The opening paragraphs of Last Laugh depicts the main character, Robbie, biking up a hill to visit his best friend, Kevin. When he took a break half way up the steepness, he looked back at the town, picking out his home, his school and downtown.

The scene sprung from a writing workshop, where we were instructed to draw a map of where most of our story’s action takes place. We were to note natural meeting places (such as the gas station in F. Scott Fitzgerald’s Great Gatsby) and natural barriers that separate characters (the water separating Jay Gatsby in nouveau riche West Egg from Daisy Buchanan’s home in old-monied East Egg).

This exercise transformed and deepened my novel. I knew Robbie lived in a middle-class neighborhood, and Kevin in a wealthier part of town. But I hadn’t visualized their homes, settings, or what separated them geographically.

If you’re working on a story — fict or nonfic — you might try physically drawing a map, marking natural meeting places and obstacles between one place to another. Then sketch a scene imagining granular descriptions of traveling (by foot, bicycle, car, or bus) from one character’s home or favorite hangout to another’s.

And don’t be shy about writing in the comments about how this helped (even if it didn’t), and feel free to include an excerpt of a scene that includes geographical details.

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As I videotaped him, I hoped my squealing, “My books! My new novel!” as he schlepped boxes up my stone steps and pathway would be fun to post here. But the poor delivery guy looked like he was about to melt into a puddle of his own sweat on my stone pathway. He didn’t even register the first time I offered him the drink.

So I stopped videotaping. But I’m glad I didn’t erase the footage. Because by posting it, I hope you, dear readers, will appreciate the irony, pathos and, yes, joy of the moment.

My new young adult novel, Last Laugh, is a composite story woven around cancer journeys of a bunch of IRL friends and family who struggled with cancer. I hope it informs, amuses and engages everyone who picks up the digital or paperback version.

One of the best recent posts I’ve read is Substacker Hans Casteels’ “Yes, It Sucks. Welcome to Cancer. Please Take a Number and Question Everything. What Newly Diagnosed Cancer Patients Actually Need to Know.”

Even if you do not personally have cancer, you may find this helps you support those you know and love who do have it.

Last Laugh is available in paperback, here: tinyurl.com/mtb2uchr

I hope you will purchase a copy and if you like it, leave a review on Amazon and consider posting the link on your social media sites.

Here’s a synopsis:

Before his best—and only—friend Kevin was diagnosed with leukemia, Robbie’s biggest problems were zits, a prominent unibrow, and loving but neglectful, career-obsessed parents. Oh, and, vying for who was the funniest guy in the universe: him or Kevin?

In Last Laugh, two sixteen-year-old best friends use humor to deal with life’s problems. as their lives get more complex and serious, Robbie (the nerdiest and least popular kid at school) grows less concerned with having the last laugh and more determined to learn why Kevin (athletic, handsome, smart and the most popular kid at high school) remains his friend. Of course, Kevin jokes away this question—at first.

When Robbie is forced to go on a family vacation to Costa Rica—the day after Kevin’s diagnosis—during a guided tour of the rain forest, he learns of a vine that supposedly heals leukemia.

But what was he thinking when he snuck back into the rain forest alone in the darkening late afternoon to try to find the vine, only to get lost and hurt (but succeeding in his mission)? What was he thinking when he tried to smuggle his vine through customs, only to get caught by a sniffer dog? And what was he thinking when he solicited help from Kevin’s spoiled rotten, bitchy (but beautiful) younger sister, Bea, to sneak Kevin a tincture made from the vine (that he found at the health food store back home)—which Robbie later found out could compromise Kevin’s bone marrow transplant procedure?

As each boy becomes involved with their first love, the story careens to a surprising final, dramatic twist that finally answers the question of who gets the last laugh.

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Some back story. I wrote the first draft of this novel in 2004, sort of against my will. That year, I lost my mother, my high school friend Robin Cohen, and my Aunt Matty. Several years before, my friend Kevin McManus succumbed to leukemia. In a reverie, Kevin “came” to me and announced, “I’m in your novel.”

“A novel? I’m a journalist, not a fiction writer. But if I were to write a novel, what makes you think you’d be in it?”

“Just start writing, and the story will unfold.”

I was sure I was having some psychotic episode, and dismissed this strange liminal waking dream. But later that day, back on my computer, my fingers started tapping out chapter 1. It just poured out, as if I were taking dictation. Even though I was working full time as a freelance writer and editor, and raising my teenage son, I pounded out the first draft in three months.

