Final Project 1 (I believe)

I Believe Ones Goodwill Can Spare Another

At twelve its difficult to realize that your best friend is slowly beginning to drown their own life. The most terrifying thing in my mind at that point was beginning middle school and being to shy to talk to the cute boy sitting in back of me in math class. I will never forget the day that my own best friend told me that she took up an offer a thirty year old man gave her for a ride home one night. What is there to say? Do I yell at her as if I was her mother? Do I tell her parents and loose my best friend? From that day on I was faced with my own belief that my own goodwill to never give up on my friend will spare her life.
I became extremely concerned. Even though I was only in sixth grade and I didn’t have much freedom myself, I was going to take all the precautions I could to make sure she stayed out of trouble. Everyday for a year I asked my parents if she could sleep over or go on trips with us so that I was with her and I knew what she was doing at every moment. At such a young age I was scared to tell my parents because I believed I could help her on my own and the situation could get worse if I involved her lunatic mother. Obviously as much as my own parents loved her, they didn’t want her to permanently live in our house, so occasionally they would send her home not knowing what she was getting thrown into. Until one day, when her mother called my house which was very unusual, she informed my mom that I was never allowed to speak to her daughter again because I was the bad influence who introduced her child to all of her problems. Her mother did everything she could to keep me away from any communication with her daughter, and it worked for quite a few years.
Three years later I got another unannounced phone call from her mother. At this point we were both about 16 years old, in the 9Th grade, and had not talked for about three years. I was given a ridiculous apologetic plead that she had no idea I was the one trying to help her daughter all along. She had been put in the hospital for an overdose and her mother thought that I may have been able to encourage her to let us all help her. Even though I was so incredibly infuriated at that lady for accusing me of those things, I accepted her apologies just for my friend.
The first time I saw her out of the hospital face-to-face on a normal day I was completely speechless. She was not the same girl that I had called my best friend. Her hair was crunchy as if it had not been washed in weeks as well as burnt out in different exotic colors. Her face was as pale as a ghost. Her eyes looked as if she had to use all her strength to keep them open. She was hunched over wearing big baggy dirty clothes on her skinny body that looked as if she just entirely gave up on cleaning, and she mumbled out her words barely even making a sentence. Immediately I spent every day with her making sure she was clean. Thank god she was happy to see me helping her and not disgusted. Our first step we made together was to go to an AIDS clinic so she could get tested, which turned out negative. We took a childcare class together so that we could go after what we originally said we wanted to be when we grew up, which were special needs teachers.
Now I am delighted to say that she is totally 100% clean from drugs, prostitution, AIDS, and everything else that had challenged her life in the past. She is healthy and is currently attending Broward College majoring in Special Education. She even works at a preschool at NOVA Southeastern University as a special needs teachers aide. This is an experience that proved to me that ones goodwill can spare another.