"The tall one was statuesque. She had a beautiful figure, the kind you saw on the cover of the Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue, the kind that made every girl around her take a hit on her self-esteem just by being in the same room." - S. Meyer

I want to say just a couple more things about Claire before moving on. To our friends' credit, when they realized why she and I no longer hung out together, the majority of them were on her side and stopped fraternizing with me. Though it hurt a lot at the time and I admit I was pretty upset with them, I can see now that they were right in siding with her. I had acted very stupidly and very rashly and inconsiderately, and if I could go back in my life and change one thing, it would probably be my attitude towards Claire after she had kissed me.

Instead, I think of our chemistry class in tenth grade. Mr. Lawler was drawing a diagram of ionic compound bonding. "You see," he explained, drawing circles with plus signs to correspond with negative ones, "The positive goes with the negative, and that way, they are attracted, and the bond is strong. But when people try to pound the ionic bonds together, that arrangement is shattered, and all of a sudden, you have pluses with pluses and the minuses with minuses. Therefore, the bond becomes brittle and ultimately useless." He crossed out the diagram he had just drawn to illustrate this, and turned to face the class. "Think of it as if they were humans—opposites, men and women, attract, which breeds families and good bonding." His lip curled. "But if you were to get a man with a man or a woman with a woman, you will have a fruitless, brittle relationship that will have to be destroyed eventually."

Unable to help myself, I stole a glance at Claire. Over the past year, she had turned from quiet and respectful to rather indifferent and as much of a punk as Our Lady of Sorrows would allow her to be. At Mr. Lawler's rude remark, she just kept her arms folded and rolled her eyes. She looked over at me and I quickly averted my gaze. The next day, as I was waiting for the bus, I saw Claire with another girl by the side of the school, making out. Part of me was surprised but most of me was revolted, particularly with myself for not being able to look away immediately. I was just trying to understand what Claire could possibly want from someone of our own sex. This girl (Alyssa, I think) began to kiss Claire's neck, and Claire looked directly at me. Knowing she had my full attention, Claire put two fingers in the shape of a "V" on her mouth, then wagged her tongue between them. Narrowing my eyes at her, I turned away in disgust.

The last week of February that month marked not only Claire's but my sixteenth birthday. While this was typically an age to be celebrated—"sweet sixteen" or whatever—I was frankly terrified of the number. It was loaded with responsibility, just an ever-growing reminder that childhood was disappearing quickly behind me. Sixteen was the age that my parents allowed us kids to start officially "dating," and I remember when Moriah had finally reached it, she had a list of guys to start toying around with. She made a point of telling me that she knew several boys who were eager to take me out on a date, but I pleaded with her to tell them off.

It sort of freaked me out that there were guys who wanted to date me who didn't even know me. I mean, I get that the point (generally speaking) of going on dates is to get to know a person better, but the names she listed for me were ones I barely recognized, let alone knew. What on earth could possibly attract these guys to me when they had no understanding at all of what I was like? It bugged me.

When I mentioned this to Cody one day, he seemed uncharacteristically distant. As usual, he was my sounding board and I told him all my concerns about turning sixteen (the least of which was that it'd mean I'd have to get a driver's license soon, and I was not looking forward to that, certain I'd kill a pedestrian or two by accident). He was full aware of Moriah's eagerness to set me up with some guys, and he wasn't really on her side. I told him my confusion at Moriah's insistence that there was a line of guys waiting to go out with me, and at this, Cody snorted a laugh and ran a hand through his hair.

"Amy, do you think you're pretty?" he asked.

"Uh…" Admittedly, this question kind of threw me off. "I dunno." Not really.

With a sigh, he stood up off his bed and walked over to me, where I sat on the chair by his desk. Cody patted my shoulder and then just went straight out of his room without saying another word.

After school the next day, I waited for Cody in the back of the bus as usual. I was a little surprised when he instead took the front seat with our brother Peter. The two of them put their heads together and started whispering, very much like two people who didn't want to be overheard. Confused and intrigued, I made to stand up, but at that moment, Cody glanced back at me and motioned for me to stay put. Shane McNally, a boy Cody's age who lived on the end of our street, got onto the bus, caught my eye, and started to very purposefully walk towards me. Cody got swiftly to his feet and grabbed the boy by the shoulder, forcing him to turn around. It was only then that I saw Cody had a fresh cut on his cheek. Over the background noise on the rest of the bus, I had to strain my ears to hear what they were saying, and even then I could only guess snippets (mostly by reading Cody's lips).

"That's my sister, McNally. I already told you, leave her alone."

Pointing to the cut on Cody's cheek, McNally said, "And I already told you that it's a free country, Duncan. I can talk to her if I want to."

"Yeah, but it's not talking you want to do, is it?"

McNally turned again, facing me, and the look on his face was, well, I don't know how to put it. Crass. Even though we were on a bus crowded with people, and there was an adult driver waiting to leave in five minutes, I was still afraid of that look. Before the fear could sink in too deeply though, Cody had grabbed McNally once more, this time twisting him back around and throwing the heaviest punch I'd ever seen anyone even attempt, right at McNally's jaw. This floored me for two reasons, the first being that I'd never actually seen Cody punch someone before, and the second being that strong though Cody may have been, McNally seemed at least a foot bigger than my brother in every direction.

