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he decided to attend UM.
    Huguet was proud of Donaldson. “I always thought he was intelligent,” she told me. “I was very happy for him when he got a scholarship. He came from a family where none of them had gone to college; most didn’t even graduate high school.” For her part, Huguet left Montana after high school to attend Eastern Oregon University,where she was offered an athletic scholarship. She saw Donaldson only once or twice after she departed for college.
    On September 24, 2010, Huguet was living in Missoula at her mother’s house and was getting ready to return to La Grande, Oregon, to begin her junior year at EOU. That evening, she received a call from her friend Keely Williams, who suggested they go to a party at a house Beau Donaldson was renting in Missoula’s university district. Williams had also grown up in the Target Range neighborhood and had known Huguet since Allison arrived in Missoula. After graduating from Big Sky High School in the same class as Huguet and Donaldson, Williams had left town to attend Portland State University and happened to be back for a week to visit her parents. When Williams told Huguet that most of the posse they’d hung out with since they were six years old would be at Donaldson’s party, Huguet enthusiastically agreed that they should attend.
    Williams drove. Upon arriving at Donaldson’s house, at around 10:00 in the evening, they were happy to see many of their childhood soul mates. “When we walked downstairs I immediately ran into Beau and hugged him,” Huguet remembered. “It was a nice evening. Everyone was relaxed and having a good time.” People played beer pong in the basement and held “tea races” to determine who could chug bottles of Twisted Tea (a brand of syrupy malt liquor favored by UM students) the fastest.
    It was a Friday night, and the Griz football team would be playing Sacramento State University on Saturday afternoon, but Donaldson had suffered a serious ankle injury the previous summer and wouldn’t be suiting up for the game. He was pounding down alcoholic beverages with gusto. Enjoying the company of seldom-seen friends, Huguet and Williams found themselves drinking more than they customarily did, too.
    By 1:30 in the morning, the party was running out of steam, and the handful of people still there moved upstairs to the living room. Donaldson and Huguet sat down together on a couch. Huguet, growing sleepy, lay across the couch, put a pillow on Donaldson’s thigh, and placed her head on the pillow. But there was nothing remotely sexual about it, said Huguet and Williams. “Allison never had anyinterest in that type of relationship with Beau,” Williams insisted. “Absolutely none.”
    Another classmate from their Target Range days, Sam Erschler, * who lived in the house with Beau Donaldson, urged Keely Williams and Allison Huguet not to drive home, because they’d been drinking. “Which was nice of him,” Huguet acknowledged. “That’s how Sam is. Kind of caring like that. He said, ‘Why don’t you guys just stay here and sleep on the couch.’ So we all agreed we would.”
    Not long thereafter, Donaldson got up from the couch he was sharing with Huguet, went downstairs, and Huguet fell asleep on the couch alone, fully dressed. Huguet enjoyed sleeping on couches; even when she was home, she often preferred to sleep on the couch instead of in her own bed. Williams, meanwhile, went in search of an empty bed and soon found one. “It was even made!” she said. “I thought, ‘If we have to stay here, this is where I am going to sleep.’ ”
    After discovering the vacant bedroom, Williams went back to the living room to invite Huguet to join her. She shook Huguet awake and said, “Ali, do you want to come to bed? I’m sleeping in this room, and there is a bed.”
    “No, I’m fine,” Huguet groggily replied. “I’ll just stay here.” Williams got a blanket and placed it over her friend, then returned to the