That was the day that our town changed-that we were changed.

in just a few hours, one year ago, i was awaken by a text message that simply said "they found her." I was SO sure that she was just hiding out somewhere, mostly because i couldnt believe that anyone in our town was capable of anything worse. It took me a minute for the realization of what was being said to hit me. I sat up for the rest of the night, numb, and wondering how we were going to make it through school that day. There was a lot of crying and hugging in the hallways, but we had 800 kids who were counting on us to be strong for them, and that was what our jobs were, as staff at Simmons.

I spent that day, and the ones after it, in a complete fog. We all did.

That friday before, there was a train vs car accident right behind our school, at morning arrival time, involving the mother and baby brother of two of our students. We spent all day friday whispering to each other and giving glances because while we knew who was involved, the students' didn't.

Then came Saturday. The day they took you from your family. We were all at the homecoming game, cheering on our team and hanging out, laughing, and enjoying each other's company. I still have such a hard time thinking back to that day because it kills me to know that we were all at that game and just a few blocks away, you were taking your last breaths, over a bicycle.

We spent the next few days searching everywhere. I was so convinced that you had run away or were hiding. I just could not wrap my head around anything worse than a teenage stunt. Those things didn't happen in the town that we grew up in. The town where your awesome Grandmom taught for years, and where your father, your aunts and uncles, and you and your siblings all went to school.

People tried to blame it on race, and Clayton was not that town. Racism is so foreign to me because of where I grew up, and I am thankful every day for that. There are a lot of factors to blame this on, but race is not one.

Your death pulled the core of the town together for a common good, therefore, it was not in vein.

It affected so many of us in so many different ways. Some left town for a fresh start. Some made friends out of the tragedy. Some turned on their fellow townsmen, on the people that they grew up with, and got angry at the hurt that people were feeling. That last one is something that I surely will never understand, but the other stuff I totally get.

I have said, since a few months out, that the anniversary would be hard, though it seemed to be a lot better than I imagined, but that after that, the town would begin healing.


Autumn will not be forgotten. Her legacy is branded on us. In the wake of your death, a town came together in an unimaginable way, and that seems to have stuck. We will all move forward with our lives, which is to be expected, but we will all carry that day and that little girl with us forever.