It was a dark cold night. I don’t remember when it last snowed. The roads were icy. Not just any kind of ice. Black Ice; black ice that you can’t see when you are driving.  

Everything was going smoothly that day. I had no homework for the weekend. My sister and I made the best supper ever curly fries, extra crispy. My parents were going out for a Fair board banquet. So my sister, Sierra, and I got to go to our 4-H meeting by ourselves.

The meeting was in Wolf Lake, which is pretty much the middle of nowhere. It normally takes forty minutes to drive there from our house in Emmaville. We had to drive through Park Rapids, so we had to deal with some small traffic, before we got back to country roads.

Everything was going fine, it was all fine. Sierra and I were singing along to the radio; Singing and laughing, Being sisters. We just drove past Jay P.'s house, everything was fine. The roads over by Wolf Lake were a little better than other roads.

Or so I thought.

It was a straight stretch. With no stops, until the very end. I was going a little fast, but not too fast.  It was a dirt road for about two miles, before turning to tar. I was driving fifty miles per hour which was fast for winter, but it didn’t feel fast to me. I normally drive faster. But this time I am thankful I didn't.

There were no deer. Nothing. The roads were empty. It was just the two of us, singing and laughing. Having fun. Being sisters. Enjoying the ride.

I was approaching the end of the road,with a choice to turn either left or right. When I realized the road was ending it was already too late. I tried to slow down. Too fast. I hit a patch of ice. In my mind I started to freak out. We entered the the intersection, I tried to turn to prevent the accident. That didn't happen.

“Shit.”

The car started to jump the road. Instead of turning on the road, I turned in the ditch. The front end of my car was all smashed up. Smoke was coming from the engine. I turned off the car. We got out. I started to freak out thinking my parents were going to kill me. Then my sister said  “I think I broke my arm.” I started to freak out even more.

We could taste the smoke in the air.

We called our parents. I was too scared to say anything. My sister did all of the talking. My parents were not mad, they were just as scared as we were. To my relief, they sent Jay to find us and sit with us. It was negative forty degrees out. The coldness in the air felt as if frostbite was growing on us. Jay came, helped us take the valuables out of my car, calmed us down and sat with us until my parents came.

We went to the hospital and my sister got checked out for her elbow. On the way to the hospital all I could say to Sierra was, “I’m so sorry.” The doctor said she bruised it and had whiplash from the seatbelt. He said give it a few days and she should be fine. I was still freaking out. My blood pressure was through the roof, it would be days before my blood pressure returned to normal.

In the end, my car was ruined. I didn’t drive again for two weeks. I was too scared and upset that I destroyed my car. All we could think about is how I almost killed us. Friday, January 5th, 2018. The scariest night of my life.