Without really noticing, I had fallen back into my seat, silently shocked at what I was seeing as McNally took a swipe at Cody, who dodged it and shoved McNally to the floor of the bus, falling on top of him and punching him again. By this time, the driver had finally woken up to what was going on and stepped in, yanking Cody up by the scruff of his blazer. McNally grabbed the nearest seat and pushed himself up, and I could see that the sleeve of his blazer was torn. The driver, yelling about proper conduct and sportsmanship, pulled Cody by the ear to the door of the bus. He roughly threw my brother out onto the sidewalk, laying down the strict and rare punishment of forcing him to walk home.

I tried to catch Cody's eye as the bus pulled away, but he was staring at the ground. Quickly I reverted my attention the front of the bus, where I saw Peter stand up, get glared at by McNally, and sit pathetically back down. Oh, God please help me, I thought as McNally walked towards me with a smug look on his face.

"Hi," he said, squeezing into the seat next to me. I had no idea what to say back to him. Could he possibly expect courtesy after being responsible for getting my brother kicked off the bus? I mean technically, Cody had thrown the punch, but obviously something had happened between them before now that warranted it. When I didn't respond, McNally said, "I see you're speechless. I know, it's big of me to come and sit by you after your brother sucker-punched me."

Still, I couldn't bring myself to speak. I'd never been any good in situations like these, and my mind was completely bankrupt for something appropriate to say.

Smirking at my silence, McNally went on, "I hear you're sixteen now."

"This Saturday."

He nodded. "Right. We've been waiting, you know. We remember that Moriah only started, um, 'dating' when she'd turned sixteen and so naturally, we assume that you're fair game now, too."

"Game?" I asked, raising my eyebrows. "Look, I don't know what your 'game' is, Shane—"

With one of his sick grins, he interrupted me, "Oh, I think you do."

My lips pressed together, forming a thin line the way they always did when I was intimidated. I wished someone would come or look back here, and maybe give McNally a talking-to. This was ridiculous—again I reminded myself that he wouldn't do anything to me on a bus full to bursting with other kids, but it freaked me out enough to think that he wanted to do something to me. Trying to keep a cool head, I forced myself to at least act brave and say something back to him.

"Leave me alone," I said through my teeth.

"Or what?" he asked with a condescending laugh. "Is your big brother going to come to your rescue?"

He knew that he had me cornered, like a scared rabbit. I trembled through my response: "You can't make me go out with you, Shane. And I'll never want to. Look, I'm sorry if Moriah didn't want to date you either, but—"

"Moriah? Oh come on, Amy. This isn't about Moriah. This is about me and you."

"Stop it," I whispered. "Just stop." This only amused him further, and that smirk of his spread until it touched every part of his countenance. The bus lurched to a stop, and a few kids were starting to file out. Just as McNally was about to touch my leg, I got abruptly to my feet and joined the throng of students in the middle of the aisle.

"Aw, c'mon, Amy!" McNally laughed. "This isn't your stop!"

But I didn't listen to him, and just kept walking ahead. My heart beat returned to normal only when I had gotten safely off the bus and seen it drive over the hill and out of sight. Where was I—Lily Pad Lane. If I remembered right, it was about ten blocks to my street. I considered waiting for Cody, but dismissed this idea as I just thought about getting home, and fast. To my surprise, as I reached the top of the hill, I saw the bus had come to a stop again. I hung back, intensely afraid that McNally was going to get off it. But then I saw my brother Peter coming towards me instead, and the bus drove away again.

Peter was about my height, and probably just as skinny. He liked to spend all his time reading about things like how cars work, or taking apart old walkie-talkies and then trying to reconstruct one while labeling all the parts of the other. As I walked towards him, it suddenly dawned on me how alike we were: he and I were the quiet ones, the unsocial ones in the family. Cody and Moriah were the popular siblings, always going out and meeting new people and able to start conversations with near-strangers at the drop of a hat (and it seemed our youngest brother, Dennis, would be following in their footsteps; he was always running around and yelling). I didn't want to be like Peter, though. It was rude of me to say this, but, well, he was sort of a geek. And he seemed to get no greater joy from anything than when he was teasing me—which didn't explain why he was waiting for me now to catch up with him.

"Wanna wait for Cody?" he asked.

"No, I want to go home."

And so we walked, in complete and total silence. He knew I was embarrassed about what had happened with McNally, and probably guessed that it had scared me, too. I think he was afraid as well, and not just because McNally could beat him to a pulp if he wanted to. It's just that Peter was aware that I wasn't as easygoing around guys as Moriah was, which meant she was not only capable of flirting but of saying "no" and sounding like she meant it. When we finally got home about twenty minutes later, I headed for the garage while Peter ran into the house to tell my mom why were late (no doubt she'd be worried we hadn't gotten home by now).

I opened the garage door, and the sight that greeted me was one of an essentially empty room: mom always kept the car parked in the driveway, meaning that the only vehicle in the garage was Cody's motorcycle. Oh, how he loved that bike. He'd wanted a motorcycle ever since he'd turned fifteen, but mom and dad refused to buy him one. When it occurred to him that he could get a job and buy one with his own money, our parents had to concede defeat. I'd been horrified that they'd given up so easily—so I took it upon myself to look up statistics on motorcycle accidents, making pamphlets and signs that I'd slip under Cody's door to warn him. He later told me he felt touched by my concern, but that it was unnecessary. Not to worry, little sis.

