The mortgage would default because they could not pay it, not because I made it default; I had only, for years, been paying it for them.

The credit fraud would fall on Tate because Tate committed it, not because I framed him; I had only, until now, been the shield he hid behind.

I was not the author of their ruin.

I was the retaining wall that had been holding back their ruin for six years, and all I did, in that kitchen, was decide to stop being a wall.

What happens to a thing that has been leaning on a wall when the wall steps away is not the wall’s doing.

It is gravity.