"Ladies and gentlemen—" with a deep bow to the hedges and hose reel "—may I present to you...me, Norman Foreman! In my exclusive new show, for one night only, Sausages and Gravitas! And now for a few questions, ladies and gentlemen. I ask you, what is a tree's least favorite month? Septimmmberrr! What do you call a fake noodle? An immmpasta! What do you call an alligator in a vest? An invessstigator! Thank you. Thank you. Thank you very much!"

The thing was, though, that even with all that astounding gravitas and notwithstanding his devastating good looks, no matter how much he practiced and how closely he tried to emulate his old-school comedy heroes, Norman could never quite master the art of comic timing. The jokes were there, every punch line was delivered word-perfect, but they always pulled into the station a little too late, or too early, or ended up on the completely wrong platform with a commuter under the wheels.

It wasn't until he joined forces with Jax that he was able to wrangle his earnestness to perfection to play the straight man, serving up the spotlight for his fearless mate's outrageous showmanship. They had the makings of a young Abbott and Costello, the Two Ronnies, or their favorite comparison, Reeves and Mortimer. The perfect comedy duo. At least to their appreciative audience of me and the hedges.

Teachers, classmates and even Jax's parents never understood what Jax and Norman saw in each other and said as much at every opportunity. Presumably in an effort to steer Norman away from a potential life of petty crime, the direction in which everyone was convinced Jax was headed. But I understood. Because by introducing Jax to his comedy heroes, Norman opened that kid up to a way all that energy, bravado and even the little bit of genuine badness inside him could be funneled into a different kind of outlet.

Norman gave Jax comedy and Jax gave Norman the best friend he'd never had. And oh how I loved him for it. It was a good deal all round.

* * *

I know everything there is to know about Norman. From every scab and scale that's ever tormented his poor, defeated skin, to the crease that appears in his forehead when he smiles and the other one that forms when he frowns. When his psoriasis is particularly vicious that one moves in for an extended stay. I know his left eyebrow is hairier than his right, and that his ears move up and down far more than other people's when he chews. Although I've never told him that last one, because, let's face it, the kid has enough to deal with.

But after Jax died I found myself having to do a double take when I caught sight of the stranger sitting on the sofa staring into a blank TV screen. Or standing in the bathroom brushing his teeth. Or glancing sideways at a hole in the wall. Nothing about Norman looked the same as it had for the past nearly twelve years. He was also more measured than he'd been before, like he was carefully acting his part in every scene according to how he thought I wanted it to play out. Doing just enough to fool me into thinking he was still with the rest of us in the land of the living, and not maybe wishing he was somewhere else with his best friend in the land of the not-so-living.

But no matter how many times he said he was all right, I knew Norman was so far from all right you'd have needed a three-day hike to catch sight of the tail end of it disappearing around the corner. He even slept differently. He'd always had a habit of winding his top sheet around his legs as he read in bed, as if he was trying to dig in his heels and get as deep into the story world as possible. Every night after he fell asleep I'd creep into his room to turn off his light, retrieve whatever book he'd been reading and untangle the knot of bed linen. When he was younger he could never believe I was able to do it without disturbing him and was convinced some kind of nocturnal sheet-straightening aliens were at work.

Excerpted from The Funny Thing About Norman Foreman by Julietta Henderson . Copyright © 2021 by Julietta Henderson . Excerpted by permission of Mira. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.