The bus drives tentatively away after swallowing up my son for his first full day of school. I lope across our front lawn, up the brick stairs, over the peeling grey porch paint, and pause.
Slowly, I walk in through the half-opened front door as if entering someone else’s house. My eyes scan the scene. No one is home. All I hear is…Silence. Silence! There is a sweet, peaceful moment I savor like a butterscotch candy, before taking in the mess. Who could live this way?! Papers, books, clothes, toys, strewn over the furniture in the living and dining rooms. It looks like someone has been eating peanuts! A bag lies open on the TV table beside a bowl of shells. Between the two, a trail of shell-crumbs and peanuts are scattered. A vacuum cleaner sits abandoned for who knows how long, in the corner, its cord half coiled and half draped over a chair. I walk into the kitchen to check the time. It’s 8:07. Where is everyone? Then I see the kitchen counters. It looks like they fled pretty quick. Shoes, multiple pairs, lie in all positions by the table and door. Bags and backpacks, hats and shawls, all piled high on the only two places to sit. Makings for numerous meals are out, though it is apparent from the tower of dishes and the variety of crumbs and food bits that all meals have been made and either eaten of brought wherever it is everybody went.
I push aside some bags and sit, leaning back against the kitchen wall. It slowly dawns on me that this is, in fact, my home. My son is gone. For seven entire hours, he will be elsewhere and I will be here, alone. Faced with myself, to contemplate my own thoughts and dreams, my own desires, for the first time in six long-short years, since my child was born.
My chest expands and retracts, both, at the same time.