The Garden on Sparrow Street: A heartwarming, uplifting Christmas romance

by Tilly Tennant

  ‘Dad said there was no point in waiting around and Pam agreed. They’re going to set a date for the wedding early in the new year if they can find a venue that Pam likes and that can fit them in so soon.’

  ‘A shotgun wedding?’ Robyn grinned and Nina had to laugh.

  ‘I think they might be a bit past that – at least I hope so! I don’t blame them one bit for being impatient really. Dad and I both know that happiness can be fleeting and it can be snatched from under your nose. If they love each other – and they seem to – then why not just get on with it and be together?’

  Robyn picked up the jar of curry sauce and yanked off the lid. ‘Where are they going to live?’

  ‘I don’t actually know,’ Nina said thoughtfully. It wasn’t something she’d considered, though now she thought about it, it seemed like an obvious question. She couldn’t imagine Pam wanting to inhabit the shrine to Nina’s mum that Winston called home, and she couldn’t imagine Winston letting anyone eradicate those last traces of his late wife, no matter how much he might love them. She could only guess at some heated discussions on the matter, though her dad hadn’t said anything about them if they had indeed taken place.

  ‘I expect they’ll start somewhere fresh,’ Robyn said. ‘Most do.’

  ‘Do they?’

  ‘Well, what would you do?’

  Nina was silent for a moment. She tipped the washed rice into a pan of water that was now bubbling. What would she do? She could hardly imagine a point where she might have to consider her own home in Sparrow Street and what it would mean to whomever else might come into her life, but perhaps one day she’d have to.

  ‘I don’t know,’ she said finally. ‘It’s not something I’ve thought about.’

  ‘Maybe you’ll have to,’ Robyn said, echoing Nina’s thoughts.

  ‘Not for ages I should think.’

  ‘Who knows?’

  Nina looked around her little kitchen. Could she leave this place if she had to, this little house so full of her life with Gray? She might love again, but she could never forget that life and she wouldn’t want to. But she could understand that it might be hard for another man to come into a place where every stick of furniture spoke of the man who’d been there before, of the man who would have still been Nina’s one true love if life had allowed it. Nina couldn’t imagine how hard it might be to make that compromise and she wouldn’t wish it on anyone. It seemed like a long way off now, but if things continued to go well with Colm then that day might come soon enough.

  The fact was, Nina didn’t really know how Colm might feel about this house because he’d never even set foot in it. There seemed to be an innate understanding of boundaries, of respect for the delicacy of her feelings. They’d seen each other almost every day for the past couple of weeks but they’d always spent time somewhere public. Besides Colm not wanting to impose himself on Nina’s home life, she’d been cautious about doing the same to him, mindful of the fact that perhaps he wanted to be sure of her before she went to his home and met Polly.

  From what Colm had told Nina about Polly, she was still clinging to the hope that one day Jane would come back, and so she might struggle with the idea that Colm had fallen in love with someone new. Nina understood that the situation needed to be handled sensitively and she was fine with that. For now. But like everything else, she and Colm were both aware of the unspoken truth – that things couldn’t stay like this forever.

  ‘You want to get the oven on to warm the naans?’ Robyn asked.

  Nina turned to her. ‘Huh?’

  Robyn rolled her eyes. ‘Dreaming of Mr Right again?’

  Nina had to grin at this. She hadn’t been – not in the way Robyn had thought, but now she’d been reminded of him she could have happily sat down and dreamt away.

  ‘Honestly,’ Robyn said. ‘And I thought I was bad.’

  Nina was about to reply when she noticed the rice pan boiling over. She rushed to turn the heat down. ‘Shit!’ she said, noting the sticky water already congealing on the hob.

  ‘That’s what you get for daydreaming,’ Robyn replied serenely. Nina laughed.

  ‘It is.’

  Half an hour later they were ready to eat.

  ‘I’m bloody starving!’

  Robyn sat at the table as Nina brought warmed plates over.

  ‘I must admit I’m hungry too,’ she said. ‘I’ve been saving myself since breakfast so I’d have plenty of room to stuff my face.’

  Robyn smiled as she tore off a strip of naan bread. ‘I have missed our curry nights, you know.’

