After serving his term, he left town without telling Vance where he was going. A few days later, an envelope arrived with no return address. Inside, a short note: I’m sorry. For him. For you. Sorry doesn’t fix it, but at least now you know who aimed the gun and who didn’t.
Vance read it twice. The blame he’d carried—believing he alone had driven Adam toward that life—shifted. He still wished he had been a better father. But he no longer believed he had written every line of his son’s story or pulled the trigger on its ending.