In David’s final year of school, he began to focus on his studies in a way that we had never seen before. He had decided that he was going to study business management and marketing at university, and had the goal to return to Milton Falls one day to set up a business of his own.
‘As long as it’s not a rival grocery store, that sounds like a great idea,’ Wyatt laughed.
I assumed that David meant to go to university at Bathurst. That campus was within driving distance so he could live at home with us. When the time came for him to put in his university applications, he filled in the paperwork by himself and then asked me check it over.
‘But, David,’ I gasped, ‘all of these universities are in Sydney or Melbourne.’
David looked at me blankly.
‘Of course they are. Where else would I study?’
‘I assumed… I mean, your father and I just figured that you’d study at Bathurst. Are you really ready to leave home just yet?’
‘Mum, I’m eighteen now,’ he laughed easily. ‘I’m not staying at home.’
‘But, David… we’ve given you plenty of freedom. You have a car, you come and go as you please. What more do you want?’
‘Mum, I just need to spread my wings. I’ll be back during the holidays, and most likely I’ll be in Sydney – it’s only four hours away.’ He gave me a consoling hug and said softly, ‘Look, this is happening, okay? So can you just check the paperwork, please?’
I tried to talk him out of it. There were dozens of reasons why Sydney was not a good option for David. All of our family lived around Milton Falls for a start, so he would have no support network there, and although David couldn’t see that he needed one, even Wyatt could see why I was concerned. In typical fashion though, once David had an idea in his head, he was going to head towards it regardless of what I or anyone else thought.
He aced his end-of-year exams, and that meant he got accepted to the uni of his choice in Sydney. Before I knew it, we were packing up a ute, and with David in his car behind us, we made the trip to Sydney. I sobbed the entire trip, and while Wyatt and David were amused at first, when the time came to leave him there, Wyatt almost had to drag me back to the car.
David spent his first undergraduate year in a dorm on campus. This was an expensive accommodation option, but I was happy to foot the bill, particularly given it meant that there would be food, electricity, and at least a roof over his head for the entire school year. At least he kept in touch with us. David called every single week without fail, even if the calls were sometimes short.
‘How are you?’ I’d ask.
‘I’m really good, Mum. How are you?’
‘Well, I’ve been updating the kitchen, you’ll love it. New benches, more modern. And Dad’s had the stocktake on so… you know, we’ve been busy.’
‘That’s great.’
‘And tell me about your week. What have you been doing?’
‘Ah, the usual. Study, footy, a party last Friday but don’t worry… ’ I heard his chuckle, and it made me smile. ‘I was well behaved.’
‘Of course you were.’
‘Can you tell Dad I called? I’ll call at night when he’s home next time, I just had training tonight and I was missing you guys.’
‘Oh, we miss you too,’ I said, and there was a pinch in my chest at the sadness in his voice.
‘Anyway, I’ll be home at midterm break, only a few weeks. See you then?’
‘See you then, Davey.’
I couldn’t believe the hole David’s absence left in my life. I lived for those phone calls, and between them, the house had never felt so empty or so vast, and it wasn’t long before I began to wonder why I was there at all.
Wyatt and I had never been much for talking, and when we did talk, it was generally about David, but with the absence of David in our lives, there was this insurmountable chasm between us. Some days, I’d crawl into bed and realise that Wyatt and I hadn’t spoken a single sentence between us over the full day. He wasn’t one to come in through the door and greet me, just as I wasn’t one to greet him. More often than not, I was angry with Wyatt about one thing or another: leaving the toilet seat up, putting his whites into the dark bin in the laundry or leaving his plate half full of food because he wasn’t impressed with what I’d cooked – but he also wasn’t man enough to tell me what he actually wanted.
I stewed over all of this in the spare time that David’s leaving had left me with. It started as a small idea – a possibility for the future – maybe I’d move to the city too at some point, to be closer to David. I thought about raising it with Wyatt, but I couldn’t predict his reaction and that made me nervous, and so I put it off again and again over several weeks and months, until it was no longer a small idea – it was a huge one, and behind it was two decades of resentment and frustration.
By the time I spoke up, I had actually convinced myself that Wyatt was going to be very pleased to see me go, since he clearly didn’t love or even like me any more.
‘Doesn’t seem much point to me staying here, now,’ I said to him over dinner one night. ‘So I’m thinking that I might pack up and get my own place.’
Wyatt stared at me as if I had suddenly grown a second head.
‘What?’
‘I’m going to leave.’
‘Don’t be bloody stupid,’ he said, and he blinked at me, clearly dazed. ‘Ivy – love – why? And where would you go? Your place is in this house.’
