“You know the easiest way to burn the most calories, right, girls?”

My best friend’s mom, whom we called Mary Therese, leaned against the doorframe and didn’t wait for an answer.

“Sex.”

My 9-year-old eyes shot up from the Monopoly game board.

“You can burn up to 1500,” she continued.

“Really?” I inquired, the whole idea going mostly over my head, but nevertheless, I was intrigued.

“You should tell your mother,” Mary Therese nudged.

My mother did what other mothers did ― went to Weight Watchers. And she didn’t talk about sex.

Regina grabbed my hand, her eyes wide with horror.

“Let’s ... go swimming.”

The author (right) and Regina in the pool in Phoenix in 1978.

Mary Therese was born in 1940 and died in 2022. I just found her funeral card tucked in the back of my underwear drawer.

If Regina was embarrassed about her mom, she didn’t need to be. I thought Mary Therese walked on water, even though she sometimes didn’t get out of bed during the day, and one time she went to the hospital because she’d gotten too sad.

That afternoon at the Monopoly board was in 1978. There was an awesome rhythm to our lives then. It was the middle of a summer filled with Marco Polo, bike rides to Circle K, playing Spit, and trying out the newest gadget on the block ― the microwave. Regina and I took turns spending the night at each other’s houses, oblivious to the idea that accidents could happen and that days that were entirely predictable could, in an afternoon, explode into shards.

One Saturday, Regina’s dad left to give a flying lesson in his small plane, and he didn’t come back. They crashed into North Mountain, just down the street from our neighborhood.

How could that be? I wondered. We were just playing. We were just feeding peanut butter to Regina’s dog, Rags.

Mary Therese Doyle in 1958.

Mary Therese — suddenly a widow at 38 and a little shaky as it was — was left to raise four children under 14 on her own. She decided to move the family to Ohio, and I was devastated as I watched Regina’s bed and dresser and bathing suits and board games being loaded into a moving van.

My childhood was over in an instant. For a year, Regina and I wrote a million letters back and forth.

Then we didn’t.........

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