Ben Austen

Man, in the story I told, it was the opposite of laughing.

Like I was trying to protect you.

That's the part we remember so differently.

Maybe I've held on to my version because in it I've cast myself as the good guy.

I see his terror and I'm the one calling out to him, telling him not to run.

Eddie describes another boy who teased him that day about how fast Eddie ran from the dog.

He could be a track star if there was always a dog behind him.

Eddie blamed me for that one too.

That's just how he saw me back then.

I became the dog?

For Eddie, I turned into this major figure in his life.

I became this villain.

Eddie tells me that when he changed schools, I wasn't the only reason, but I was part of it.

And he tells me how decades later he saw a photo.

It was from our 20th high school reunion.

He spotted me in the background and was relieved he didn't go.

Then, classic me, I sent him that note which was way more clever than honest.

He opened it at a cemetery after presiding over a funeral.

He tells me it was like a spell was broken.

It set him free.