i need to tell this story just because

it was april 20th, 1999. i was 17. it was my junior year of high school and school would be out for the summer in about four weeks. it was wednesday and prom had been the previous saturday. i was in track. it was an early dismissal that day but our track coach said we would still have track practise at our regular time, 3:45. the boys track team however decided to have theirs right away. i was coming back from lunch with kari and sherry. we had gone to subway. when we pulled into the school lot, three track team guys came running up to kari's truck, one of whom was a guy i had just broken-up with the day before. they had these looks on their faces, wild eyes, it was weird. they said, "todd's dead." then my ex-boyfriend, j.j. said, "no! we have to go to the hospital. the ambulance took him to the hospital! i can't drive! i need you to drive!" he was hysterical. he was crying violently. i looked at my friends. in a weird way i didn't believe him. i felt he was always pulling some scheme to manipulate me. i was so wrong this time. kari and sherry said, "go!". i got into j.j.'s car and we took off for the hospital.

we arrived at the same time as todd's mom. she grabbed j.j. and took him into the emergency room with her.


j.j. and todd were best friends. i later found out that the track boys had been running their warm up route and were almost back to the track field when todd suddenly went to his knees. j.j., was right behind him. when he saw that todd wasn't breathing, he began mouth to mouth recessitation. j.j. later said all he could hear was air deflating from todd's chest.

at the hospital i stood in the hallway waiting. i know there were a few other people there but i can't remember who. more and more students kept showing up. soon there were so many of us, that the hospital staff opened up a conference room for us to all go in. everyone was terrified.

you see, todd was very well liked, in fact, he had been homecoming king at our small 700 student high school that year. everyone knew him. and honestly, most everyone liked him. he was a four-sport athlete, good looking, outgoing, funny, and smart.

the room was now packed. probably 60-70 students filled the room. hospital counselors had been sent down to us. teachers had showed up. we waited. we knew nothing. it seemed like an eternity. then, in walked j.j. and todd's mom. she held her hand up in the air and let it fall to her side. "todd's dead!" she exclaimed so loudly it surprised me.

in the Bible when they talk about hell, they mention the sounds of "weeping and nashing of teeth." i heard the sounds of hell in that moment. i will never forget that sound. it truely was "the weeping and nashing of teeth." i remember our vice principal trying to talk to me. i remember a hospital staffer bringing in bottles of pop and thinking, "you think we are going to drink pop?!" i remember that j.j. would not come into the room with the other students. he paced a short line in the hallway, fast. we were there all evening, as if going home would be leaving todd there and thus admitting he was really dead and was never coming home.

j.j. really didn't have family, so he slept downstairs on our family room couch. a friend of his from another town came and stayed too, but i can't remember why.

the next morning, thursday, we walked into the school foyer where student's would hang out until the first bell sounded. it was dead silent. everyone was seated. no one stood. no one spoke. i think a few underclassmen walked and were startled because they had not yet heard. they ended up letting school out early for those who wanted to leave. we did. i think that must have been the afternoon a guy from the sophomore class showed up on our front porch looking pale and confused. my mom told me this. i don't remember it. that night somehow, everyone ended up down at the track/football field. some went across the small bridge to the spot were todd had gone down. most only stood under the bleachers. a lot of people were smoking. there was such a wierd feeling of energy and massive fatigue. some guys had gotten tatoos in todd's memory.

friday night was the visitation at the high school. his casket was in the theater and when we showed up the line to get into the high school was all the way out the door of the high school, trough the parking lot, and down the side walk on the street. it took us two hours just to get in. i went with todd's brother and a few other's with the janitor to open todd's locker. i'm sure it was just imagined, but when he opened it, it felt like a gust escaped up and out of it. his letterman's jacket. some papers. that was about it. so weird that he himself had opened it two days before. the visitation started at 5p.m. and the line finally ended around 2am.

the funeral was on saturday in the high school gym. there were over 3,000 people there. it was sooo sad.

i need to just end here. there's so much more.
j.j. went on to have night terrors and was seen by the psychiatrist he had met that night at the hospital. he dreamed almost every night about giving todd mouth to mouth and the sickening sound of todd's breath escaping his lungs.

two days after todd died the columbine shootings happened. we were appalled in such a numb way. it was horrible, but just couldn't match what was happening here, to us. every anniversary of columbine on the news is for me, actually the anniversary of todd's death.

oh, and one more thing. the afternoon that todd died, my mom had gotten home from work. it was right about 3:00 when suddenly the door bell when ding-ding-ding ding-ding! the front door normally just goes ding-dong! and the back door only goes ding! my mom went to the front door, then then back door but there was no one there. 3 :00 was approximently the time that j.j. was giving todd mouth to mouth.
the doorbells have never worked since.