Eric Brady | The Roanoke Times

Cheryl and Dean Kemp and a friend watch the Cave Spring football team play Graham High School. Their sons, Reece and Tyler, will take to the field tonight when the Knights play Richlands in the Region III Division 3 championship game.

Eric Brady | The Roanoke Times

Tyler, No. 9, is a defensive end for the Knights and Reece, No., 3, is a cornerback.

Eric Brady | The Roanoke Times

Tyler (above left) and Reece Kemp tell their parents, Dean and Cheryl, about football practice. Tyler and Reece enrolled at Cave Spring High School when the family moved from Richmond earlier this year.

Black Friday.

Cave Spring High School's football team hopes to color it that way tonight when the Knights play Richlands in the Region III Division 3 championship game at Dwight Bogle Stadium.

Twin brothers Reece and Tyler Kemp will be among the black-clad Cave Spring players when they take the field for tonight's 7:30 p.m. kickoff.

Proud parents Dean and Cheryl Kemp will cheer from their usual spot high above the home sideline.

However, they will not be in the bleachers with the moms and dads of their sons' teammates.

Dean will be in a motorized wheelchair and Cheryl will be at his side. Just as she has been for the past 25 months since Dean was diagnosed with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, more commonly known as Lou Gehrig's disease.

The day after Thanksgiving is reserved for early-morning shopping, leftover turkey and football.

For Dean Kemp, it's another day to battle an insidious disease that has attacked his muscles, robbed him of his motor skills and slowly taken away his ability to breathe.

Black Friday?

It's not a dark day for Reece and Tyler Kemp.

This Friday is like every Friday ... and every other day in the Kemp family's Southwest Roanoke County home.

It's another day of thanksgiving.

It's another day that two 16-year-old boys can be with their father.

"We're just appreciative of every day that we spend with him," Tyler said. "We don't know how long he has left.

"Every day is a gift."

No known cure

Of all places for Dean Kemp to first notice the onset of the disease named after a legendary New York Yankees slugger, it was on a baseball field.

The Kemps were living in Richmond in the spring of 2007, and Dean was helping move a pitcher's mound for a youth-league team he was coaching when he felt a sharp pain in his back.

By summer, Dean began dragging the toes on one of his feet. By August, he had an MRI scan.

"Three MRIs later we knew," Cheryl said. "It was the onset of Lou Gehrig's."

Dean and Cheryl immediately sought help at the University of Virginia Health System's Richard R. Dart ALS Clinic in Charlottesville in early October.

At UVa, the Kemps got an unwanted education about the disease:

n There is no known cure.

n In 90 percent of the cases, the cause is unknown.

n Only 20 percent of ALS patients survive more than five years after diagnosis.

Reece and Tyler were about to be confirmed as members of the Lutheran Church. Dean and Cheryl did not break the news to anyone until the calendar hit November.

"We hadn't told any of our family for that long, because we just had to settle it for ourselves," Cheryl said. "We had to figure out how we were going to proceed and also tell our children without scaring them to death.

"We tried to just be real direct without much detail. We told them we were going to UVa, that we were going to fight the best we can."

The boys already knew something was seriously wrong.

"We saw him get weaker and weaker," Tyler said. "We could tell before he was diagnosed."

Dean continued working in his job as an insurance manager for a full year until the disease began taking a heavier toll. During an October 2008 UVa football game in Scott Stadium, he was stricken with severe breathing problems that required an emergency tracheostomy.

"He almost died last year," Cheryl said.

In February came another blow. Cheryl was diagnosed with leukemia.

How much could one family stand?

"There was some frustration, trying to figure out what was happening to our family," Reece said. "She was so strong with it, though. You could tell she was struggling, but she never made it obvious."

However, caring for Dean was a full-time job. Dean's parents, H.B. and Renate Kemp, spent months in Richmond, but Cheryl needed their help year-round.

It was time to move back to Roanoke.

Back with old friends

The Kemps were next-door neighbors of Cave Spring boys basketball coach Billy Hicks until 2004 when Dean's employer -- Atlantic Mutual -- was bought out by OneBeacon and the family moved to Richmond.

Reece and Tyler had been enrolled at Deep Run High School on Richmond's West End and were promising junior varsity athletes when their father became ill.

Now they would have to start over at another school.

"We said we were sorry, but they never were angry," Cheryl said. "They went forward. Sure, they were nervous. But it's part of being a twin. You always have a bud."

Dean and Cheryl told the boys they could enroll either at Hidden Valley or Cave Spring.

