember that the homeless have (or have had) a home somewhere. That they aren't nameless.

There are people in the world who care about the barefooted man on the subway train, much like there are people in the world who care about Brianna Zani.