So he started working an evening shift at McDonald's, which he realized was not going to get him enough money in the time that he wanted. This prompted him to also take up lifeguarding at the local pool, working weekends, holidays, and the summer. I'll tell you right now that that's where all the money is for students! None of us could believe his salary, but he was frugal as they come. Cody didn't spend a dime, saving everything he earned—well, except for ten percent. He always paid ten percent tithing to our church every time he got a check. (I wish I could say Moriah—the only other one of us to have a job at this time—did the same, but she usually "forgot" to pay hers).

The pool was where Cody met his first girlfriend, Julia Anderson. She lifeguarded there as well, and they first bonded when Julia hadn't been working and Cody was on duty, and wound up saving Julia's little sister. Well, he said it wasn't likely that her sister would have actually drowned, but Julia (who'd probably been looking for an excuse to ask him out, anyway) insisted that his actions were heroic and that she wanted to repay him by taking him to dinner. Cody certainly had no objections.

After much hassling and begging, Julia got her parents' permission to ride with Cody on his Suzuki (he hated it when people referred to it as a Harley). But now they went almost everywhere on it together—to parties, to the pool, even to church. Julia didn't belong to the same church we did, but she started coming when Cody finally invited her to. He'd have driven the bike to school, too, but both St. John and Paul's and Our Lady of Sorrows had a strict anti-motorcycle policy. Disturbance of the peace, I think. Noise pollution. That's all it was to them. To my brother, it was his baby.

"Want to take a ride?"

Cody's voice immediately jerked me from my reverie. He was standing by the garage door, sweating a bit but not looking nearly as exhausted as I felt for having walked all the way home on a particularly sunny day. It was then that I realized I had taken the handlebars on the Suzuki and had been about to sit on it when he came in.

"Oh—no," I said, letting go of the bike instantly. "I was just, um, admiring it."

"You know, I'm sure I could convince mom and dad to let you get on it if you wanted to," Cody said, picking up the helmet he kept for Julia at our house.

He tossed it to me, and I tossed it back. "Um, I don't think so. I'd rather hold on a bit longer to life, if that's okay."

With one of his heartfelt laughs (so unlike McNally's cruel one), Cody placed the helmet back on a nearby table and said, "C'mon, Amy, you've got to stop being so afraid all the time! More people die in car accidents than they do in bike crashes! If you're going to live your life by statistics, you're never going to have any fun." But he'd already said something that worried me, which was the mention of car accidents—he knew I was nervous about this and getting my license.

"You'd better go tell mom you're here," I said in a flat voice. Cody just nodded, patting my shoulder and walking into the house. I turned my attention to the desk he'd put Julia's helmet on. Here also were two of dad's toolboxes, and above them was the locked cabinet behind which he kept grandpa's rifle and shotgun. A couple of times, he had shown Cody and Peter how to use them, never thinking to show me and Moriah, but it's not like we wanted to anyway. Every time I even thought of guns, I thought of how grandpa had shot that bear, and even now it still pained me.

This was when my mother, my wonderful mother, walked into the garage. She was wearing one of her favorite dresses; it was a dark orange, almost rusty color, and around it she had a dark brown belt that matched her heeled shoes. Mother wasn't a June Cleaver, but she did feel like she had to wear heels, because she was a bit short, and that always bothered her. I never noticed it, though—she always seemed to stand six feet tall to me, because her spirit was so tremendous and her heart so large. She didn't wear pearls in the kitchen, but I don't think I ever saw her wear jeans or lay down for a day or two because she was sick. That's just how she was raised—good and old-fashioned, never taking any time for herself.

In her heels, mom had a couple of inches on me. She put a hand on my shoulder and said, "Peter wanted me to come talk to you." I didn't say anything, looking down at the floor as mother moved her hand up to my cheek. "Honey, what's wrong?"

"Nothing, mom. It's nothing."

She sighed quietly, putting her arms around me and letting my chin rest on her shoulder. It was no use now, because she'd be able to feel that I was shaking, and I couldn't keep a tear or two from sliding into her auburn hair. It wasn't only the thought of McNally that was bothering me now, but the upcoming weekend. My birthday.

"Mom, I don't want to grow up," I whispered, hugging her back and feeling pathetic as I said it. Fifteen, almost sixteen, seemed too old to be crying into your mother's hair about something.

But as always, mother validated my feelings. "It's okay to be scared, Amy. Everyone gets scared. Growing up isn't an easy task, but it's something you're going to have face for the rest of your life. I know, it seems like you're going to reach a magical age someday where suddenly, you won't have to worry about it anymore, but… that's not always the case. Now and then, I get scared of getting older."

"It's just…it's different," I sniffed. "Sixteen is… it's older, it's just more different. Maybe that's because of the dating thing, I don't know. But on the bus today, there was this guy, and h-he…"

For whatever reason, fear or shame, I couldn't finish the sentence; I just shuddered and emitted a little sob. Mother seemed to get it anyway, though. I gathered that Cody had had to explain the cut he'd gotten, and he wouldn't have lied to her about it.

