Alyssa Brennan says her best friend, Marissa Lorea, sends her signs every day. There are the lady bugs that appear in Brennan’s bedroom every night. Each time Brennan starts her car, Lorea’s favorite song — “Bubbly,” by Colby Calliat — always seems to be playing on the radio.

“I just think those are all her little signs,” Brennan said. Ways that her friend lets her know that she is still with her in spirit.

And over the past several months since Lorea was killed in a car accident, Brennan has been letting her friend know that she will not be forgotten, holding fundraisers for the Marissa A. Lorea Scholarship Fund that will provide three scholarships to students who played the sports that the 15-year-old played: soccer, indoor track and outdoor track.

Brennan, a sophomore at Lincoln High School, says that $2,000 has been raised through the sale of pink bracelets bearing Lorea’s name and her uniform No. 20. She hopes to raise even more money through a memorial fun run/walk and soccer game, to be held Saturday at the school.

“Marissa loved running and she loved soccer, so we thought we’d create a combination of both of them,” Brennan said. “This is the best way to show her that we love her.”

It took some time before the reality of Lorea’s death sank in, said Brennan.

A passenger in the front seat of a car driven by her cousin Andrew Bessette, Lorea died Oct. 15, 2007, when the car, traveling at about 70 mph, smashed into a tree on Wilbur Road. (In an arraignment March 20, Bessette, through his lawyer, pleaded not guilty to two felony charges — driving to endanger, death resulting, and driving to endanger, serious injury resulting — in connection with the accident.)

Lorea and Brennan had been friends since they were toddlers and thought they’d be friends forever.

“At first it’s not really real,” Brennan said. “You don’t believe it until you look at pictures and her Facebook and you realize that . . . . she hasn’t called. I think about all the plans we talked about for our lives together. That’s when it makes it real.

“At first I was wicked angry, but then I realized that Andrew made a mistake and we just have to deal with what happened,” she continued. “They were very upsetting circumstances, but I just think about the fact that Marissa’s in a better place.”

Channeling her energy into Saturday’s event has also been helpful, Brennan said.

“Doing this makes me happy,” she said. “The best way to deal with it is to do things for her.”

Registration for the fun run/walk will begin Saturday at 9:30 a.m. at the high school. The 2 ½-mile run, scheduled to start at 10, will begin and end at the school and include a loop within the nearby Amica complex.

Post-race food and refreshments will be donated by Target and CVS, along with a raffle that will include a CD and poster autographed by Colby Calliat, gift cards from local merchants, and a soccer ball and jersey autographed by members of the New England Revolution.

Runners and walkers will receive a pink bracelet that will be good for admission to the 2 p.m. soccer game between the Lincoln soccer and track teams at Ferguson Field, behind the high school. (Admission to the game for those not participating in the fun run is $15.)

“I just can’t wait for Saturday,” Brennan said. “There have been a lot of late nights, but it’s all going to be really good.”

For more information, contact Brennan by e-mail at alyssabrennan3@yahoo.com or by phone at (401) 527-3498.

cthorn@projo.com