again.

I'm so relieved that he's doing ok. I can't even begin to think about the whole situation, that it would happen [again] so close to home, so close to me even, even closer this time. I see him every day. It's just weird and shocking and painful.

All day today, when I was trying to study, all I could think about was last year. I can't believe it's already almost been a year since that day. January 19th, 2007. I will never forget, nor do I think anyone who was at LS then could ever do so. All I could think about today was how I felt that day, after first being told by a panicked Mrs. Kramer to get out of the room quick, to go the very very long way around to another building, seeing the pool of blood outside the bathroom, the yellow caution tape across the doorway. Hearing from Amie's friend exactly what had happened because their friend had been in the bathroom. Sitting in Mr. Grace's room with Anna and Amy and Amie watching the Italian Job while we pretended nothing was wrong until we got official word. Finding out that he had died, probably right outside that bathroom, although not officially. Having to sit there, knowing what had happened, until we were allowed to leave, all of us streaming outside together from the school, not knowing what to think nor what to do, numbly walking to our cars and the buses to head home. Somehow driving home, then going to Amy's, then to work at Barbieri, where the principal came and talked to me about what had happened, which was touching. All the candlelight vigils. Standing outside LS in the freezing cold, but warm from huddling with hundreds upon hundreds of people with candles and flowers and emblems on the ground. The rage with the media and how it portrayed the whole event, how it made both the victim and John seem. How it made LS and Dr. Ritchie and our school as a whole seem. Coming back to write a letter to James and sending them up with a bundle of balloons to who knows where. Going back to school on Monday, and all cramming into the auditorium somehow, having Dr. Ritchie talk to us as a school. Going to each class, talking about the same things, the same events, painfully, over and over again, seven times. Somehow making it through that day too, with everyone. The silence of the school that day, seeing more tears than I have ever seen in my life. Actually standing where it happened with someone, and the disbelief.

All I could think of was that day today, and the days after, hoping that I would not have to relive that again.