"And why do I have to go to the church dance this Saturday?" I whimpered. "It's my birthday, I should be able to do what I want to do."

Understand that I was saying this not because I thought a church dance was a stupid place to spend my birthday, but because I hated church dances. I loathed them with every fiber of my being, but dad made us all go to them. I mean, Cody and Moriah liked going anyway, but dad gave me and Peter no alternative: though we'd have much rather stayed at home, left to our own devices, dad thought we would turn into antisocial weirdos if we never went to dances. Originally, the one that was now on my birthday had been scheduled for Friday instead, but for some reason it had gotten moved over to Saturday, and now I would be forced to spend an already unpleasant day at a function I wanted only to avoid.

Mother had already tried appealing to dad, wanting him to let up on his strict and silly policy just once, for my birthday, but he would not yield to her. He was dead set on my going to that dance, making a point of reiterating that I had to go at dinner that night.

I wanted to do something defiant, but nothing came to mind. That was when Cody stepped in: "Hey, dad. Amy was telling me today that she was thinking of riding my bike. How about she goes to the dance, and you let me pick her up on the Suzuki?" (Cody couldn't go to the dance because he had a major test coming up, and dad was making him stay home to study for it.)

Dad raised his eyebrows, no doubt surprised by this weak attempt at arousing his anger. "You want to get on that death trap, Amy? Weren't you the one who spent so long trying to convince Cody to spend his hard-earned money on something else?"

Whether or not he meant it that way, I felt like dad was mocking my fear. Well, dad, you can forget about that one. "I want him to pick me up on that bike."

"But honey, you've never ridden it before," mother said. "And it'll be late, and dark—I don't want you to do that."

"No, no," dad said, waving a hand at mother but looking me in the eye. "She wants to do it, let her do it, Eleanor. She's a year older, a year wiser."

Looking for another way out of this, mother pursed her lips together. "Well—what about Peter and Moriah? They have to get home somehow, and they won't all fit on that bike. Cody, you can take the car and pick them all up."

"Mom, I'm going to Robby's band's gig after, remember?" Moriah said, naming the boy who she was currently going around with.

"Yeah, and I'm sleeping over at Joshua's," said Peter.

Still, mother was obviously less than thrilled with this idea. "Mom," Cody said, "I was going to go out on the bike tonight, anyway. Max and Nick and Ryan and I were all going to study together at Max's house, and that's only like, two blocks away from the stake center. I'll just pick Amy up on my way home."

Finally, mom gave in. For the moment, I was happy that Cody had helped me settle something with dad, but by the next morning, I remembered my terror of that Suzuki. I talked to Cody about it on the bus ride to school, asking him if he could drive to Max's house in the family car and pick me up in that instead. But he refused to let me back out of the motorcycle thing, trying to calm me down by telling me he promised to go extremely slowly once I got on.

When Saturday arrived and I was at the church dance, I actually found myself wanting nothing more than to get on Cody's motorcycle and get out of there. Dances were always the same: there'd be really lame music, and guys were almost always awkward, and it was impossible to have conversations with people over the noise. Basically, I was a wallflower: Moriah was always with her friends, or dancing with the boys. All of my girl friends were the type who either liked dances as much as Moriah, or hated them as much as me and were lucky enough to have fathers who didn't make them go if they didn't want to. So, dressed in what was nearly my Sunday best, with my hair carefully done and makeup on that Moriah had begged me to wear, I stood with my hands behind my back against the wall.

A couple of guys came over and asked me to dance, but I turned them down. I was way too shy. Then I got annoyed because I realized I was not the only girl sitting out on the dances, but these guys who'd asked me wouldn't ever go over to the other girls who no one had asked. And that's what I sensed, was that these girls were just silently waiting for some boy to come and ask her to dance with him, but no such invitation ever came. I hated that these guys asked me and not them, and that because of that, those girls probably hated me.

Finally, a familiar and welcome person approached me. It was Austin Cooper, the only boy my age at church. We were pretty good friends, and I actually did think he was pretty cute. He was a bit more talkative than me, but he was sometimes reserved and he had a reverence for religious subjects that not all the other teenagers had. He had turned sixteen two months before me, and as he walked towards me at this dance, I wondered if he had remembered it was my birthday today.

"Happy birthday," he said. Guess he remembered.

I wasn't as good at speaking above the music as he was, but I tried my best: "Thanks, Austin."

With a playful smirk, he waved around at the room and said, "Enjoying it so far? I think this is all supposed to be for you."

"Oh, ha, ha."

We stood there awkwardly for a bit longer; I don't know if Austin just didn't know what to say, but in my case, I just had trouble hearing myself think over the song that was so loud, I could feel the bass thudding the floor. "Hey, um, want to get some food?" Austin asked me, having to lean over and shout directly in my ear so that I could hear him. I nodded. Once at the refreshment table, we resumed our silence as we got some lemonade and brownies.

Finally, after what felt like hours, the loud crazy pop song ended, to be replaced by a much slower one. Austin threw his cup into a nearby trash can and said, "Amy, do you wanna dance?"

