The Last Summer at Home
William arrived on a Wednesday, just as the sun was tilting toward noon and heating the tiles so the roof crackled. The garden gate had come off its hinges three years back; he stepped over it and stopped in front of the porch. Three steps upbottom one rotten through. William gingerly put his foot on the second, testing it, and carried on inside.
The house smelled of stale air and the faint musk of mice. Dust settled in thick layers along the windowsills; a spiders web stretched from a ceiling beam down to the old sideboard. William prised open a windowneeded a good shoveand a rush of nettle and sun-baked grass from outside flooded the room. He toured through all four rooms, making a mental tally: scrub the floors, check the fireplace, fix the cold tap out in the summer kitchen, bin anything mouldy. Then ring Andrew, Mum, the niece and nephew. Say: come up in August, lets have a month here like old times.
Old timestwenty-five years back, when Dad was alive and the family gathered here every summer. William remembered jam-making in the copper pan, how the brothers lugged bucket after bucket from the well, and Mum reading stories on the veranda, dusk settling in the garden. Then Dad died, Mum moved to the town flat with the youngest, the house boarded up. William would visit once a year, just to check if itd been pilfered, then head home. But this spring, something gave way inside hima switch flicked: he had to try and bring it all back. If only once.
He spent the first week working solo. Swept the chimney, replaced two rotting planks on the porch, washed the grimy windows. Drove to the market town for paint and cement, searched out an electrician for the dodgy wiring. The parish council chair spotted him at the village shop and shook his head.
‘Why bother, Will, pouring money into this old heap? Youll flog it anyway,’ he said.
William just replied, ‘Not selling. Not till autumn,’ and moved on.
Andrew was first to arrive, Saturday evening, with his wife and their two kids in tow. He climbed out, surveyed the garden and wrinkled his nose.
‘You seriously think well last the month here?’
‘Three weeks,’ William corrected him. ‘Fresh air for the kids, do you good too.’
‘Not even a proper shower.’
‘Theres the old washhouse out back. Ill have it steaming tonight.’
The kidsa lanky boy of eleven and a sceptical eight-year-old girlshuffled off to the swing William had slung onto the old oak tree yesterday. Andrews wife, Claire, dragged a bag of groceries inside without a word. William helped unload the boot. Andrew still scowled, but didnt say more.
Mum arrived on the Monday, dropped off by the kindly neighbour in his battered Vauxhall. She paused in the lounge and let out a sigh.
‘Everythings so small,’ she murmured. ‘I remembered it bigger.’
‘You havent been here in thirty years, Mum.’
‘Thirty-two.’
She glided to the kitchen, ran her hand along the counter.
‘Always freezing in here. Your father promised to put the central heating in but never quite managed it.’
William caught something in her tonenot nostalgia; more weariness than anything. He poured her a cup of tea, plonked her on the veranda. She gazed out at the tangled apple trees and shared tales of lugging water, the aching back after laundry, local gossip from long ago. William listened, realising this place wasnt a warm nest to herit was an old bruise that never faded.
That evening, after Mum retired for bed, William and Andrew sat around a makeshift fire in the garden. The kids slept, Claire read in the half-lit parlouronly half the house had working lights so far.
‘Why all this, Will?’ Andrew asked, staring into the flames.
‘Wanted to bring us all together.’
‘We see each other at Christmas.’
‘Its not the same.’
Andrew snorted.
‘Romantic, arent you? Think if we muck in for a few weeks, well rediscover family unity or something?’
‘No idea,’ William confessed. ‘Wanted to have a go.’
Andrew fell quiet, then replied a bit softer:
‘Im glad you tried. Honestly. Just dont get your hopes up.’
William didnt. But he hoped, all the same.
The next few days were one long blur of chores. William mended the fence, Andrew helped patch the leaky roof over the old shed. Young Arthur, whod first proclaimed himself bored stiff, unearthed fishing rods in the shed and became a fixture down by the river. The girl, Lucy, took to weeding veg beds with Gran in the little patch William had dug by the warm south wall.
One afternoon as they all painted the veranda railings, Claire burst out laughing.
‘We look like a right commune!’
‘At least communes had a bit of a plan,’ Andrew grumbled, but even he grinned.
William noticed the tension begin to ebb. They dined together at the long table on the veranda; Mum brewed soups, Claire took to baking pies from cottage cheese she bought in the village. Conversations hovered around small things: where to get decent mosquito netting, whether the grass needed cutting, if the pump would finally work.
Then, one evening after the children had gone up, Mum said quietly, ‘Your father wanted to sell this house, you know. The year before he died.’
William froze, mug in hand. Andrew frowned.
‘Why?’
‘He was tired. Said the house was an anchor. Wanted to be in town, somewhere near the doctors. I refused. I said this was ours, the family home. We argued. He never did sell, and by next year he was gone.’
William set his mug down.
‘You blame yourself?’
‘I dont know,’ she replied. ‘I just… this place exhausts me. Its a reminder that I dug my heels in and he never got his peace.’
Andrew leant back in his chair.
‘Whyve you never told us this?’
‘You never asked.’
William watched her. Here was his mother, shoulders stooped, hands worn with years, and he saw now the house wasnt some treasured relic for herit was a weight.
‘Perhaps it wouldve been for the best,’ he murmured.
‘Perhaps,’ she nodded. ‘But you did grow up here. That matters.’
‘Does it?’
She looked at him.
‘Its what connects you to who you were. Before life pulled you all different ways.’
He didnt fully take it in at first. But the next day, down at the river with Andrew and Arthur, when the boy snagged his first perch and Andrew burst out laughing, arm around his sons shoulders, for a moment it all made sense. Later, when Gran told Lucy how she used to teach her dad to read right on that veranda, William heard something new in her voice. Forgiveness, maybe.
They set the return for Sunday. The night before, William fired up the old washhouse, and they all crammed in for a steamy scrub, then drank tea out on the veranda. Arthur asked if theyd come again next summer. Andrew glanced at William but didnt answer.
In the morning, William helped load up the car. Mum hugged him tight.
‘Thank you for this.’
‘I hoped itd be better, Mum.’
‘It wasits own kind of good.’
Andrew clapped him on the shoulder.
‘Sell it if you want. Its up to you.’
‘Well see.’
Car loaded, they drove away and the dust settled on the lane. William wandered back inside, gathered bits of crockery, took out the rubbish. He closed the windows, locked the doors. Finally, he pulled from his pocket the old brass padlock hed found out back, and hooked it over the gate. Heavy, rusty, proper British; probably never to be opened again.
He stood at the front gate, gazing at the house. Roof level, porch solid, windows sparkling. The place looked alive. But William knew better. A house is only alive when its full of people. Three weeks, it had lived. Maybe that was enough.
He got into the car and slipped away down the battered lane. In the rearview mirror, the slate roof flickered, then vanished behind the hawthorns. William drove slowly, thinking that perhaps come autumn hed ring the estate agent. But for nowright nowhed remember their evenings round the table, Mums laughter at Andrews jokes, Arthur showing off his catch from the river.
The house had done what it was meant to do. It brought them all back, one last time. Perhaps that was enough to let it go, with love, not sorrow.
