When I went to sleep that night I was full of the kind of happiness I never dreamed possible. Little did I realize that tragedy was about to yank my happiness away as fast as I had achieved it.

I awoke to Aiden out of bed, leaning over me and gently kissing me on the lips, then placing his finger over mine to keep me quiet. "Mom's home", he said as he handed me my underwear, "And she sounds like she's on the warpath. Get dressed, quickly". 

I did as he said, and once we were both dressed we went downstairs to the kitchen. Aiden's mother was there glaring at us, and Richie was sitting there at the breakfast nook eating his cereal with a big shit eating grin on his face. I had never seen such a venomous look on her face – she was usually happy to see me, but not this morning. Had she somehow found out what we had done? I looked over at Aiden and it was clear he was thinking the same thing.

"So, how was your evening?" She asked coldly.

"Fine", Aiden said carefully.

"What did you do last night?"

"We just sat around watching movies."

Richie piped up: "That's not all you did!"

The blood drained out of my body, and I could see Aiden had turned white as a sheet as well. Worse, his mother noticed it on both of us.

"Shut up, Richie!" Aiden said.

"Don't you talk to your brother like that! He didn't do anything wrong! You, on the other hand, are in big trouble. Now, I'm going to ask you again, what did you do last night?"

"I told you, we just watched movies!"

"Really. Well, would you mind explaining this?" she said, as she reached behind her and presented three empty beer bottles.

"...Or this?" she said, as she slammed a full ashtray down on the table, butts going everywhere.

Aiden and I glanced at each other, our relief palpable. Yes, getting caught smoking and drinking was bad. Very bad. But if she had known what we really got up to it would have been certain death for both of us. She mistook our relieved expressions for smugness.

"You can wipe those smiles off your faces, both of you. Richie told me that you guys huffed him off to bed as soon as the first movie was over, but he didn't want to go to bed so he hid in the hallway and watched the other movie. He said he also watched you guys smoke about a half pack of cigarettes each and drink beer."

Aiden shot Richie a dirty look, and he just grinned back. Richie was clearly enjoying this.

Aiden's mom continued: "What the hell were you thinking? That I wouldn't notice the beer missing? Well, clearly you weren't thinking at all, because you didn't even bother cleaning up after yourselves. I found the beer bottles and cigarette butts all over the table when I got home from work".

We both looked at each other, then at our feet. We really were that stupid.

"Well, you're grounded, Mister", she said to Aiden. She then rounded on me: "And I'll be telling your parents about this too".

Aiden's mom's anger at us seemed to pale in comparison to Aiden's anger at Richie. I was kind of mad at him too, but it wasn't his fault that we smoked and Aiden drank, and we did leave the evidence lying around, so we'd have been caught anyway. Aiden did not share this opinion and was being particularly nasty. Each time he said something awful to Richie his mother barked at him to leave him alone. 

It was very uncomfortable for me there, so I left shortly after Aiden's mom had finished reaming us out one last time. I was relieved to be gone but terrified about what my father would have to say about my smoking. I wasn't worried about the beer – I couldn't stand the stuff and Dad knew it – but he would kill me over the smoking. 

I slowly made my way home and went inside. Everything was normal, so I figured Aiden's mom hadn't told Dad yet. Relieved, I planted myself in front of the TV set, with the phone right next to me, determined to be the one to answer it when she called – no small task with a house full of teenagers. Several hours passed, and while there were several calls (Mom and Dad were going to be hosting a New Year's Eve party that night), Aiden's mother was not one of them. I guessed she had either calmed down or was going to call after she woke up after her night shift.

When she finally did call, I answered, and it was not the call I was expecting at all. In fact it was the beginning of one of the most traumatic things I had ever experienced.

"Hi Carmen, have you seen Aiden or Richie?"

"Um, no, I haven't. I thought Aiden was grounded."

"Well he is, but after you left he and his brother got into a big fight. They were screaming at each other, and Richie ran out of the house crying. I tried calling him back but he disappeared, so I sent Aiden out after him. I haven't seen either of them since. Let me know if you see either of them, OK?"

"Sure".

I had barely hung up the phone when Aiden knocked on the door.

"Hey man, your mother is looking for you."

"I know. Listen, I need your help. Richie took off and I can't find him."

"Have you checked by the lake?"

The lake was only just starting to freeze, with maybe two inches of ice on it, and it wasn't frozen all the way across. We had warned Richie to stay away from it, even told him there were monsters in the water, but he still always found his way there.

"Yes, but I didn't see any sign of him down there. I need you to help me look for him, OK?"

"Sure. I'll call the guys up, we'll all look."

"I feel so guilty," Aiden said. He was clearly choking back tears. "I was really bad to him, and I said some really bad things. If anything happens to him I don't know what I'll do."

It was probably 11:00AM by the time I rounded up Ian, Danny, and Alex. We all went to the woods by Aiden's house, spread out, and started searching, looking for any sign of Richie. There was no snow on the ground yet, so we had little to go by; no tracks to follow. We thoroughly searched those woods, then moved out into the neighbourhood, calling out his name and looking anywhere a kid might hide: Under tarps, in boats in peoples' yards, in unlocked sheds, etc. We searched until suppertime, when it started getting dark. We then headed back to Aiden's place, and were shocked to discover several police cars in front of his house. This was getting really serious.

