HAU'ULA — One month after Alithia Ah Nee's 16th birthday, hundreds of relatives and friends gathered in Hau'ula yesterday to mourn her death and try to make sense of a pair of road tragedies that claimed the lives of four teenagers in one day.

"Alithia had the biggest heart. She loved her parents. She loved her family. And she loved her friends," Olga Leota, Ah Nee's aunt, told the more than 450 people who crowded into the Greater Mount Zion Holiness Church yesterday. "I just thank God for blessing us with her."

On Aug. 19, Ah Nee and 15-year-old Pepe Naupoto were killed and two others were injured when their speeding car rammed into a utility pole near Kokololio Bridge in Hau'ula. Some 19 hours later, two more teens — Benson Orem Kauvaka, 16, and Summer-Lynn Mau, 19 — died at the same spot on Kamehameha Highway when a speeding car plowed through a crowd as they paid their respects at a roadside memorial for Ah Nee and Naupoto.

"When you pass that memorial site, it makes you have a sickening feeling," said Joshua Kalua, whose daughter grew up with Ah Nee. "I loved Alithia like a daughter."

At services for Ah Nee yesterday, mourners lined up in front of her open casket to say goodbye — with a final kiss or touch on the forehead — for the bright, happy teenager, who loved to talk and would always lend an ear to a friend going through hard times.

A bouquet of pale pink roses rested on Ah Nee's chest, and a large photo of the 16-year-old smiling broadly at the camera was propped above her head. Behind the casket, nearly a dozen funeral floral sprays decorated the church.

The dedication on one read "friends forever."

Among those who attended the services was a teenager injured in the crash that killed Ah Nee and another who suffered a broken leg in the second accident that day.

Both were on crutches and one had scars on her face. Their eyes brimmed with tears as they walked past Ah Nee's casket and kissed her mother, whose name is also Alithia.

Other teenagers, many of whom grew up with Ah Nee, filled the church. They dropped their heads as they passed Ah Nee's casket, stroking her hand and pausing over her body for a moment of reflection. Some wore white T-shirts with a photo of Ah Nee, and a few used their sleeves to wipe tears from their reddened eyes.

"Whenever I had a problem, Ali would listen," said Kapua Tagata, Alithia's cousin, with tears running down her face from behind dark black sunglasses. "Ali had a great imagination, full of hopes and dreams. I will miss her. I love her."

Ah Nee was born at Kahuku Hospital and was a former student at Kahuku High School. She has four brothers and three sisters, all of whom were in their teens when she was born. "Her birth came as a surprise to her parents. They thought they were finished having babies," Leota said at the service. "But they embraced her. She was so beautiful."

Recently Ah Nee had been living with an aunt in Utah.

On the day after the crash happened, Ah Nee was scheduled to go back to the Mainland. She had only been in the Islands for a week on vacation, friends said.

In the back of the church yesterday, a collage of photos chronicled her short life.

There were photos of Ah Nee in high school. Older snapshots showed her as a toddler. And in the middle of the arrangement was a large photo of Ah Nee in diapers.

"She was the apple of her dad's eyes," Leota told attendees during the eulogy, while glancing at Ah Nee's father and mother seated next to the casket.

Reach Mary Vorsino at mvorsino@honoluluadvertiser.com.