“Mum, I need water.”
“Mum, where’s my glue stick?”
“Mummy, snack!”
“Mum, Sophie took my pencil!”
“MUUUM!”
“I swear,” I mutter, “if one more person says my name I’m changing it.”
Dan steps through the door, exhales, and immediately snaps, “Can you two stop shouting for five minutes?”
The irony almost makes me laugh. Almost.
“They’ve been shouting all day,” I say, keeping my voice even.
“Yeah, well, I’ve just walked in, and it’s chaos.”
I put the spoon down. “Welcome to my world.”
He loosens his tie, rubbing his forehead. “I’ve had a rough day, Em. And that drive back from the city was hell!”
I bite back the urge to say,Oh, really? Tell me about your 2 hour child-free drive while I scrape porridge off the walls.
Instead, I just hum. Because if I say what I’m really thinking, it’ll turn into an argument, and honestly, I don’t have the energy.
Dinner is the usual circus.
Dan snaps halfway through. “Oscar, for god’s sake, just eat it!”
Oscar’s eyes well up. Sophie goes quiet. Ruby bangs her spoon.
And there it is; the shift. The moment where everything teeters.
I take a breath, step in. “Hey, hey. Everyone calm down, okay? It’s fine.”
Dan sighs, mutters an apology, but the damage is done. The air’s thick with tension. I smooth things over like always. Soothing the kids, changing the subject, pretending it’s normal.
Later, when the kids are finally in bed and the house is quiet, I sink into the sofa. The living room’s dim, lit only by the TV glow. Dan’s beside me, scrolling through his phone. We don’t speak for a while.
“How was your day?” he says eventually, without looking up.
“Fine,” I lie.
He nods. “Mine was mental. The new project’s a nightmare.”
I smile faintly. “Fun.”
We both know we’re just making noise now, filling space so it doesn’t echo.
He yawns, says he’s shattered, and heads up to bed.
I follow behind, trudging upstairs with the heaviness of someone who’s carried a hundred invisible bags all day.
I go into the bathroom and flick on the light. It’s far too bright. The kind of light that makes no allowances for the realities of motherhood. I squint into the mirror, toothbrush dangling from my mouth, and study my face like it’s a stranger’s. There are faint lines that didn’t use to be there, or maybe they were always there, and I just never had the time to look. My eyes are bloodshot, the whites dulled with exhaustion, like the light’s gone out a bit.
I start brushing my teeth, leaning one hand against the sink. Foam gathers at the corners of my mouth as I stare myself down.
