prompt: low

---

Ma asks sometimes but he's real careful not to give her any details when he writes home. She thinks he's working freight or something respectable like that. And, well, he is working freight, after a fashion. He gets paid to move things around, usually with a gun in his hand but that don't make no never mind.

What Ma don't know can't hurt her, he tells himself.

He sends credits home, often as he can. She doesn't say much about Pa in her letters but he can read between the lines. The man weren't worth much to begin with, for all that he talked a big game, but she loves him and she'll stay with him until he drags her down for the last time.

Jayne hopes he'll be close enough to pick up the pieces when that happens.