“Come on Tori! Hurry up!” My sister laughed at my failed attempt to make her hurry so that we could get to school on time. Tori was usually so organized and ready to go in the morning that I was surprised to see that she was scrambling to get all of her books in her backpack. Running out of the house with my keys in my hand I told her to hurry up and get in the car.

Tori looked at me and said in her sweet voice, “Can I please drive?” I had every intention of telling her no, that she was only thirteen and that was way too young, but then I remembered. Today was Tori’s birthday. She was fourteen now. “Alright, but don’t tell mom I’m letting you do this.” I knew that Tori had some experience with driving because I had seen her drive before when she was over at her friends’ house. Her friend had an older sister who would take them to the old abandoned K Marts parking lot and let them practicing driving there.

Tori got in the drivers seat and started the car. At first I was on the lookout for everything warning her not to go too fast and to watch out for red lights and stop signs. But Tori knew what she was doing and I started to relax. Flipping on the radio I heard my favorite song playing, “What Makes You Beautiful” by One Direction. Smiling Tori reached over and turned up the radio. Quickly I turned down the radio and told her not to do that. “It’s fine.” Tori said, “I can drive and listen to the radio at the same time.” I was about to contradict her when my voice was cut off by the blaring of a car horn, the squealing of a cars tires and the screaming of Tori as we saw a car heading straight towards the drivers side of the car. The last thing I heard was the crack of glass and the screeching sound of metal on metal.
The next thing that I knew I was standing in a grave yard looking down at a tombstone. On it was the name, Tori Keeps. Underneath that was her date of birth, March 3, 1998 and her date of death, March 3, 2012. I was shocked, how could this have happened? Then I remembered the car crash! I had let Tori drive and that killed her. She must have run a red light or something. “It’s my fault. I’m so, so sorry Tori! I wish I could erase the time. I would do things right, I promise!” With that said I broke down and started weeping uncontrollably over my sisters’ grave.
“Hey, are you alright?” Tori was looking at me like I was crazy, probably because I was just standing in front of the car door staring at nothing. Tori was alive! Holding in my emotions I looked at her and smiled. “Yeah, I’m o.k.” Tori looked at me and asked, “Hey, can I drive?” I shook my head and told her to get in the passenger side of the car. “Happy birthday” I told her. “And there’s many, many more to come.”