Introduction

When Robin Matheson’s husband is killed in Afghanistan, she cuts ties with his obnoxious best friend, Cyril—a 500-pound hacker who didn’t even bother to come to the funeral. Unfortunately, her three-year-old latches on to him, and Robin can’t bear to take anything else away from her son.

As Robin grudgingly arranges playdates, she begins to realize that Cyril is the one person who truly understands the magnitude of her loss. He also knows far more about her husband’s death than he’s been letting on.

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Excerpt

Chapter One

ROBIN’S HAND CLOSED TIGHT around the bottle of pills when she saw him standing there, a big black thumbprint smudge on the fresh-cut field of green.
She probably wouldn’t have gone through with it anyway. She’d survived the funeral, and the day after, and the day after that. Odds were, she wasn’t going to work up the nerve.
Still. This was her place. Her time. His presence denied her even the small comfort of an imagined end.
She shoved the bottle into her low-slung canvas purse and started to get back in the truck, belatedly recognizing his geriatric gray Datsun at the other end of the lot. But then he glanced up and she knew he’d seen her there, in her ragged cutoffs and no bra and her hair sticking out at all angles in a huge, unkempt fro. There was no retreat, after that, because she wasn’t a coward. ... view entire excerpt...

Discussion Questions

1. Who is the most important person in Robin's life? How does this compare with who (or what) other major characters prioritize? What does each character's priority say about his or her outlook on life?

2. Later in the narrative, Robin realizes her grief has blinded her to the struggles of others. What are some things she fails to notice? Is she truly alone in her grief?

3. Identify some of the moments where Robin or Cyril could have avoided a great deal of pain "if only" they had chosen to say or do something slightly different. Have there been any "if only" moments in your own life?

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