After many drafts, thanks to my writers critique buddies Harriet Rogers and the now late Daisy Mathias, I put it away. Because another novel idea invaded my brain, based on ten songs I’d written, which my son, Ryan Hommel and his friend and music partner Seth Glier produced (the album and novel share the title “A Lot Like Life.” I hope to dust that one off later this year.

In the years that followed, I somehow wrote two more novels: “Southern Fried Soprano” and “Cultivating the Eternal Light.” More about those in the future.

For now, I want to thank everyone who had a hand in “Last Laugh.” I hope I’ve done justice to the story the real Kevin inspired. I hope his widow, Anne McGrath, enjoys the book she encouraged me to push forward with. And I want to thank various friends and cousins who offered suggestions and encouragement along the way, including: Robin Pearl, Ellen Pollen, Hilary Salk, and Janet Isenberg. This novel has had such a long gestation that I’m sure I’ve omitted many others, but please know I am grateful beyond measure.

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“What do you mean, you’re not going to Costa Rica?” said Kevin, from his bed two days later.

Robbie shrugged. “It’s obvious, douche bag. No way can I enjoy the trip with you going to the hospital.”

“Your parents will never let you stay home, jerkoff.” He flipped Robbie the bird by pretending to scratch his cheek with his third finger. Robbie responded with “the Code”: punching numbers on a pretend keypad on his forearm, which forced the third finger to flip up.

“That one’s so old!” Kevin rotated his two fists side by side, causing the right middle finger to spring to life.

“And you think ‘the Crank’ is original?”

Kevin responded with “the Blow,” exhaling into his fist to slowly raise the middle finger.

Robbie unsuccessfully tried to stifle a smile.

“Admit it, Roo. I’m the funniest guy you ever met.”

“As if... I know plenty of funnier folks.”

“Name one, epididymis!”

“Mitch Hedberg.”

“He doesn’t count. Hedberg is Deadberg.

“Okay, how about Josh Johnson? Or the cast of ‘Saturday Night Live?’”

“They don’t count. They’re all professional comedians. Plus, you don’t know them personally.”

“But they’re a whole lot funnier than you are,” Robbie countered. “Even Hedberg, from the grave. Even your toothless ninety-three-year-old neighbor, who farts more than she breathes, is funnier than you, you bulbourethral gland.”

Bea poked her head in the door. “Are you dick heads still obsessing over the sexual organs from junior-year bio? Grow up!”

“Whattaya want, you symphysis?”

“I don’t want anything. Mom wants you to know dinner is in half an hour. And I’m not going to bother asking you what symphysis means.”

“Your lack of intellectual curiosity is tragic,” Kevin said.

“And she told me to discretely tell you, Kevin, not to invite your little friend.”

“Nice work in the discrete department,” Robbie said. He caught Kevin’s eye and mouthed the word, “bouquet.” Kevin nodded and grinned. They began waving their fingers, palms in, at Bea.

“Guess what this is?” Kevin asked her.

“Like I’m supposed to give a flying ef?”

At once, they lowered all their fingers but the middle ones. “A bouquet of these,” smirked Kevin.

Bea rolled her eyes.

“I swear, neither of you knows shit about shit. Grow up, goons.” Kevin aimed a rubber band at her butt as she walked out. He just missed. Bea slammed the door behind her.

“Damn. I’m losing my touch,” he said.

“I don’t remember anything in the male anatomy chapter called symphysis,” Robbie admitted.

“Show a little initiative and for a change and read ahead to the next chapter. It’s on the female reproductive system.”

“You would.” Robbie dug out a small wrapped package from his backpack and handed it to Kevin.

“What’s this?”

“Only one way to find out.”

Grinning, he tore open the wrapping paper and pulled out a bootleg CD of a Mitch Hedberg live standup routine. As Kevin attacked the packaging, he said, “Wow–this is so cool. Where’d you get it?”

“If I told you, I’d have to kill you.”

“Don’t bother. My white blood cells may do the job.”

“You may not be the funniest person, but you sure are the most melodramatic.”

“What’s this for? A pity present?” Kevin asked.

“Bingo. Since you have such a lousy sense of humor, you’ll need help finding things to laugh at while I’m away. If I go, that is.”

“I’m sure it’ll be hilarious. He always is. Or was. My biggest problem will be resisting telling Hedberg jokes to the doctor tomorrow. I don’t want him shaking with laughter while he sticks needles in me during my bone marrow test and spinal tap.”

Kevin popped open the case and slid the disk into the alarm clock-CD player on his night table. Mitch Hedberg’s smart-ass voice oozed from Kevin’s CD player:

Someone handed me a picture and said, “This is a picture of me when I was

younger.” Every picture of you is when you were younger. “...Here’s a

picture of me when I’m older.” Where’d you get that camera, man?

“He almost sounds like he knew there would be no older him,” said Kevin. After listening to a few more minutes of the CD, Robbie rummaged through his backpack and pulled out a DVD of “Spinal Tap,” the mocku-drama about a fake British rock band on tour in the U.S.

“You are warped,” laughed Kevin. They watched for a few minutes, laughing, smirking and reciting the dialogue along with the characters. Just a few minutes into the movie, Bea screamed from downs stairs.

“Dinner, scum ball!”

“Wanna eat over again?”

Robbie sucked in a deep breath. “Uh, your mom expressly banned me from your dining room. Plus, my folks will not be happy if I sleaze out of cooking dinner again.”

“So I guess this is adios muchacho.”

“Yeah, for the next week, anyway.”

They looked at each other a moment.

“Awkward,” Kevin said.

“Yeah, well…”

“So have a great trip.”

“No way I’m…”

“I mean it, Roo.” His voice was flat, like he was trying not to choke up.

“If I go—and that’s still a big if—I will call you every day. My dad added international service to my cell phone in a lamed attempt to try to bribe me to go. Of course, I’m still trying to convince them I shouldn’t have to go. But if I do, at least I’ll be able to call and text you to see how you’re doing. How you’re reallydoing.”

“Yeah, right! I’ll be your daily downer, casting a pall over your vacation. Anyway, you’re taking your laptop, right? We can email or Skype. You’ll probably find cyber-cafes everywhere.”

“Um, not in the rain forest, dude.”

“Your hotels might supply wifi or a room with a computer for the guests.”

“Will you be allowed to use your laptop or smart phone at the hospital?”

“We’re allowed, but they discourage it, to avoid theft.”

“Damn. But you’ll be home most of the week. So I’ll call you there. And no phony-baloney ‘everything’s just fine and dandy’ routine with me. Promise?”

“Yeah, yeah... Only if you promise to tell me all about your adventures. No holding back on some bogus theory that your having fun might make me feel all sorry for myself for being stuck in the hospital. Just don’t let the facts get in the way of a good story.”

Robbie stopped mid laugh. “Actually, these days I wish I could throw some facts out the window.”

“Like the little fact that I probably have leukemia?”

“Dinner!” Kevin’s younger sister shouted from the bottom landing. The boys pushed and laughed their way downstairs, as Mrs. Rubin added another gilt-edged place setting onto a starched-white linen tablecloth.

“Bea, go fetch some napkins, dear,” she ordered her daughter.

“Which ones?” Bea sighed.

“Oh, any which ones will do…” As Bea reached for the bone-colored napkins, Mrs. Rubin snapped, “No, not those!”

Bea exhaled a louder sigh. “Can’t you just specify what you want if you have a preference?”

“Kevin, would you mind moving that monstrous bean stalk from the corner chair? We’ll need it for Robbie,” Dr. Rubin asked.

“That’s a ficus, dear,” corrected Mrs. Rubin. Kevin grunted as he lifted and moved the potted plant.

“Don’t tell me Rooni Brow is mooching off our food again,” Bea rolled her thickly mascaraed eyes.

“Shut your pie hole!” Kevin looked from his mother to his father as he sat down.

“Are you going to let her get away with that?” Kevin scratched his leg with his fork.

Mrs. Rubin cleared her throat. “That will be enough, young lady.” Then Dr. Rubin patted Bea’s hand and shot her a conspiratorial wink.

Mrs. Rubin narrowed her eyes at her son. “Really, Kevin—do not use your fork to scratch your leg.”

“Gross!” Bea drew out the word into three syllables. “Almost as gross as Rooni Brow.”

“Haven’t I taught you to make our guests feel welcome?” Mrs. Rubin snapped at Bea.

“You also taught me to be honest.”

“But not cruel, Bea. What does that mean, anyway—Rooni Brow?”

“Ugh—you can be so dense, Mom. Don’t know even know Roo stands for Kevin’s stupid nickname for Robbie since they were little—from his initials: Robbie Owen Olinsky. And the ‘brow’ comes from the unibrow he grew this year along with other wonders of puberty, like disgusting zits and greasy hair.”

“Come. Kitchen. Now!” Mrs. Rubin maintained a tight smile through clenched teeth.

“Great. I’ve got to serve the primate, too?” When Mrs. Rubin shot her the evil eye, Bea grunted, then arose and followed her mother, hips all swively as she strutted into the kitchen.

Kevin lifted his pants leg and grimaced at an angry Galapagos of welts.

Dr. Rubin frowned. “Maybe I should take a look at that after dinner. You look a bit pale. Any other symptoms?”

Before Kevin could answer, Mrs. Rubin reemerged, followed by Bea. They each cradled a platter with barely enough for two in Robbie’s house, let alone the five mouths at this table. Robbie’s stomach groaned, knowing this meal would barely make a dent in his appetite. He thanked Mrs. Rubin as she carefully dished out stingy, dried-out salmon pieces, each topped with a slice of lemon and a sprig of rosemary. Then Bea wordlessly forked a few grains of white rice and three spears of shriveled asparagus onto each plate. No wonder everyone was bone-thin in this family.

Robbie tried to match the painstakingly slow pace at which the Rubin family ate.

He strained to swallow the first dry bite. The only part of the supper in large supply was the tension hovering over the table.

In his own home, Robbie thought, one or two days a week he cooked a recipe his grandmother had taught him or one he would look up on the internet. He would make enough for himself and his parents, with leftovers enough for the next day’s lunch or dinner. His parents often came home from work too late for him to wait for them, but always Friday nights they arrived just in time to eat together. He loved those nights. They’d sit for hours laughing, unpacking what happened that week at their jobs or at his school, arguing over what was happening in the news, talking over each other. He enjoyed hearing his mom discuss her job as a yoga and meditation instructor, and how some of her students dramatically improved their mobility or health problems by learning how to move, breathe, center and quiet their bodies. He especially loved hearing about his dad’s work as an immigration lawyer—the lives of his clients from all different countries, the strategies he used to help them get green cards or prevent them from getting deported. He admired both his parents for pursuing meaningful work that actually helped people.

Robbie recalled the one time that Kevin’s family accepted an invitation to his house for a Sabbath meal. Mrs. Rubin had looked horrified at how his family had talked and laughed with mouths full and elbows on the table and wildly gesturing with their hands.

Kevin broke the current dinner’s awkward silence. “Did I tell you guys that Roo is going to Costa Rica this weekend with his parents?”

“Wonderful!” said Dr. Rubin. “Christmas at our Cancun time share feels so long ago. I wish we could go back now. Ah, to relax on that perfect beach.”

“Actually, I hope our trip will be anything but relaxing,” said Robbie. “I’m looking forward to some adventures in the jungle.”

“You don’t know shit about shit,” said Bea. “You’re not exactly the macho-slash- athletic type.”

Robbie paused for one of her parents to object to her swearing, shrugged when neither did. “We’re going to take one of those zip lines through the rain forest and hike up a recently active volcano. And the white-water rafting there is insane.”

“Why don’t you just find a nice resort and sleep on the beach all day, party at the discos at night, sipping virgin piña coladas? Virgin being the operative word for you.” Bea yawned as she inspected a chip on her manicured nail.

“I have to agree with my daughter,” said Mrs. Rubin, squinting menacingly at Bea. “About the relaxing part—not her rude barb—which, Bea, you can now apologize for.”

“Sorry,” Bea blurted. “But I don’t get you, Mom. You hate rustic vacations, but you spend all your time in the garden at home. Pruning and dead-heading, watering bushes and flowers in our yard.”

She should spend more time perfecting her cooking and less trying to perfect nature, thought Robbie, chewing his last dry bite.

Kevin turned to his mother. “It’s about taming the wild. God forbid Mom should let nature run its course. The garden has to be perfectly groomed.”

“Not to mention all the plants you bring inside the house and schpritz with insecticide,” added Dr. Rubin. He turned to his wife. “Dear, I’ve told you those poisons don’t just kill insects. They can cause all sorts of medical problems for people.”

“I guess this is gang-up-on-mother night.” Mrs. Rubin snipped.

Robbie shifted in his seat. “I should be getting home,” he said. “I still have English homework.”

“The essay on the dreaded Eliot poem, The Waste Land?” asked Kevin. “It’s not due until the end of the month!”

“I don’t want it hanging over my head while I’m on vacay. ‘April is the cruelest month,’” Robbie recited while pulling out his chair.

“Not for you. You’ll be swinging from vines like Tarzan and communing with howler monkeys,” Kevin said.

“So far all I get from that poem is how morose Elliot is.” Robbie slunk back into his seat.

“Yeah, he’s a downer,” agreed Kevin.

“Bo-ring,” said Bea. “May I please be excused?” She looked at her father, who was staring blankly into the air.

“I remember struggling with that long poem in college,” Dr. Rubin said. “I’m impressed you boys are tackling it in high school.”

“Well, not the entire four hundred-plus verses,” said Robbie. “Just the first section, ‘The Burial of the Dead.’”

Dr. Rubin furrowed his brow, trying to summon up a stanza of the poem. “I think the section you’re studying starts like this:

“‘April is the cruelest month, breeding

Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing

Memory and desire, stirring

Dull roots with spring rain.’”

Mrs. Rubin smiled. “Lovely, sweetue. Who needs to struggle through the hot and sweaty rain forest when you can read a poem like that and look out at one’s own garden, in the comfort of one’s own home?”

“Go figure. A nature lover who avoids being out in it,” Kevin laughed. “I don’t get you, Mom.”

“I don’t get the poem,” said Robbie. “I mean, in that stanza, flowers are starting to bloom. What’s so cruel about that?”

“Later in the poem, he answers that,” said Dr. Rubin. “Do you have a copy handy? I’ll be happy to show you.”

Robbie got up again to fetch his backpack from the stair landing.

“It’s the poem that’s cruel, not the month. This is torture to listen to!” Bea interrupted. “May I please be excused, Daddy?” she repeated, batting her eyes at him.

“Sure, angel.”

Bea planted a kiss on her father’s tanned cheek, got up and started to sashay her butt out of the room.

“Not so fast,” said Mrs. Rubin, collecting the dishes. “If you’re so bored, you can make yourself useful in the kitchen.” She handed the stack of plates to Bea.

“This is not fair! Haven’t you ever heard of child labor laws?”

Robbie riffled through the satchel as he walked back into the dining room. “Here it is, Dr. Rubin,” he said, handing him some rumpled pages.

Dr. Rubin scanned them. “Aha! Here’s a hint about April’s cruelty:

“‘That corpse you planted last year in your garden,

Has it begun to sprout? Will it bloom this year?

Or has the sudden frost disturbed its bed?

O keep the Dog far hence, that’s friend to men,

Or with his nails he’ll dig it up again!

You! Hypocrite lecteur! - mon semblable, - mon frère!

I had not thought death had undone so many.’”

“Uh, who’s the hypocrite?” Kevin raised one accusing eyebrow at his mother as she disappeared behind the kitchen door.

“ I don’t get that either. What’s Eliot saying?” Robbie asked.

“We all are hypocrites, at least some of the time, aren’t we? It’s part of human nature,” said Dr. Rubin. “The human head—and heart—are complex, nuanced, and often in conflict with each other. Maybe that is part of what he’s saying.”

“What about the part about death? It takes us all, not just ‘so many.’”

“Ah, it might take us all, but it does not necessarily undo us all. As a doctor, I have seen all kinds of death—even some good ones.”

“What is a good death?” asked Robbie.

“An easy, calm one. Some are quite spiritual, even, when there is no struggle or fear. I think a peaceful death, surrounded by loving family and friends, is a good one.”

Mrs. Rubin, back from the kitchen, chimed in, “I don’t know anyone who was lucky enough to die that way. It all seems awful and pointless. But the only death that I think could actually undo me would be that of a child.”

“God forbid,” said Dr. Rubin. He turned to the boys. “Does any of this help you understand the poem?”

“Sort of. Maybe,” said Robbie. He arose again, and stuffed the poem into his backpack as he looked toward the lace-curtained window. “The rain has let up but it’s getting dark. I’d better get home. Thanks for dinner.”

Dr. Rubin rose from the table and turned to his son. “Come to my study after you see your friend to the door, Kevin, so I can have a look at that rash you’ve been torturing.”

The weather started out perfect. There was no hint of rain—yet—on the unseasonably warm April afternoon as Robbie Owen Olinsky rode his bicycle up the winding hill to his best friend’s house. It was only two-point-four miles from his house to Kevin’s, but his lungs and ligaments had not yet readjusted to the steepness after a long, stagnant winter. Still, he waited until he had reached the mid-way point to stop and catch his breath, slurp greedily from his water bottle, and stretch his calf and thigh muscles.

Squinting to scan the ribbon of road below, Robbie picked out his own mustard- colored home and his red brick high school around the corner from his house. Lime green new growth burst from familiar branches of bushes and trees beyond the base of the hill.

His jaw tightened when he noticed the first hint of dark clouds hugging the horizon, and suddenly remembered the morning weatherman had warned of late-afternoon thunderstorms. He could even smell a slight muskiness that infused the air as it became heavy with humidity before the coming spring shower.

Once he slaked his thirst and calmed his breathing, he tucked a sweaty, matted curl back under his helmet and nudged his sore butt back onto the bike seat. He ignored the start of a blister on his palm and began pedaling the harder half of the trip. Robbie finally stopped at the mailbox at the base of Kevin’s long driveway and grimaced. Instead of reading RUBIN, the letters spelled RU-space-IN. Ruin. When had the mailbox shed its B?

He didn’t know why it annoyed him, but it did. So much so that he sucked in a resolute breath and high-tailed his bike back down the hill. He veered left past his home, and on towards downtown. It was another couple miles to the old family-owned hardware store, a stubborn holdout to the dueling big box behemoths that anchor twin strip malls in the next town.

As Robbie locked his bike to the store’s rusted wrought-iron handrail, he realized he had no clue about the size, shape or color of the mailbox letters. A bell on the door rang and the wide-planked floor creaked as Robbie trudged inside. He inhaled mingling scents of sawdust, motor oil and rawhide. The shop owner pointed an arthritic finger down the far aisle to a display of stick-on letters. Robbie scanned the row of Bs: black outlined with glow-in-the-dark-silver; silver with black outline; black and white; white and black; regular font and italic; large letters and extra-large, medium, small, and extra small; upper case and lower; serif and san serif. Robbie plucked them all from the rack— all fifteen—and counted eight bucks and change onto the counter up front. Back outside, the darkening sky leered at him.

Robbie twisted his torso until he was rewarded with a good crack. Then he swiveled his leg over his bicycle. He didn’t pause at the halfway point this time, ignoring his huffing and puffing and shaking thigh muscles as he strained up the steepest stretch. Losing momentum, he pedaled furiously in low gear, in slow motion. “I’m pathetic,” he thought, as he peeled his now seriously sore butt off the seat and walked the bike up the last block and a half.

The first clap of thunder stabbed his chest as he approached Kevin’s driveway. A tentative drizzle misted his glasses. Letting the bike drop, Robbie pulled out the wad of Bs from the wilted brown paper bag. He held them, one by one, up to the now damp gap between the silver RU and IN. None of his Bs fit quite right. So he selected the closest in size, even though it was black outlined in white, and italic. He wiped the side of the mailbox with his t-shirt, peeled off the paper backing and pressed the B in place. He could not prevent the B from slanting into the I. Hey Kevin, he might say if he were not so profoundly spent and cranky, you got a B in your I!

Still, he was satisfied. Mission accomplished. He slid his helmet from his now drenched scalp, stuffed the rest of the Bs into his pocket, and knocked on the front door.

“Roo, you must be way out of shape,” said Kevin as he let Robbie in. “Not only are you almost an hour late, you’re schvitzin’ like there’s no tomorrow.”

“This is more rain than sweat. Lend me a dry t-shirt?” Robbie followed Kevin upstairs to a sparse bedroom. He pulled up a wooden chair he’d bought at a tag sale for Kevin’s birthday the previous summer. Robbie had painted the seat, back slats and legs each a different Caribbean color. Kevin had said he loved it even though it almost seemed to pain him to disturb his precious starkness. “If less is more,” Kevin had joked at the time, “then I have way too much.”

Unzipping his backpack, Robbie groaned. “Have you checked out how much trig homework we have?” He wiped sweat and drizzle off his forehead with his bunched-up t- shirt, then let it drop near his feet. He pulled Kevin’s fresh polo shirt over his head. “I’d give anything to get out of this class.”

“Anything? Like your left testicle?” Kevin scratched his leg with the tip of his pencil.

“Maybe your left nut, not mine, douchebag.”

“Well, you know what they say: You can’t teach an old dog new trigs.”

“Two points!” said Robbie, tilting the chair on its back legs.

