Woman, 87, Fights Off Teen Who Attacked Her in Bed, Feeds Him Snack

“I thought to myself, ‘If he’s going to cut, I’m going to kick,' " the 87-year-old woman said

Sean Neumann is a journalist from Chicago, Ill.

An 87-year-old woman in Maine fought off a teenage intruder last month and then graciously fed him snacks in her kitchen after he complained of being “awfully hungry.”

Marjorie Perkins, who has lived at her house in Brunswick, Maine, for more than 40 years, told the local Times Record that she woke up to the teenager standing over her in bed after he had broken into her home.

“He said, ‘I’m going to cut you,'” Perkins recalled to the newspaper. “I thought to myself, ‘If he’s going to cut, I’m going to kick.’ So I jumped into my shoes.”

News Center Maine

Perkins, who was home alone at the time of the attack, said she and the teen started to fight — the intruder hitting her, grabbing her shoulders, and pushing her against a wall as she grabbed onto a chair nearby to defend herself.

“That helped,” Perkins said. “I was hollering for help out the window. … Thank God I had the chair between us. It would’ve been worse.”

The 87-year-old said the teenager “kept punching me and pushing me” until the teen, who reportedly wasn’t wearing pants or shoes, got tired out and went into the kitchen.

She then pleaded with the teenager to leave the home, but he wouldn’t as he continued to look through the kitchen.

“I kept saying, ‘You need to get out. You need help,'” she told the newspaper. “He said he was awfully hungry and hadn’t had anything to eat for quite a while. And I said, ‘Well, here’s a box of peanut butter and honey crackers. You can have that whole box.’ I gave him two containers of Ensure and I gave him two tangerines.”

Perkins then called 911 as the teen ate.

News Center Maine

The Brunswick Police Department said in a news release last week that when officers arrived, they found the teenager did have a knife with him at the time of the attack, but had left it in the kitchen during the scuffle.

Want to keep up with the latest crime coverage? Sign up for PEOPLE's free True Crime newsletter for breaking crime news, ongoing trial coverage and details of intriguing unsolved cases.

Police ultimately tracked the teenager down “a few blocks away” from Perkins’ house and took him into juvenile custody. The teenager was charged with burglary, criminal threatening, assault and consuming alcohol as a minor.

His name has not been released since he is a juvenile.

Perkins told The Times Record that the same boy used to mow her lawn roughly 10 years ago.

“I hope he gets help,” she said.