Tom had spent eight months in the same town in southern Portugal. He had arrived for two weeks. He learned the names of streets he had no reason to use. He had a table at the café where nobody asked him what he was doing. For the first time in years, he felt no urgency to be anywhere else. But one morning he woke up and knew — without any event to trigger it — that the time had come. He packed in two hours. He said goodbye to the café owner. He walked to the bus stop. He had no dramatic reason to move on. He had simply learned, over many years of travel, to recognise the feeling.

Tom had not been back to his parents' house in four years. Not out of conflict — out of motion. There was always a next place, a next plan. But standing at the bus stop in Portugal, he bought a ticket not to another city but home. His mother was in the kitchen when he arrived. His father was in the garden. Nobody said anything about the four years. They had dinner. They watched television. He slept in his old room with the same curtains from childhood. He stayed for three weeks. When he left again, it was different — not an escape, just a departure. He had come back, properly and completely, for the first time. It turned out that was all he had needed to do.