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"I looked at her and tears were falling off my face," Brannon Prisk says. "I am thinking, what the hell has happened? How did I get here? How am I going to get out? How do you put the woman you love in this position?"

It is the memory of the first of more than 200 nights — through frigid and sweltering temperatures, snow, rain, relentless pests, fear and emotional depths — that Prisk and Adria Mackesey slept in a tent in urban woods on Madison's East Side.

Before that night, they'd endured struggle and tragedy, some of it brought upon themselves. Yet they'd found each other and were building a life with jobs, a car and sharing an apartment for more than a year and a half. It crashed when Prisk lost his job in December.

On that first night outside, they joined more than 2,000 homeless in Dane County who strain an under-resourced and overwhelmed support system with few openings in longer-term housing and crowded emergency shelters that have no space for couples. They spoke with the State Journal several times in the months that followed.

"I had to juggle the car payments and the rent," Prisk said at his campsite in February, the couple's cat, Weasie, nestled between them. "I ended up getting evicted. This is where I came."

'It's a very dark time for me'

With the help of Will Brewer, a street outreach worker for Porchlight Inc., Prisk and Mackesey set up in a strip of woods near other homeless campers, some with alcohol addictions and severe mental health problems.

"We didn't have a prompt solution to put them into a safe situation," Brewer said. "They luckily found a place where they could camp out. We were able to maintain them out there."

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The couple used scarce savings to buy a 10-by-20-foot tent, propane heater and cooking stove, and brought in a mattress, clothing, portable shelves, books, lanterns and other items. Prisk hung his dress clothes and ties on a portable rack opposite the mattress.

They created a small walkway to the tent flap and lined the floor with rug remnants, but water got in. To retain heat, they placed a Mylar sheet on the ceiling above their bed. They ate from paper plates. They relieved themselves outside until buying a small loo.

"You don't realize the level of comfort you have when you have a home," Prisk said. "We have made it the best possible."

For security, Prisk set a baseball bat near the tent flap, and the couple strategically placed scissors for weapons in and near the tent, which was covered by tarps. On her cellphone, Mackesey had at the ready a YouTube clip with the sound of a gun being cocked.

"It's a very dark time for me," Prisk said. "This relationship is the only thing that gives me peace. But it is also a source of panic. It's very difficult for me to have her out here."

'Things started to slide'

Madison natives, Prisk, 45, and Mackesey, 39, led disparate lives before becoming a couple in 2014.

In his youth, Prisk bounced around, was a runaway, addicted to drugs, into crime and jailed. He got married, had a baby girl, divorced and, at age 26, was sentenced to prison for stealing from a safe where he worked. After release in 2002 came more jobs, more drugs, and a conviction for aggravated battery that led to probation, which he violated by moving out of state.

In 2006, he began a four-year sentence at Green Bay Correctional Institution, his fifth incarceration. While there, his former wife died of a blood clot. Released in 2010, he has since had only a few minor court contacts.

In 2012, he had a son, who died of sudden infant death syndrome. After the baby's death, Weasie filled a void.

Mackesey had her own miseries. She was molested by a family member as a child and lived in a group home. She went to Shabazz City High School and later earned a GED. She had an abusive boyfriend and married his friend, whom she divorced. In 2000, she was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis, which affects her cognitive skills and causes other health problems. Like Prisk, she is trying to remain sober.

Then, they met as co-workers. Articulate, persuasive and experienced in sales, Prisk was a salesman and trainer at a company offering internet and television packages, where Mackesey was in sales training. After a time, they shared an apartment and thought about buying a home together.

"It was heaven," he said.

But Prisk lost his job after he lost an account and Mackesey could no longer hold hers due to her health problems. Money dried up. "Things started to slide," he said. "It ended up piling up."

'You don't know what to do'

Homelessness brought boredom, hassles and cycles of hope and despair.

Prisk would rise first and make coffee on the propane stove. They'd attend their drug treatment programs, then devise ways to get money. They'd spend time at a library or the Dane County Job Center, returning to camp in the late afternoon, often watching movies at night on an old DVD player. Weasie offered companionship.

At the camp, Mackesey took pictures of sunsets and set out cut flowers. "I tend to make the best of it," she said. "Being sober helps. There's a lot of love and a lot of laughter. But the things we're doing are humbling and shameful."

There was constant pressure to make payments on the car, which was on the brink of being repossessed. Food, phone cards, and gas for the car and stove vied for scant dollars. They used public restrooms when possible and arranged to shower three times a week at Goodman Community Center. Prisk would don a shirt and tie in the tent to prepare for job interviews, but his criminal history undermined employment.

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As a couple without dependent children, they landed at the bottom of lists for housing.

"You don't know what to do," Prisk said in early March. "I'm glad I'm not using. The old me would have committed a criminal act to get the money to survive. She has headaches, nausea, doesn't eat well. I want her out of here. When I start thinking people are jerks for not helping, then I know it's getting to me."

By summer, the landowner forced Prisk and Mackesey to relocate within the woods, footpaths by then lush with growth and their new site deep in the trees. They added amenities. In late June, a large oval mirror rested near the tent. Hammocks hung from branches. They had three tents, one for sleeping, another for clothing and a third, smaller one for storage.

But the change of seasons brought oppressive heat, swarms of mosquitoes and bugs, chipmunks and animals drawn to food. "The summertime has been much more stressful for me," Mackesey said. "That was the most surprising thing. We couldn't wait until it got warm. It turned out winter was much better."

One day, Weasie didn't return.

'We learned who our real friends are'

As summer took hold, the couple came under pressure from property owners to vacate their new campsite. Brewer tried but couldn't help them secure housing. "I'm trying to juggle fireballs out there," Brewer said of his outreach work. "It's just crisis triage."

Prisk was hired as an assistant manager at a restaurant on the Beltline, but it didn't work out. Mackesey got a temporary job house-sitting a cat, which let them clean up, wash clothes and enjoy a brief escape from the woods. But it also brought dread of returning outdoors.

In late July, Brewer helped the couple get a motel room to escape stifling heat, which had earlier spurred an emergency room trip for Mackesey.

Finally, this month, almost seven months after their first night in the tent, they moved into a two-bedroom apartment on the North Side. Mackesey's poor health and lack of a permanent home since 2011 moved her up on the community's prioritized housing list. The nonprofit Housing Initiatives, which helps the homelessness with mental illness, delivered the apartment. When they have an income, they'll pay 30 percent of it for rent.

It's left a toll — and lessons.

"There were so many nights I was out here crying," Mackesey said in their final days at the site. "I used to like to camp. I don't think I'll camp out for a long time. I'm so over it."

"It did its job," Prisk said of the encampment. "It saved us. It got us through."

Prisk noted their families didn't help them while they were in the woods or after they'd secured the apartment.

"I will never, ever regret this, nor would I take it back," he said. "We learned who our real friends are. It's not always your friends. People who don't have anything are willing to help you out. We learned a lot about being friendly, being kind."

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