He had stood at the edge of his own ending more than once, watching monitors blink and doctors murmur, realizing that none of his power could bargain for a single extra breath. The mansions, the syndication deals, the ratings records—all of it shrank to noise against the raw fact of mortality. What he saw clearly, maybe for the first time, was that money could insulate a child from pain, but it could also suffocate purpose.
So he made his will a manifesto. The empire he built from televised judgment would be redistributed to strangers, to children without safety, to animals without advocates. His son would inherit only stories, lessons, and the freedom—terrifying and sacred—to fail without a parachute. People called it heartless. He believed the opposite: that the greatest vote of confidence is refusing to script someone else’s life, even when you can.
