It was Wednesday evening June 29, just before the July 4th holiday weekend, when two young women sped south on Parker Road heading toward Parker’s downtown.

The friends were getting ready to spend one of their last nights together, as one of them would be departing to join the U.S. Navy. Both had graduated from high school weeks earlier and the world appeared to be at their feet.

The rain that night started slowly, but intensified quickly.

Driver Loren Harris, 18, liked driving fast and seemed fascinated with street racing culture, according to the police report and statements from friends and family.

“Throughout the investigation, it was learned by other officers involved as well as openly discussed by Loren’s mother that she was actively into street racing,” according to the Parker Police Department’s investigation report.

It would be Loren and 17-year-old passenger Destiny Zimmerman’s last night alive.

The two were killed, almost instantly, when the car they were in slammed into a light pole at almost 100 mph, tearing the car in three and leaving one of the girls dead on the sidewalk.

Parker Police investigators found no evidence that Destiny and Loren were involved in a street race at the time, but said excessive speed and wet roads were to blame.

The horrific crash on a popular street corner, and the deaths of two promising young women, hit the Parker and Douglas County communities hard. Family, friends and community members flooded social media with photos, memorial posts and GoFundMe fundraisers for the families. A makeshift memorial at the southwest corner of Parker Road and East Plaza Drive sprang up the next day, and remains today.

The families did not respond to requests for interviews with the Denver Gazette.

Witness Morgan Green was driving with a friend to Parker Mainstreet, one of Green’s favorite places. As they drove, it started to rain, a sprinkle that gradually became a downpour. Water pooled on Parker Road and Green slowed her car down.

“Wow, it’s actually coming down pretty hard,” Green recalls saying to her friend in the passenger seat.

Southbound Parker Road is a three-lane highway with a posted speed limit of 45 mph in that area of town.

As Green approached the intersection of Parker Road and East Plaza Drive, a black car sped past them, going what was at least 85 mph, Green recalls. She remembers looking at her friend and making a remark about the car’s speed as the puddles got deeper on the road.

“I just got this weird gut feeling,” Green said. “The puddles were increasing on the road, the rain was coming down hard, this wasn’t going to end well.”

The black Honda Accord, with Loren driving and Destiny in the passenger seat, passed two large trucks and “aggressively” merged in front of them, according to Parker police’s investigation report.

As the car reached the intersection, it lost traction on the wet road and spun, slamming into the light post on the southwest corner, according to witnesses and the police report. One of the trucks had a dash-mounted camera and police were able to view the video.

The Accord driver’s side hit the pole first. The impact tore the car into three parts, leaving the passenger compartment literally wrapped around the pole. The front and engine ended up 500 feet away in the parking lot of the shopping center that has restaurants and retail. The rear of the car was 250 feet away in the other direction.

According to police records and data collected from the car, the Accord was moving 93 mph five seconds before the impact — which tore the seat from under Destiny — whose unnaturally bent body ended up on the sidewalk — and pinned Loren in the driver’s seat.

“I pulled over and I don’t even remember turning off my car fully,” Green said. “I just remember running out of my car fully expecting to have to pull someone out of a car and do CPR or whatever I had to do.”

Meanwhile, at the Domino’s Pizza in the plaza where the crash occurred, Michail Winstead was on his way into work, about to enter the building. That’s when he heard the deafeningly loud crash behind him.

He ran to the scene, joining Green and other witnesses in an attempt to help.

“It all happened really fast,” Winstead said. “It was like fight or flight.”

Green ran around the light pole and saw a woman’s body on the concrete. She didn’t know what to expect. It was quickly apparent to Green that the woman was dead.

“I didn’t know if she was still with us so I walked up to her thinking maybe I could help,” Green said. “She was not.”

Police arrived quickly, Green said, and announced the woman dead on scene over the radio.

“It was full shock,” Green said. “Panic at this point.”

According to police records, responding officers found Destiny dead on scene. Officers attempted CPR on Loren, who was pinned inside the car, but were unsuccessful. Loren died in the vehicle.

The Douglas County coroner ruled they died by blunt force trauma — crushed to death.

In the months following the incident, Green said wondering about these girls became an obsession for her. She felt like she needed to know who they were and what had happened. Had she gone to school with them? Played soccer with them?

“When I found out I didn’t know them, I still felt very connected to them in an interesting way,” Green said. “I really witnessed two wonderful people lose their lives and it really gave me a new perspective of life.”

On the night of their deaths, Loren picked up Destiny for a sleepover. Loren was leaving for naval training just over a week later and it was the last night the girls would have to spend together before being separated, according to family statements to police.

