Open me.

Dear Caroline, Right now you're opening this letter with a slightly confused look on your face. It's been four and a half years but you sort of remember this (scratch that definitely remember this Ms. Kind-of-photographic-but-not-really-memory-girl). It's the same de ja vou feeling we get when we check under the table in the living-room and see the spot where I wrote "bad things happening" in purple pen just because I thought it was cool. Or when you remember how the alarm went off that one time but we knew no one broke in because there weren't footsteps in the snow and feel like it was just yesterday but you know that's impossible because like usual it is 110 fracking (see vlogbrothers) degrees outside. Or that time when you put a quarter in the Santa clothes purse ordainment with a letter written in henna (that language you made up when you were six. I'm sure you still remember today... ail blic celleo?) And it had that funky message saying you were going to die unless you did this and this and this. I'm pretty sure you wrote that just to seem cool and mystical because you were way too fracking (see john greene) addicted to Harry Potter at that point (STILL WAITING FOR THE HOGWARTS LETTER, jk.) Point is you did it and you felt cool when you were doing it then you looked back and laughed and felt embarrassing and relieved that no one found it or understood it. (I understand that's a run on sentence and this is full of grammatical errors, Ms. Novelist.) This is probably going to end up being one of those things when you have a nice laugh and kind of remember this but not really and it will seem like yesterday and a really long time at the same time. But this is different. I'm holding you to this. Suppose everything works out. The Taliban haven't destroyed St. Louis. The new nuclear reactor didn't break like in Japan. The Mayans were wrong. You managed to make it through high school without killing yourself or ending up like Emily Butler, Meredith Brouster, The Douche/Devil's Spawn/Lucifer, or ending up WITH him. Suppose everything goes right. May day went perfectly and you had a fabulously preppy yet cheap one-of-a-kind dress. You were on the activities committee for at least another year besides the upcoming one. You managed to survive NCL and gracefully completed your presidency sophmore/junior/senior year. Maybe even a run at student council. The brand new neighbors who are moving next door in September have you babysitting every once and a while and you're the best Peer Tutor there is. Hopefully there was an internship along the way or you made it into STARS. Maybe you even got over your silly grudge with DanDan (the teacher not Kate's bf/future husband). I hope Bareback Paperback is on the bestsellers list... or at least made it to print. So say best case scenario you're on your way to Stanford with a 4.0 in the fall (unless California is in ruins/owned by china more so than it already is, then you're fracked (see the fault in our stars) and headed to Princeton to run). Straying from the point. Anyway, the point is you're about to graduate or already have. You're ready to take the next step in your life. And take some advice from someone who's about to do the same thing. I don't care how high school went. The important thing is now. And the first thing you're going to do right now is to follow these instructions VERY CAREFULLY AND EXACTLY. The first thing you need to do is wait until 11:11pm tomorrow (your least favorite time of the day) and be able to leave by 12:11pm exactly. Take care of anything you need to do before then. Next find your old Vera Bradley bag in the basement (the purple and green one with flowers). Put on a pair of your oldest sperries, skinny jeans, and an old oversized teeshirt. Leave your hair in ratty pigtails. Absolutely no make up. Put two cans of redbull in the bag, along with Bugals, ice breakers, and water. Make sure your tank (of either the jeep or accord) is full. Throw in a notebook and TWO eraseable pens for good measure. Stash the guitar in the trunk of your car. As one of your very first upper school teachers says "the problem isn't getting it, it's getting out." Well you got into college and it's going to be tough getting out. You need to solve some unfinished business first and prep for the upcoming four years that lead to the rest of your life. Soon you'll be sitting in an office living from 9-5 with crumbles of your 2.5 kid's cherrios shoved in between any spare minute you have. It should take three hours to get to Sweet Springs. Yes, Sweet Springs Missouri. You know exactly what that is. Park by Gusher Park's playground. It should only take fifteen minutes to do what you need to do. I know this sounds crazy now but you'll understand when you get there. You'll understand. I'm not promising anything or saying these 15 minutes will change your life, but you have to do it. Be back at home by six, lovely. You are only allowed to play: Casimir Pulaski Day Mrs. Robinson American Pie Sweet Caroline Say Yes- Elliott Smith For Emma- Bon Iver Bruises- Chairlift I Won't Give Up- Jason Mrazj You are only allowed to take one person. Whoever is closest to you. If they need any convincing I guess they weren't really close in the first place. Remember to take your phone, ID, and Credit card but leave them sealed in your bag. See you later honey. The sensation of six ribs breaking at once thrust me into consciousness. Screams tore at the midnight air until the world around me crumbled into a melted heap on the warm interstate pavement. The impact was instant. Metal on metal. Head first. Two grinding forces unbound by yellow double striped lines pounding together in a mangled mess. Raspy breaths transformed into suffocating hiccups, cut closer and closer, pressed harder and harder. My body wound so tight it hurt to think. Then the impossible happened. Time stopped. Dust settled; motors hummed. It grew quiet enough to hear the lonesome squawk of a barn owl, miles away. The airbag had retracted enough for me to take a shaky breath needed to process the past minute. Thinking proved to be impossible. I didn’t know my own name, much less where I was. My brain pulsed with the pounding reminder of a single word: Run. We needed to run. “Becca,” a voice shouted. Becca? My head swam. Was that my name? It seemed familiar, but a wave of fogginess over took the recollection. “Are you okay?” The voice spoke again. “Yeah,” I said, unsure of whom I was talking to. The voice didn’t respond. Instead, it focused on something else. “They’re turning around!” I looked up at what the voice was talking about. Through the windshield I could see a black SUV about fifty yards away. The car had tinted, almost opaque windows and an empty space where its license plate should have been. It was turning around, so fast that I could hear the squelch of the tires from where I was sitting. It was getting faster, heading quick and straight for us. It was destined for a head on collision. It was pulsing closer and closer, until our sentence was inevitable. There was no trial. There was no justice. The verdict was out and we were the ones marked by death’s impending arrival. Karma doesn’t miss a beat. It was close enough that I could touch the driver of the SUV without leaning over too far; I could feel its warming grip already ushering me into a place I was sure I didn’t want to go. Was this my last whiff of life, the reflection of my car’s headlights in the sunglass-cloaked eyes of a stranger, two guns strapped across his chest, a slight smile at his lips? My CNS must have been bogged down with god knows what, but I was still alert enough to realize this was a very surreal end to an otherwise normal life. Just as fast as the grin had appeared, it dissolved. Five seconds to impact. I had to remember. Remember. Run. I braced myself. At the very last moment before collision the SUV veered left, scraping across my jeep with the metallic sound of steel on steel. Then the noise stopped altogether and the SUV was nothing but a hazy blur against the Chiricahua Mountains in our rearview mirror. (your most recent piece of writing... I wonder how the contest will go) -Yourself, Four and Half Years ago. The very night before your first day of high school.