A million excuses popped up in my mind: I haven't finished this brownie yet. I hate slow dances. Actually, I've never slow danced. I'd step on your toes. I'm clumsy. Moriah will make fun of me. It might tick off the other guys I'd turned down. I don't like this band. My feet hurt. I like you. Being around you makes me nervous. I might throw up on your shoes by accident if you touch me.

Yet somehow, the word that came out of my mouth was "yes." Austin smiled and looked relieved, taking my hand and leading me out to the dance floor. He seemed to know what he was doing at any rate, as he took my hand and put his other one on my waist. Instinctively, I put my free hand on his shoulder, and we started to sort of waltz around in a circle. I wanted to look around at the other kids to see how they were dancing, and if I was doing something wrong, and if Moriah or Peter was watching me (or no, not Peter, he'd already left by now, the jerk). But even though I'd only thought that whole you-can't-keep-your-eyes-off-your-partner deal was something that only happened in Hollywood, I suddenly found it was true. I couldn't take my eyes away from Austin's dark green ones. He, on the other hand, was smiling nervously and kept trying to look away from me. A thick black curl fell onto his forehead as he cleared his throat to speak over the slightly-softer song.

"Y-you, um…you look really pretty tonight."

It's a good thing the lights were so low, otherwise I'm sure not even partial blindness could've kept him from seeing me blush. "Oh, uh, thanks." Was I supposed to return the compliment? Demurely deflect it? I don't know! I never knew.

We kept rotating silently, awkwardly, on the spot. "So, you're sixteen now," he finally said.

"Yup."

"And…I'm sixteen."

"Right."

"So…so, just to, uh, make sure we have it right: you're sixteen and I'm sixteen, and we're pretty good friends, right?"

"Yeah…"

The dance ended; Austin slid my hand off his shoulder and was now holding both of my hands in between us. In the few moments of relative quiet that the deejay spent looking for a new, faster song to put on, my heartbeat replaced the thud of the bass in my ears. Austin's Adam's apple was always noticeable, but I was sure I could see it quivering now as he said, "I thought that maybe, you and I, uh… next weekend…?"

"OH!" I suddenly gasped, looking at the clock over Austin's shoulder. "It's already 9:50, where does the time go? I was supposed to meet Cody outside five minutes ago, sorry—I'll see you tomorrow in church, bye!"

And that's how the awkward goose ran away from the dance. I actually wasn't meeting Cody until 10:00, but I'd been so terrified of what Austin was about to suggest that I just had to speed right out of there. That was so stupid, and not only because I'd have to face him the very next day in church. I liked Austin, I would have liked to have gone on a date with him, and I was 99.9% sure that's what he'd been about to ask me—yet at the same time, that's what I had been so horrifically afraid of. Was it because I thought maybe we wouldn't like each other romantically, and that was something I never wanted to find out? If we dated and broke up, we'd stop being friends, as had happened with Moriah and the first boy she'd gone out with? I don't know. All I know is that I turned completely chicken and run out on Austin when he had probably spent days trying to figure out how to try to ask me that question—and I hadn't even let him finish! What a creep I turned out to be.

I heard the door open behind me, and for a second I was deathly afraid that Austin had followed me outside and would learn that I'd lied about when I was meeting Cody. But it turned out to be Moriah, and I turned away with a scowl.

With a loud laugh, Moriah asked, "Aw what?" She giggled as I folded my arms and turned away from her, looking towards the street. "C'mon, Amy, tell me what that was all about!"

"Go back inside," I said, walking away from the building and towards the actual sidewalk. "I'm sure Robby's wondering where you are."

"Probably not, since I told him where I was going," Moriah said, catching up to me. Oh, I wished she'd go away. "Now I was watching you and Mr. Cooper back there, little missy, and I want to know what it was all about! Come on, this is what sisters do, they chat about boys! I mean, unless you're weird like your friend Claire and actually like girls, for some reason—"

"Claire's not my friend," I said hotly, stopping because I had reached the street and had no where else to walk away.

In that condescending, I'll-humor-you-though-you're-being-naïve voice, Moriah said, "Okay, okay, sorry. But I know what I saw, I saw you and Austin slow dancing—not too badly, might I add, considering that it was the first time I ever saw you actually dance with a guy. Why now, why Austin? Do you like him?"

"I don't know, maybe," I sighed, just giving it up. I rolled my eyes as Moriah squealed in excitement. "Oh my gosh, would you calm down?"

"No! Because after the dance was over, I saw that he was looking pretty serious, and holding your hands. Did he ask you out?"

"I think he was going to."

"You think—" Moriah came to a stop, staring at me and then saying, "You didn't let him finish, did you?"

"Look, I got scared, okay? I'm not like you, Moriah. I'm not good at the whole flirty, talking-to-boys thing!"

Moriah sighed in annoyance, turning me to look at her. She and I were rather similar in appearance; we both had fair blonde hair and our father's sharp noses. But she had green eyes and mine were blue, and her face was a bit wider, like mother's. Still, at times we looked almost like twins, which is why I was surprised when Moriah said, "Amy, I have no qualms about admitting that you are prettier than me. And," she went on, having to raise her voice over mine because I hated when people said things like that, "I am fine with it. I've made my peace with it. Amy, don't you get it? You don't have to lift a finger to get guys interested in you. All you have to do is stand there and let them come to you, not unlike what Mr. Cooper—and several other boys, I noticed—did tonight."

