A girl broke into my house and backpacked around my house for 3 days before I caught her

This happened to me in 2008 when I was 15. I was an only child and my parents got a divorce the year prior. My dad got a condo and my mom got a very nice 4 bedroom house that was new. She let me choose which parent I wanted to live with and I decided to stay with my mom. I have a feeling she gave me a choice so I wouldn’t feel bad about the divorce. Our house had a sliding glass door and large window facing the street. We lived in a gated neighborhood and often left the front door unlocked. My mom was a flight attendant so she was out of town often. I was an unsupervised child and often had a house full of people over drinking and doing drugs. <br><br>The morning it happened I was hung over and laying in bed. I remember hearing a noise and thinking it was just my friends that stayed over. I got out of bed to go to the kitchen and grab something to eat. As I was walking down the hallway I saw a girl that I didn’t recognize. She was walking towards me with my moms vintage Chanel backpack. I froze in shock and couldn’t say or do anything. She walked past me down the hallway and into my mom's room. I walked into the kitchen to grab a knife. When I walked back into the hallway I didn’t see her. I thought maybe it was a hallucination but then I smelled her. She smelled like BO, mold, and dirty laundry. I ran to my room, grabbed my phone and called my dad to come over. While I was waiting for my dad, I searched every room in the house and couldn’t find her. When he got there, we both searched the entire house and still couldn’t find her. I had a feeling she was still in the house. <br><br>I went to the hallway and yelled at the top of my lungs “GET OUT OF MY HOUSE NOW!” My dad thought I was crazy but then we heard her voice say “ok”. She had climbed into the attic through my closets. My dad told her to come down. She slowly climbed down with my moms backpack and a pillow and blanket. My dad asked her who she was and how she got in the house. She said she had been walking down our street and saw our house and the open window. She said she broke in to get something to eat. I asked her how long she had been in the house and she said 3 days. That morning she had packed my moms backpack to leave with it and that’s when I saw her. My dad asked her why she didn’t just leave. She said she was scared to leave because my friends that stayed over were mean to her. One of my friends had a gun and she was scared they would shoot her. My dad asked where my friends were and she said they were in the attic. He asked her to get them. She climbed back in the attic and yelled for them to come down. My 2 friends climbed down and my dad asked them what they were doing. They said they were hiding because they didn’t want to get in trouble. My dad said they were thieves and to get out of the house. <br><br>The girl that broke in didn’t want to leave. My dad said he was going to call the police and she started to cry. She said her sister was locked up and she didn’t want to be locked up too. He felt bad for her and told her to leave the house and never come back or he would call the police. She left with just the clothes on her back. My dad lectured me on how I didn’t deserve the nice house my mom provided for me. He said I needed to be more responsible and take care of my things. I agreed with him and promised him it wouldn’t happen again. <br><br>My mom got back in town a few days later and I told her what happened. She didn’t believe me because no one had ever broken into the house. I told her to ask my dad and he confirmed that it happened. She didn’t believe us until she found out that 2 of her jackets were missing. She yelled at me for not calling the police. I told her my dad said to let her go. She was mad at him for letting her go. I never saw the girl again but I often think about what could have happened that morning.