Loren drove to Destiny’s house on Glacier Park Circle in Parker and picked her up. They drove down Parker Road back toward Loren’s house on Waterhouse Circle, stopping on the way for food at Chick-Fil-A.

Destiny graduated from Chaparral High School in May and had just completed her certification to become an esthetician less than two weeks before her death. She had plans to start her own business, her family said in her obituary.

She was very family-oriented, according to her friends. She was known as “auntie” to her nieces, Chanell and Chloe, and was excited to be auntie to her first unborn nephew, her family said in her obituary.

“We will all let (her new nephew) know who his aunt Destiny was and how much she already loved him,” her family said.

Destiny’s family described her as a hard worker with a very bright future. She was artistic, tough, kindhearted and sassy, they said. She knew how to get things her way.

“Our beautiful Destiny was always fierce and didn’t fear anything except being home alone,” her family said.

Destiny’s array of passions changed as she grew up. As a child, she loved horseback riding and dancing. As she entered middle school, she developed a love for volleyball, gymnastics and wrestling.

Mackenzie Smith, a friend of Destiny’s, met her in sixth grade.

“I was the new girl and she immediately wanted to be friends with me,” Smith said. “Every new person she would meet she wanted to be friends with.”

Smith said Destiny defended her friends, regardless of the situation, and she loved her family more than anything.

“Even though she was tiny, she was mighty,” Smith said.

Smith will always remember Destiny’s loud laugh and desire to know everything about everyone she met. She wanted everyone to feel included, Smith said.

“She was just a kindred spirit,” Smith said. “And she was really freaking weird, like weird funny, she was hilarious.”

Smith was asleep at a sleepover when her friends rushed into the room and woke her up to inform her that Destiny had died. They struggled to tell Smith through tears.

“They were like ‘get up get up something really bad happened,’” Smith said.

She said even months later, it’s still difficult to process that Destiny is gone.

“It makes you think about your own life and how easily it can be taken away,” Smith said.

Loren graduated from Legend High School in May and had a bright future ahead of her, with plans to join the Navy just over a week after her death.

Loren’s Native American name was “Iyoyanpa wicahpi win,” which means “Bright Star Woman.” She was Navajo and Lakota Rosebud Sioux. Loren was proud of her indigenous heritage, always finding an opportunity to share her knowledge and teach her friends and family about her culture, her family wrote in her obituary.

As a child, Loren was rebellious, according to her obituary. She constantly tested her own limits and others’, but always with love. She grew up playing volleyball and made a community of friends through the sport.

“She was a social butterfly, and a friend to many,” according to her obituary. “Loren wasn’t one to judge people, she embraced them.”

Loren’s family meant everything to her and she loved babysitting her younger cousins, especially her niece, Esri.

Kairi Blackwell, Loren’s friend of seven years, said she brightened every room.

“She was so bubbly. She was always jumping around, excited, happy,” Blackwell said, explaining that the two connected through their mutual enthusiasm for life.

The two also bonded through their shared Christianity, Blackwell said. They talked every day and had a Bible app they used to do studies together.

What stuck out most about Loren to Blackwell was how much happiness she brought to the world.

“She loved everybody,” Blackwell said. “She had no hatred in her heart.”

Blackwell works at Freaky’s Smoke Shop on the corner where the crash happened. She wasn’t working at the time, but was across the street getting gas. She heard the crash that killed her friend from down the street.

“I didn’t see what happened, but I did watch the video footage like a thousand times,” Blackwell said.

The makeshift memorial for the girls sits at the corner in sight of Freaky’s.

Green, who pulled over in hopes of helping, says she still stops at the memorial if she has time when she drives past. Witnessing the crash doesn’t affect her like it did at first, but she thinks about it, especially as her younger sister reaches driving age.

“Every time she is in the car with me, I talk to her about safety things,” Green said. “I always tell her that things can wait. A text can wait. A phone call can wait. Changing the song on your playlist can wait.”

A Parker Police Department spokesperson warned the public about the dangers of driving at high speed.

“Vehicle crashes at higher rates of speed cause more damage to people and property,” the spokesperson said. “The speed associated with street racing puts racers, innocent bystanders and property at risk.”

Green said she’s always been a cautious driver, but is more cautious now after witnessing the crash that ended the young girls’ lives.

“I always see this sign that says ‘arrive alive’ and I love that because, no matter how late you are, you can make up for that,” Green said. “You can’t make up for not arriving at all.”

Green hopes people remember Destiny and Loren by how they lived their lives, future goals and hopes to change and improve the world.

“They had these life plans that were just suddenly taken away from them,” Green said. “I hope people remember that as much as one decision affected (their lives), remembering how many more good decisions they made before that.”