As the night moves on, the narrator is very much aware of the passage of time, and hopes to be able to catch some sleep before daybreak, when he needs to get up to go to work. She doesn't remember the details, but she recalls that the dream did not include the narrator, which upsets him. Iris talks about the dream the phone call interrupted. The narrator desperately wants to go back to sleep, but he gets caught up in Iris's ruminations. Once back in bed, Iris starts chain smoking and engages the narrator in conversation. But she persistently calls back, forcing him to take the phone off the hook. When the narrator answers the phone, a woman's voice asks to speak to "Bud." The narrator tells the woman she has a wrong number and hangs up. When the mother finally heads back to California in her packed car, both she and her son realize that they are not likely to see each other again.Ī 3:00 am phone call wakes the narrator and his wife, Iris, from a deep sleep. During this time, Jill's easy going response to the mother's disruptive presence keeps the narrator and Jill's relationship on even keel. A half year passes before she finally departs. No sooner does she move into her quarters then she packs her possessions into boxes (the story's title) in preparation to return to California. When she moves to her son's community, she dislikes everything about it. She is constantly on the move, going from one place to another, hoping to find a good life, but is always disappointed by what she encounters. Soon after they set up a household, their comfortable life is disrupted by the arrival of the narrator's seventy-year-old mother. The narrator and Jill find each other after failed marriages. The collection contains the following stories: