Page 24 of On Fire Island

“Want me to go check?”

“Joel just went to check.”

A guy in the outfield yelled in, “That was ten minutes ago!”

Matty picked up a bat, leaning against the backstop.

“Pitch me a couple, and then I’ll go.”

He hit three balls over the right field fence, put down his stick, and headed for our house.

“Wow, someone’s been hitting the cages!” the catcher remarked.

I imagined it was his father’s face he pictured on that ball as he smacked it, though it could have been the drummer’s.

We stood in the doorway of my house and surveyed the sorry scene in front of us. There was a lot to take in. The song “Everybody Hurts” by R.E.M. played in the background as six grown men sat around the living room in a disjointed circle on either side of Shep and Ben. It looked like one of those group-therapy sessions that the doctors at Sloan were constantly pushing me to join—ones with names like Stupid Cancer and Share. I always refused. Sitting in a circle wallowing in one another’s misery didn’t seem like a fun way to spend my ever-dwindling afternoons. From the look of this group, I was right.

I worried Matty would join the sob fest. He certainly had the material, but he kept his eye on the prize. He pulled open the shade on the living room window. Sunlight filled the room, and the men squinted, adjusting their red-rimmed eyes.

“What’s going on in here?” Matty asked.

Most greeted him with blank stares, but one of them spoke over the depressing music. Tears pouring down his face. “My dog died.”

“Mugsy? He’s tied up on the fence at the field, where you should be.”

“Not Mugsy. Mr.Chillypeppers. My mother said I was too young to hold the leash, but I wouldn’t listen.”

They all looked wrecked, ironically except for Ben and Shep. Ben was clearly suppressing amusement while Shep, in his typicalfashion of not giving a crap about appearances, was actually laughing.

The next song came on, Johnny Cash singing “Hurt.” I recognized the first few chords of the guitar even before he crooned the first line—

“I hurt myself today to see if I still feel.”

I couldn’t believe my ears. Matty walked over to the iPod and inspected it.

“And what’s with the depressing music?”

Shep answered proudly, “I made a playlist!”

Right after SUMMER CHILL and JULIA’S DANCE MIX, it read HAH.

“ ‘Hah’? It doesn’t sound very funny,” Matty observed.

“It’s an abbreviation,” Eddie explained while Joel, as always, tried to lighten the mood.

“Ever think about how the wordabbreviationis so long?”

“It’s not an abbreviation,” Shep corrected him. “It’s an acronym. You kids love those acronyms.”

Matty asked Shep with his last thread of patience, “What does it stand for?”

“IDK, my BFF Matt.”

Ben put us out of our misery, explaining “Hopeless and Heartbroken” as Shep smiled proudly.

“You said I should make a playlist. What’d you expect? Show tunes?”

“You know, it’s beautiful out,” Matty announced, ignoring Shep.

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