He slammed the phone down on a future he could no longer have.  Taunts of his own self hate echoed to his soul as salty tears of sad anger rolled down his aged cheeks.  Robert Dickson wasn’t a man who would catch himself crying.  His eyes hadn’t so much as misted since he was 9.  He was just entering his fifties, but hard living easily added ten years to his pale leathery face.     In Bob’s experience, everyone was worthless.  He reserved a little extra hatred for himself and his tears made him feel that much more worthless.   “Men don’t cry,” he said to himself.  He began to stare off into thoughts of the last time he cried.  They turned out to be just as painful…

   ”I put in a full day’s work and come home…and have to put in more work on you ya dumb cunt!”  

   ”I’m sorry I over-cooked it.  I- ”  *CRACK*

   ”Stop it Daddy, No!”

   The sounds of a just murder that seemed so long ago. 

   ”I didn’t raise my son to be a fag!”  *CRACK*  “Why don’t ya crawl back up your mamma’s couchie hole, fuckin’ faggot!” 

   Bobby’s father then turned back toward his mother.  Her eyes were wide and stricken with terror.  Her long brown hair was disheveled and the color red ran down her white blouse.  That look on his mother burned his eyes to the soul.  She looked like a victim, a damn VICTIM.  The word soured in his mind and left a cold sickness in his stomach when used to describe his mother. 

   Bobby began to see red as he grabbed a Louisville slugger.  ”Daddy…I said…STOP IT!” *CRACK* *CRACK* *CRUNCH* *CRULSH*…

   This scene burned his retinas as he took one last pull of his bottle.  By that time the bite of cheap whiskey had been numbed, unfortunately the numbness didn’t quiet the fire of his self loathing.  He breathed a sigh of smoke in the dim light of the desk lamp in his office.  His smoky breath was partly from the cigarette and partly from the frigid temperature of his office.  He sneered at the smell of moldy wood and week old pizza.  He inhaled again as he leaned to open a desk drawer.  Silver shined up from a gun and 6 bullets rolling around.  With a crooked smirk he picked up the gun and one bullet.  ”Hrmph…the only thing I ever won in my life…and I cheated,” he said half laughing. “Let’s see if you fire.”