"Moriah, I don't want guys to like me just because they think I'm pretty," I protested. "They should like me for me, and…" I stepped back as Moriah started staring at my stomach, then around me. "What—what are you looking for?"

"The umbilical cord," she snidely replied. "Because you were obviously born yesterday." Laughing at my peeved expression, she said, "Come on, Amy! Once a guy gets to know you, he'll learn how cool and interesting you are, but everyone knows that it's almost always looks that have to attract a person first. I'm not saying it's right, but it's just what people do."

This didn't comfort me very much. "Oh, look," I said dryly, shifting my gaze over Moriah's shoulder, where I could make out the sight and sound of his bike in the distance (his headlight had broken yesterday, which he conveniently forgot to tell my parents). "Here comes Cody, so you can go back on inside now."

In retrospect, I wish she hadn't listened to me. But Moriah just rolled her eyes, leaving me and running back into the building as she heard a song come blasting that she loved. The next few moments happened so fast that I felt as if not only a rug but the entire earth had been pulled out from under my feet.

As this was usually a busy road during the daytime, there was a traffic light and intersection right outside the church building. Cody had the green light, and I thought maybe he was going a bit faster than he should have been before I also noticed that he wasn't wearing a helmet—probably just showing off. There was an enormous truck coming up at a right angle to Cody's bike, opposite the driveway I was standing next to. This meant it had a red light, but it wasn't slowing down.

"Stop!" I shouted, either to Cody or to the man driving the truck.

Cody was the one who heeded what I said, though I doubt he'd actually heard me; he just saw the truck himself as it made its turn towards him. But Cody was going way too fast, and in trying to hit the brake, his bike skidded almost sideways, slamming head-on into the truck's grille. I saw Cody and the lower half of his bike disappear under the truck as the driver finally stopped; the music I could still hear from the church and the sound of my own scream had almost kept me from being able to hear the noise of Cody's Suzuki being crushed in half, deforming the grille of the truck. This scene unfolded not fifteen feet in front of me.

The driver leapt out of his truck, swearing in a clearly panicked voice as I just stood there, literally paralyzed in terror. My heart, my mind, my soul were all begging me to try and turn back time, or tell me that what I had just witnessed was in my imagination. But my senses could not be denied; no matter how hard I shut my eyes, when I opened them again, I could see the accident right before me; I could hold my breath, but when forced to inhale again, I would smell the acrid burning and scent of destruction; I didn't even bother trying to block out the sound of the driver's frantic voice.

"You saw it!" he yelled over to me, clearly not knowing that Cody and I were related. "He—he didn't have his light on!"

I turned on my heel and ran back into the church. There was a telephone I could use near one of the bathrooms, and even though I'd not even felt that surge of gross and sickly bile in my throat, I instinctively leaned over a nearby trash can and threw up. I was crying and shaking so much that I toppled the garbage can over, and my vomit soon covered the floor. As I tried desperately to get a hold on myself, I heard that dance music and thought how stupid it had been that that's what I'd been afraid of not ten minutes ago, of dancing and boys and being sixteen.

A boy and a girl I knew from church walked into the hallway just then; they were behind me, but I could hear them laughing until one of them must have seen me and they rushed over. "Amy, what's wrong?!" the girl asked. She looked alarmed that I was still crying too hard to answer her. "Joel, go get Moriah," she said to her boyfriend, trying to help me sit up. "Amy, Amy, what happened?!"

But I couldn't waste time in telling her, Cody was in actual mortal danger, and could die if I didn't call someone right away—I didn't trust that truck driver to do anything. But who should I call? "D-do I call the p-police to get an ambulance?" I asked the girl by me, forcing myself to get to my feet as she carefully stood up with me. "Or is th-there a different number for them?"

"An ambulance? What—?"

"Amy!" It was Moriah, and gratefully, she hadn't brought Robby with her. The girl from church left, sensing this was a family thing, and Moriah looked more worried than I'd ever seen her. Admittedly, she had never seen me so upset, either. "What happened, what's going on? Where's Cody?"

I fumbled with the telephone that was secured to the wall, trying through my shuddering breaths to communicate to her what had happened. But I didn't know what to say, and I still didn't know which number to dial. Just then, though, the hallway was flooded with blue and red lights as the sound of a siren just barely reached our ears over the music from the dance. Moriah and I could see the lights through a window behind me, and this time in a more anxious tone, Moriah repeated, "Amy, where's Cody??"

"He's out there," I whined, pointing at the window.

Moriah's face blanched and she grabbed my hand, running to the main door of the building. Outside, we saw that two police cars and an ambulance had pulled up on the sidewalk I'd vacated only a few moments ago. (We later learned that the owner of a shoe store next to the church building had heard the crash and called the police.) The sound of the dance music lessened, and I dimly registered that another slow song must have been playing now. Instructing me to stay where I was, Moriah raced to the sidewalk, where I saw a policeman hold his hand up and tell her, "Whoa, there, step back, kiddo."

"That's my brother!" Moriah shouted, nearly hysterical, pointing to the accident.

Looking quickly between her and the head of the truck, the policeman said, "If that's so, you'd best look away right now."

