As Tom and I are getting on the turnpike, I get a call from our brother Steve, "You're going the wrong way, the airport's east." Actually, we're going the right way, west, to his elaborate, big-deal, surprise — don't anyone blow it - 50th birthday party. His wife has been planning it for months. Earlier, I'd told Steve I'd be driving Tom to the airport. And we'd left our mother's hospital room considerably after Steve did. Where was he, and how had he spotted us?

I play dumb, something people often find more believable than I'd like. I pull off like we're turning around, and just wait. Still, ten miles after we're back on the interstate, a horn blasts, and who pulls up beside us with a confused look on his birthday face? Steve calls again, asking, "Why are you still headed west?"

I laugh unconvincingly. "Why are you heading east?" We argue about the direction, which is moronic. We're looking into the setting sun — which, up until now anyway, has habitually set in the west. Plus, half the signs on the turnpike read West 90. I drop back and eventually, reluctantly, agree I'm wrong.

At least now we know Steve's in front of us. To make sure he stays there, 20 minutes later we stop at a rest area for a leisurely bite. Carefully, we scour the parking lot. There's no sign of his car.

Inside, I pay for my meal, step from the cafeteria into the dining room and, you guessed it, sitting directly in front of me, munching a burger and staring right at me is — the 16th president of the United States, Abraham Lincoln! No, of course it isn't. But nearly as unlikely, it's my damn brother, Steve. Who, by now, has got to be sure Tom and I are heading towards his house and lying about it. Plus, it's Saturday and his birthday is tomorrow, and Steve's wife is going to murder us. I immediately pivot and duck back into the cafeteria. As if maybe Steve hadn't recognized me. You can see why it's so believable when I play dumb.

I grab Tom and tell him to follow my lead, though I have no idea what that's going to be. We trudge back to Steve's table. Putting on a grim face, I say, "You can't tell anybody, Steve. Not a soul. Particularly not Tom's wife and kids. We don't want anyone worrying. We are heading west — to Springfield. Tom's following up with a doctor he's been consulting."

Tom's been a diabetic since he was twelve. He lives in Oregon now, so it makes sense that, while back here, he might see a world-class Boston specialist. Why the imaginary world-class, Boston specialist chose to set up a hundred miles from Boston in Springfield is the specialist's business, not mine.

"What's the issue?" Steve asks, concerned. I feel a twinge of guilt. But I'm expecting Tom to say it's just a routine diabetes check-up.

"Cancer," Tom says. Cancer!?! Now Steve is really worried. We try to talk it back, like we don't think it's too serious. But this secret, Saturday afternoon, cancer specialist appointment says different. We finish our grim meals. Eventually, Steve leaves, heading for his invisible car, parked across the rest area beside the gas station.

"Cancer?" I say to my idiot brother, who somehow made it through MIT in three years. "What's wrong with diabetes?"

"I'm sick of diabetes."

Not much chance Steve was buying my supposed wrong-way confusion. But he believed the cancer story without question. No sane person would ever lie about something that serious. Much less two — theoretically at least — sane people. His party was almost as big a surprise as Tom's cancer.

Irrationally, though, it almost felt like we'd tempted fate and Tom might actually come down with cancer. He didn't. I did. Fortunately, it was in my brain, so hacking it out didn't damage anything important.

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Photo credit: Dan Gold at Unsplash