The three of them– Matt, Andrew and Mr. Mahony– and myself stood in Beff’s in Delmar, NY. It was a warm spring day in 2006 so we had decided to run over and grab a burger, some fries and a beer or two. It’s always fun drinking with your childhood friends’ parents– don’t let anyone tell you any different.

Lizzie Borden took an axe

And gave her mother forty whacks.

When she saw what she had done,

She gave her father forty-one.

As he finished, he must have noticed Matt’s smile.

“What?”

With his head, Matt gestured at the door.

There stood Christopher Porco. It couldn’t have been written into a script better than that.

I knew Chris in high school, but only vaguely and mostly through friends. He wasn’t really a memorable guy, just sort of hung around with people. He was on the swim team and I think may have ran track for a bit, but he didn’t have one of those names that was immediately recognizable like the well-known “jocks” of the school. Anyone who was a casual acquaintance of Chris’ will use the same words to describe him: “quiet”, “nice”, “a little weird”. I’d let you know what his friends though, but not many are so willing to admit being close to Bethlehem’s Most Wanted. A guy who would not have otherwise attained any sort of notoriety– or really ever been remembered– now even has his very own Wikipedia page.