The room was dark. He took a pack of cigarettes off the nightstand, put one in his mouth and as he lit it the room was illuminated long enough to see her heaped on the floor across from him. He heard as she stood and fumbled to turn on the lamp. He could see the cut in her lip now and the blood on her dress. He looked at the floor. From a downstairs bedroom the baby began to cry and she looked into the dusty mirror over her dresser and used a handkerchief to wipe most of the blood away. She left him alone.

      An hour passed before the door crept open again and a small face peeked inside. 

      "Daddy?"

      "Yah, buddy. You okay?"

      "Yah." It was Chase, their oldest child, who was only 5.

       "Why were you fighting?"

       His father thought for a moment about how to say things. Images flashed in his mind that he had lived so often they had begun to run together: his hands shaking as he withdrew every cent from their checking account, the look on the teller's face as he snatched it away while she was still counting it out, the walkway up to the door of a house that should have been condemned. He emptied his wallet, tied his arm and fell into a black river.

      "Dad's pretty messed up, bud.  It's not your or mom's fault though, okay? Now you go hop in bed." He watched him leave.

       He stood, paced for a minute and walked downstairs. He grabbed his flannel shirt off the peg on the wall, and tossed it on as he stepped out into the cold night. Inside, Chance had watched him go from the bedroom doorway, lowered his head and went to his bunk. It was almost dawn before he closed his eyes.

      The porch light barely lit Chance's daddy's way when he struck out. By the time he hit the gravel road his eyes had adjusted but the blackness still hung heavy all around him. His knuckles stung and reminded him that he hadn't taken a moment to kiss her before he left. Her dark hair always smelled like apples. When the sun came up, he was in the cab of a stranger's pickup. In the single selfless act of his life, he had left his family behind. Chance's daddy was gone. 

 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~