“Emily!” my mom yelled up the stairs.
I shuffled out of bed, my hair a jumbled mess and my leftover makeup from the night before smudged under my eyes.
“It’s time for school!” she shouted.
Today was the start of a typical Tuesday morning: wake up, get ready, go to school, go to lacrosse practice, eat dinner, go to bed. I threw my hair into a ponytail, grabbed a piece of buttered toast, and ran out the door. Life had become a routine; I barely even had to think about what my next step was. My brain, always one step ahead, seemed to just drag my body around like a dog with it's owner. Life had become predictable, easy to understand.
Honk! Honk! Chase’s car was parked in my driveway and he was waiting for me to come outside. 7:05 am on the dot. Chase was my best friend, and he had been ever since I was an awkward, confused middle schooler who wore Crocs and basketball shorts to school. He was the person I went to when I cried because I didn’t make it into extended art freshman year, the person who listened to my rambling stories about summer camp, and the person who had gone to every football game and every school dance with me for the past four years. I couldn’t imagine my life without him.
“One sesame seed bagel and a boiling hot caramel mocha,” Chase said, smirking.
“Since when do you buy me coffee?” I said as I shuffled into his Toyota. In all of the years we have been friends, I think he has bought me coffee two times and both were because it was finals week.
“It’s the last Friday of April, the worst month of the year, so we’re celebrating!” he said, smiling.
Besides my extravagant breakfast surprise, it was a normal day at school; nothing exciting, nothing new. I had a pop quiz in Calculus and a test in Environmental Science. After school, I had plans to drive into New York City with Chase and go to my friend Sarah’s birthday dinner. Sarah had been my friend ever since I knew how to walk. She knew my deepest, darkest secrets and every embarrassing, funny, sad, happy, and pointless story I had. We have been inseparable our whole lives. She and Chase got along, but they weren’t the greatest of friends. I never really knew why; I guess I just accepted it.

“Hey, Em I can’t hang out after school anymore, my mom is being annoying,” Chase texted me right as the bell for eighth hour rang. It was really unlike his mom to have him stay in on a Friday night, especially if she knew he was hanging out with me. Our families were really close.
“:(“ I responded. I was bummed but I didn’t really think too much about it; parents will be parents. Sarah’s birthday dinner wasn’t until 9:00, so I decided hike through this trail Chase and I discovered a few years back. No one really knew about it, and I liked it that way. It was a quaint, peaceful part of the world that only Chase and I knew about. I slipped on my grassy, white tennis shoes and adventured through the Grassy Lakes Trail.
I walked and searched and discovered as the new fallen leaves crunched beneath my feet. It was a beautiful day: a sparkling sun, a few fluffy clouds, and a warm breeze that whistled against the trees. I hummed to the beat of my ipod and turned the corner to walk over to a ginormous tree that stood in the middle of the hiking path. As I made my way over, I heard hushed voices. I crouched behind a prickly bush and gazed up at the top of the tree, where I spotted Chase and Hannah (a girl who made fun of me all throughout middle school for wearing Crocs) and a few others sitting atop a tree branch with their feet dangling below them. I was furious. Chase had lied to me, left me alone on a Friday night, and was hanging out with a group of kids who hated me.
I emerged from the bush and said, “Hey, guys.”
I got a handful of superior glances until eventually Chase jumped down from the branch.
“Hey Sarah... what are you doing here?” he asked, as he scratched the back of his head. “I...I...”
“It’s fine.” I said as I turned away and walked back out of the trail towards my car.
“Wait!” He called, but I just continued walking. I could’ve guessed something like this was going to happen at some point. Chase was always concerned with popularity and being ‘cool’; things that seemed insignificant to me. 
Twenty minutes later, Chase called me to apologize. I told him that I forgave him, but there was still something in me holding onto this grudge. We still had to go to Sarah’s party though, so I knew I had to try and brush it off.
It was pitch black out when we started driving. The highway was practically empty, so Chase and I glided across the pavement with all the windows down. The sky was a smooth black with swirls of white and dark blue scattered around. A million stars surrounded the glimmering moon, filling the sky with light and warmth and vibrance. I stuck my head out the window and let the spring breeze engulf me. I felt free, like I was flying. I couldn’t help but laugh. It was a beautiful thing, you know, to be surrounded by air and light and dark all at the same time. I tried to ignore the fact that I was still mad about earlier, but something in me kind of held onto it. Everytime Chase asked me a question I gave him one word responses.
“How do you think you did on the Environmental test?” he asked.
“Fine.” I muttered.
He looked at me, confused by my monotoned answer. I just rolled my eyes and continued to look out the window, wondering about the stars and planets and trees and how everything was made.
Thirty minutes passed and I finally was awoken from the dream I had found myself in while looking out the window. I glanced over at Chase who was blasting the radio and shouting the words to “Down to Earth”, by Justin Bieber. He always sang so loud in the car that even if you had the radio on full volume, you could still hear his screechy voice shouting over it. He turned to me with his adorable puppy eyes and I couldn’t help but laugh.
We were getting close to the city but there were still barely any cars on the road. I started looking up more throwback songs on my phone. “Maybe we should play some Michael Jacks...”
I couldn’t even finish my sentence before the car came slamming into us. A black truck, its engine roaring and its headlights bursting across the empty highway. The first thing I saw was the windshield; what used to display the glowing moon was now shattered, broken, lost forever. Next, the glass. Shards of clear, shimmering fragments filling the air in slow motion. And then…
Everything went black.
It was unbearable, the pain. My legs ached, my arms filled with sharp throbbing, my body motionless. My fingers wiggled, desperate to grab something, maybe air, maybe life, maybe nothing. Empty, unfamiliar voices filled the room and swarms of people shouted things like, “Don’t let go.” “Please hold on.” “This isn’t it.” And their words weren’t strong; their voices weren’t firm. They were trembling, shaking, like their body was using all of its energy to hold back tears, to continue breathing even though they were breaking, crashing. And it was in these moments that I craved noise. Not people noise, human shouts or even quiet whispers, but all consuming noise. Waves crashing in the midst of the vast and empty ocean, roaring thunder, wind sliding through trees, humming birds. I longed for anything, anything besides the deafening noise that filled this moment, this heart wrenching, shattering moment.
And the worst part, the part that killed the most.
Was him.
“He’s gone”, my mom said to me a clear, quiet voice with tears in her eyes. Eight years of friendship, a hundred car rides, countless stories, and it all ended with two simple words. He’s gone.
A week passed, then two. I never really believed that he was gone, and it was mostly because I couldn’t bear it. Every once and awhile, little clips ran through my head; things I had forgotten about that night that began flowing back and I couldn’t help but cringe when they did. I don’t know how to move on, how do you move on? How are you supposed to go forward when your best friend isn’t there? What do you do when the shoulder you cry on, the arm you grab when you shriek with fear and the thought of the unknown is no longer there? Who do you tell all your secret thoughts and lost words to? How do you go from everything.
         To nothing.
It’s weird how moment's work, one falling into the next like waves crashing in the ocean. We think we have so many here on earth, that time will continue on forever. We always think we can tell that one person we love them later, or that we can make better decisions next week, or that we can forgive others tomorrow.
I would do anything to go back in time to forgive Chase and enjoy every moment of that last car ride. I had been so stuck in the thought that we were guaranteed a tomorrow; I was so sure I could wait to forgive him. I forgot that today, and every day, is important and that each moment is a part of our story. We don’t know when the pages are out and the book closes, so we must learn from the past, put our hope in tomorrow, and live wholeheartedly in today.