But a little while later, still awake, I was thirsty, and so I padded down the hall, back to the kitchen. When I did, I found my father sitting alone at the table. Most of the lights in the room were off. Just the lamp above the stove was burning, a yellow glow, casting shadows. He looked up when I stepped into the room. “Oh, hello again,” he said. “Fancy seeing you here.”

“Ha,” I said. It was a pretty sorry excuse for a joke.

In front of my dad sat a glass of water and a small plate, holding a mostly eaten sandwich. I thought it was probably the saddest dinner of all sad dinners.

“What kind of sandwich?” I asked.

“Peanut butter on wheat,” he said with a sigh.

“No jelly?”

“No jelly. We were out.”

I took a glass from the cabinet and filled it at the tap. It felt like I was moving in slow motion. It felt like my brain was empty. There was nothing to say.

But then I turned. “Dad?” My voice came out shaky. I didn’t have any words for what I wanted to say to him. What I really needed was help. What I really needed was for someone to tell me what to do. What I really needed was for him to drive me over to the farm. And then to solve everything, the way parents are supposed to solve everything.

I needed for him to be my dad. Right now. This minute! But when he looked up, his eyes were lost. Everything in the world was lost.

“Yes, Leah?” he said quietly.

I opened my mouth to speak, but then I shut it, and we both stared at each other, as if there was a conversation waiting for us, floating in the air around us, and one of us only needed to reach up and catch it.

At last I said, “Never mind.”

He reached for his phone. “Okay.”

About an hour later, Mom still wasn’t home, and I was still wide-awake. That’s when, in the dark stillness of the house, I heard the back door open. Carefully, I slipped out of bed and down the hall. From where I stood, I could see that the kitchen light was still on. Then I heard the screen door settle quietly, as if someone had gently closed it, not just let it bang shut like usual. I sneaked forward into the kitchen, drew aside the curtain at the back window, and watched as the garage door opened and a rectangle of dingy yellow light beamed out into the night. The door closed. The light disappeared. And swallowed up my dad.

My dad. Silent. Always disappearing.