‘My place was with David, and he has his own life now so there’s no reason for me to stay here. You and I haven’t really been married for a decade.’
‘What do you mean – “haven’t been married for a decade”? Have you lost your mind?’ Wyatt said, and he rubbed his forehead, then he blinked again. ‘I have no idea what you’re talking about, love. Can you slow down, maybe rewind a bit and start at the beginning? What’s this about?’
‘I’ve done my hard yards, Wyatt. I raised our son. I’ve looked after your house. I don’t want to be here any more – I want to go and live my own life. I’ve earned it. Why would you even stop me? We don’t talk, we don’t have much of a life together – it’s just time for me go.’
‘Ivy, don’t do anything rash. Let’s just think about this for a while,’ Wyatt muttered, and he looked down at plate and played with his vegetables for a minute, before pushing his plate away. ‘I think this is what they call empty nest syndrome. Sometimes women go a bit crazy when the children leave… don’t know what to do with themselves. Maybe you should get a new hobby.’
‘Wyatt!’ I slammed my hands onto the table, and pushed myself into a standing position. I was shaking – not with fear, not with regret – but with rage. ‘I have been waiting for years to do this. I don’t want to be with you any more. It’s not too late for me; I’m only thirty-seven. I could go to uni, or I can move away, and train and get my own career. There’s nothing to keep me here with you any more.’
Something of what I was saying was finally penetrating Wyatt’s thick skull. He looked at me in shock, and then, he carefully extended his hand towards me, and he said, ‘Let’s just a take a minute. Take a deep breath. You’re clearly hysterical… is this a hormone thing?’
When I growled at him, Wyatt raised both of his palms towards me, surrendering quickly.
‘Look, Ivy… just… don’t do anything rash.’ I could almost see the way his mind raced as the implications of my announcement sunk in, and it surprised me. Wyatt was panicking. I really thought he would let me go without a fight. ‘Maybe… ’ he said thoughtfully after a moment. ‘Maybe we could go on a holiday? You always wanted to travel. Let’s go overseas.’
‘Now you want to go overseas? I’ve been asking you for two bloody decades!’
‘We were raising David, love. We were busy with the family – and I know that it’s scary with David gone, but let’s think of it as an opportunity – this is our time now. We can focus on each other, have some new experiences—’
‘It’s too late for that, Wyatt,’ I said, but I was no longer angry, I was simply pitying my husband. He wasn’t exactly pleading with me, but he was visibly upset. He had always resisted the idea of travelling overseas. So this one small peace offering, as silly as it was, meant something to me.
If only he’d made it ten years earlier.
‘I can’t believe you’d give up on us this easily,’ Wyatt said then, and at last he sounded both hurt and more than a little pissed off. ‘I can’t believe that you’d let me look after you for all of these years, and then the minute our son leaves home, you abandon me.’
I went to move out of the room, but Wyatt gently put his arm in front of me – blocking my path. I looked up at him in surprise, and found his eyes were full of shock and confusion and hurt. He reached to touch my cheek, very gently, and I wondered when the last time we had showed each other affection was. Years before, possibly even decades. If Wyatt thought that a tender touch of his hand could change that now, he was kidding himself.
‘I’m going to move into the spare room,’ I said quietly, and I stepped past him and out of the room.
I thought Wyatt was adjusting to my decision. Days passed, and although we didn’t speak about it, he was smiling at me, greeting me warmly. He ate all of his dinner, he was careful to put his socks in the right place in the laundry, he didn’t complain when I ironed his shirt too crisply.
And then David called.
‘Mum, tell me this isn’t true,’ he pleaded, without identifying himself. His voice was hoarse, as if he’d been crying but… surely not. Not David. ‘Dad said you’re leaving him? That’s not right, is it?’
‘David – Dad shouldn’t have – I mean; I was just—’ I was embarrassed, and confused. I wasn’t prepared for this, not at all. I was going to sit David down in person and break the news to him gently at midterm break. Just as anger started to rise in me at Wyatt’s lack of sensitivity, I heard David’s sigh, and he sounded completely heartbroken. ‘I’m so sorry, Davey. I was going to tell you in person.’
‘Mum, I can’t even begin to tell you how upset I am about this. It’s been playing on my mind since Dad told me… it’s all I can think about.’
‘I’m sorry, Davey. I really am. But… you don’t live here any more, and well – the truth is – your father and I haven’t been in love for a very long time. I think it’s time for me to go and live my own life. I had you so very young—’
‘I know you did, Mum. I really do get it. It’s just so upsetting to think of you two apart. Our home and our family have been everything to me, you know? And having somewhere to go back to… Uni is great of course but life is so different out here… it’s just been such a comfort to know that home was always there waiting for me.’
