Today was a hard day. My alarm clock went off at 6 am ringing in my ear, the little black box on my headboard singing as loud as it can. I raise my hand up and smack the box hoping it will turn off. Silence rolls over my room, I roll over feeling my soft plush sheets against my skin as I wonder…...why should I get up today? What does the day have in store for me? Will I make it through it? Just then my mom screams up the stairs.

MRS.RAY- MEDIUM LENGTH BLACK HAIR ABOUT 5,8 SLIM TO MEDIUM WEIGHT, 43 years old.

“Elaina are you up? Are you ready for school?”  (Mrs. Ray)

I pull myself out of my bed through some clothes and head downstairs. When I reach the bottom It begins even harder to get out of the door. I felt like I was 1000 pounds getting heavier and heavier as I take the smallest simple steps to get out the door. ‘BEEP’ I jumped… my mom was honking her horn to get me to hurry up. 

MRS.RAY

“Honey, are you doing okay?” 

ELAINA- ABOUT 5,3 LONG BROWN HAIR SLIM TO MEDIUM WEIGHT, 19 years old.

“Yes” 

MRS.RAY

“Are you sure you just seem” 

ELAINA

“Yes I said yes I'm fine just a little tired that's all” 

As we drive down the road I gaze out the window, the bright green leaves on the trees look like they could just crumble with a strong wind gust. The crystal blue sky that could crack if a meteor hit it. All of a sudden we stop, my mom hits the brakes and the car just stops…we're sitting there in the school parking lot with what feels like the whole world moving around me. 

Elaina

(Say it casually as the words fall out of your mouth)

The world is a crazy place to live in, theirs crime, vandalism, bullying, fights, and more. How do we figure out whether to be the good people or the bad, to be nice or mean? Every day we wake up and go to work or school or something else you have to do that day.  You have a choice, whether or not to be good or bad.

ELAINA

(Wake up lay in bed for a second then get up but look tired depressed not ready for the day)

At 9am the alarm goes off. I wake up, make my bed, then head to the shower to start my day clean. After my shower I get dressed, you almost believed that right…. Like anyone actually writes inside of a journal like this all day every day...Did you believe me? Did you really believe me? In three days it's my birthday, my mom has made a trip on a private plane to some destination that I don't know of. However, I'm excited…. I think...

ELAINA

(Look confused as putting things into the suitcase)

I need to pack today. I have been asking my mom and brother about where we are going if it's hot, cold, or warm. I grab my large blue suitcase and start to fill it with things I think I will need. I pack so many clothes, probably more than I ever needed.

MRS.RAY

“Elaina, I have a surprise for you” 

ELAINA

“Yes?”

MRS.RAY

“I was gonna tell you where we are going”

“We are going to… Miami”

Ahhhh Miami, warm soft brown sand, ocean blue waters, and beautiful scenery. I head up to my brother's room to talk about the trip. I open the door and the smell hits me! His blood-red walls and charcoal grey ceilings don't distract you from the smell.

ELAINA

“Sam?” 

He wasn't there but his window was open, he must have left to go see his girlfriend. On my way down the stairs, I hear a laughing sound. I turn around and creep up the stairs like a bear, I see my baby sisters dress sticking out of my door. I open the door and yell

ELAINA

“BOO” 

Avery jumps and turns around with her long platinum blond hair and giggles.

ELAINA

“Come on we need to eat” 

ELAINA

(Look sad, like everything as been taken out of you, like you just got punched and are in pain)

Today is the awful horrible miserable day, where everything goes wrong and I turn to stone. Bright and early in the morning, my mom, dad, baby sister, and brother grab our luggage and head to the airport. We walk into the huge airport and try to find our flight gate. As we make our way on the plane we start to find our seats, all of us have our own seats in a row with someone else except for me. Since it was my birthday my mom said that I could sit alone if I wanted. The engines start and the plane begins to rumble….. All of a sudden the wheels begin to turn, I remember thinking….. how can this huge plane balance on the two little wheels that looked like marbles? Slowly as we make it down the runway the plane begins to tilt, higher and higher until we are headed into the sky. Before we had left, my mom said that it would take about seven hours to get there due to how far away we lived. Which I was okay with just thinking about our destination was good enough. 

ELAINA

(Look happy, then sad, then scared)

In the plane there were 2 rows of seats in each row there were approximately four seats each. so starting at the front when you walked in the first two seats in the first row are my mom and dad,  starting row number two the first two seats were my brother and my baby sister, in the last two was me. But what they didn't know then was that that seat was the only seat that survived what was going to happen next. Around this time the flight was at 11:52 a.m., all of us were tired from getting up so early to make it to the airport on time. So we decided to take a nap. Have you ever tried to sleep on a plane? It's not that easy. Somehow we all managed to figure out how,  I remember looking out my window and seeing clouds that look like pillows in the baby blue sky. I remember how I wanted to jump through the clouds because they look so soft,  I wanted to reach through the window and just grab one. I leaned over and laid my head on the wall right next to the window. The wall that looks like sand wasn't very comfortable, neither was the dark blue leather seat that I had been sitting on for hours. I fell asleep…... it felt like I slept for hours in reality it was only a couple of minutes. All of a sudden the plane began to shake, the window began to crack, the wings looked like they were bending, the seats rattled, the engines caught fire. I remember how scared I was. I  looked for my mom who was still asleep. I unfastened my seat belt stood up and went to go wake her. Just then the plane dropped, it started to fall, everyone was screaming my sister, my brother. I will never forget their screams, when I go to sleep I can still hear them. I remember making my way back to my seat and thinking….what is happening? How do I stop it? As I start to see the ground getting closer I am able to make out the shapes of mountains, houses, and cars.  Just then….. everything went dark ……

