That night I was still shamed from dropping out, defiant and angry. I patiently nodded while Grandma Nancy made me feel worse and worse, then went out to have a beer with Daniel, my best friend, roommate, and long unrequited love.

Daniel and I had a place in Boone, NC, close to the ASU campus. I was working for a florist and Daniel had become a clerk at Belk in the Boone Mall. We were both fully entrenched in our single twenty-something lifestyle, other than actual success, death was the next-furthest thing from our minds.

Unfortunately the car crash that took my life also killed Daniel. When we died, our obituaries didn’t say, “he never got caught cheating his way to his BS degree, which he used to sell men’s clothing at Belk,” or, “she chose her college based not on building a bright future, but because she was in love with a guy who treated her like a sister.” They trumpeted how everyone liked us, how close I was to my grandma and how Daniel came from a tragic background, only to end his life tragically. They also went into great detail about our work with the local homeless shelter.

The funny thing is, Daniel only worked at the homeless shelter because his girlfriend worked there and he wanted to impress her, and the night of our death was the first time I had gone with him. The papers didn't say that, either, nor did it say how reluctant I had been to go.

What can I say? The air of the desperate has always scared the shit out of me. When I was a Girl Scout (which the papers mentioned) I cried when we took Halloween candy to a nursing home to brighten the residents' day (which they did not). Uncomfortable with the stale smell and the toothless grins, the dingy nightgowns and the hopeless vacant looks, I trailed behind the girls in my troop. I peeked into an open door and saw an ancient man struggle to get out of bed. His hospital gown hung open at the back, and I could see his spindly legs, his sexless, nonexistent butt, and his bony back. I was sure he would shatter if he fell. Before I could look away, he slipped and scrabbled at the bed's supports, but went down.

I screamed and ran to get a nurse, who took care of it with such calm command I wondered if she were a robot. How could anyone human not run and hide from the vision of people decaying before they’d even died?

I never told anyone this, not my grandmother, and not even Daniel. He always invited me to go to the shelter and help out with him and Kristin, but I always refused. The night of our deaths, he finally snapped.