HEARTBREAKING NEWS

YOU NEVER WANT TO LIVE SOMETHING REMOTELY CLOSE TO WHAT MY FRIEND LIVED SOME WEEKS AGO.

It was almost 6 am when the doorbell rang.  It was a Saturday and everyone was sleeping. At the lack of answer, the men on the door knocked louder.

A half-awake middle-aged man went to the door and opened it and found two grim looking policemen waiting for him.

“Are you…?” one of them asked.

My friend, still not completely conscious answered that yes, he was.

“I am afraid we have some bad news” the other policeman said.

By this time his wife was almost at the door, but the visitors had not seen her yet.

“Your son suffered an accident” the agents said “and we are sorry to have to tell you that he is dead.”

The scream did not come from my friend, but from his wife who fainted on the front door.

Yes, you do not want to go through a moment like that ever.

My friend and I grew up together in Venezuela. We attended the same school, played baseball on the street, shared many things; we stayed over in each other’s house. We are more than friends we are brothers.

We decided to come to this country searching for a better future for our families, knowing that the government in our country had chosen the wrong path for development.

Then fate happened.

Or was it something else?

His son is dead in what appears to be a reckless drunk-driving accident. I have to say appears to be, because it is still under investigation, although a very slow investigation if you ask me, but then again, I am not the authorities who have to deal with the case, I am only a concerned and interested, even biased, party to this.

This is apparently (here I go again with the apparent and alleged words) what happened.

My friend’s son, 22 years of age and full of vibrant desire to live, got on a car with another youngster. I have been told that this young man had been drinking, again, I have been told, I was not there. They boarded the car, but the passenger, who happened to be Alexis, such was my friend son’s name, could not fasten his seat belt because it was not working.

The driver, accelerated up to more than 80 miles per hour and in a second, lost control of the car.

What happened afterwards was very fast. The car hit a pole, a cement pole nonetheless and it was immediately totaled. The driver did not suffer much, but the passenger, who could not buckle up, was ejected from the car and died on the scene.

I went to the scene of the accident, and I could not imagine why someone would go that fast in that expanse of road, but he did and the result was a terrible loss for my friend and his family.

It had only just begun

It is a nightmare. It is impossible to think of it otherwise.

Imagine going to the morgue and go through the process of retrieving what was once and not long ago, a vibrant person, was now a body. I hate to write these words, but if I don’t, my message won’t get through; their son was forever gone from this world.

Drunk-driving fatalities

According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) 32,885 people died in traffic crashes in 2010 in the United States (latest figures available), including an estimated 10,228 people who died in drunk driving crashes, accounting for 31% of all traffic deaths in that year.

If you did not read that number, do it again, please.

More than 32 thousand people died in traffic accidents in 2010 and more than 10 thousand as a result of drunk driving.

Something has to be done

(To be continued)