‘You’ll always have a place, Davey,’ I said urgently. ‘Both with me and with Dad.’
‘Yeah,’ he said, reluctantly. ‘I suppose so but… it’ll never be the same again, will it? Sometimes, I think all that’s got me through this year has been the thought of coming home and seeing you guys on the breaks. When I’m studying or going to training, I get distracted by parties or girls and it’s just the thought of making you two proud that brings my focus back, you know?’
‘Oh, Davey… ’
‘I mean, Mum, you have to do what you have to do,’ he said miserably. ‘I understand. I just can’t stop thinking about what Christmas will be like now.’
‘I guess… we’ll have two Christmases,’ I said unsteadily. David had fallen silent. I paced the kitchen with the cordless phone at my ear, and I was bewildered. I didn’t realise how much David would care. I didn’t realise how upset would be. As the silence stretched on and on, a rising sense of guilt enveloped me – I felt quite queasy with it. ‘Say something, David,’ I prompted urgently, when the pause became just too much.
‘I… I think I better go,’ he said, his voice a bare whisper. ‘I… Dad told me yesterday and I didn’t study last night and I didn’t get much sleep… I don’t want my grades falling because of this.’
‘Of course,’ I whispered, and now there were tears in my eyes. ‘I’m so sorry, Davey.’
‘It’s… well, I won’t say it’s okay. But… I understand. I support you, Mum. Even if the timing of this isn’t great, I understand.’
‘The timing?’
‘My exams… I’m studying for my half-yearly exams. At least I, I was and now I’m… well, you know. I’ll catch up, I guess. I better go. Bye, Mum.’
I hung up the handset, completely numb to everything but the guilt that radiated all the way through me. I walked around the house in a daze, back to the spare room, and I sat on the bed. I thought about what David had said. I hated myself for distracting him, but I hated Wyatt for telling him – why tell him now? Why not wait and let me do it? This was my decision – my responsibility – surely Wyatt could have left the conversation up to me.
I would have waited. I would have told David at a better time, when he had more brain space to process it. For a few minutes I think that might have made all the difference, but then I remember the aching sadness in his tone as we discussed it, and my chest tightens. I just didn’t realise the impact my decision would have on my son.
When Wyatt came home that night, he walked through the door and he stared at me, and I knew then I wasn’t actually going to go through with it. I moved back into our bedroom that night, and when he came to bed, Wyatt pulled me closer to him and he kissed my hair.
Broken as we were, Wyatt and I were David’s family. And David, even at eighteen and living four hours away – needed his family. Besides which, although he hadn’t spoken directly to me about how much he wanted me to stay, Wyatt had sent me a message when he rang David to tell him I was leaving.
He knew David would be upset. And he knew that nothing would motivate me like the sound of my son in pain.
I called David the next day.
‘Hi, Mum,’ he said heavily. He sounded exhausted.
‘Davey, I just wanted to let you know, I’m going to stay with Dad.’
‘Really?’ There was an immediate change in the tenor of his voice. Now he sounded excited, like a child again. ‘My God, Mum, that’s—’ he broke off, then he asked me cautiously, ‘Mum, this isn’t because of me, is it? I was quite upset yesterday; I would hate to think I influenced your decision… ’
‘No, no… I just came to my senses, that’s all,’ I laughed weakly. ‘It’s been an intense week and I did some thinking yesterday and realised how foolish I was being. I’m really sorry to distract you from your exams.’
Later I’d reflect on those phone calls and I’d feel guilt, but also… an odd discomfort. It was hard to put words to it, but it was almost like the outcome I’d chosen wasn’t actually what I wanted, but I couldn’t actually make sense of that. I was sure David would never want to manipulate me. I was also sure Wyatt wasn’t smart enough to do it.
But it felt a lot like someone had, and I was just never sure who or how.
Wyatt surprised me with an overseas holiday later that year. We spent six weeks going through Europe together, and although it didn’t fix things, it did rekindle some warmth between us again. Every year since then, we’ve travelled for at least a week or two – and we always stay in the kind of accommodation I would never be able to afford on my own – and we eat out at the restaurants that I pick, and we usually do the tours that I pick. Sometimes we manage to stretch the budget far enough for business class flights.
I live in the big house we’ve owned since David was a boy. I renovate when the whim takes me, and it takes me often, and the renovations are expensive. I get my hair done every fortnight, and I buy premium brands and I never, ever have to worry about how to pay the bills.
Maybe I gave up some things to stay with Wyatt, and maybe even once he was an adult, I did it for David.
I just don’t kid myself any more that there isn’t something in this life for me too.