  ‘Me too. We’ll have to make a new rule that we never stop doing it, no matter how busy we get with other things.’

  ‘Like fellas?’

  Nina laughed. ‘Yes.’

  ‘I suppose we could let them eat curry with us.’

  ‘We could, but then we wouldn’t be able to talk about them.’

  Robyn grinned. ‘True.’

  The warm tang of spices on the air was making Nina’s mouth water as she spooned rice onto her plate. Like she’d told Robyn, she’d been saving herself, but she hadn’t realised quite how hungry she was until the smells of cooking had begun to fill the kitchen. Now, she fell on her meal with gusto, the flavours of tomatoes and spiced cream bursting into life in her mouth.

  ‘This is so good!’ Robyn mumbled through a mouthful of naan bread. ‘Whatever did we do without curry?’

  Nina laughed. ‘No idea!’

  ‘I’ll tell you what, though,’ Robyn added. ‘This needs a beer.’

  ‘There are a couple from last time in the fridge,’ Nina said. Robyn got up to look but had barely left her chair when there was a frantic hammering at Nina’s front door. They exchanged a look of alarm.

  ‘Not expecting anyone then?’ Robyn asked.

  ‘No. I suppose it could be one of the neighbours after something. I’d better go and look.’

  Nina went out to the hallway and Robyn followed. The knock that had threatened to batter the door down was hardly the casual knock of a neighbour who perhaps wanted to borrow a cup of sugar and clearly Robyn was as rattled as Nina. She stood behind her as Nina opened the door. But there was nobody outside.

  ‘Weird,’ Nina said quietly, more unnerved than she had been a moment before. She glanced at Robyn, who looked just as spooked.

  ‘Probably kids,’ she said, sounding unconvinced.

  Then they heard shouting and stepped outside to look down the street. Nina frowned. Waddling from door to door, calling everyone out as he knocked at each house was the answer to the riddle – Ron.

  ‘What the hell…?’ Robyn shouted.

  ‘Come and see this!’ Ron called to nobody in particular, but in a tone of great self-importance. ‘Come and see why we’ve all been wasting our time for all these weeks!’

  ‘Does that man ever stop complaining?’ Robyn said to Nina. ‘How do you put up with him?’

  ‘Something’s bothering him,’ Nina said. ‘We’d better go and see.’

  As they stepped out onto the street, Nasser came out of his house in shirtsleeves and slippers, looking as though he’d been woken from a doze in front of the TV. ‘What’s going on?’ he shouted.

  ‘Broad daylight!’ Ron bellowed, still padding from door to door to bring out more neighbours. ‘Caught the little bastards red-handed I did!’

  The street was in darkness and it wouldn’t have escaped anyone’s attention, but nobody was about to correct Ron on his spurious broad-daylight claim. Something had riled him and anyone wanting to tangle with an angry Ron probably needed their heads looking at. Some people came out onto the street, as Nina and Robyn had, while some simply rolled their eyes when they saw who was making the fuss and went back inside. But most who’d been involved with the Sparrow Street garden renovations took note, because that’s where Ron was now hurrying to, beckoning them to follow. There was a sudden, strange, heavy feeling in Nina’s gut as she began to realise what the problem might be. She glanced at Ro
byn, the two of them now following Ron, and saw that she’d come to the same conclusion too.

  And then they found themselves staring at the carnage of upturned benches with obscene messages spray painted onto them, uprooted saplings and trampled flower beds.

  ‘Fat lot of good this fencing was,’ Ron said savagely. ‘They were straight over the gate – might as well have had a big sign telling them to come on in and do whatever they liked.’

  ‘It’s not Colm’s fault!’ Nina said, so hotly that some of her neighbours stared in mild surprise.

  ‘I didn’t say that,’ Ron shot back. ‘I’m just saying that the stuff he put up did nothing but look pretty.’

  Nina opened her mouth to argue, blood rushing to her face, but Nasser cut in.

  ‘How many of them would you say there were, Ron?’

  ‘Three, four… not sure,’ Ron replied tersely. ‘Enough to make a mess. Does it matter? I chased ’em off anyway.’

