By the time I'd posted my overlap entry late Friday night, it had already happened. But nobody knew it yet besides the dozens of kids who'd started calling each other within minutes.

My sister didn't find out until after 5:00 Saturday morning. I didn't find out until after 6:00.

At 6:21, my phone rang. I looked at the screen. It was my sister, Dina. I answered. She was crying.

Now my grandmother has been in the hospital for a couple of weeks, and not in the best of health. So I steeled myself for the news that my grandmother had died.

But that's not what had happened. That's not why Dina was crying.

I can never remember the exact words at times like this.

"Cory...(blah)...accident...(blah)...killed...died," she told me.

My mind went off-track. I hadn't steeled myself for this. Not at all.

Wait a second, I thought. Cory is her son's name. My nephew's name. And he was killed AND he died? That's just too much.

It's still too much. It will be too much for a very long time.

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I've been at Dina's all day. Everyone has gathered around her. Doing what we can, which isn't much, but it's something. Making phone calls so family and friends don't hear about it on the news. Screening calls to Dina's house. Making sure that someone is always at her side, offering comforting touches.

My family is destroyed.

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I suppose it's ironic or something that all of the thoughts I used to suppress so that I could sleep, those are the thoughts I call upon now to let me sleep. I call upon these fantasies from the past to distract me from the horrors of the present.

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I went to work Monday. Dina had gone to the visitation for another boy killed in the accident. I needed to keep busy. So I sat at work and configured some software while my nephew lay on a slab at the funeral home.

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I'm so worried about my sister. About everyone in my family, but mostly about Dina.

This is the hardest thing she will ever do. She will get through it though. Not because she wants to, because there will certainly be times when she doesn't want to. But she'll get through it because she has to. Because she's the strongest person I know, and because she has a daughter and another son. She will get through this and while she'll never get over this pain, she will get to the point where she can at least live with it.

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Tomorrow is Cory's visitation. The funeral is Wednesday.

So fucking surreal.

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One of many news stories about the accident.