Heyborne, Kirby: I still smelled like a deep-fryer when I rolled out of bed at 6: 00 AM that first Saturday in September. We'd been up late the night before the last Friday food trucks of the season at Springitsberry Park, and we'd been slammed. The lines snaking from our window to the other side of the gravel parking lot for a good hour. The deep-fryer spitting out droplets of oil, like angry hornets every time I plopped in another batch of munkar: Swedish for donuts.

I'd already been in school nearly two weeks by that point. It already sucked. And now with Saturday's festival in downtown York, the last big one we do for the year, I was looking at the endless slog of just school through the fall, winter and spring. Senior year, 172 more days.

"Ready, Gouban?" Fafar called from the kitchen where he'd just finished packing up the last cooler from the emergency cook-fest the night before, barely five hours before, really.

"Ready." Two travel mugs of thick, dark coffee waited for me on the island counter, mine turned light by a healthy pour of heavy cream and sugar, Fafar's the color of roofing-tar.

We thought we'd prepped enough earlier in the week to handle back-to-back events, but we didn't plan on the Peewee football scrimmage overlapping with the free concert for that Eagles cover band wiping out our entire stock of munkar dough. We were lucky we didn't blow a fuse that night trying to reload for the festival in the morning.

"Did you get all those extra kebab sauces I packed last night?" I asked, taking a first cautious sip from my coffee.

"Already took the cooler down to the truck."

"You shouldn't be lugging coolers down the stairs, Fafar. Seriously, I told you I'd get them."

"Eh." He waved me off. "You spent so much time dolling yourself up in the bathroom, I had no choice."

I held my arms out, stared down at my ratty clothes. Even after multiple washes, all my [hay-hay 00:02:21] shirts smelled a little like a deep-fryer, not unpleasantly so, but still.

Fafar hefted another cooler into my arms, which nearly pulled me to the floor. "There you go, Gouban. You can carry this one down, spare and old man his aching back.

Gouban, rhymes with Reuben, is actually Swedish for old man, but like you'd call a little kid "Big guy". It's what Fafar has called me since I moved to Gettysburg with him, to this country with him, when I was four.

Kupa laced between Fafar's legs, meowing and purring aggressively for attention, like she knew we'd be out for the entire day. Whenever Kupa saw the coolers, her separation anxiety kicked in.

On cue, Fafar scooped her up in his arms. "[Swedish 00: 03: 17]." His gray ponytail swung over her gray face while he prattled on in his ridiculous Swedish baby talk, Kupa yowling and batting at the end of his hair.

"That's enough," I said, straining with the handles of the cooler loaded down with dough and backup fruit filling. "It's getting uncomfortable."

"Ah, Gouban. There's enough love to go around."

The two of them snuggled up close to my face, Fafar babbling Swedish baby-talk to both of us now, Kupa purring like an outboard motor, burrowing her gray face into mine.

"That's nice. Thank you," I said, blowing cat hair from my lip. Fafar gave Kupa one last nuzzle with his short-trimmed beard before setting her on the floor, Kupa twisting and yowling incessantly between Fafar's feet, begging us - him - to stay.

"Okay. Come on, Gouban. To the truck."