  ‘It’s lucky you were here,’ Nasser said soothingly. ‘It was brave of you to act. Did you see them climb the railings?’

  ‘I did when they made their getaway – like rats out of a pipe. Took them seconds to clear the gates and leg it – might as well not have gates at all.’

  Nasser was thoughtful as he looked at the fencing. ‘It’s a pity but we might have to invest in some anti-vandal paint.’

  ‘What good will paint do?’ Ron asked with a look of vague outrage and incredulity.

  ‘Well, it might make them think twice about trying to climb the railings if their clothes are going to be ruined,’ Robyn put in.

  ‘A bloody good caning is what they want – never mind paint,’ Ron huffed. ‘That’s what these lads need – should never have got rid of caning in schools. I’ll volunteer to go round Bluebird Street and find them; I’d enjoy teaching them a lesson!’

  ‘And get done for assault?’ Robyn offered Ron a withering look. ‘Where have you been? It’s the twenty-first century – you can’t just go around beating kids no matter what you think they’ve done!’

  ‘Honestly,’ Nasser added. ‘They may only be teenagers but seeing the size of some of them I wouldn’t want to mess with them anyway. Best to leave it to the police.’

  ‘It looks like someone already ruined their clothes,’ Nina said, pointing to a scrap of fabric flapping from a point on the top of the fencing. Robyn stared at where she was pointing.

  ‘Oh! A clue!’ a voice squeaked from behind Nina. She turned to see that Ada and Martha had appeared. They both had curlers in their hair and were bundled up in matching candlewick dressing gowns.

  ‘I wonder if the police can do forensics on it,’ Ada said.

  ‘Oh, yes!’ Martha replied. ‘They can do forensics on anything these days; it’s on the television.’

  ‘So it is!’ Ada said, the pitch of her voice rising with her excitement. ‘We saw that programme last week, didn’t we? The one where they found fingerprints on a mushroom.’

  ‘That was a marshmallow,’ Martha said.

  ‘No,’ Ada insisted, ‘I’m quite sure it was a mushroom.’

  Nina stared at them. Firstly, did it matter? And secondly, what kind of weird crime was being investigated here?

  ‘Well,’ Robyn said firmly, ‘I very much doubt the police will be interested in running forensic tests on a bit of old coat. Let’s face it; this is hardly the crime of the century, is it? We’d be lucky if they sent anyone out at all.’

  ‘Sadly, I have to agree,’ Nasser said. ‘It’s hardly worth reporting really.’

  ‘Are you serious?’ Ron cried. ‘You’re going to let these little buggers get away with it?’

  ‘I don’t see what else we can do,’ Nasser said.

  Ron let out a noisy sigh of disapproval, though even he must have been able to see that Nasser had a point. The police had real crimes to solve and they were stretched enough doing that – they hardly needed the extra work of coming out to look at a few overturned ceramic planters. The residents of Sparrow Street might have been upset by the second attack on their garden, but the police had more important things to worry about.

  ‘What about the CCTV?’ Nina asked suddenly. ‘Will we have anything on there we could possibly show the police? That’s why Colm got it for us, after all.’

  Nasser looked sheepish. ‘There might be a problem there… I’m afraid I haven’t quite got around to purchasing a memory card for it…’

  ‘So, essentially there’s no film in it?’ Robyn asked.

  ‘It doesn’t use film,’ Nasser said. ‘It’s digital; it needs—’

  ‘But it’s useless?’ Robyn demanded, arms folding tight across her chest.

  Nasser gave an awkward shrug. ‘I’m sorry. I meant to do it but I just haven’t had the time.’

  ‘You could have asked one of us to do it.’ Nina looked to see that Kelly had just turned up. She could smell the wine on her breath even across the few feet that stood between them. ‘At least it would have been sorted.’

  ‘I didn’t want to bother anyone when you’ve all given so much time already,’ Nasser said.

  ‘Time that’s been wasted again now,’ Kelly snapped, and while Nina thought her tone was unnecessarily harsh, she did think that she might have a point.

