Suicide, 13

Leah Sottile: It was a Tuesday. In a dusty-orange bedroom — papered in Twilight posters and stacked with stuffed animals — 13-year-old Casey Holliday brushed her dark hair into a severe angle over her right eyebrow. She pulled on a grayish-blue hooded sweatshirt, blue jeans and black Converse All-Stars.

Casey sidled into the backseat of the family Nissan Xterra. Her little sister, Sydney, 11, sat in front with their mother, Carrie Holliday. Holliday asked Casey why she didn’t have her backpack. Casey said she’d left it at school because she didn’t have any homework.


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