I said: “I’m not going to spend this conversation complaining about specific things she’s done. We’ve been over specific things. I want to talk about decisions.”
He said okay, cautious.
“Three decisions,” I said. “First: we need a jointly agreed plan for how the house works for the rest of the stay. Not her rules, not a free-for-all. A plan we both accept. Second: we need an actual departure date. Not ‘soon,’ not ‘she’s looking.’ A date. And third: you need to be the one who communicates it to her, alongside me. Not instead of me — with me.”
He was quiet for a moment.
“That sounds like an ultimatum,” he said.
“It’s a request for decisions we’ve been avoiding. The difference is I’m not saying ‘do this or I leave.’ I’m saying ‘let’s actually decide, together, what we want to happen in our home.'”
He said: “She’s not going to take a departure date well.”
“I know. She’ll be hurt and she’ll probably cry. And then she’ll need to find an apartment.”
“Maya –“
“Daniel.” I stopped walking. He stopped with me. “You’ve told me twice that you’ll talk to her and you haven’t. You invited her for four weeks and it’s been eleven. I’ve stopped having undisturbed work days. She reorganized my kitchen. She invited your uncle Carl without asking me. These are not small things. And when I’ve brought them up you’ve said she’s just being herself and she’ll be gone soon and I should be patient.”
He looked at the sidewalk.