When They Stop Talking to You

The silence is developmental before it is anything else. These are the moves that keep the connection alive while she does the work of growing up.

• Take the side door. The car journey, the dog walk, the supermarket run. Teenagers talk when nobody is looking at them; the shared activity gives her the dignity of not being watched while she speaks.
• Say nothing at the front door. After seven hours of school she has nothing left for “how was it”. A hello, a smile, and back to what you were doing; the kitchen slowly becomes a room she comes back into.
• Ask the question that is not a question. “I was wondering whether Maya has been around much this term”, said to the windscreen, followed by a silence you do not fill. The wondering is the form.
• Let silent suppers be silent. She is refuelling, not punishing the family. Keep your eyes on your own plate; she will say something at the fourth supper, not this one.
• Practise presence without demand. Be on the sofa, in the same general airspace, without requiring her to do anything with you. It feels like doing nothing; it is the entire parental task of the adolescent decade.