Goodbye September — still owing home a phone call

The calendar on the wall is on the last page of September. He scrolls through his call log and has to go a long way down to find his mother — the last call was back in August. All month, every day, he told himself: tomorrow.

Leave it long enough and it turns into embarrassment. He picks up the phone, thumb hovering over the green button, then puts it down again, not knowing how to start without sounding guilty. Then the phone rings. His mother called first. She doesn't ask why it's been so long — only whether he's eaten, whether it's raining where he is. She sounds glad, as if he'd called yesterday.

She asks when he's coming home. He promised Mid-Autumn; now he's promising Tết. It isn't that he's busy — he knows that. It's the thin wallet, the wish to come home looking like someone who's made it in the city. But back home, there's a bowl turned upside down on the tray, set aside. She saves a place for the person, not for the presents.

Once, after an argument with his father, he packed his bag and went straight back to the city. Since then, every call home has been to his mother. Then she mentions, lightly, that his father forgot about it long ago — he still pours two cups of tea every afternoon. All this time, the only one still holding on to that anger was him.

She isn't waiting for you to succeed. She's waiting for you to come home for dinner.

September is over. There's still October. Who at home are you still owing a call?