(ABC 6 News) — It’s a gut-wrenching story of a young boy saving a stranger’s life.

One year ago, tragedy fell on a middle school classroom after 14-year-old Hunter Flaxbeard died when a sand hole he was playing in collapsed on him.

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“To send that email that said ‘Hunter is gone. He is no longer with us,’ to send that email out to the kids was heart wrenching,” said David Zabel, Hunter’s former principal and teacher at St. John’s Lutheran Church.

While his classmates were left heartbroken, in Kellogg his family was devastated.

A joy, a gift, and a treasured son: that is how family and friends describe Hunter.

“He just was such a good heart and he had the biggest smile when he was talking to you,” said Hunter’s mom, Lori Flaxbeard. “I can be driving down the road and start crying just thinking about something. I find myself wanting to talk to him in the car.”

Throughout his short life, Hunter was always known for his generosity.

“He was a giver,” said Flaxbeard. “He always would give anything, he would buy something or make something special for people and give it to them.”

It’s because of the person Hunter was that Flaxbeard made a choice.

She said yes.

Two hours north of the Flaxbeards, another family was battling a different type of grief, as they prepared for what they saw as inevitable.

“It was hard to see him sit back around the kids or not being able to go play games with the grandkids. Even just being in their lives as much as he truly wanted to be,” said Katie Jones.

For the past 13 years, Jones and her sister Tara Hagman have watched their dad go from bad to worse.

In 2010, Jim Otto was diagnosed with cardiomyopathy.

One day, Jim’s heart stopped entirely in front of his family.

“I was dying,” said Otto. “They said ‘you’re not leaving the hospital and you’re either going to get a transplant or you’re going to be in hospice and your days are numbered.”

For Hagman and Jones, they say their whole world stopped.

“There’s nothing worse than listening to your dad just sobbing and crying on the phone,” said Hagman. “He just felt like there’s no hope and it’s not going to happen for me.”

Until the family received a phone call that would change everything.

“Dad called and he had just tears and said ‘they have a heart and it’s going to happen soon within 24 hours,” said Jones.

Ultimately, Otto was the recipient of Hunter’s heart, thus bringing the two families, who were once complete strangers, together forever.

“When the doctor said something it was just like, something told me that’s what he would want. I said, ‘yes, definitely’ because I know in my heart that’s what he would have wanted,” explained Flaxbeard. “To help somebody because he always liked helping people.”

Whether it was a sign from God, from Hunter, or both, Flaxbeard says being an organ donor was one last gift she knew her son would have wanted to give.

In the middle of a blizzard in April of 2023, Hunter’s heart was rushed to Minneapolis, Minn. to save the life of a man that was preparing to say goodbye .

“My family was just elated because you really have to be lucky to get one,” said Otto.

Typically, this is where these stories end, as officials with LifeSource say donor and recipient families meeting one another in person is rare.

However, Otto wanted a different outcome.

“I wanted to meet my donor so that I could personally thank them,” he said. “That was just something I really wanted to do.”

So, Otto wrote a letter.

“It took me a while to open it because I knew it had to have been something [about Hunter] and I am still glad and grateful to this day that I did,” said Flaxbeard. “It was a lot of emotions reading the letter and crying because they were just so grateful.”

In July, the two families met for what they say will be a yearly tradition.

“We’re just hoping they want to continue being a part of our family because they really are family now, they are so special to us and they always will be,” said Jones.

As the two families sit around the kitchen table, this is how they celebrated Hunter’s would-be 16th birthday.

While the day brought many to tears, they say it also brings them peace.

“13 years Jim went struggling to breathe and not having activity. It’s just a blessing and God works in mysterious ways and this was one of them,” said Flaxbeard.

For others, it has given them an entirely new purpose.

“I asked got to reveal to me why he saved me and so many other people don’t get that opportunity and there’s a number of things he has shown me as to why,” said Otto.

“I never thought we’d be here. Never. I thought for sure when he was diagnosed and all of this stuff happened that that was it, he would die that way. I mean, I watched him die that night. I watched it, I was there,” said Jones. “Now, when you see someone who was almost dead have the life that they have now, and the spark they have, I mean he is so excited about life now.”

Otto has plans to make a lasting contribution to Hunter’s memory.

This legislative session in 2025, Otto is proposing a new law that would automatically enroll any Minnesotan with a driver’s license as an organ donor unless a person chooses to opt out.

Otto says “Hunter’s Law” will change the way organ donation is handled in the state and forever mark then kindness he left behind.

Hunter’s heart donation is a gift Otto’s family says they can never repay. For the mother of that generous boy, her gift is hearing her son’s heart beat once again.

ABC 6 News anchor Mayzie Olson met with both families to learn more about their journeys which can be viewed above.