The Foreword introduces the Oppenheimer triplets: Harrison, Lewyn, and Sally. Although they are siblings, they have never been close, and have distanced themselves from their parents as well, despite their mother’s best efforts to bring them all together. When the triplets turn 18, they are ready to leave for college, and the family will now be physically, in addition to emotionally, distant, when something happens that will change the family forever.

Johanna always tells a story about how she and Salo met at a wedding, because when people ask how they met, they do not expect to hear that they met at a funeral. Salo’s girlfriend, Mandy, and his best friend, David, died in a car accident while he was driving, while the fourth passenger landed in the hospital. Salo feels terribly guilty because he walked away with just a few scratches, and yet no one, not even Mandy’s parents, blame him for the accident. Instead, everyone blames his car, a Jeep, bought because his grandmother was upset when he wanted to buy a Mercedes.

Although Salo and Mandy were not engaged before she died, he lets everyone believe that they were, because it comforts her family. Johanna was a friend of Mandy’s, and watched Salo with interest at the funeral, approaching afterwards to offer her condolences.