Ian, Danny and Alex split off to go home, but I went inside with Aiden. His mother was there with a few police officers. When we went inside the cops sat us down and told us that not only was Richie missing, but so was a six-year-old girl who lived just down the road. They asked us where we had searched and if we had seen anything, and while they were asking I looked at Aiden's mother. The look she had on her face while we were talking to those police officers will haunt me to my dying day. I had seen people who were worried before and had heard the expression "worried sick" countless times without even thinking about it, but this woman was literally and clearly worried sick. We answered their questions, and the police told me I might as well go home, that we had done what we could do and it was now up to them.

When I got home I told Mom & Dad what was going on, and they became worried also. Their guests started showing up for the party. Several had heard the news on the radio about two missing six year old children, but they hadn't realized that it was somebody we had known. As the party progressed the mood got more somber - It was the saddest New Year's party ever. People were just standing around staring into their drinks, and on the rare occasion a conversation started it was about the two missing kids. 

Each time the phone rang everybody jumped and held their breaths while somebody answered it. Each time, it was something completely unrelated: Friends of my brothers or sister calling, party guests calling to say they were running late or couldn't make it, stuff like that. Throughout the evening I tried calling Aiden a few times. Each time the phone was answered by a police officer, who would tell me that there was no news but that the search continued. Eventually they asked me not to call again because Richie might be trying to call. The cop assured me they'd call us and let us know as soon as there was any news.

The party went on (albeit subdued) and time passed very slowly. The phone calls dropped off as siblings' friends were admonished not to call and all of the party guests were either already here or not coming at all. It was the most agonizing evening I ever went through.

Then, shortly before midnight, the phone call came that would forever change things. When it rang the party screeched to a halt and everyone looked at me. I picked up the phone and said, "Hello?"

It was Aiden, and he was crying uncontrollably. He finally managed to stammer out: "They found him. They found him in the lake. He went through the ice".

"What do you mean, in the lake?" I could see the blood draining from the faces of everyone at the party. A few people gasped.

Aiden continued crying, then screamed into the phone "HE'S DEAD! BOTH OF THEM ARE! THEY DROWNED! THEY FOUND THEM BOTH IN THE WATER!"

At those words I started to choke up. I didn't know what to say or do.

I said "Aiden..."

He cut me off. Still crying, he said "I've got to go, they want to use the phone. I'll talk to you later. He's dead, Carmen. Gone. Forever. And it’s all my…"

And then he hung up.

I stood there with the phone in my hand. I could not move. I looked around at the party guests, who were all staring at me. Tears were running down my cheeks, and I started hearing sobbing coming from the crowd. I couldn't say anything. I just wanted to drop the phone and run to my room but my body was not responding to signals. My mother, sobbing, came over, took the phone out of my hand, and hugged me. I was still in shock, so I just stood there. I didn't hug her back. I didn't say a thing. I just stood there while my mother hugged me, and a whole party's worth of people started crying. Mom stopped sobbing long enough to let go of me and say "Why don't you go to bed, honey?"

I don't remember answering. I don't remember walking to my room. I don't remember getting undressed and crawling into bed. All I can remember is lying in that bed, staring at the ceiling, and picturing Richie's face in my mind with that big grin, the whole time thinking "I'm never going to see him again. He's gone. Forever". 

I laid on my back for a while, tears streaming from the corners of my eyes onto my pillow, then turned and looked at the numbers on my clock radio. 11:59. That number seemed to hang there for an eternity, the longest minute ever. It seemed like the whole 13 years and six days of my existence had flashed by, but the world was stuck on 11:59. Finally the red LED's changed to 12:00. 1984 was gone, 1985 was here. It dawned on me that there was no countdown at the party; no noise, no cheers welcoming the new year. Nobody felt like celebrating. Everyone there, whether they knew Richie or not, was a part of this tragedy, and they sat, talked, and cried while 1984 sneaked off into the history books.

The next morning the reality started setting in. For one thing, the story was all over the radio and TV, and the details of what had happened were starting to emerge. The two children were found after the RCMP helicopter discovered a hole in the ice about 40 feet from the shore. It was difficult to find because the ice was thin and there was no snow on it, so the hole in the ice was the same colour as the ice itself. New ice had started to form over the hole, so it had been at least a few hours. They sent some divers into the lake to search. First Lake was still murky from the silt due to the construction of the subdivision, but thankfully there were no currents – the lake was spring fed, so there was no major rivers in or out. They found their bodies a just a few feet apart, and only 20 feet or so from the hole. They had gone through just beyond a drop off – had they gone through just ten feet closer to shore they'd have been in knee deep water. None of this matters, of course: They went through the ice, and they were dead. Two six year old children, gone far too early.

This was my first real experience with death, and I wasn't sure how to deal with it. My grandparents had all died before I was two years old so I didn't experience that loss. All of my aunts and uncles were all healthy and alive. Until now I had never even thought about death and what it meant. It had just not occurred to me at all. Now I was forced to face reality. All I could do was picture Richie and think about how I'd never see him again. And if this was bothering me this much, imagine how poor Aiden and his mother were taking it, not to mention the parents of that girl!