“They had a keg. Everyone was drunk or getting there. I resisted, at first. My parents were Mormon, so we didn’t have alcohol in our house. I had never even drunk alcohol before. But between the peer pressure and my depression and my friend nagging, I gave in. It was the worst mistake of my life. It didn’t take much to get me drunk. I had maybe three beers. My friend was completely wasted, so I took his keys and drove us home.”

I could see the pain grow in his eyes.

“We were coming down Parley’s Canyon onto twenty-first south. I was driving fast, close to sixty miles per hour, when I reached Sugar House Park. Wrong place, wrong time. There was a young family leaving the park. They were in the crosswalk. A mom, dad, a three- and a one-year-old in a double stroller. It was dark, and I was driving so fast I don’t know if I would have seen them anyway, but I hit them. The father saw me just before; he tried to push the stroller out of the way. He was killed instantly. I hit him and his wife and clipped the stroller, then rolled the car into a telephone pole.

“The mother was thrown more than eighty feet, but somehow she was still alive when the ambulance arrived. I climbed out of the car and walked around the scene like I was in a nightmare, listening to the mother scream for her children. When I have nightmares, that’s what I hear, that mother’s screams.” He looked into my eyes. “The three-year-old lived. Her name is Olivia. She’s seventeen now.”

I let the story settle over me. When I could speak I asked, “Have you met her?”

“A year ago,” he said softly. “I’ve taken flowers to the grave every year on the anniversary of their deaths.”

“December seventh,” I said. “That’s where you were.”

He nodded. “Last year I was in the cemetery, just kneeling there, praying for forgiveness, like I always do. When I stood, there was a teenage girl behind me. I hadn’t heard her come up. She just looked at me for a moment and then she said, ‘It’s you, isn’t it?’