The story of Julian’s guitar would probably be told wrongly someday.
Someone would shorten it.
A boy sold his treasured guitar for a girl in a wheelchair.
Police appeared the next morning.
A hidden scandal was exposed.
His father’s old investigation was completed.
It had all the ingredients people liked because they could arrange them into something neat.
But life had not been neat.
Julian had acted generously and impulsively.
Caleb had acted helpfully and carelessly.
Mercer had acted fearfully.
Victor Lane had broken rules partly to help people and then hidden so much that someone dishonest could exploit the secrecy.
Thomas had pursued the truth while keeping truths from his own family.
Nobody fit perfectly inside the role the story first seemed to assign them.
Maybe that was what growing up actually meant.
Not discovering that people were good or bad.
Discovering that people were complicated, and deciding how to love them, trust them, forgive them or set boundaries with them without pretending the complications did not exist.
