Chapter 6: The Home Front

As had happened every night since the reorganization of his group, Dexter walked into the house shortly before six in the evening. After a month of early evenings, he would have thought he’d have gotten a little closer to the family. That wasn’t the case.

One of the women at the firm where his wife worked, had gone on maternity leave. Management had distributed her work among the other employees, with the result that there was more work than could be done in a work day. If that wasn’t bad enough, another of the people had a heart attack. His workload had been distributed around, also. The end result was that Janet was working most nights until nine.

His son came home from school and locked himself in his room with his game box. He came out at six thirty searching for food. If there wasn’t anything already made, he nuked a dinner in the microwave before disappearing back into his room. Nothing Dexter could do would get the boy to say anything more than to ask about dinner. Apparently his son and friends were in the middle of some grand on-line adventure game, which didn’t allow even minor interruptions for trivial things such as talking to parents.

His daughter had an active social life and never seemed to come home before six thirty. She would enter the house, and then ask about dinner. If there wasn’t anything made, she would nuke something and then disappear into her room, while texting on her telephone. Dexter could never get her off the phone long enough to hold a conversation.

As far as he could tell, his kids were pretty good compared to the kinds of stories he heard about other kids their age. They were both making good grades, and hadn’t gotten into any trouble with the law. They essentially took care of themselves around the house. He assumed that after years of having an absent mother and father, they had just become self-sufficient.

The net result was that he typically ate dinner alone. After dinner, he would putter around the house cleaning or fixing things. He hadn’t watched evening television in so many years, that he didn’t even know what programs were on. After flipping through the channels a couple of times, he gave up on television.

His cell phone beeped that he had a message from his wife. He glanced at it, and found that she was going to be home late. Despite the fact that he had come to expect it, he frowned at the news.

Dexter made three thick hamburger patties, and took them out to the gas grill on the patio. He put them on and returned to the kitchen to get out the makings for burgers.

His son came out and asked, “What’s for dinner?”

“Hamburgers,” Dexter answered.

He grabbed the package of hamburger buns and tossed it on the table.

Will looked around for the bag from the burger place and didn’t see one.

He asked, “What burgers?”

“I’ve got them on the grill,” Dexter said while he grabbed a tub of potato salad and put it on the table.

“Cool,” Will said.

“We’ve got a can of pork and beans somewhere,” Dexter said. “If you want to heat it, I’ll check on the burgers.”

“Okay,” his son said shrugging his shoulders.

It was just as easy dumping a can into a pot and watching it as it was nuking something in the microwave.

“When your sister gets here, could you ask her to cut up some onions and tomatoes to go on the burgers?” Dexter asked.

Will asked, “Will this take long? My friends are waiting for me to get back to the game.”

“It won’t take long,” Dexter said.

“Okay,” his son said.

Dexter went outside and flipped the burgers over. He looked back at the house thinking about his conversation with his son. This had been the longest conversation with his son in ages. It wasn’t much, but it was a start.

It took a little time, but the burgers were soon cooked. He put them on the plate and carried them into the house. His daughter was there. She had sliced some tomatoes and onions. She had also remembered to put some lettuce out. Someone had set out the ketchup and mustard, too. His son set the pot of beans on the table.

There was a moment of scrambling while everyone put together their burgers, and loaded their plates with beans and potato salad. The three ate without talking. His son was the first to finish. He left the table. At least he put his plate and fork in the sink before leaving the kitchen.

“Were you laid off?” Sarah asked.

“No,” Dexter answered.

“What are you doing home so early?”

Dexter answered, “I reorganized my group at work. We don’t work overtime any more.”

“I was afraid that you had been laid off, and we’d end up homeless,” Sarah said.

“No. I’m still bringing home a paycheck.”

His daughter finished her burger.

She said, “I’m going to go talk to my friends.”

“Bye,” Dexter said watching her leave the room.

He sat in the kitchen thinking about the conversations with his kids. It seemed to him that he was the stranger in their lives. He wondered how much his wife knew about them. She was a lot more active in their lives: she took them to school in the morning, and she took them shopping for clothes on occasion.

