"That depends how you look at it." Luther glanced out the window. Across the street, sitting on the curb in front of the hardware store, a man in a torn jacket was hunched over with his head in his hands. Dirty. Twitching. A cardboard sign beside him that nobody was reading.
"For instance," Luther said. "You see that homeless man out there?"
Ethan looked. "Yeah."
"If I went out right now and gave him a hundred dollars, do you think that would be good?"
“Sure. It could buy him some food. Or a room for the night."
"That it could," Luther said. "If he used it for that. Chances are, though, he's going to spend it on whatever put him on that curb in the first place. And let's say he overdoses. Were my actions still good? Or are they now considered bad because of the outcome?"
"But you didn't know he would do that."
"Exactly." Luther pointed at him. "How do we know the ultimate outcome of our actions? What I might deem as good could turn out to be someone's undoing. And what another person might call heartless, walking past him without giving a cent, could turn out to be his saving grace." He paused and looked at Ethan. "You see, the only reason we call things good and bad, right and wrong, is to try and control society. To have it function. But look around you, Ethan. Is it functioning?"
Ethan shrugged. He wanted to argue but couldn't find the seam.
"Just because the law exists doesn't mean bad things won't happen," Luther continued. "Like your girlfriend going missing. It doesn't mean they'll find who took her. Or that she'll be found alive."
Ethan's jaw tightened. "She's alive."
"Oh, I'm sure she is. I'm sure she's perfectly fine and she'll show up in a day or two." Luther's voice was gentle. Almost kind. "We can convince ourselves of many things, Ethan. We humans are excellent at that. Your sister, for instance. Right now she probably has lofty ideas of changing the country. Saving the unsaveable. Righting the wrongs. But will she? Or will she simply witness the truth?"
"And what's that?" Ethan asked.
"That we cannot control the outcome of anything. Life is inherently uncertain. However." Luther set his cup down. "We can control ourselves." He looked outside at the homeless man. "The question is, do you know how to do that? And if you did, what would you control? What would you change?"
He glanced back at Ethan and smiled. Not the grin from before. Something quieter. More patient. A seed being planted by someone who knew exactly how long it would take to grow.
Luther finished his drink and stood. He reached into his jacket and placed a card on the table between them. Thick stock. Embossed lettering. A phone number and an address.
"If you ever need someone to talk to," Luther said. "A place to stay. Help with anything. My door is always open."
He left the card on the table and walked out. The door closed behind him. The draft of evening air came and went.
Ethan sat in the booth and looked at the card. He didn't pick it up. But he didn't push it away either. Lacey appeared with a fresh coffee and set it down in front of him.
“What did he want?”
“Nothing,” Ethan said.
But that wasn't true and they both knew it. Something had shifted in the conversation, some boundary Ethan hadn't been aware of until it was already behind him. Luther hadn't asked him to do anything. Hadn't offered anything. Hadn't even been unkind. He'd just talked to Ethan like an adult, like someone whose opinions mattered, and in the current geography of Ethan's life, where his father kept secrets and his girlfriend was gone and his sister was leaving and nobody told him anything, that was worth more than it should have been.
He picked up the card and put it in his pocket.
The house wasdark when Noah pulled into the driveway. There was another vehicle parked in front of his home. A jet-black Aston Martin DB12, its paint catching the porch light in a long clean line from hood to trunk. He knew the car. He knew the owner.
Noah pulled in beside it and glanced through his passenger window. Natalie Ashford sat in the driver's seat, her face half litby the glow of her phone. She looked over when his headlights swept across her. She didn't wave. Didn't smile. Just watched him with an expression that was somewhere between resolve and exhaustion.
He killed the engine and got out.
"Natalie." He walked toward her as she stepped out of the Aston Martin and closed the door behind her. "I thought we talked about this. It's not going to work."
"I get it." Her voice was steady. Rehearsed, maybe, but not cold. "You don't trust me. You think I've been my father's eyes and ears. That what you and I had meant nothing more than a means to get close to you." She paused. "And I get it. I shut you down every time you want to talk about him. But you have to know that he's my father. He could end my world in an instant."
"And that's why this doesn't work. Look, we had some good times together, but..."
"You need a reason to trust me." She nodded and looked off toward the forest. The porch light caught the edge of her jaw and the dark fall of her hair across one shoulder. She stood there for a moment, then reached into her jacket pocket and pulled out a small brown paper bag. She held it out to him.
