“What’s wrong?” I asked, a bit scared. What more could happen to this kid?

He turned the phone toward me so I could read the screen.

Must work late. Sorry! Can u make sandwich for yrself? Obviously it was from his uncle, and it meant Oren would be alone for dinner.

“Come to our place,” I blurted out.

Oren just stared at me.

“For dinner,” I said. “I mean, if you want to.”

He looked over my shoulder toward my dad, who was still waiting for his banana split. “I’m sure it’s okay,” I said. “We have people over for dinner all the time.” Which wasn’t exactly true, but still, I knew my parents would be fine with it.

“And don’t worry. I’m not, like, trying to force you to be my friend or anything,” I explained. “It’s just so you’re not alone.”

When he frowned at me, I added, “I don’t have any friends. And that’s just the way I like it.”

Oren kept frowning, but I wasn’t about to start telling him about Sam. Definitely not here anyway. Plus, I barely knew him.

Finally he took a long breath and nodded. He started to tap out a response to his uncle. It was pretty awkward to watch.

“Why don’t you finish your ice cream first?” I said, pointing at the dribble of minty green ice cream running down his cast. “People might start to think you have some kind of gross infection.” I made a face and pretended to gag.

Oren giggled. He actually giggled!

See? I was right. Ice cream really does make everything better.

Ten

Dad was cool with Oren coming for dinner, like I knew he would be. Once we finished our ice cream, he drove us home. As we were getting out of the car, I noticed Oren looking across the parking lot at the funeral home. His jaw clenched.

Sometimes I forget that when other people come into Walman Memorial Chapel, they aren’t thinking about keeping the fridge filled with water, vacuuming the carpets or making sure the bathrooms are clean. They definitely aren’t thinking about who dusts the caskets and the pews in the chapel. They probably don’t even think about how those things need dusting.

When most people go there, it’s because they have lost someone close to them.

Obviously that’s what Oren was thinking about now.

“Come on inside,” I said quickly, pointing in the opposite direction, toward my house. “We can watch TV until dinner or something.”

He followed me to our side door. There were two sets of steps on the landing, one that went up to the kitchen and another that led down to the rec room. Dad had gone up, but once we were inside, I kicked off my shoes and led Oren to the basement.

I could hear Mom and Dad above us, getting started on dinner.

“Do you like corned beef?” I asked Oren as we sat on the couch.

He shrugged.

Great. More shrugging.