A year ago, my wife initiated a series of discussions about preparations for the day when our children finally leave home. These talks mostly stressed the need for me to transform myself into a better person, before my faults became unacceptably glaring when set against the stark backdrop of an empty nest.
“The day you need to prepare for,” I would say, “isn’t the day they leave. It’s the day they come back.”
That day has arrived rather sooner than expected: the middle one has completed his degree, and is returned to us; the youngest still has a year of education to complete while living at home; and the oldest moved back in after his lease ran out over the summer. I draw no pleasure from being right about these things.
“There are going to be some new rules around here,” my wife says.
“Yeah,” I say, supportively.
“OK,” says the oldest one. I think my wife envisaged this talk as a sit-down with all three sons, but she has been obliged to pick them off one at a time. The oldest one has chosen the wrong moment to come home from work.
“Firstly, this kitchen is to be kept clean,” my wife says.
“Yup,” he says.
“Secondly, I think you should be paying rent,” she says. She names an amount.
“Sounds fair,” the oldest one says. He is nodding earnestly, but there is something calculating in his eyes that says: agree to everything, pay nothing.
“That price will include meals,” she says.
“In that case, the standard of cooking might have to rise,” he says.
“Lastly, I need to know if you’re going to be here for supper,” she says. “Every day, by 5pm yes or no.”
“Fine,” he says.
Several days later I find my wife sitting on a sofa working on some kind embroidery – a defiantly empty-nest type of project.
“I was on the radio with this woman last week,” I say.
“I didn’t listen,” she says.
“I know,” I say. “Anyway, she said that when her oldest son moved back in she made him pay rent, but she secretly put the money in a savings account and gave it to him when he left.”
“I was thinking about doing that,” my wife says. “But then I accidentally told him I was thinking about doing it.”
“Oops,” I say.
“And he hasn’t actually paid any rent,” she says.
“No,” I say. “Which I guess amounts to the same thing.”
“What’s for supper?” she says.
“How many are we?” I say.
“I’ve heard nothing,” she says.
The nation, meanwhile, is in chaos. Legal challenges are mounting, ministers are resigning, democracy itself is under threat. I monitor rolling news all afternoon. My children will never leave home, I think. Who would want to live out there?
Some time after 6pm I return to the kitchen, where my wife is still stitching.
“Any updates on numbers?” I say.
“One’s out, one’s in,” she says. “Don’t know about the third.”
“Have you texted him?” I say.
“You text him.”
I chop vegetables in front of the television. A newsreader and a correspondent are discussing the implication of a development I do not understand. I return to the kitchen.
“He hasn’t replied,” I say.
“His phone is probably dead,” my wife says.
“I’ve gone as far as I can, without knowing.” I look at the clock. “I’ll give it 15 minutes,” I say.
On television a reporter is standing in the central lobby of parliament, talking to camera about the latest upheaval. It strikes me that I am genuinely frightened about the future. Frightened, and hungry.
At the far left of the TV screen, a loping figure appears in the background and slowly crosses the lobby. He is wearing a lanyard of some kind, and he is also, unmistakably, my oldest son. “What are you doing there?” I say. He crosses behind the reporter’s head to the far right of the screen, where he pauses to look directly at the camera.
“I sent you a text!” I say. He turns, pulls a jumper over his head, and vanishes.
