Simon gestured to the ornate gold frame on the wall. The tiles in her foyer. Her suitcase now grayed out. On top, the bright purple logo of Beyond Bank. “You’ve decided not to leave your husband, but the bank account is still open, isn’t it? You acknowledge the truth, but still it isn’t a part of you.”

Kelly dropped her head. “Is that why Daniel won’t be honest with me?”

Simon ushered her to the frames. “Honesty doesn’t mean telling everything to everyone all the time. Some people take longer to get there than others, like your Gramps. He spent years using the camera to capture the truth in other people’s lives before he finally addressed his own. Some people think they can manipulate the world so they can bury the truth or hide from it, but that doesn’t work either. Like Becky here.”

Simon tapped at a frame crafted from flagstones, holding the image of a woman in a pink pencil skirt applying another layer of pancake makeup to an already made-up face. “She’s terrified of people seeing the real her, so she goes nowhere without her mask. For her, the price of honesty will be when her husband tires of a marriage to someone who, deep down, she isn’t.”

The frame next to it showed a young man running from a horde of suited men, anger writ large on their faces. “Or Andy here, whose desire for the shortcuts in life will keep him running from those he cheats. It will cost him everything.”

Kelly thought of the bosses at Rubicon who raked in million-dollar bonuses regardless of their performance. They dismissed truth as an impediment to business. “You know that’s not always the case.”

Simon beamed. “It’s always the case. Truth isn’t invited in. It’s treated as an academic argument that can be discarded if it’s unsettling. Sometimes the consequences are immediate, sometimes a little more drawn out. Sometimes they aren’t felt until the fog of age clouds the mind, blocking everything but regrets, and they follow people to the grave. Or beyond.”

Worst-case scenarios from her drive came back to her. “So what consequences will Daniel face?”

Simon brushed the lapels of his white lab coat. “The same as everyone else. A price to pay for mistakes. It may simply be a different life path, perhaps not the one he should take. But ultimately, an unhappy one. An unfulfilled one.”

The sound of a soft buzzer drifted from the back of the lab.

“Excuse me. Daniel’s—sorry, your—photographs are ready.” Simon drifted to the back of the lab and took care in slipping on white gloves. He extracted several photos from the bowels of the film processor and flipped through them, a solemn smile on his lips.

He brought them back to the counter, where Kelly waited with an outstretched hand.