Dream, Nightmare, Reality

Cassie Brownlow loved winter break. Every Christmas they went up to Chicago to see her grandparents on her dad's side. When she was ten she'd asked why they never visited her mom's family. Her mom had left the kitchen doing a poor job of hiding the tears. Cassie had spit out an apology before her dad could figure out what to say. Her mom's family had never been brought up again. This year was the year Cassie finally became a teen. Being born at 12:01 on January 1st she'd been the 1st baby of the year in her hospital. Her mom still had the special bracelet the hospital had given her, even though it was just a plastic band. It read "1st in the Millennium" and had the hospital logo printed on either side. Cassie thought that it was cringe. And the last couple of years she'd groan when her mom took out her baby box right after the ball dropped at midnight. One tradition Cassie didn't mind were the ribs they always had for her birthday dinner. They came from this small place across the border in Indiana. They were the best! So tender that you couldn't pick them up too fast cause the meat would fall off. Cassie was sure better ribs didn't exist anywhere in the world. At noon her patents headed out to pick up the order. Sometimes Cassie went, but this year she stayed behind because some of her cousins had already arrived. Cassie and her cousins went out to build snowmen and have snowball fights. coming in every hour or so to warm up. Everyone lost track of time as the family slowly arrived. It wasn't until the sun began too set that people started to worry. Two hours later their was a knock at the door. Apparently both her parent's phones had broken in the crash. With them being from out of town it took a while to track down the family, but Cassie hadn't heard the cop explain. Cassie hadn't heard anything after "Do you know a Derrick and Tiffany Brownlow?... I hate to tell you, but there was a crash this afternoon. They both died at the scene." Cassie's attention had been caught by the vase filled with thirteen,of her favorite calla lillies, her mom had given her the night before. Just like that Cassie was an orphan. Because an older Cousin had moved in with them to save on housing during College. It was decided that Cassie would finish out the school year before moving up to Chicago to live with her grandparents. Cassie cried a lot those first couple of days, and then she stopped. You couldn't say she shut down. Cassie became a top student, not that she'd ever been bad, but Bs and Cs became Straight As. She stopped celebrating her birthday, although her grandma refused to let her skip her sweet 16th. Living like that Cassie Brownlow got a full ride to Vanderbilt University.