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Melanie's Story

by Tammy and Brian Bemis

As a parent you always think as long as you're a good mother and father everything will be all right. You always hear of tragedies and you say to yourself, thank God my kids are alive and you go about your day and everyday thinking it will never happen to me, we're good parents, kids are really good. We couldn't of asked for anything more.

I can still remember Christmas break of 2002. Our kids were so excited about Christmas. Especially Melanie, she loved going shopping and then wrapping the presents. I remembered we played a lot of cards on Christmas break and talked and laughed. And one night somehow we got on the subject of death and dying. Melanie said she's never going to be old. That she was going to be young forever. Of course I laughed and said we all would like to be young forever but unfortunately we all get older. And then she said she was afraid to die. I looked at her and said, Melanie everyone's afraid to die, but when it's our turn we will know it. So Christmas break was over and it was back to school. Christopher finally got to drive by himself with others in his vehicle. Of course Melanie didn't want to ride the bus. So I told Christopher he could take Melanie and Jeremiah to school. So he did Monday and Tuesday. Tuesday night they asked if they could take my car Wednesday, but I said no because I had some things to do that day.

I still remember January 8, 2003. My husband called and said that someone called and told him that the kids had been in a wreck. He said he thought maybe it was just a fender bender. So I got dressed so I could go down to see if they were all right. I remember praying to God. Please let my children be all right. When I got to the end of our road to crossover, I saw a man with his vehicle blocking the road. I knew then it was bad. So he let me through and I drove down the road and I saw the truck and my husband came up to me and said that they didn't think Melanie was going to make it. I knew she was gone. My only little girl was gone. She was only 14 years old. Christopher wasn't hurt, but our nephew Jeremiah was hurt pretty bad. I remember going to the hospital to see our son. He didn't know that she was gone. Melanie was like everyone's best friend, you could always talk to her and she would listen, we will never understand why she had to go. They were just on the way to school and hit black ice. Melanie died instantly.