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Michelle and I were in seventh grade when we became friends. We met in the outfield during our gym-class field hockey games. She and I would both head toward the outfield because we knew there was little chance of the ball coming out that far. The outfield was a great place for two gym-hating girls to have a conversation about the "important" things in life.

After eight or so years of growing close and growing up together, Michelle and I became the victims of a drunk, speeding, driver a month or so before our 21st birthdays. Michelle died as a result of injuries almost immediately. I was left with a bunch of injuries and a future, which had once been colored and rich with the bright dreams Michelle and I had shared, had been replaced by a blank, white, screen before my eyes. As I saw the blank white screen that had so cruelly taken the place of a once warm and inviting future, I realized there was no path to follow, no doors to open, and no clear milestones ahead. It was as if everything in my world and future had been wiped out, and I was left to venture on alone - completely alone. Maybe it wasn't really about losing my future, as it was about seeing all those growing-up years disintegrate.

I don't pretend to have known exactly what my plan was as I entered that blank, white, future; but I was very aware that having that seemingly blank future was having a better future than Michelle had been given. It was, at times, difficult to reconcile being happy to have that bleak future while grieving the loss of a friend, as well as her loss of her future. I had to decide not to try to reconcile those feelings. It was clear that, with such an emptied out future ahead, all I could do was pack up what was left of a damaged life and take the first steps.

In the beginning, I felt as if I was, in fact, surrounded by all that nothingness. Just as I had thought it would be, it was like walking through an expansive, snow-covered, mountain range with no paths. As time went on, I began to run into new people and new situations, which added color to all the white. Over the time, the white was no longer as stark. There was more and more color, although the absence of the feeling of having paths to walk remained unsettling. Once enough time had passed I became used to the feeling of having had all the normal paths of life taken from mine, and, I suppose, I became skilled at making the best of things.

The paths that were missing were those paths Michelle and I had imagined throughout

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