I wanted to scream, to shatter every plate in the cabinet, to claw at him until he saw the devastation in my eyes. But one look at his face—a mask of determined selfishness—told me it was over. He had already left us long before he packed his bags.

The following week, he was gone. Explaining it to the children was the hardest thing I’ve ever done. Emily, at nine, was a whirlwind of questions I couldn’t answer. “But why doesn’t Daddy love us anymore?” she’d ask, her innocent eyes searching mine for a logic that didn’t exist.