The family and friends of two teenage girls continue to struggle through the aftermath of their tragic deaths.
Hundreds of mourners attended the funerals of both Rachel Smith and Rachel Crites last week. The bodies of the two teenagers were discovered on Feb. 2 in rural Loudoun County, Va. after a high-profile nationwide search that lasted two weeks.
The two girls called their parents on Jan. 19 to say they were going to see a movie in Georgetown. That call was later traced to Charlestown, W.V. through the girls' cell phones. The search for the two girls drew nationwide attention and Montgomery County Police received tips from as far away as Texas. Police were never able to make contact with them and their bodies were discovered in Crites' car less than a half-mile from the West Virginia border. A preliminary autopsy report indicated that the two girls died of carbon monoxide inhalation and likely died by suicide. Reports have indicated that one or both of the girls suffered from depression, but those that knew them have said this was out of character for both.
The family and friends of the Rachels — as they have frequently been referred to — bade final farewells to the two close friends last week.
“You have suffered a great loss,” said Rev. Msgr. Mark Brennan of both the Smith and Crites families and friends.
Brennan, the priest who conducted Crites’ funeral Mass at St. Martin of Tours Catholic Church in Gaithersburg, said that like all of those who have been affected by the tragedy, he wished he could have spoken to the girls before they made their fateful decision.
“We want to shout to both girls the words of Dylan Thomas,” said Brennan. “‘Do not go gentle into that good night … rage, rage against the dying of the light.’”
Brennan urged young people dealing with personal issues and emotional struggles to speak with their peers and with sympathetic adults.
Matt Duckery coached Rachel Smith on Wootton’s indoor track team last winter, and said she was the type of girl who fit right in and who made friends easily.
“She seemed like a well-connected student and a well-grounded teenager,” Duckery said. “She had a great spirit.”
Duckery said that Smith did not come out for the team this season.
Bianca, a friend of both girls, said that she wished that somehow God had made a mistake in calling them back to him and that she could still remember Crites' contagious laughter.
"I'll always be able to hear it," Bianca said.
Christie, a friend of Rachel Crites, said that she would remember Crites for her bubbly energy and sarcastic wit. She said that Crites was with God now, and that instead of being gone from her friends and families, she was now with them at all times.
“She’s everywhere,” Christie said, and would be laughing as she watched the silly things her friends did. “She’s laughing at you when you spill toothpaste on your shirt.”
Troy Crites, Rachel Crites’ father, said that although the search for the two close friends did not end as everyone would have hoped, that it was not completely in vain.
“Our search did bring the world a little closer together,” said Crites, who thanked the community for the outpouring of support for Crites and Smith families through their ordeal.
Crites extended his sympathies to the Smith family and closed his daughter’s funeral Mass with a quote from Mitch Albom’s novel, “Tuesdays With Morrie.”
“All the love you created is still there. … Death ends a life, not a relationship.”