The night before Jonas Read became a kidney donor, his mother was almost frantic. Dressed in his hospital gown, he mocked her concern: ``Oh, no, you can't go driving around. What if you get in a car accident? No, you can't do this because you're gonna die. No, you can't do that because you're gonna die. Everything was gonna kill me!''

To calm her, Read, 19, said: ``If I die, give Austin my kidney.''

Just hours away from his surgery last month to donate one of his two healthy kidneys to free his lifelong friend from the clutches of dialysis, this teen with dirty-blond hair, button earrings, chin stud and platinum beard was all too calm about becoming a donor.

The surgery at the University of Miami/Jackson Memorial Medical Center was his moral obligation, he felt, to help Austin Pence, 22, a friend since both were toddlers modeling on South Beach, earning $75 an hour. ''We were so young back then,'' Read says.

He's so young now, as well, to be making such a life-saving decision that he considers ``no big deal.''

But it is a big deal. As with all major surgeries, there are risks -- infection, pneumonia, blood clots, death. There's also the risk of a collapsed lung because of its proximity to the kidney. And although studies have shown living with one kidney does not increase health risks, heavy trauma could lead to the loss of a single kidney -- and dire consequences.

The benefit of donor surgery, however, is the gift of life.

In the decades since kidney transplants first appeared as leading-edge surgery, the procedure has become increasingly common -- more than 16,000 were performed last year. Most transplants involve one family member donating to another, but friend-to-friend or stranger-to-stranger transplants are not uncommon.

''There's about a 10 percent chance to get an identical match'' outside your family, says Dr. Linda Chen, assistant professor of surgery at the University of Miami's Miller School of Medicine and director of the live kidney donor program.

''When [Jonas] got tested, my insides felt like it was right,'' Pence says. ``It was really a weird feeling.''

Jonas felt it was right, too.

CHILDHOOD MEMORIES

The boys grew up together, Read in Cooper City and Pence in Davie. Jonas remembers ''playing a lot of games and stuff, running through orange groves and riding around in go-karts,'' while Austin fast-forwards to their love of those ''awesome'' Batman and Hellboy flicks.

Pence ''was like my little boy,'' recalls Jonas' mother, Lynn Read. `` 'Cause, you know, you're like 7 or 8, and a little 5-year-old wants to come and bother you. [Austin] used to take him. . . . He got a payoff for being nice.''

The boys grew apart when the Reads moved to Lake Worth in 1999, but the families still gathered for Thanksgiving. In 2004, Pence enrolled at the University of Central Florida in Orlando, and in 2007 Read moved to Jacksonville, where he's managing a yogurt shop while attending Florida Community College.

''I don't know how to explain it,'' Read says of their friendship. ``It's just like a connection you get.''

When Read heard in June 2007 that Pence needed a kidney transplant, 'the first thing I said was, `Sign me up.' I mean, what more could you want in life than to better someone else's?''

Pence's kidneys had been failing for more than a year. During his junior year as a criminal justice major at UCF he visited the campus clinic, complaining of a lip infection so painful it kept him awake. After his blood work was examined, he was sent straight to an emergency room.

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