"We went to Hidden Valley. It was new and it was nice. The next day, we went to Cave Spring. Billy Hicks was at the door. The bell rang and here comes kids they played basketball with. Here comes other kids they played rec football with. Dean and I just looked at each other. It felt like home."

Heartbreaking, but inspiring

Dean Kemp played varsity basketball at Cave Spring under head coach Rudy Lacy, graduating in 1979.

Now he watches Tyler wear jersey No. 9 at defensive end while Reece wears No. 3 at cornerback for Cave Spring's football team, which needs two more victories to reach the Group AA Division 3 state championship game.

"They started out as receivers," Cave Spring head coach Tim Fulton said. "As it's turned out they've been playmakers on defense.

"They provide our team with a lot of emotion."

Fulton, a high school teacher with two young children of his own, has learned lessons himself from Tyler and Reece.

"It's heartbreaking but it's inspiring at the same time," the Cave Spring coach said. "What I see them do, every day, is inspiring to all those kids, to me and to our coaching staff."

Last month Cave Spring's entire coaching staff and many of the players joined the Kemp family in a benefit walk at Hollins University sponsored by the ALS Association that raised nearly $25,000.

"We felt that was something we wanted to do to show our support for these two boys and for the Kemp family," said Fulton, who attended Cave Spring with Dean Kemp's sister, Lisa. "There's nothing more important than taking care of one's family and we view our football program as an extended family."

He's not in pain

Lacie Kemp, the boys' great-grandmother, recently celebrated her 100th birthday.

Two generations down the tree, Dean celebrated his 49th birthday Sunday with a large family gathering.

"His mom came in the next day and said, 'You have 364 more days until you're 50,' " Cheryl said.

An army of people hopes to make that happen.

Dean's parents are a phone call away. H.B. Kemp, who grew up in the Carroll County community of Dugspur, recently bought a device called a barrier-free lift to help Dean get in and out of bed.

The ALS Association has provided Dean with an air mattress and the use of the $30,000 motorized wheelchair that he can manually control with a joystick on the right armrest.

While ALS causes muscles to atrophy, it does not affect the senses or a patient's mental state. Dean can speak in a barely audible whisper, which Cheryl and the two boys augment by reading lips.

"He eats whatever he wants," Cheryl said. "He can have a steak, which is a blessing for him.

"If you take [the breathing tube] off he can breathe on his own. It's just very taxing.

"The only thing wrong with Dean is he has Lou Gehrig's. He's not in pain. He's not suffering."

When Reece and Tyler arrive home at night after football practice, Dean often is already in bed.

"We'll go in there and hang out with him, watch TV, talk about football and basketball," Tyler said.

Dean still disciplines his boys, too. Tyler found out the hard way after drawing a 15-yard personal foul penalty in Cave Spring's last regular-season game against Hidden Valley.

"It's not any different than it was," Reece said. "He talks to us about our problems. He lets us know he's there for us."

Talk to Dean Kemp for 60 minutes and not one look of resignation or despair will cross his brow.

"He's the glue," Cheryl said. "His attitude is what's kept us going. If he was distraught, throwing his hands up in despair, we all would have imploded."

Search for cure is slow

Cheryl Kemp is strong enough to raise two sons and fight two battles.

Cheryl's cancer is in remission but she still undergoes chemotherapy daily.

"I'm blessed," she said. "I've got a drug. Dean doesn't."

So Cheryl keeps fighting to raise awareness about ALS.

"Lou Gehrig's is a funny disease because at any one given time there's only about 30,000 people with the disease," she said.

Dean Kemp is one of 15 known individuals suffering from ALS in the Roanoke Valley and one of 292 statewide, according to Kathleen Kelly, a patient and family services coordinator with the Richmond-based Virginia regional office of the ALS Association.

Kelly said countless other people do not realize they have ALS.

"So many symptoms mimic other diseases," Kelly said.

The Kemps are at the forefront of those hoping for a cure.

"We follow every research," Cheryl said. "We look at every stone. It can be a very frustrating endeavor. Science is slow. There have to be clinical trials.

"We certainly believe that it's just a matter of time. They'll get it. We just pray that it's sooner."

Tonight, Reece and Tyler will take the field wearing red ALS wristbands.

"I play for my family, for my mom and dad," Tyler said. "It just motivates me to take advantage of the opportunities I have in my life. They don't have the opportunities right now.

"You can't be mad. Some things, you can't do anything about. You have to accept it. It's part of real life. The only way you can deal with it is by being grateful."