My Friend.

The Accident

Mary Elizabeth Reagan was an exceptional child. She could play the violin at age eight, was playing Beethoven on piano by ten. Her grades were perfect, she never failed and most importantly she never gave up. Words would roll out her mouth like little acrobats and land perfectly in a sentence. She was an excellent public speaker, it was no surprise when she was awarded a scholarship to two universities for Political Sciences. We both grew up as neighbours in a little English countryside village that had one school with just over one hundred pupils. In our little village it was easy to stand out. Mary's voice and my forever-changing hair colour were always talking points of the town. That was why when, on our final day of school, Mary's death shocked us all. Mary pulled me towards the large Ferris Wheel at the centre of the touring carnival. We waited for the last of the previous riders get off and we climbed into a pod each. I thought it was strange that she wanted to be alone but before my pod was closed another body entered. This was her plan. The other person was none other than Jack Daniels who played football for our school. He was talented and was expected to play for the local city's football town after school. We were in each other's class since we were six and we had very few conversations. Even now, it was silent and awkward to talk to him. He smiled at me and opened his mouth.

"Jean, I know this is very abnormal but I asked Mary to get you alone so that I may ask you something,"

As shallow as it was I didn't expect Jack to speak so politely as most of the other football players spoke rudely. 

"I am alone," I said softly. "You may ask me,"

He stared at me. 

"You may not get the answer you expect," I added matter-of-factly.

He stared more. He opened his mouth unintelligibly.

"The cinema just opened around the corner and The King and I starts playing tomorrow," He coughed. "I wondered, if that is your type of film, if you would kindly go with me,"

He held out his hand. I clasped it. I nodded. I then saw a streak of blue fall past my window. Immediately after there was a loud scream. I let go of Jack's hand rushed to the window and looked down and saw the bloody body of Mary Elizabeth Reagan lying at the bottom of the Ferris Wheel. I let out a blood-curdling scream and collapsed into the arms of Mr Daniels. He held me until the ride stopped on the ground and I threw myself across the blue dress of my best friend. Eventually I was pulled off and the paramedics took her away in a black van and I never saw her again.

I went to her funeral and I sat in her bedroom with her parents a few weeks later and we went through her belongings. It helped me. I then saw a sheet of paper that we wrote when we were children and it stirred a memory of long ago.