by Nina Liss-Schultz, Mother Jones

"I was a mess, I was crying, I didn't know what to do."

One night in May 2009, Jocelyn packed a backpack and left the ramshackle house in Naples, Utah, where she lived with her mom and two of her five siblings. She was six months pregnant—a condition that had caused the 17-year-old to drop out of high school and become alienated from her Mormon family. That night she'd broken up with her new boyfriend, who, though not the father, was her biggest source of support.

She planned to hitchhike 2,000 miles to Florida, where her dad lived, even though they hadn't spoken in years. She only made it to a gas station a block away before she stopped, in tears. Aaron Harrison, a "Goth" 21-year-old, approached Jocelyn and asked if he could help. "I was a mess, I was crying, I didn't know what to do," she remembers. "I told him everything. I even told him about thinking of ending the pregnancy." He asked if she wanted to go to his place nearby and talk.

Jocelyn (which is not her real name), a petite woman with wavy brown hair and a soft twang, told ...