In a rural town, a woman attempts to run away, with her three children, from her abusive husband. While the feat seems straightforward at first, a series of complications causes their escape to become increasingly precarious.

A girl flees her home when her parents want to send her back to her abusive husband.

A son tells a series of stories, most of them about his father and stepfather. As the son describes a robbery that took place at his house in high school and his experiences with his father, a former Jehovah's Witness and current alcoholic, he begins to recall details from his childhood.

After losing both his wife and son to a car accident, a French prince begins an unlikely friendship with a woman who is a victim of domestic violence.

Once fired from her housemaid post with the MacFarland family, whose son she loved deeply, Lula Borrow falls into street-peddling, religious fanaticism, and direly ill health. Lula Borrow barely escapes her abusive husband, whose maltreatment kills one of their two children. Her sole reprieve is a housemaid post with the MacFarland family, whose son she loves deeply, and when she is fired she falls into street-peddling, religious fanaticism, and direly ill health.

A woman navigates her new life and her relationship with her criminally insane husband, who killed her three children.

A woman addicted to narcotics works as a waitress and fixes up her apartment in hopes of getting back her son from foster care after throwing him against a wall.

While witnessing his boys of his neighbor's family commit chaotic damage to the people of the neighborhood, a father continues to show kindness. The neighbor's family faces their own drama until they are no longer a part of the neighborhood.

A divorced 16 year old girl reflects on how the sexual trauma she experienced as a child perpetuates in her relationships with men throughout her life, forcing herself to grow up too early and leaving her starved for affection and love.

Though numerous social workers try to step in, a co-dependent mother and son bounce from city to city, in search of a place where they can be together at all times.