CHAPEL HILL - Lilli Manis wrote an essay for her senior English class saying that she felt like an outsider at Chapel Hill High School and that her schoolmates didn't really notice her.

"I hope she knows that she was wrong," said classmate Gina Balamucki, who played in the string section with Manis in the school orchestra. "She mattered so much to us, and everyone I've talked to misses her so much."

Lillian Broox Manis, 17, was killed on Glenwood Avenue in Raleigh early Saturday. She was riding in a Honda when a Ford driver ran a red light on Lynn Road and struck the Honda shortly before 5 a.m., according to Raleigh police. The driver of the Honda, her boyfriend, Philip Iavorov Jurov, 17, of Durham, was seriously hurt.

The driver of the Ford, Justin Caleb Crouse, 19, of 4612 Limerick Drive in Raleigh, was charged with death by motor vehicle and assault with a deadly weapon. He was released from the Wake County jail Monday after posting $50,000 bail.

Police say Crouse was approaching Glenwood on Lynn Road when he lost control of his car and ran off the right side of the road. The car then entered the intersection of Glenwood, hitting the passenger side of the Honda.

Both cars were going about 50 mph when they collided; they traveled more than 120 feet across Glenwood Avenue, according to the police report.

Manis graduated from Chapel Hill High School last month. Balamucki and other members of the orchestra planned to play at her memorial service at the Chapel Hill Friends Meeting on Raleigh Road on Saturday and to remember her with their own gathering Monday.

Manis was to begin studies at Earlham College, a Quaker school in Indiana, this fall.

Enamored of Japanese graphic art, such as manga and anime, Manis planned to major in Asian studies and art.

"Lilli was just such a free spirit," said her cousin, Charlene Cherry of Gainesville, Fla. "Her mom's a smart woman, and she knows what she wants out of life, and that's Lilli."

Her parents, Paul and Elizabeth, both have doctoral degrees in the biological sciences. Paul runs the Manis Laboratory at UNC-Chapel Hill. Elizabeth works for GlaxoSmithKline. Her younger brother Cameron, 16, will be a senior at CHHS.

"He loved his sister. They're only a year apart," Cherry said. "It's going to be a long road for everyone. ... It's another [fatality] in some people's mind, but to us it's Lilli."

(Staff writer Marlon Walker contributed to this report.)

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