Excerpt from The Half-Life of Everything by Deborah Carol Gang, plus links to reviews, author biography & more

David had once been the tall one, but both boys surpassed him by early high school. For the last year or so, Dylan would hide behind Jack, copying his stance but obscured by Jack's thicker silhouette. They enjoyed scaring David and he always seemed to fall for it. He didn't mind. He would rather see them silly than unhappy. Now, looking at Jack, who was studiously not crying, he realized that the narcissism of adolescence was over.

"I know Mom is gone," Jack said. "She's just someone who looks like Mom. But I like having someone around who looks like Mom. It helps a little. I mean - " He found a tattered Kleenex in his pocket and blew his nose. "Since we can't have everything." He gave a half smile. "I don't want her to leave before I do. I'll take her driving and on more walks. We'll buy stuff for the dorm. I'll just have to be around more."

And he was, but he was leaving for college in late August, and that was non-negotiable as far as David was concerned.

* * *

Eventually, August came and the four of them found themselves parked in the surprisingly small lot of the Caring Glenn Residence. The day after July Fourth, they had begun working their way down a list from the local Alzheimer's group. This was only their fourth place (unlike the names of plumbers, those of assisted-living facilities clustered towards the middle and end of the alphabet).

Dylan hadn't seemed surprised or angry when, shortly after he arrived home for the three weeks between graduation and a summer internship, his dad told him that the time had arrived. He showed no sign of claiming, as absent relatives sometimes do, that things could be managed better.

Perhaps he saw David's exhaustion and watched as his little brother managed to look simultaneously eighteen and thirty. Perhaps, like David, he was determined that Jack go away to college as he had.

Only the twins had pleaded for more time. "We can keep this going until we graduate," one of them said. "My boyfriend will cover if we need him to." But David just smiled, puzzled that they seemed to genuinely love Kate when they had never really met her.

He and the boys had debated whether they should bring Kate along for the tours. David remembered similar discussions about whether to bring their young sons to a concert or a funeral. They often guessed wrong and found themselves saying, "The kids would have loved this" or "I'll take him to the car." They didn't want to frighten her, but they thought she'd make a good impression, and they also hoped to detect signs of a preference, though so far she just seemed uniformly puzzled. Yesterday, when they toured a small garden belonging to a facility none of them liked, and surprised them by saying, "Did they want our advice on something?" But that was all she said.

"I don't like this - the parking lot. It means hardly any relatives visit," Dylan now complained as they looked around the very small lot and saw that the employee area was the only one with cars. Despite the limited parking, the building itself turned out to be large and expensive-looking. They entered through an overperfumed and over-decorated lobby that led to activity rooms with fabric flower arrangements on every surface and homilies hung in tiers of two or three. He and the boys studied them while their guide left to take a call.

One said "Every Ending Leads to a New Beginning," seemingly more cruel than wise. Another read "Live Out Loud," which the boys decided was bad advice. They were puzzling over "Life Itself Is the Proper Binge" when Kate spoke up to say maybe they shouldn't worry about it. Jack then pointed to one on the far wall, "Life is Short, Fill it Up," and said, "That's something you would say, Mom," and she said, "Why, thank you." David reminded himself she could sometimes be less vacant than she seemed, though only for long enough to hurt.

"I envy these families," Jack said quietly. "Their people probably didn't get sick until seventy or eighty." Dylan put his arm on Jack's shoulder. David reminded himself that when Dylan graduated from high school, his mom had been a vague but credible presence. For Jack, she was a stranger looking at the wrong kid. They finished their tour and were standing at the main entrance where David was preparing to thank the guide and politely convey their lack of interest. Kate interrupted his first sentence to say, "Is everybody warm enough?"

Excerpted from The Half-Life of Everything by Deborah Carol Gang . Copyright © 2018 by Deborah Carol Gang . Excerpted by permission of Bancroft Press. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.