Back when they were kids - say, in the sixth grade, when they were cute and rowdy and a bit of a handful - neither of them could have guessed it would come to this.
The two of them, grown men with real-life worries and joys, on separate operating tables, one giving, one receiving.
"I know he'd do the same for me," says Jason Pennington, 34.
"It's just been kind of a back-and-forth thing our whole lives," says Jim Romano, also 34. "We've always been there to lift each other up."
And if that means Pennington giving up a kidney so that Romano doesn't die, well ... game on.
Since they were 12 and held behind on a school trip - one because his mother was over-protective, the other because he'd had a little run-in with trouble - Pennington and Romano have been the kind of friends who were always a bit tender-hearted about each other. At least, it seems that way in retrospect.
Teammates on the baseball field since their Little League days, Pennington likes to paint Romano as the A-list kid who could have had anyone, but chose him.
"He was very popular," says Pennington. "All the chicks loved him."
When they were playing ball at Palm Beach Gardens High and Pennington was going through a rough spell, Romano would stick behind after the final out to be there for his buddy.
Read more about this amazing friendship: http://www.palmbeachpost.com/news/wild-95-5s-jason-pennington-gives-childhood-friend-1873432.html
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