Free The Lost Child by Julie Myerson

he said he would, he promised he would, even though we both knew he wouldn't. And how could I blame him? I'd said I'd go to Families Anonymous and I hadn't. The broken-hearted can't make themselves do anything.
    And then one day we can't do it any longer. We can't be without him. So we do exactly what we said we wouldn't do, what the experts categorically say you should not do. We take him back without negotiation, without having secured any promises about behaviour. We take him back unconditionally. We tell him we love him. We just take him back.
    All right, for a quick few moments, we do pretend to weigh up the pros and cons: What exactly are we doing? Is this really right? We have two other children to protect, remember.
    But then again, they miss him. We know they do. It's just not natural to live without your brother. It's too unnerving, surely, to know that he's out there somewhere, adrift and alone, moving from sofa to sofa?
    And although it's true that we all felt relief when he went, it's been too long now, too painful. It feels right to try and put the family back together. This is what we tell ourselves.
    If we can just draw up a set of conditions, his father says brightly, already excited at the prospect of living with his boy again, If we could just manage to negotiate something that he could try and adhere to -
    I tell him I agree, that would be good. But in fact I'm barely listening. It's too late, I'm gone, I want my boy. Love shoots through my veins. I want the mummy-fix of seeing him fast asleep, safe and warm in his own bed.
    When he comes home, we do at least try to talk to him about the possibility that he needs help.
    Help with what?
    Your addiction to cannabis. We know an awful lot more about it than we did a few months ago. There are people you can talk to - people we can take you to see.
    As usual he laughs loudly.
    You guys. I can't believe it. You're just cracked.
    OK, may be addiction's too strong a word. But we think you're smoking far too much.
    What's too much?
    I take a breath.
    We think you're smoking pretty much all the time.
    He rolls his eyes but he does not look at me.
    Fuck's sake, Mum, I'm smoking when I want to smoke. Now and then I do a bit more than I want to, yes, sure, who doesn't?
    But then I pull back.
    So when did you last smoke a joint?
    None of your fucking business!
    Have you smoked one today?
    I told you, it's none of your business. But I don't have one every day. Last week, for instance, I didn't smoke for three days.
    Three days? I say, looking at his pale, pale face. You think that's a long time?
    He shrugs.
    It means I can stop whenever I want to.
    But darling, three days is nothing. You need to try and stop for three weeks at least - three months may be. Three days proves nothing. In fact, to be honest, it just makes me feel even more certain that you're addicted.
    Now he looks at me with real anger.
    I'm not sure I can live here with you guys if you keep on treating me like some fucking junkie. It's quite insulting, you know.
    I'm sorry, I say, but I'm not always going to be able to say what you want to hear.
    It would be nice if you could learn to mind your own fucking business.
    I give him a long look.
    Well, let's just see how it goes, shall we? I say.
    When we take him back, we do it because we hope that, with love and patience and understanding, we can get through this.
    You'll get him back, well-meaning friends have told us again and again, you'll see. It'll be all right in the end. We're not just saying it. We know it will.
    But it's not true. They are - just saying that. They don't know. No one knows.
    He returns sometime in March, sometime after my visit to Narborough Hall.
    Soon, he is keeping everyone awake by coming home at 2 a.m., making cheese on toast, watching South Park DVDs, playing the guitar till four or five in the morning. Sometimes, coming home late, high and wired, he fries eggs and leaves the gas ring on. Or else wakes his brother up for a