Now, that's not saying that they each didn't have their own weaknesses. One talked too much sometimes, another had the worst memory, and a third had dyslexia. The fourth, his name was Jack, and he had some trouble with frustrations. When he got too frustrated, he would either start hitting things or he would just stay completely still. Luckily, his three friends would help him whenever they saw him begin to reach his limit in a conversation or situation.
One winter day, they were goofing off, as usual. The four friends had already sat at their favorite spot at the park, talking to eachother and prying into one anothers' business about girls, school stuff, and whatnot. Then, they all got in the car to leave.
They began driving into town, ready to take on the world as all boys of their age were.
Then they saw headlights right in front of them, traveling well above the speed limit.
Jack was the only friend who survived the car crash.
Weeks after the funeral, Jack is walking home from school due to a fight breaking out. He can't remember if he started it or not, but it doesn't matter. Just another reminder that they're gone. He didn't want his mom leaving her work and coming to get him, so he just walked. Luckily, he lived 2 miles away from the school.
During the weeks following the accident, he had recieved the usual condolences offered by his classmates, but now it seemed that his friends were forgotten. Even the principal stopped including their names in the announcements during the moment of silence. He tried to focus on his classes, because he knows that's what his friends would have wanted him to do, but it seems to get harder and harder every day. He gets home and tosses his back pack into his room because he knows that he won't be able to focus. Instead, Jack goes into the living room, intending to turn on the TV, but he doesn't. Instead, all he can think about his what happened to his friends.
Jack's eyes begin to tear up, and within the next minute they're pouring out of his eyes. He doesn't know if he can even live with this loss anymore, with this pain. He's tried and tried, but he just can't. He decides it's better if he doesn't have to endure the pain at all. He looks around his house for a length of rope and finds some in his garage. He goes out into the front yard, not bothering to put on a coat because he knows he won't need it for long. He went to Boy Scouts at his church, so he easily tied the not that was needed and flung it over a nearby tree limb. He finishes tying the rope and goes inside, looking for a chair.
He finds one and brings it out under the noose of the rope. Jack ties it around his neck and looks around, taking in everything for the last time, glad for a beautiful last scene of Earth for him to see. Then, he closes his eyes and moves his legs to kick down the chair...
Suddenly, before he can kick it down, he suddenly feels a warmth that envelops his entire body. He looks and sees three people, each wearing jackets and jeans, their hands stuffed in their jacket pockets. Jack looks closer.
He sees that's it's his friends, smiling at him. He smiles and more tears fall from his eyes. He looks down at the chair and is prepared now more than ever to remove the chair. He looks back at his friends, ready to see them in the next life. But then, they suddenly shake their heads. He frowns. He asks them why, and they just shake their heads, smiling sadly. More tears fall from Jack's eyes, and now his vision is blurred. He doesn't care what they think, he's going to see them again. He takes a deep breath and kicks the chair.
Thats when the branch above him snaps from his weight.
He layed on the ground for so long, he was still there when his mom got home. She found him and rushed him to the hospital. where they treated him for hypothermia and bruising. But, he was still alive. When he gained consciousness, his mother was sitting by his bed, half asleep. He called out to her softly, and she woke up. She gave him the biggest hug she could muster, and they both sat there in that hug, crying on eachother's shoulders.
Now, when he thinks about the loss of his friends, he thinks of that time when he nearly died. But he was saved by a dead branch weakened from winter's cold. He thinks of the second chance given to him, promising not to let it go to waste. Promising to live as his friends would want him to live.