Discovering that his kids were basically strangers had unsettled him. He realized that his wife was just as much of a stranger.

They were not not a family.

They shared the same space, but they didn’t share their lives.

He couldn’t remember the last time he and his wife had actually talked about anything personal. The majority of their communications were via texting. He would text her goodbye in the morning, and keep her informed of any late hours. She would keep him informed of when she was working late, and make any requests for him to run an errand if she was going to be too late in returning home. There were even times when she texted him ‘goodnight’, when he was on a conference call.

He tried to remember the last time they had sex. That was something that should have been easy to recall, but it wasn’t. Their last anniversary had ended with a fizzle. The last vacation had not included sex. He tried to remember what they had done on New Years and Valentine’s Day, but those two occasions were a blank. He wasn’t even sure that they had even celebrated Valentine’s day.

He wondered if he even knew anything about his wife. He tried to remember how they had settled on a trip to Hawaii last year. He recalled that he had mentioned it as a destination and she had agreed with the suggestion. There really hadn’t been any planning ahead of time except to schedule the business calls. He had gone online and booked the airline and hotel.

It dawned on him that he hadn’t seen a travel agency in years. It used to be that he’d call up a travel agency, and they would talk to him about the kind of vacation he wanted. Sometimes they would even call his wife to get her input. Then they would give him a list of suggested vacation spots. They would find flights and hotels for him. They would make suggestions about things to see and do while there. They would purchase tickets to events and tours of the area. It might have taken more time to book a vacation, using a travel agency, but it had generated a greater sense of anticipation.

Dexter got up from the table and cleaned the kitchen. There wasn’t really much to do. He put the leftover potato salad back in the refrigerator, and dumped the last of the beans in the trashcan. He stored the hamburger buns in the bread basket. Once the dishes were in the dishwasher, he wondered what to do for the rest of the evening.

After wandering around the house looking for something to do, and not finding it, he went out to the garage. It hadn’t been cleaned in years. There were dead leaves piled in one of the corners. He didn’t have any hobbies in working with wood or metal. There was an old tool box his father had given him years ago, when he was a kid. He had added a few tools to it when he bought the house. It was filled with rusted tools that were never used anymore. The only thing that got any action at all was the lawnmower. The last time he had gone to edge the driveway and sidewalk, he had discovered that the edger was broken.

Old bikes that hadn’t been used in ages were stacked along a wall. There had been a time when the kids were younger, that the four of them would ride around the block as a family. They’d laugh and talk while pedaling along. Now the bikes were rusted, and each had at least one flat tire. He tried to remember the last time they had gone bicycling. Based on the size of the kids’ bikes, it must have been ten years ago.

He scrounged around and found a manual tire pump. It had a leak in the rubber hose, but a little black plastic electricians tape fixed that problem. He filled the tires on his old bike. It was an old five-speed that he had bought used, and refurbished. Feeling a little foolish, he climbed on in it, and peddled it down the length of the driveway. It was hard work, even downhill, since the front tire didn’t seem to want to turn.

He knew by the end of the driveway, that he needed to check the wheel bearings, and oil the gear changing mechanism. Even if he was able to get the bike into good condition, he was convinced that he stood a pretty poor chance of making it around the block without collapsing. Years spent in an office had left him out of shape. Disheartened, he put the bicycle back in the garage.

He puttered around the garage without finding the lubricants needed to fix the bike. He did find a pad of paper and a pencil that managed to have a point on it. He wrote down the need for grease and chain oil. If he went to the hardware store to get a new edger then he could buy the material necessary to fix his bike.

He checked over Janet’s bike and saw that it was in the same condition as his. He didn’t bother with the kids’ bikes. He could fix them up enough to sell, and buy new ones that were large enough for the kids. He wondered if they would even want new bikes. He doubted they would, but you never knew. Sometimes people surprised you. Anything his kids did would surprise him.