The New Road

Story idea

I woke up with this stuck in my head. In the first part of the story we meet a young college professor who writes his first book. It's a story about two friends who went to war. It's a story of sacrifice as one dies trying to rescue the other.

In the second part of the story and older struggling businessman finds the professors book, which was a bestseller. He remembers that he told the story to the other man when they were in college. He angrily writes his own version about the story. His version is a story of one of a friendship betrayed.

In the last chapter we meet one of the grandkids of the original professor, who is now attending the same college that her grandfather attended. While she was working at the local paper she finds in the archives of the paper a small version of the original story. The byline lists both men. She takes it to her grandfather who reads it. He takes it to his long-estranged friend, now in the hospital dying. The dying man reads it aloud. It's a story about two young men, their plans for the futures, their struggles and their enduring friendship that endures through their whole lives.