“Please stay,” Josh said. “I’ll order something. Don’t go yet.” He looked at Sarah, who nodded. He hadn’t told her about Lauren’s letters. Maybe Lauren had told her. Regardless, they were all here, he was going to stick with the plan, damn it.

“I’m on it,” Darius said, taking his phone out. “Everyone okay with pizza?”

“The faster the better,” Jen said.

Forty minutes later, after he’d cleaned up the kitchen mess and tried unsuccessfully to make conversation, and Ken had given up on gluing the platter back together, the pizza arrived. Josh sat down, exhausted. Took a sip of water.

They ate. The pizza was awful, and they chewed grimly. Jen scratched her arm. Her face was flushed, but she kept drinking wine. Who could blame her? Sarah had offered to make a salad, but he didn’t have lettuce, and she’d used up his remaining vegetables for the appetizer. He served the flaccid broccoli, noticing Darius shudder as he took a bite.

Someone mentioned that baseball had started up again, and the Sox had lost two-thirds of their games so far. Typical.

“Funny story,” Ken said, and Josh jumped a little. “My real name is Kenobi. My parents are total Star Wars geeks.”

“Well, that’s a fucking curse, isn’t it?” Jen said, and Darius subtly moved her wineglass a few inches away from her. “Is your brother named Darth Vader?”

“No, but my sister is Leia.”

“Shouldn’t you be Luke, then?” Jen asked.

“Our dog is Luke. Was. He died a long time ago.”

There was an awkward silence. “Star Wars is a great movie,” Josh offered.

“‘Help me, Obi-Wan Kenobi,’” Sarah supplied. “‘You’re my only hope.’”

Ken(obi) grinned. “I will help you,” he said. “I will totally help you, Sarah. And all of you. Jen. Darius. Josh. In fact, now that we’re all pretty much done with dinner, I have something I want to show you guys.”

“You do?” Sarah asked.

“I do! Come on, let’s go in the living room.” He got up, went to his messenger bag by the front door and pulled out a laptop.

“We should go,” Jen said. “We have children. Who are not named after Star Wars characters. But maybe next time, huh, D? Little Lando Calrissian? Baby Kylo Ren?”

“Okay, hon, tone it down,” Darius said, trying to hide his laugh. “We can stay a little longer.”

“Right,” Jen whispered loudly. “We can’t leave Josh all by himself with this weirdo.”

Josh was grateful.

“This will only take a second,” Obi-Wan Kenobi said. “I promise, you’ll love it.”

Was he going to show cat videos? What . . . Josh looked at Sarah, who shrugged and grimaced.

“So you’re probably thinking, ‘Ken, what can you do for me?’”

“Teach us to use the Force?” Jen asked, then snort-laughed.

Ken was undeterred. “And I get that, I do. So here’s the deal. Darius, my brother—”