In less than 90 minutes we are leaving this hotel, leaving St Andrews, leaving Scotland, leaving behind our boy.

I have no idea how other Mothers cope with the leaving. There is no manual and like other “women’s issues’ little discussion on how. And while I imagine every leaving is different dependent on the relationship and on practice; this is my first time. It hurts as if some magical being is reaching inside me and slowly extracting the organs which keep me breathing.

I promise Roscoe that I will not cry when we walk away from the boarding house. I remain dry-eyed all evening. The bright blue sky’d sunny yellowness of the following morning lifts my mood: the day beckons to get to know better the town where he’s going to be for the next few years. We are texting and he says that most of the boarding house boys are off to Edinburgh for the day so of course we pick him up and saunter into St Andrews for a large plate of celebratory oysters. Leaving the restaurant it’s apparent that this Barbados boy is inappropriately dressed for Scottish sunshine so we purchase a lightweight fleece to go on top of his thin T shirt as he is beginning to turn blue with the cold. Craig has to take him back to our hotel as he cannot get heat into his bones. His first lesson in dealing with our home climate; Layered dressing.

We walk the beach. The sky is glorious and the miles of cold hard golden sand are scattered with dog walkers, kite flyers, pram pushers, whole families out enjoying time together. We amble-walk, the wind at our backs, catching our words, our laughter and blowing all imminent future wrenching away. We argue how far Ben Cross, Nigel Havers, Ian Charleston ran for the opening sequence of Chariots of Fire; both boys have no faith that the actors ran far at all. My romantic notions of about a mile dashed by my husbands pragmatism as he points out the freeking freezingdom of the North Sea. Although we are surprised at the amount of hardy Scots with their trousers rolled up and their feet bare as they walk in icy waters this afternoon. It’s enough to make my bones ache just watching.

I know they ache for other reasons as I loop my arm into my son’s as we more purposely stride into the wind heading back towards St Andrews town. Turning into its cold embrace is a metaphor of momentousness: the leaving is marching towards us. 

We decide to have dinner at the hotel; Roscoe lured by the promise of escargot and being still of the age where the whiff of strong garlic is of no consequence. I watch him wrestle with the tongs and a few elusive snails and wonder how the boy who dislikes anything but pasta, loves the food we’ve eaten today: another quirk of his capricious contradiction.

All too soon it’s time. This time much harder as we all know this is the dreaded au revoir. I have to dig deep to maintain any semblance of composure, managing only by seeing my boy is matching me and I don’t want to make it any harder for either of us.

Now, I watch the rain battering against our window; it’s dreich grayness apt. How do other Mother’s do this? I have no blueprint, no plan. The packed cases mock me, silent tears run as I type. No words come. It’s just screaming emptiness inside, impossible to describe.

My challenging, gorgeous, contradiction of a boy is now being nurtured and grown by others.

I ache.