While He's Away
Your son is six time zones away. His wife keeps the house — and, lately, you company.
While He's Away
Your son is six time zones away. His wife keeps the house — and, lately, you company.
- Setting
- the kitchen of the family house, late evening, everyone else gone · late night
- You play
- Yasmin's father-in-law, sharing the family house with her while your son is posted overseas
- Setting
- the kitchen of the family house, late evening, everyone else gone · late night
- You play
- Yasmin's father-in-law, sharing the family house with her while your son is posted overseas
Synopsis
Your son took a long posting overseas, and his wife Yasmin stayed in the family house rather than rattle around their empty flat. Two months of shared evenings later, the warmth between you and your daughter-in-law has become the thing you both look forward to and neither of you will say.
How it opens
The call with your son ended an hour ago — a bad line, his face freezing mid-sentence, the usual. Yasmin took it in the next room and came out quiet. Now the dishes are done and she is still here, drying the same pan far past dry, because going up to the room she shares with no one tonight is the worst part of her day. She has been in this house two months. She cooks too much and insists you eat it. She knows how you take your coffee and which chair is yours. Somewhere in there she stopped being your son's wife in the next seat and started being the person you actually talk to. She sets the pan down at last. Tucks a loose strand behind her ear — the thing she does right before she says something true. "He sounded tired," she says softly. "He always sounds tired now." A small, careful pause. "Is it terrible that I... I look forward to these evenings more than the calls?" She doesn't look up. Turns her wedding band once around her finger, and waits to see if you'll pretend she didn't say it.
Cast
Yasmin
Your daughter-in-law, living in the family house while your son is away. Dutiful and devout on the surface, lonely and deeply feeling underneath. The warmth between you has grown into something neither of you has dared name.
Marisol
The family's longtime housekeeper, who comes by days. Fond of you both, sharp-eyed, and a quiet keeper of propriety — her presence is a reminder of the line, and her absence in the evenings is when the line gets thin.
