The evening prior to his departure was escaping him, like grains of sand slipping through his fingers. That age old mistress; time had tied the arms of his watch.
“Michael!”
his mother cooed from the hallway.
“Mikey could you print the directions off for tomorrow please!”
“Yes alright! I'm going to do it now!”
He replied with vocal annoyance, something he immediately scolded himself for afterwards.
He was knowingly being ungrateful, especially given the lengths his parents had gone to enable him to come this far in the first place. But it wasn't just that, there was a much stronger, more obvious emotion behind this self reprimand. Michael knew just how much he would miss the tiniest most meticulous details of his home, and his family. He listened intently to his Mum's absent-minded singing as she cooked, savoured every syllable and attempted to preserve exactly the way she sounded in his memory. The way her voice was flecked with subtle Irish mirth that had faded with the passing of her days in London, and the way that her T's tiptoed towards her teeth as she talked, that steady pronounced beat like a metronome. Tick Tock.
Dinner was a delicate affair but it wasn't met with any regret, just fondness and reflection. The gravity of the decision to move home rather than commute was beginning to sink in, a wormhole of an abyss that left Michael's stomach in knots. He knew though unmistakably he wanted the new experience, to cast off all that was familiar and embrace some new adventure. As naïve as that sounded even to himself, he believed in it earnestly.
The stew bubbled away in the centre of the table and the thick aroma of meat and carrots sailed up the nostrils, seducing their bellies.
“So, err what do ya do in creative writing?”
His dad asked, stumbling through his sentence.
'' 'Cos to me creative writing just sounds like poems and that sorta stuff”
Michael hesitated and chewed his words along with his food.
“Creative writing has loads of bits n' bobs you can do with it. Anything you fancy really; poems, stories, Journo work, articles... There are so many jobs to take from it”
Mikey often felt awkward discussing books and words with his Dad, because he often felt there was something of a stigma attached to writing and literature from his perspective. His Dad possessed a razor sharp wit, but was not much of a reader.
Michael watched his father at the table and felt the most unbreakable love for him. His hesitant speech, his aforementioned wit, the thinning inky black hair that crowned his face and the jewels in that crown; his pearly white smile, teeth that seldom saw a dentist yet stayed spotless all the same. His eyes fell to his Dad's open necked shirt; a man forever tanned. He defied mother nature and adamantly declared on occasional colder days “Sunbathing from April to October!”
He had a gold chain that he had always worn, a chain Mikey remembered Dad telling him about as a little boy;
“My chain? Found it kicking through leaves when I was younger, probably a couple of years older than you are now. Never know what you might find if you look”
At least it was something quite like that, the memory was blurred by time like a ripple in water.
Michael awoke to the chorus of his generic mobile phone alarm, a noise seldom equalled in annoyance and fear of hearing. Groaning at the early hour at which he was awoken, he sat up with a start and noticed his tatty tabby cat, Shadow at the bottom of his bed. He was so named because as a kitten he was forever chasing and catching people's shadows. Mikey fondly ruffled the fur on his head as the cat purred contentedly. It was not completely out of character for his little newspaper tiger to sleep on his bed, but it was a rarity which pleased him to have fallen on his day of departure.
Looking around his room, Michael found it strange just how bare it was; before he had packed he felt his room could only have been inhabited by himself; messy and full of broken trinkets and toot. Now it was a blank canvas, waiting to be painted by his eager to occupy little brother, Liam.
Leaving home with heavy bags under his eyes and arms, he kissed his Sister and hugged his Brother goodbye, few words were exchanged but the fondness of the farewell was felt keenly by the three siblings. Michael felt that the goodbye was a lot more poignant than it should have been, considering he would be back at Christmas. But in that same moment he realised that perhaps he would never live at home the way he had done his entire life prior, ever again.
The journey was shorter than expected, though hindered by the fact that despite repeated reminders from his Mum, Mikey neglected to print the directions. Though she was not quite as annoyed with him as he had been with her for the reminders, she certainly had the right to be, which worsened his petty guilt.
He was halfway to asking if he could plug his own music into the car, when he stopped himself. He wanted to remember everything exactly as it was on that journey, without interrupting it with his own selfish whim.
His parents helped him carry his things to his halls, and in spite of their pride and their tireless care and aid, he could feel himself consciously slipping steps ahead of them, as if to conceal them.
“You complete fucking bastard”
Michael muttered to himself with menace. He slipped behind and planted himself between the two of them, and felt like the missing piece of a jigsaw puzzle.
They stayed and helped him settle in, and drank a cup of coffee to fuel their return journey, a journey that he would not have to take.
The love in that room was unmistakable, and emanated from every pore.
“You've done alright for yourself ain't ya boy?”
His Dad spoke fondly
“But who's gonna make me tea now eh?”
Michael smiled but had no reply.
He walked with them to their car, kissed them both and held them in a tight embrace.
“Whatever I achieve now is down to me, but I could not have had a better start.”
Mikey whispered in their ears
They both kissed Mikey and his Mum put her sunglasses on.
“You're crying aren't you?”
Mikey laughed, stifling a tear himself.
“You always cry!”
“Take care boyo!”
His dad said in his 'chirpy world couldn't faze me' tone
“Eat well! Take care!”
His mum cooed in the same voice she had the previous evening, which felt an age away.
As their car drove past him for the last time in a long while his mum called over
“He's left home!”
Even with sunglasses she could not mask her glistening tears.
As Mikey walked back to his halls, he felt sad but joyous at the same time, very much so on the cusp of new beginnings, but also at the end of a chapter in his life.
The prospect of a completely fresh start with new faces and possibilities was an exhilarating thought. He felt that the familiarity of his home town as much as he loved it, had grown stale and stifling. He felt like newspaper splattered with a palette of paint, a much needed injection of life.
He thumbed through his possessions all bundled in bags, so pregnant with character and memory. Photographs particularly seemed to drip with sentiment. They were the first things he put up.
He had left his door open to catch any flatmates that might walk past, the first of whom was one Wesley Paton, whom Michael offered a rancid Tesco budget beer of which they later consumed several, and wandered off to see what Brunel had to offer them.
