I got super tight with Toby back in third grade—like, we're-blood-brothers-now tight. Yeah, we actually did that whole slice-your-hand-and-shake thing like total geniuses. Pretty sure that's how people catch, you know, HIV or whatever, but did I care? Nope. Life's too short to freak out over a handshake with a little shared DNA, right? That was our thing—being legendarily stupid but committed.
Toby and I would sit at the lunch table plotting world domination between bites of mystery meat, pretending the cafeteria apple juice was whiskey and we were hardened outlaws. We thought we were so cool. Spoiler: we weren't. But that didn't stop us from building elaborate stories about growing up, moving to the woods, and living like survivalist kings.
So naturally, when Grandpa Woodruff suddenly d
