Need to Attend Best Friends Funeral

Hi, my name is Alix Pitner (the girl in the middle in the main picture). I'm a college sophomore attending the University of Central Florida. This past year has been the best year of my life due to the fact that I spend every day with my three best friends, Ethan Halverson (on the left), Derek Verhoeven (on the right), and Cheyenne Williams (pictured below). My college experience has truly been one that I will tell my kids and grandkids about someday and I owe that to those three incredible people. We do everything together. This past Friday the three of us spent the entire day together playing video games as Ethan cooked bacon wrapped chicken for our little family. We had let the dishes pile up for days so we were having to drink from measuring cups and eat off of aluminum foil plates (haha). We didn't realize it at the time, but those little quirks made our times together special. That night I went to bed early because I had a headache from our incredibly loud and intense Nazi Zombie game. When I woke up in the morning I saw that Ethan wasn't in his room but thought nothing of it, he's a wild soul who continuously travels back and forth from UCF to Daytona (his Florida hometown) to see his friends and family. I texted him to see where he was but I didn't get a response (obviously because it was only 9:30 am and he was sound asleep). I was wrong. Minutes later Cheyenne showed me a tweet about a 19 year old boy named Ethan Halverson being shot and killed that night. I thought it was a joke... Why would Twitter be the first place we see or hear about something like that? I was wrong again. I ran into Derek's room (they share a town home) and typed the dreaded words I just read on Twitter into google... Numerous articles appeared. I showed my phone to him and all we could do was cry.

Our best friend, the person who runs around the town home every day making monkey noises and breaking things because he's too big for his own good, was gone and there was nothing we could do about it. We can only do our best to get through this and help his family cope with this horrible tragedy by constantly reminding ourselves and them of the wonderful memories we were lucky enough to share with Ethan.

His memorial will be held in Minnesota, the place his family calls home and the place that gave Ethan such a funny and charming accent. Derek, Cheyenne and I are trying everything we can to raise money to find a way to get there. We are unsure of the date of the ceremony due to numerous factors, but we know it will be soon. We need to attend his services to pay this remarkable force the respect he so sincerely deserves. However, the price of traveling on such short notice from Orlando to Minnesota is financially daunting for the three of us with the fact that we are all struggling college students.

We are asking you to help us get there from the bottom of our hearts. Help us attend his funeral service so that we can see our best friend out.






Ethan Halverson, Inky Halverson to all of us, will always be missed and fondly remembered. He played a role in our lives that no one will ever be able to replace. He demanded our love and respect from his sincere and unwavering kindness and intense desire to help those around him.

Derek and I are art majors, and would love to make it up to any of you who are kind enough to donate by creating something for you this summer, if you would like. He loves to draw and paint with water colors and I love to draw and paint with acrylics. You could request anything from us and could reach me via messaging on Facebook.

We greatly appreciate you taking the time to read this. And any amount will greatly help us reach our goal. Please keep his family in your prayers during this dark time. They are the most wonderful people I have ever met and need every happy, loving thought they can get right now.

Any money that is received over the price of the tickets will go to a charity of his family's choosing.

Thank you so much,
Alix Pitner