Best Friends in Life, Death : Tragedy: The 13-year-old boys who drowned at a church outing were inseparable. Parents, pastor and congregation are left devastated.

Quoc Thai Cao and Man Minh Tran were about as close as two 13-year-olds could be.

Their homes separated by less than a mile, the two boys sought each other out on the playground and looked forward to frequent meetings at the Vietnamese Baptist Church.

“They were always together,” church member Chris Trinh said. “They were truly the best of friends.”

The skinny kids who so enjoyed each other’s company died together Sunday, drowning during a church-sponsored swimming party and picnic. The accident has not only devastated the boys’ families but has badly shaken the tightknit Vietnamese congregation.

“My heart is broken,” Van Quang Cao said, cradling the new high-top sneakers he bought for his oldest son just last week. “He was saving the shoes for a special time. He never wore them. He will never wear them.”

Cao wept softly as he pulled his son’s most recent report card from a drawer in the family’s tiny but spotless apartment. A bright student, Quoc sometimes left the neighborhood playground early to spend more time on his studies, his father said.

“Please continue to work very hard in school,” teacher Grace DeLew wrote in the child’s last report card. “You have many talents.”

At times, when Cao found it too painful to speak, church member Nhan Le placed a hand on his shoulder in an attempt to steady him.

“The whole congregation is very upset,” Le said. “Nothing like this has ever happened before.”

Since the Sunday afternoon tragedy, church members have volunteered to keep a vigil with the young victims’ families, some offering to stay the night while the parents grieve.

“Everybody is still in shock over this,” said Trinh, part of a church delegation that met visitors outside the Tran house Monday. “Our main concern is to provide comfort to the families who are mourning right now.”

Cao said his family was still uncertain about the events that led to the death of his son and Man. The father, who is studying to become a mechanic, said he knew little more about the incident than was contained in the reports of local authorities.

During the party at the home of the church pastor, the Rev. An Thien Vo, the boys apparently slipped out of a shallow Jacuzzi where they were playing with several other children and into a deeper pool in the pastor’s back yard.

Trinh said the youngsters were apparently placed in the Jacuzzi with others because they did not know how to swim. A youth minister was monitoring the pool party, but the two boys apparently found their way to the deeper water without being noticed either by him or other children in the pool.

A short time later, the youth minister discovered the pair at the bottom of the pool and called for help.

“If there is one person other than those in the family who is feeling the worst right now, it is him,” Trinh said of the youth minister, who church members declined to identify. “He was just in tears when he came here. He could not stop crying.

“This is a big, big loss for our whole congregation,” he said. “Everywhere I go, I am seeing people crying. The oldest members of our church and toughest kids in church are in tears over this. It is horrible.”

Trinh said the pastor’s wife, Minh, was virtually inconsolable. “She has not been able to eat or drink anything since this has happened.”

At the Cao apartment, the grieving father seemed to reach for anything that might remind visitors of his son and his many accomplishments. He pulled a certificate from the wall, recording Quoc’s successful completion of the Drug Abuse Resistance Education (DARE) program at Anderson Elementary School.

Cao thumbed through a family album, crammed with photographs of young Quoc and two other sons. When he pulled a tattered three-ring school binder from under a chair, he broke into tears again.

“He never even asked for a new one,” Cao said. “He never complained about anything.”

Funeral arrangements are incomplete, but the church is asking for donations to defray the costs. Contributions may be sent to the Vietnamese Baptist Church, 14200 Golden West St., Westminster 92683.