But Moriah was never one to be told off, and even though I shrank away from my safe distance of at least sixty or fifty feet, Moriah pushed the officer aside and watched as a towing vehicle I'd just noticed was there made a grinding noise as it pulled the wreckage that was Cody's bike out from under the truck. The officer forcefully grabbed Moriah and stood in front of her, blocking her view. "The driver of the truck isn't talking. Do you know what happened here?"

"No, I didn't see it, I was inside, I… my sister saw it, though." Then, as if she had just realized what this must have meant, Moriah turned around and looked at me. She'd seen the aftermath of the accident and now, I could tell, was running it through her head, trying to imagine what it must have been like to actually see it happen. I took a feeble few steps towards her, and Moriah left the policeman, hurrying back towards me and embracing me tightly. I sobbed unabashedly onto her shoulder, forgetting how much it hurt just to cry; it felt as if my stomach was going to cave in on itself, as if my throat was on fire and my eyes were drowning. I could feel Moriah shaking too as she held me closer to her, and I was unsure at that moment whether she was comforting me or if she was the one who was afraid and in need of that comfort.

Either way, the police officer gave us a minute or two before walking over with his partner. "Did you see what happened?" he asked me.

I could only nod.

"Please, don't make her say anything now," Moriah cried, her words forcing their way through her tears. "Please, just give her some time, at least a day!"

The officer looked as if he wanted to object, but his partner put a hand on his arm and said, "Tomorrow, Richard. She can't even speak right now."

"Officer," Moriah choked. "Cody, our brother…" She was afraid to ask whatever it was, and her hesitation scared me.

The gentler officer pushed his hat further up on his head. "I'm sorry, girls," he said in a strong but quiet voice. "Your brother is dead."

Moriah found her voice again. "But—the ambulance, the—the doctors, how can you be sure, how do you know?!"

This was wishful thinking, as I could easily picture how the officers would know. "I'm sorry," the policeman repeated. "We are sure."

I couldn't let go of Moriah, though her grip on me had slackened. My crying had picked up again, and the tears consumed me. Moriah asked the policemen to call our parents, and I just remember them obligingly walking away to leave Moriah and I standing there, crying in each other's arms. Time passed, but I'm not sure how much when Moriah let go of me suddenly and walked away. Through my tears, I could see that she had gone to join dad, who had since arrived and was talking to the policemen over by the ambulance. Moriah had always been closer to dad, but I wanted my mother.

She didn't leave me waiting much longer. The next thing I knew, mother had come up to me and pulled me to her, stroking the back of my head as I continued my relentless sobbing. We didn't exchange a word; she only rocked me gently and let me cry my eyes out. It wasn't until later, when she was driving me and Moriah home, that I noticed her eyes were red from crying as well. But of course she would cry. Her oldest child was gone.

This sounds so cliché, but what had happened was just so frightening that I felt it must have been a nightmare. But that horrible aching feeling in my heart—another gaping hole—let me know that it really had happened. I went to bed that night and lay awake until morning, staring up at the ceiling where Cody's accident replayed itself in front of me like a movie, over and over again. I was afraid that if I were to close my eyes, I would dream something even worse, though I wasn't sure what could have possibly been worse than the reality.

The next day, the officers came by the house as they had said they would. Mother and dad were in the kitchen with me as the policemen asked me question after question. Dad paced back and forth, refilling his glass of water after every other sip, while mother sat next to me at the table, her hand exerting a warm and gentle pressure on my trembling one. I had to recount everything, and to my embarrassment, I cried more than once in front of those policemen. I wanted to lie and tell them Cody's headlight was on, but I couldn't—not only because I was terrified of the prospect of lying to law enforcers, but because I knew the truck driver would say it was untrue. At least I could tell them in all honesty that the accident was the driver's fault for turning on a red light without slowing down. I wanted justice to be done, I wanted that man in jail for the rest of his life for killing my brother.

After the police left, mother asked my other siblings to come down to the kitchen table. She and dad were seated at the heads, and Moriah, Peter, and Dennis came in and took their regular seats. Silent tears were eking out of Moriah's eyes, Peter was trying to be tough like dad and not cry, but his lip quivered, and Dennis sniffled throughout mother's entire discourse. I placed my hand on the seat of Cody's empty chair, to my right.

"Kids," mom sighed, straightening up. "I know this isn't—isn't easy." A small sob broke her speech. I hated to have to hear or see my mother cry; most of the time she was just such an inherently happy and kind person that to know she was sad just put a heavier layer gloom on the house. "And this is really …I hate that we have to deal with this, and I really hate that you guys have to deal with it."

"It's n-not fair," Dennis cried, pounding the table with his fist and looking imploringly at mother. "It's not fair!"

"No, it's not," mother assented. "Sometimes, life is just that way."

"Mom, you can't just say that," Moriah said thickly, her arms folded tightly. "We know life isn't fair, but that can't always be the explanation for things! The man that did this has to go rot in jail until he dies, and then rot in hell!"

Though Peter and Dennis soundly agreed, mother just shook her head. "That won't make it fair, Moriah. No matter how much time that driver spends in prison, it won't bring Cody back to us. Not in this life." She inhaled deeply again, encouraging us all to do the same. A collective breath came out along the table, except from my father, who continued to just sit there with his hands clasped in front of him, staring down. "You know we have to forgive that man."

