Oh, Sam, this deserves more of a response than to tell you it made me cry. I wish I were articulate enough to do it justice. You write beautifully and this broke my heart to read. I'm so sorry that you had to go through this.
No, I won't. This is all I have of him. Save for a few memories I don't share because they're mine, they're private, I don't have anything else of him. From what I understood at the time, his mother threw most of his possessions away, one of his sisters kept some things, as did his ex-wife. But all his press clippings and scrapbooks... all of it is gone. I have nothing to work with but the time I had with him.
None of his friends, much as they love him, want to talk about him anymore, so even an oral history would be impossible. It's too painful for them even now to revisit. And it's not because he's dead, really, but the horrible injustice and smearing of his memory at the trial. There were either six or eight people involved in his murder that night. Only the underaged kid went to trial, the 17 and 18 year olds got nothing.
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Do you think you'll ever write that book about him?
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None of his friends, much as they love him, want to talk about him anymore, so even an oral history would be impossible. It's too painful for them even now to revisit. And it's not because he's dead, really, but the horrible injustice and smearing of his memory at the trial. There were either six or eight people involved in his murder that night. Only the underaged kid went to trial, the 17 and 18 year olds got nothing.
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