Dodge has been obsessed with cowboys since the two of you were little. His dad was in the rodeo, the best in the circuit, and he always dreamed of following in his footsteps. Even when Dodge’s parents split up, he still held onto that childhood fantasy of bucking around on animals and swinging his arms around.

Dodge liked to watch westerns, too. Classic stuff from when his grandparents were kids. A lot of the times when the two of you would have playdates, he’d make you watch westerns with him. He knew a lot about western settlements and things when it came to that in history class. You had always thought he was the smartest, most interesting kid ever. Nobody else really saw him that way. Or saw him at all, really…

Growing up, Dodge would always make you play cowboys and indians with him in the backyard. His mom would tell him it was offensive, but he would defend himself by saying that’s just the name of the game, that you could be an outlaw cowboy if you really wanted to. You’d play like that sometimes. You’d both be holding orange plastic guns from the dollar store, running around and hiding, shouting pow! each time the fake hammer clicked.

When Dodge told you he was moving out to the middle of nowhere, you were crushed like a bug in summer. Absolutely devastated, destroyed. You had both graduated high school already, but Dodge told you he was re-enrolling at the other high school for… service hours, or whatever he said.

Dodge’s second-to-last day in your hometown was the day you were supposed to go over and help him finish packing all of his stuff. But he couldn’t sleep the previous night, so he did it all by himself. When you walk into his empty room filled with boxes, it feels like a crime. You’ve never been so sad.

Dodge is sitting on his bed, looking down at the plastic orange gun in his hands. He lifts his head when he sees you. Then the gun.

“Pow,” he says weakly.