Change of Destination

   “This time I am putting my foot down,” said Irena. “This year we are having a change of holiday destination. And that’s that.” Her husband Tobias and their children, Jacinta and Joel, ten and eight, looked at her as if she had grown an extra head. They weren’t sure what shocked them most, the words themselves, or the way she spoke them. It wasn’t that Irena was any kind of doormat or shrinking violet (not that you ever actually saw a violet shrink) and anyone who thought otherwise was generally rapidly disillusioned. But she was still a believer in picking your battles. And Tobias and the children would never have imagined this would be a battle she would pick. 

     “But why, Mummy?” Jacinta asked, her solemn brown eyes infused with a look of genuine puzzlement. The prospect didn’t seem to exactly frighten her, but she was utterly bemused. Her mother might as well have proposed hanging from the ceiling or walking on your hands to school. 

     “I don’t want to go anywhere else, Mummy,” Joel said, in that way he had of making words that, from another child, might have seemed petulant, become a heartfelt plea. Irena almost literally (but not quite) bit her tongue to stop herself saying either that when she was his age she would have welcomed a change in routine or that as she and his father were paying for it what he wanted was neither here nor there. Both phrases were, of course, if you aspired to be a good parent, entirely unacceptable. The trouble was, though Irena loved her children more dearly than life itself, she was not always sure she necessarily aspired to be a good parent. Still, in this, she told herself, she had the moral high ground. Tobias didn’t say anything, as they had agreed that they must present a united front when the children were present, but his expression made it clear that in the first place he could see the children’s point of view, and that in the second place, she should have at least discussed it with him first. That expression made it equally clear that they were most certainly going to discuss it at the first opportunity. 

     That opportunity came quite quickly, as the children were off to their choir practise. Irena and Tobias, unlike some of their friends, hadn’t over-loaded their children with a burden of hobbies, but both of them had good little voices, and plainly looked forward to this. 

     “It would have been courtesy for you to mention this to me, Irena,” Tobias said, evenly. 

     “I suppose it would,” she admitted, “And I’m sorry about that. But you’d have tried to talk me out of it.”

     “That’s what’s called discussion,” he reminded her. He didn’t deny her second statement, because it was almost certainly true.

     “Toby, this was well overdue! I was talking to Lyra at work the other day, and she can hardly believe that we have the same holiday routine every year.” Tobias tried not to do something so childish as to scowl at the mention of Lyra’s name, but he and Lyra didn’t get on. It was as simple as that. Fair enough. Irena didn’t like his colleague and friend Sebastian that much, either, and they had plenty of mutual friends. There was no reason for either of them to be best buddies with everyone. Generally, on the subject of Lyra and Sebastian (who, ironically, got on very well with each other!) they maintained a polite truce. But it had its limits. “Since when does Lyra dictate what happens in our family?” he asked.

     “Of course she doesn’t! I’d soon have something to say about it if she tried. But just because you don’t like someone doesn’t mean everything they say is wrong.” They were both silent for a few minutes, but the atmosphere seemed to thaw and warm a little.

     “You must admit,” said Jacinta (remembering too late that you must admit wasn’t supposed to be an advisable phrase when you were aiming for a reconciliation) “that we’d got stuck in a rut. It’s not as if we can’t afford a change. We both have good jobs, and it’s time the children saw a bit more, had some new experiences.”

     “Are you referring just to the children?” he asked, quietly.

     “Maybe not entirely. But yes, mainly I am. After all, we could take a break by ourselves now and then, you know that either set of grandparents would be delighted to look after them, and they’d be fine. But honestly, Toby, don’t you think it’s time we tried to broaden their horizons a bit? And I mean in real life,” she added, forestalling his comment. “Don’t you think that Jacinta and Joel deserve more than – rusty rollercoasters, and building sandcastles on the same beach, and playing endless games of crazy golf on rusting replicas of pirate ships?”

     “Well, they don’t seem to mind,” he said, “shouldn’t we make the most of it while we can? Jacinta isn’t that far off being a teenager, and we both know what’ll start happening then!”

     “That’s true enough,” Irena mused. Jacinta was an odd, though rather endearing mixture. She was precocious in many ways, yet also seemed in no great hurry to grow up. 

     She was, in truth, beginning to wonder if she was really so certain it was a good idea. But that very doubt made her more determined to stick to her guns. “I’m not suggesting some – interstellar expedition or the like, for heaven’s sake! Just a bit of a change.”

     Just as she was starting to have her doubts in one direction, Joel and Jacinta were starting to have them in the other. On their way back from choir practice (it didn’t involve crossing any roads, and since Jacinta had turned ten they were allowed to come to and from choir practice by themselves) they talked it over. Like any sister and brother they fought and bickered, and each sometimes regarded the other as the lowest life form ever created or invented. But for all that, they were close, and when needs must, they could, and did, present a united front that could make Irena’s and Tobias’ parental united front look like a spider’s web that had been flown through by a rocket ship. “What Mummy said,” Joel said, “Do you think it was really that bad an idea, Jass?”

     “Don’t call me Jass,” she said, automatically, but without any rancour. “Actually – no, I don’t. I mean – when she first said it, I could hardly believe my ears. But perhaps we might enjoy it. And – most of my class have been somewhere else.”

     “If most of your class walked in front of a turbo-transporter, would you?” Joel queried, in deliberate imitation of one of their Grandma Rachel’s, their Mum’s Mum, favourite phrases. He had captured her voice perfectly, too. They adored Grandma Rachel, who knew perfectly well that they liked to make fun of her little sayings!

     “We’d all have enough sense not to do a thing like that, as unlike some people, we’re not little kids,” she retorted. 

     “But I wouldn’t really mind going somewhere else, either,” Joel admitted. “I mean – not somewhere where there are – raging fires or – vicious beasts….”

     “Or snakes, or floods or poisoned clouds – or savage humanoids,” Jacinta agreed. Both of them were remarkably well read for their age, and perhaps not always the texts that their parents would have approved of. 

     “Daddy didn’t know,” Joel said, thoughtfully, “I could tell by the way he looked. I bet they’re having one of those talks.”

     “Best to pretend we haven’t realised that,” Jacinta counselled. 

     When they got back home, they exchanged a glance that confirmed yes, they were right. Mummy and Daddy had been having one of those talks. They were being very bright and chatty and over polite. They asked how choir practise had been in that slightly high sing-song voice. So they decided to put them out of their misery.

     “We’ve been talking it over,” Joel said, solemnly.

     “And we think it’s a good idea,” Jacinta went on. “We’d like to go on holiday somewhere apart from Planet Earth!”