Tasha Reeves is one more about 150 who eat lunch at the Lawrence Interdenominational Nutrition Kitchen.

The streets of Lawrence are home to Tasha Reeves.

Fending for herself has been a way of life for the 20-year-old, on and off, since she was 16. She’s a regular in the lunch line forming outside the Lawrence Interdenominational Nutrition Kitchen, at the corner of 10th and Kentucky streets. LINK serves about 150 people a day.

Tasha arrives early, about 12:30 p.m., and is No. 44 in line. She pours herself a glass of tea but not before filling a fourth of it with sugar. Her tray holds meat loaf, mashed potatoes drenched in butter, salad and white frosted cake.

“The food is good here. I just eat to stay alive, either here or at Sally’s,” street slang for the Salvation Army, according to Reeves, who says she was raped at age 10, then bounced back and forth between foster care and the juvenile justice system.

She takes a seat alone, at a vacant table near the rear of the crowded dining room.

Reeves says she woke up this morning in a shack she found in the woods north of the river. During lunch she pulls a small canister of pepper spray from inside her bra, demonstrating how she stays safe on the streets.

After lunch, she’ll go to the library and use the computers, then head to Massachusetts Street to panhandle. On a good day she nets $40.