After the meeting I sat in my car and cried.

I wasn’t crying because I regretted what I’d said.

I was grieving the last chance that he might give me a simple, unqualified confession.

Even then, he had made himself the exhausted caretaker of people he’d deceived.

Laura called as I reached home.

“Want company?”

“Not right now,” I said.

“I think I need to be by myself for a little while.”