The Fatal Jet Ski Ride :: Memoir Essays

The Fatal Jet Ski Ride Walking down the cold, white, hospital hall, my mind was racing a million miles an hour. How could she be dead? Two people in two days...what are the chances? We rounded the corner, my cousin Daniele holding on to me as hard as she could, me gripping her arm to keep myself in pace. There she was, Pam Doan, her body I should say, lying there under that white sheet. Pam, was my cousin's best friend, and mine too, for the fourteen days I'd been there. Two weeks earlier I had arranged for my boyfriend, Charles, to come pick me up and take me back with him to Bridgeport, Nebraska to stay with my Aunt Annie, Uncle Gaylen and my cousins Casey, 18 and Daniele, 15. I arrived there June 23rd, 2002, the day after my 17th birthday. The first few days consisted of Daniele teaching me how to drive her car, seeing how I didn't have one of my own there, and she couldn't drive yet. I had never driven a stick shift before, and it was a pretty comical experience for the both of us. But once I had mastered it, we drove all over that little town. Just Daniele, Pam and I. Pam was 17 also, looking forward to her 18th birthday in November. Our days started routinely. Daniele and I getting up and showering, convincing her dad to take the boat out to the town lakes so we could go tubing and water skiing. Meeting Pam out there and the three of us spending all day in our swimsuits getting tan and sore from riding those damn tubes around the lakes. A few trips here and there into town to my aunt's mexican restaurant to get some food. Then it was back into the shower as we got ready to go out for the night. There were places to go and people to meet. I met my cousin's ex-boyfriend, Aron, and his friend Kyle. Then there was "Perv", whose real name I haven't a clue. At one social gathering, Daniele and I were having a conversation with a couple of guys, one who was Aaron Houston and the other was Stuart Klassen, who will always be known to Daniele and I as "Possum". Then along came the 4th of July weekend that will haunt me forever. My uncle took their family camper out to the lakes and Daniele and I took turns with her brother, Casey, staying out there.