"F—forgive him?" Moriah asked incredulously. "Mom!"

"We have to," mother said, with that gentle but insistent tone she had. "Just think how it must feel to be in his shoes. He has taken a young and beautiful life, he has taken it away from this world forever. And he has caused considerable pain and hurt in those who've been left behind." Her voice cracked again, and she took a moment to compose herself. "Think of the guilt he is going to have to live with for the rest of his life. He didn't mean to do it. That doesn't make it any easier to bear, but please, let's not further aggravate for him what will surely already be eternal torment."

And although I and my siblings still wanted to see this driver go through the most horrible punishment possible, we dropped the conversation there. He wound up pleading guilty, but that's all I know—I didn't want to learn anything else. I tried to distance myself from the accident as best I could.

The funeral was anything but a blur, and I can still recount every word that was spoken. And though I focused on each speaker and every song, the entire time, my eyes were focused solely on the casket sitting before our pew. I couldn't believe my big brother was in there. I just couldn't. We hadn't had a viewing, either. It just would've made it too much for all of us to think that this boy, this beautiful boy, had had his life taken away from him at such a young age. It wouldn't do to remind ourselves of it with such an unapologetic visual (furthermore, from what I understand, Cody had been very badly mangled in the accident). Mother gave the eulogy at the funeral as dad couldn't bring himself to even speak to anyone, and my tears only fell faster and harder at having to see mother stop so often to wipe her eyes. The worst moment was towards the end of her eulogy, where she pulled back from the microphone for nearly a full minute, as her crying kept her from being able to say anything comprehensible.

"I'm sorry," she said to the large congregation. "I'm sorry." She cleared her throat to make her last testimony after having spent a good twenty minutes talking about Cody's life. "Of course, this has been hard on all of us. Losing a family member is hard at any age, but it seems particularly …unfair to have lost Cody now." Mother withdrew her eyes from the back row and focused now on the front, looking directly at each of her children as she spoke: "The question you all want to know the answer to is 'why.' And kids, I wish I could give it to you. But I can't. And I know what you may be thinking. Yes, it was the truck driver who hit Cody, but you'll want to blame someone else. You'll blame God, say it's His fault."

This actually hadn't occurred to me, but I saw Moriah and Peter exchange uncomfortable looks.

"Don't blame God," mom sniffed. "It seems so unjust and so cruel, and you may want to know, if He is all-loving, why didn't He step in and keep this from happening? I want to make this point to you: do not blame Him. Do not turn away from Him, because we need Him now more than ever. Believe in Him like Cody did, and believe that Cody is with Him now. I believe that. The Lord is there for us during our hard times, to get us through our trials. And this… this is one heck of a trial, kids. But stick with us, stick to the Savior, and He will comfort you."

Mother really threw me off with that one. I'd never thought to blame God, but now that she brought it up, I thought that was a good point. Why do bad things happen to good people? Cody didn't deserve to die; he was practically a saint, and he had such a life ahead of him! Why couldn't it have been me, why did it have to be him? Why had God abandoned us?

People approached me at our reception, but I don't remember what they said. My mind was elsewhere. I could not wrap my head around the fact that as we all stood around, talking and exchanging memories and drinking lemonade and eating the many refreshments that people had brought, Cody lay in a wooden box underneath the ground, not seeing, not tasting, not listening, not breathing. I can remember Julia coming over to me, though she didn't say much because she was crying so hard. Whatever, I thought. You were only his girlfriend. A few years, maybe just a few months from now, they would have broken up. I should have seen him and been in touch with him for the rest of my life, and now he was gone. He'd never help me with my science homework again, he'd never stop Peter from making fun of me, he'd never roll his eyes at Moriah's boy-crazy antics, and he'd never stay up late to watch old movies with me. And the worst part of it was that it was my fault. He had died because he was picking me up from that stupid dance—if I'd kept my ground and made mom or dad come get me in the car, nothing would have happened. Cody would still be here.

He would have been at our house, not McNally, who had come under the pretense of paying his respects. To my complete disgust, he made a couple of snide remarks to me and tried to get me to go out with him to help me get over this tragedy. Fortunately he left shortly thereafter, and once everyone had gone home, I went to dad and said, "I want you to teach me how to use grandpa's gun."

And although dad was surprised by this request, he was willing to acquiesce. That very same day, he took me to a shooting range and showed me how to handle a gun. I was way off my mark the first couple of times, but I improved quickly, impressing even my hard-to-please father. Learning how to shoot made me feel powerful somehow, even though I knew I could never bring myself to kill even a rabbit or a quail, it just gave me a sense of control like nothing in my life had before. The first time I shot a bullet and hit a target with it, an adrenaline rush filled me like nothing had before. If McNally were ever to bother me again (which he did), I could tell to him look out, because I knew how to use a gun (which I did). Eventually he got the message and left me alone.

Mother was worried about what kind of impact this could be having on me, but I told her not to worry about it. I wasn't going to turn into a gun-toting lunatic. She feared that I was starting to rely on the power that guns gave people, and she wanted me to glean my power from the Lord. In that respect, I wasn't the one she needed to worry about—I was still saying my prayers every night, searching the scriptures daily for answers that Cody could no longer give me.