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    "Tom! It's 7:20!" a voice rang from downstairs, of course, that voice being my mom's. I rolled to the other side of the bed, my eyes clamped shut as I replied,

    "So?" Footsteps started coming upstairs, and I heard,

    "There's school today! Get up! You were supposed to be downstairs 30 minutes ago."

    "I don't care. I don't want to go to school." The door swung open, and there was my mother, her face fuming with anger beyond my belief.

    "You get out of bed. I don't care whether you want to go to school or not. You are going to get up and get to that school bus right now."

    "No..." I glanced up at mom. Her look lightened, and she sat down next to me.

    "Tom...I-I'm sorry," she started with a weak smile. "I almost forgot about yesterday..."

    "How could you possibly forget about yesterday?" I growled at her. She dodged my question, and said,

    "Tom, I'm very sorry about Mary. But these things happen; it's part of life."

    "I don't--" But I stopped. I could feel the old me start to rush back inside me. I couldn't let it consume me. I had already flipped a new leaf.

    "Yeah, your right," I said, though not with real commitment. "I got to get dressed and...comb my hair." I dragged myself out of bed, motioned my mother out, and started changing my clothes. Then I quickly combed back my hair.

    As I ran downstairs, it was 7:37, and the bus had already left. Pooey.

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    So, of course, I was seated inside our car, watching out the window as the old Ford bounced along the road. After about five minutes of speechless driving, mom finally decided to break the awkward silence and ask a question...the question she had probably been trying to think of for the past five minutes.

    "Did you finish your homework?" You'd think she could've thought of a better question...seeing we were going to school, so if I hadn't done my homework, than I couldn't do much about it.

    "We don't really usually have homework over the weekend..."

    "Oh," she said, almost in a surprised way. "Well, so you didn't have any?"

    "No, mom, I didn't." She turned to me, and asked yet again,

    "No homework? You sure!" At this point I was getting pretty annoyed, and tried to sound that way as I snapped,

    "Yes mom, I'm--" I suddenly noticed something--mom was not watching the road. In the middle of rush hour.

    And the car was tilted slightly onto the left side of the road, as people were driving carelessly 45 miles per hour.

    "Mom! Watch the road!" I suddenly warned. My mom jumped, and exclaimed back at me,

    "Tom! You gave me a heartatt--"

    "Watch the ro--" But as I said that, the screeching sound of a car burst into my ears. Flashing lights consumed me.

    But despite the other driver's attempt to break, the impact was unquestionably immense. The crash in the car rang in my ears, and it was one of those moments where you thought, I am going to die.

    Instantly, our car was spun out of control. I was swashed in my seat...my mother screaming out of control,

    "It will be all right! God loves us!" (please) "Tom! It will be all right! Don't cry! Don't cry!" She sure sounded like she thought everything was going to be all right. And suddenly, the screaming stopped. I wasn't sure if it was because I blocked it out or because she really had shut her mouth. Suddenly, a giant rush of pain gathered up in my shoulder. I glanced to my right, finding that I had just jammed my right shoulder into the window.

    It hurt. Bad. I clenched onto my shoulder, and gritted my teeth. It couldn't be too long until we stopped.

    It wasn't. The car made one final dramatic move as it flipped over into a ditch.

    Air-bags immediately went up. It was a good thing I was 14, I thought as I moved my head away from the air bag and looked up at the extremely dented top of the car. It's also a good thing I wore my seat belt. I was bent over as I stumbled out of the car, my left hand still grasping to my right shoulder.

    Well, good thing: I was alive, and only suffered of a pretty bad bruise. But as I looked back into the car, I saw my mom was in a much worse state. She was sitting there motionlessly. Her mouth was hanging wide open, and her head was laid back, along with body.

    It actually would've been pretty funny to look at her, if not for the fact that this was real.

    About 20 people pulled over and jumped out of their cars, asking me if I was all right, if I needed help, if I needed a drive.

    Before I knew it, there were police as well as an ambulance. The driver of the other car walked up to the police, who was examining our car.

    "That idiot of a driver left a dent in my car! Half her car was in my lane! She was obviously drunk driving."

    "Sir," the police said, standing up and looking at him, "let us do the investigating." The man looked annoyed, but walked away.

    The policeman strode over to me, and asked,

    "Are you the son?" I didn't say anything, but nodded.

    "Do you have anyone you can call?" he continued. I thought for a moment, and then nodded again. He handed me his cell phone, and I started to dial.