“A weird reason. His cellie said it was because the sister of the woman he shot forgave him. He couldn’t handle it.” Stefan stopped talking for a moment and looked into the middle distance. “He was a nice guy. I know what you think, Mom, but he wasn’t the one who pulled the trigger. It was a robbery, and he said he didn’t even know his friends had a gun. Yeah, I also know everybody says that shit. Everybody in there is an innocent man. His name was Nightclub Owens. He had a beautiful voice. He sang this old song called, ‘Up on the Roof.’ It made hard guys cry.”

“Did you ever consider it?” I hated myself for asking, but to stop myself from asking, I would have had to stop breathing.

“I thought about it. It’s not that hard, if you hang yourself. It’s getting over the fear. Belinda lost everything, all because of me. Belinda wanted to do something in the world. And what am I ever going to be in the world? I’m no genius. I look like every other guy. I’m another ex-druggie. I’ve never figured out what I want to do. It would be easy, just to give it up, just to let it go.”

“Pull the car over,” I said.

“What?”

“Pull the goddamn car over.”

“I’m not going to wreck the car, Mom.” But he pulled over slowly anyway. I got out, and a cyclone of snow burst into the vehicle as Stefan scrambled over the console. When I was strapped back into the driver’s seat, with the zipper on my coat lowered to let my arms move more freely, I reached out and grabbed Stefan’s arm. I felt that huge muscle tense, and for a moment I was afraid. I glanced down at his hands, remembering those hands when they were tiny starfish with dimples instead of knuckles.

This is your child, I thought. You are his mother.

How dare he even hint at taking himself away from me?

“Listen, you melodramatic little jerk,” I said. “I get the worry and the regret. That’s natural. But if you think I drove up and down this road to that shitbox prison in that shitbox town every week for two years, when half the people I knew thought I was nuts, and I didn’t ever stop believing it could be better, so you could come out and kill yourself, you are sadly mistaken. If you think you have the luxury of killing yourself, after the worst is over, with all the people you’d be letting down, then get out of my car and get out of my life.”

“Did I say I was going to? I thought I was saying that I never would, hello!”

“Because of that guy you knew who killed himself?”