“See? I am the funniest guy you ever met.”

Kevin plopped a heavy textbook and note pad onto his single bed, barely disturbing the plain white blanket tucked in with sharp hospital corners. Then he sat and crossed his legs.

Robbie struggled to balance the heavy textbook on his left leg and a thick loose-leaf on the other side of his lap. “Sheesh, Kev. You live in the fanciest house in the best neighborhood—can’t you get your parents to shell out a few bucks for a desk?”

“You know very well that my bed and night table are all I need and all I want.”

“And your chair. Don’t forget who bought you the chair, Mr. Minimal-ass.”

“What did you spend, like—five bucks for that?”

“Plus paint and hours painting it. But if you don’t want it, I’ll take it back. It would go for at least fifty bucks on eBay.” Robbie rummaged for a pencil in his backpack.

“How you find anything in that messy bag, I’ll never know. You’re worse than a girl, schlepping God knows what in there. Thought it’s better than your public disaster bedroom.”

“Judge not. At least my bedroom has personality. Not to mention color.”

“Ha! Your walls still have clouds painted on them from when you were a toddler.

That’s not personality, that’s arrested development!”

“My Mom painted those clouds. She’d be all, like, my ‘baby’s growing up’ if I tried to paint over them.”

“Don’t be so sure. She doesn’t mind letting her ‘baby’ essentially run the house.”

Robbie threw his wet, wadded t-shirt at his best friend. As Kevin reached to catch it, he grunted. “Man, my back aches.”

“Trigonometry makes my head ache. Is the sine the ratio of the adjacent side over the hypotenuse?”

“The opposite side, not the adjacent side,” Kevin answered without looking up from scribbling formulas and solutions. Over the next hour he intermittently helped Robbie work through equations and patiently explained concepts Robbie struggled to comprehend. It was six-fifteen when Mrs. Rubin knocked on the bedroom door and poked her head in. “Dinner in about ten minutes, dear.”

“Can Roo stay?” Kevin asked his mother. “We’re not done with homework yet.”

She smiled tightly. “Oh. I suppose.”

“Thanks, but I probably should be getting home.”

“Come on, dude. Your parents won’t even be home,” said Kevin. “And Mom’s making salmon, not meat. So you won’t have to do penance for breaking any kosher laws.”

“You may only be half Jewish, but you should know Jews do guilt, not penance, dick head—oops, sorry Mrs. Rubin,” Robbie said, blushing.

“You should inform your parents you’ll be eating here,” Mrs. Rubin said, one pointy high heel in the bedroom, the other out.

“Well, if you’re sure it’s not an imposition…”

Her ghostly thin profile disappeared behind the door.

Robbie slammed his textbook shut, retrieved his cell phone from his jeans pocket and thumbed a text message to his mother.

Kevin groaned as he got up, rubbing his back. “Maybe I’m coming down with the flu. My joints ache. I feel like I’m on fire.”

Robbie put the back of his hand to Kevin’s forehead. “No fever. All those hypotenuses are turning you into a hypochondriac.”

“Not to go off on a tangent—pun intended—but we should go down for dinner.”

“Your mom didn’t seem enthusiastic about my staying. I only accepted so I wouldn’t have to eat alone. Again.”

“Not that my family gets the concept of dinner talk.” Kevin finger-combed his blond hair off his forehead.

“At least your folks are around most nights.”

“That would be great if you like living with one of the Stepford wives.

Robbie laughed. “I think your mom is more like Bree Van de Kamp.”

“Who?”

“The redhead mom from ‘Desperate Housewives.’”

“The witchy, bitchy one?”

“No offense… Except for the fact your mom is blond, she’s all Bree. All high

strung, over-starched, underfed.”

Kevin squinted toward the door and lowered his voice. “Miracle I ever survived

childhood.”

“Technically, you haven’t.” Robbie kept his voice at normal volume, not catching Kevin’s signal. “We haven’t. Not yet. We’re both still minors.”

“What about yours?”

“My what?”

“You mom. What TV mom is she most like?”

“Maybe Lois, ‘Malcolm in the Middle’s’ mother?”

“You wish!”

“I’m not so sure. She can be scary. You never know what she’s capable of.”

“She’s also hot.”

“My mother? Hot? Who wants their mom to be hot?”

“She’s also crazy in a fun kind of way.”

“Are we talking about the same person? My grandma may be crazy, but I’m not so sure about my mother.”