ELAINA

(Slowly start to wake up, looking dazed and confused, when you sit up immediately look worried and scared, panicked frightened)

I'm on the ground. On the cold dirt…….I smell the gas…..The burning gas….. In my head it's dread, there's nothing wrong, in my head, we are still in the air but my body has said we are on the ground. I see the sky, the clouds…..remember the fluffy clouds the ones that I could just grab through the window? Remember the ocean blue sky? I am seeing that right now, seeing the destination, my brother's smiling face, and my sisters giggling. The plane is getting closer and closer to the landing strip, but just then I woke up! My head hurts. I feel like I got hit with a bat. My eyes are blurry just like when you wake up in the middle of the night, or when you stand up too fast. I start to see the trees, the green crispy crunchy leaves, I hear the crackling of the fire, the crying of someone. I smell the gas, nature. 

I sit up, my plane seat is flat on the ground but somehow my seatbelt is still fastened. Then it hits me….Wheres my family my sister, brother, mom, dad where is everyone how come I can't see them. I unbuckle my seat belt and attempt to stand up but I fall right back to the ground. My head hurts I reach to touch and I feel blood. Without even thinking I stand again and I start to wander around. In my head, this voice is saying “you'd be seriously injured”….Adrenaline is what they call it, it's something that makes your pain go away. I feel like a zombie. I see everything, my feet are moving but I am not moving them. The plane is ripped in what looks like three parts, the interior is ripped to shreds. I can see the multiple layers of insulation, plaster, and metal. The empty seats are mangled, some of them don't even have backs. I start to walk down towards the tail of the plain when I start to hear someone screaming.

UNKNOWN VOICE

“HELP!!!!”

“Is someone there?” 

I start to run, who is it? My sister? Brother? Who could it be? And just then I see her and my baby sister. She's laying on the ground with the plane on top of her, she's crying hysterically, she's screaming that she's in pain. I don't know what to do, do I go find someone else if they are alive? Do I look for help? She hasn't seen me yet I stopped my zombie walking feet before I let her see me. I need to mentally prepare myself for her injuries, whether or not I know how to help her or not. I turn the corner and sprint over to her.

ELAINA

“ AVERY….” 

(I make it to her body)

ELAINA

“Are you okay? Are you hurt”? What hurts? Talk to me?” 

As I make it closer to her body I see just how bad she is hurt…. The plane is crushing her, she's bleeding from her mouth….and she's in so much pain.

AVERY- SMALL ABOUT 12 SKINNY ACTIVE 

“Elaina…(saying this in short gaspy parts) Elaina help me, I'm stuck and I don't know how to get out!” 

ELAINA

“It's okay, it's gonna be okay” 

I don't know what to do. I don't know whether to move her or keep her still. I'm trying to comfort her but I don't know-how. Wheres, my mom? she's the mom she needs to be doing this not me, I'm not the parent I shouldn't have to be going through this. I don't know how to help her, how to make her feel calm….at peace.

(Cough...Cough)-(Avery) 

ELAINA

“Are you okay, I know it hurts but you have to be strong okay?” 

AVERY

(Cough….cough) (Avery)

“I'm scared” 

ELAINA

“I know you are but you have to be brave. Just like dad taught you to take all the nervousness and channel it into brave.” 

AVERY

“ Will you sing mom's song…..” 

ELAINA

“ I cant you know…” 

AVERY

“PLEASE I'm scared” 

ELAINA

“Okay” 

And as I sat next to my dying little sister I sang you're my sunshine to comfort her, and in a few short minutes, she closed her eyes and took her very last breath. It was at that moment when everything hit me… the pain, guilt, fear, worry all of it. It hit me like a brick wall, it felt like I had just walked in front of a car. I hit the ground, I began sobbing, everything hurt, I couldn't tell if it was an injury or heartbreak. What was actually just minutes felt like hours. Adrenaline hit me again and I began to try to move the plane part. Screaming into the woods filled with nothing cursing whatever it was that made us crash. Whatever it was that made my heartache. 

I had to get up. I couldn't sit there and look at her dead body with her eyes closed, I had to find my family. I began to wander and one by one I found all of them…. Their bodies... some were worse than others. Some were too hard to look at but all of them hurt just as badly as the last one, every minute hurting more than the last. How could this have happened to me? What did I do to deserve this? I don't remember a lot about the time from when I found my parents to when I got rescued. But what I do remember is the stuff that I won't share with you! It's too hard….. to graphic for some people to handle. And no one should ever have to go through that.

ELAINA

(Look relieved that it's over, have some tears in your eyes.)

Today marks three years that my family has been gone, it marks the day that my life changed forever. From the grown-up decisions to the brokenness, I fought so hard to deal with my past, to find out how to live with it. And you know what not many people understand what I went through. But I truly hope that they never will, because of what I went through no human should ever have to do what I did. Never have to see the things that I have seen, and to this day I still have nightmares I still can't go on a plane alone. I will never fly private class again, and for some reason, I can still remember the moments, the smells, the noises right before I opened eyes on the day that changed my life. It has been three years and I will never get over what happened but little by little every day I am trying. I'm trying to forget, trying to be aware I guess you could say. My name is Elaina Ray Griffin and I am a sole plane crash survivor!