Claire, a senior pre-med, no longer reads the Times.  The stories are too big, too far away.  What can she do about all that bad news?  She’s taken to reading the local newspaper instead.  She used to skip the obituaries, but now she scans those as well, looking for people who died young, noting the illnesses that led to their deaths. About a month ago she noticed that a pretty Puerto Rican woman had died at thirty-two “after a long illness.”  When Matt told her Ramon’s mother had died, Claire recalled the face of the woman. Matt is also pre-med and, though only a freshman, the co-chair of Claire’s Ecology Club. The two received a grant to lead an after-school program called “Schoolyard Ecology” at a middle school in the city.  Ramon is Matt’s favorite student.  On the first day of the program, when the others were looking at living…