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A “hard determinist,” like the bearded man, would say the driver responsible for Kayla Halfpenny’s death could only have behaved as he actually did. His actions were the inevitable result of a genetic tendency toward alcoholism, perhaps, along with a childhood that gave him little or no moral code, an argument with a girlfriend that brought up infantile memories of abandonment, leading him to drink all through the night and then get behind the wheel the following morning.

A series of inevitably falling dominoes.

However, I was taught God gave us free will, and although I have complicated feelings about the existence of God, I believe in free will.

That man chose to drink and drive.

He could have stopped that last domino.

I hate him for making my dreadful prediction come true.

I hate him for making me accurate.