Just a week before the accident, Christopher and I were invited to a holiday party which indicated, “cocktail attire.” I had no idea what I would wear, but that prompted an opportunity to get Christopher a new suit. That Monday, December 3, we went and picked out a suit. Christopher leaned towards the more flashy styles, and I wanted something more basic. We compromised with a fairly basic black suit, but he picked out a great looking shirt and tie. The suit would be ready on Thursday.

Thursday, December 6, after school, Christopher went and picked up his new suit. He loved to dress up and look good so this was quite exciting. He stopped and picked up Boston Market (per my request) so that we could eat together before I got really going on a paper that was due the following day. (This dinner was also special, because we actually ate at the kitchen table. I always regretted that we didn’t eat more at the table as a family. It clearly didn’t bother him, but for me, it is a special memory that our last meal together was as a family should be.) As excited about the suit as he was, he was also “cool”, not to let me see his excitement. I guess at sometime he brought it in and took it up to his room.

Saturday morning, in preparations to go to the funeral home, I went into his room to get the suite, shirt and tie that he had picked out just 6 days earlier. It was odd; I was so glad to have something to bury him in that I knew that we would like. In his room, I found the shirt out the package, with the wrappers (and pins!) all over his bed; I knew he had tried on his new “outfit.”

Later that morning, Daniel and Martin (two of Christopher’s best friends) and I were talking about the fact that I knew he had tried on the suit. My only regret is that I never saw him in it. Daniel picked up Christoper’s phone and flipped through the pictures, finding one of Christopher in his new suit, without the tie, but looking good.

According to the name assigned by the phone, which includes the date, this picture was taken Friday afternoon, just hours before the accident. I love this picture, because you can certainly tell that Christopher felt good about himself, knowing that he looked good!