After Graduation (Part 1)

Graduation came and went and Michelle wasn't very good at keeping in touch with a lot of her friends. She was thinking about Chris, he worked and went to school about two hours away, it’s a weekend maybe she could catch him off of work so she called and asked him to come over.1

“Please? Can’t you just come over, even if it’s just for the night?” She asked him.2

“I don't know Shell, I'm not sure” was the only thing Chris could say to her.3

But for some reason she wouldn’t let it stop there4

“Please? I really need to talk to you, but it can’t be done over the phone.” She said to him.5

“Fine, I get off of work at 7 and I’ll head towards ya’ll” and with that they hung up.6

He never showed up, she figured he was busy or decided to come over in the morning. But as she lay in her bed Michelle couldn’t fall asleep. Something was keeping her up and she only wish she knew what it was. ‘Maybe I should call him, he's probably asleep right now but I'm worried’ and as she finished that thought her doorbell rang, she looked over at the clock and noticed it was close to being 3am ‘Who in the world could that be?’ she questioned as she put a light jacket on and walked down the stairs. When she looked outside, she saw someone she wasn't expecting to see at all. It was Chris’ dad.7

“Hey Mr. Martin, come on in” she said to him.8

“I can’t stay long Michelle, but I just needed to tell you something” he replied.9

She didn’t like his tone of voice, she knew something was wrong.10

“Is Chris okay?” Even though she had asked- she really didn’t want to know the answer.11

“Michelle, Chris got into a car accident on his way over here tonight. I don't know the exact details nor do I really want them, all I know is that there's a slim chance of him surviving.” And as he finished telling her the tears were running down his face as well as hers.12

“Chris is dying?” she asked, not really looking for an answer.13

“Look, you need to take care of yourself now, Ill keep you updated though.” He said as he walked out of the house.14

Michelle sat around for a little while, still unable to grasp the concept of her best friend since the fifth grade is dead, and it’s all her fault. Of course everyone knew by the morning time, and everyone wanted to keep from hurting Michelle so no one even mentioned it.15

“That’s it!!” She yelled, “I'm not a child anymore, I know he’s dead, well almost dead, I know! So stop trying to hide it from me!” Even though she said the words she didn’t truly believe she was ready to accept it all.16

She made her decision- she wasn't going to go to the funeral. ‘There's NO WAY in hell they could get me to go see my best friend dead, no way’17

Then she started thinking again ‘All I wanted was to say goodbye, that’s all I would ever want, well that and to say that I'm sorry.’ Then as if on cue, she did something she wasn't used to doing, never did before in her life she got on her knees and prayed 18

“Dear God, 19

I know I don't do this much, or as often as I should. But you’ve got a visitor please take care of him. I don't know what to do or how to do this but I want you to know that I'm sorry for everything, I never thought I’d be all alone in this, I always thought I’d have him in my life. So with that being said, please let him know that I'm sorry, and that I never did want to let him down.”20

With that she packed all the things that reminded her of Chris and put them away in her closet. It was bad enough dealing with this, now alone, she didn’t need the reminders of it.21