‘It’s all right, Mum.’ His warm breath tickled the side of my face. ‘I know you don’t like being apart from us, but Payton and I are doing okay. Dad makes us eat veggies, even if they are frozen ones. You need to take care of yourself. Work out what you’re going to do with the rest of your life.’

I tensed, not sure how to respond to the insinuation in his statement—did even my son think my marriage was a lost cause? Did he think I was pathetic hoping otherwise?

In the end, I forced a laugh. ‘What are you, a life counsellor or something?’

‘No.’ He laughed.

‘Come on, let’s go have dinner,’ I said. I wanted to spend some quality time with my children on our first night back together and show them some photos of Ragged Point and the ‘before’ photos of the shack. At least this would be proof that even if I was sad, I wasn’t spending my weeks alone wallowing, but doing something productive.

However, as we pulled apart, I caught a stronger than usual whiff of teenage boy smell (what I affectionately called TBO). ‘When was the last time you had a shower?’

He hesitated a moment. ‘Last night … I think. Why?’

I leaned in again to sniff him, trying to work out if it was him, the room or his clothes. I spied at least five single socks scattered around the bedroom that were no doubt adding to the stench. How often was Adrian doing the laundry?

‘Mum. Stop.’ Sax took a step away from me. ‘I ran out of deodorant. I’ve been borrowing Dad’s, but I guess he took it with him this morning.’

‘Did you tell him you needed more?’

‘Yeah, I wrote it on the shopping list on the fridge, but he always forgets to take it with him.’

I sighed, trying not to show my aggravation. ‘I’ll buy you some tomorrow.’

‘Thanks.’ Leaving the game open on his screen, Sax started out of the room.

The optimist inside me wanted to believe that Adrian would see sense and our lives would return to normal soon, but the way things were going I feared that might take a little longer. So, before I left next Monday, I’d have to make sure the house was stocked with all the little things he wouldn’t think of. I bet it wasn’t only Sax’s deodorant he’d omitted. Had he checked we had enough toilet paper? Toothpaste? Washing powder? Dog food? Or perhaps he thought those things simply restocked themselves when they ran out.