Colonel’s friends Alaska and Takumi. The three of them take Miles under their wing and
introduced him to the social life of the school. Social life as in mischief-making, smoking
cigarette and drinking. Miles became really close friend with the three of them, at the
same time falls in love with the girl Alaska. Although Alaska has a boyfriend, she
convinced Miles that she loves him. Alaska is always blaming herself in her heart, for that
her mom died by a heart attack when she was young, because she froze out of fear and
not being able to react immediately. One night she asked Colonel and Miles to help her
get out of the school, but didn’t tell them why, just that it’s important and in a hurry. She
is secretly going to honor her mom in the grave yard that’s away from school. On the way
to honor her mother Alaska died because of a car crush. Since then Miles and Colonel
have been in agony, feeling confused and guilty. Then in her honor they planned an epic
prank, showing what Alaska believed—that women shouldn’t be objectified by men. In
the end they both made peace with Alaska Young’s death and believe the best way to
honor her is to move on and forgive her for leaving just as she’ll forgive them for forget-
ting. “So I know she forgives me, just as I forgive her. Thomas Edison’s last words were:
“It’s very beautiful over there.” I don’t know where there is, but I believe it’s somewhere,
and I hope it’s beautiful.”(Green, 198) Alaska’s death gives both young men knowledge,
allows them to become more mature and lets them appreciate their life better. Through
death they understand life.
All death is gloomy and inevitable, just as water is destined to fall, clouds are
destined to fly, and time is destined to move. For those of us who are close to the dead,
we shall not feel sad, for that it’s the end of their extraordinary adventure, and perhaps a
beginning of a new one. It’s the sense of closure that gives all things meaning, and it’s the
belief of wonder that gives us hope. Teenage, a stage of life when we absorb and digest,
we learn from those that has happened to us, death or not, and we move on with stronger
belief like life does. “When adults say, “Teenagers think they are invincible” with that sly,
stupid smile on their faces, they don’t know how right they are. We need never be hope-
less, because we can never be irreparably broken. We think that we are invincible because
we are. We cannot be born, and we cannot die. Like all energy, we can only change
shapes and sizes and manifestations. They forget that when they get old. They get scared
of losing and failing. But that part of us greater than the sum of our parts cannot begin
and cannot end, and so it cannot fail.” (Green, 202)