2,555 Days

Its August 1^st again and it’s been 7 years since we lost them, that’s Two thousand five hundred and fifty five days give or take a few since I last saw Matthew and Ricky. Not one of those days went by without thinking of them.  It was a day just like this one with the sun out and blue skies above, what a nice day it was.

 I remember Ricky and Brian coming over to see if the boys and I wanted to play basketball and telling them that we would be going swimming later that day and them asking if they could come along. I told them that they could come with us if it was alright with their parents. When we left later that afternoon we had no idea that our lives would be forever changed that evening. The five of us packed into a little ford escort heading out for a night of fun at the pool. After getting there we made our way to the water and jumped right in and for the next few hours we had a blast, racing, diving and splashing around. We had invited some of our friends and family to join us that night but only my brother Albert came. Matthew, Patrick, Ricky, Brian and I spent the whole time there in the water having the “best time ever” as the kids would say. But nine o’clock came around and the whistle blew and we headed for the doors. I called home to tell Marisela that we would be home in a little bit as I was hanging up Matthew said that wanted to tell his mom about doing a flip off the diving board but I told him he could tell her when we got home.

  

We all piled into the car and headed to the corner store across the highway and picked up some snacks for the ride home, leaving the store we stopped at a red light right in front of the store. As we sat there I stared up at the light waiting for it to change, Ricky who was sitting in the front passenger seat was trying to get Brian to eat some hot Cheetos or something like it. Brian was sitting in the center of the back seat with Matthew to his right, behind Ricky with Patrick to his left behind me. As we all sat there in that little car waiting for the light to change we had no idea that those were the last few moments of the life we were living. The light turns green and I start to drive. In those next few minutes there was chaos, shouts and screams then there was silence.

 A drunk driver on the highway headed in the opposite direction had lost control of her vehicle went down across the median hit the opposing lanes of traffic and went airborne landing on top of our car crushing the roof down on us.

When the smoke cleared and the people that had stop to help were able to approach the car they found that Ricky and Matthew had been killed in the crash and that Patrick, Brain and I were critically injured.  

It’s been seven years since that day and the heartache and pain of losing them has never really left and sadly, in the last seven years nothing has really changed when it comes to people that drink and drive. Their still out there and an average of 1,100 Texans die each year in alcohol related crashes. 

Matthew and Patrick

Ricky and Brian 

 We have all had some form of tragedy strike our lives but it’s the one that you know can be prevented that are harder to take. Life has too many struggles in itself for us to add to it so never drink and drive.