  Ron threw his hands into the air. ‘Well, that’s just brilliant, isn’t it? I risk life and limb to protect this place but you can’t be bothered to nip to the camera shop to get some film.’

  ‘It’s not like a conventional video camera—’ Nasser began, but Ron cut him off.

  ‘Typical! Wants to be the boss of everything but only when it doesn’t involve any actual effort!’

  ‘Hey!’ Robyn shouted. ‘That’s out of order! He’s worked harder than you on this!’

  ‘What’s it got to do with you?’ Ron pointed a stubby finger at Robyn. ‘You don’t even live here so keep your nose out!’

  ‘Don’t you talk to me like that, you sweaty gorilla!’ Robyn snapped.

  ‘I’ll talk how I want! And don’t call me a—’

  ‘Please!’ Nina cried. ‘This is not helping! The fact of the matter is we don’t have CCTV and no amount of arguing will change that! We have a bit of coat and maybe we’ll have some footprints in the mud or something and that’s a start – right?’

  ‘Perfect,’ Kelly slurred. ‘So what are you going to do with them, Miss Marple?’

  Nina turned to stare at her.

  ‘Oh, Kelly!’ Ada cried, clutching at her breast.

  ‘That’s horrible!’ Martha chimed in. ‘Nina was only trying to help!’

  ‘Oh, you can shut up, Dumb and Dumber,’ Ron hissed.

  Nina looked helplessly on, her eyes filling with tears. The garden was supposed to bring the community together, not cause all-out war. This wasn’t how it was supposed to be at all. She sniffed hard and straightened herself up. She could still rescue this situation if she could just stay calm.

  ‘I’ll phone Colm – he’ll come and look.’

  Ron eyed her suspiciously ‘Why do we need him again? You’ve got a hotline or something? Does he need to come? If he hasn’t got anything better to do then he can’t be as good a gardener as he thinks he is.’

  ‘Got any better suggestions?’ Robyn rested her hands on her hips and stared hard at Ron.

  ‘Yeah, find someone halfway decent.’

  ‘He’s good!’ Nina began, but Ron cut her off.

  ‘We don’t need him. We didn’t need him before – we can do it.’

  Nina narrowed her eyes. Ron had no right to be so unreasonable about this and he had no right to dismiss all Colm’s previous efforts.

  ‘He offers professional knowledge,’ she said, trying to keep her voice level.

  Ron let out a scathing guffaw. ‘Professional knowledge? How hard can it be to dig some soil and stick some flowers in the hole?’

  ‘That’s not what you said when we were doing it the first time,’ Kelly cut in with a drunken laugh, swaying on her feet. ‘I’ve never hear
d anyone complain as much as you did – I wanted to cut off my ears!’

  ‘I didn’t complain!’ Ron shot back. ‘Why don’t you sod off home and finish that bottle, alky?’

  ‘What did you say?’ Kelly thundered.

  ‘We’ve all seen your empties in the recycling,’ Ron sniped. ‘Everyone knows you’ve got a drink problem.’

  ‘Ron!’ Nina shouted. ‘Enough! For once in your life shut up and listen to what others have to say – yours is not always the most important voice in the room!’

  ‘And this is not helping to repair the damage,’ Nasser said, glancing from one neighbour to another with the sort of disappointed look a teacher might give a favourite pupil after finding out they’d cheated on an exam. Ron stared him down, but he didn’t flinch.

  ‘So…’ Nina put in, her head spinning, in the mood to call it a day and admit defeat. Even if they did fix the garden again they’d need to find a way to keep it secure and safe from further damage while still making it accessible to anyone who wanted to use it. That was hardly going to happen if they turned it into a place where the security rivalled the Tower of London. ‘Do people want Colm or not?’

  ‘No,’ Ron said at the same time that Nasser said, ‘Yes.’

  ‘Won’t he want paying?’ Kelly slurred.

  Nina paused. Kelly might just have a point there, a surprisingly astute one considering her inebriated state. Colm had given a lot of his time for free – far more than the hours he would have worked for Sammy and Diana. Perhaps it wasn’t fair to keep asking him.

  ‘So we leave it?’ she asked.

  Nasser nodded, though he looked less convinced. Nina guessed that if he could have had more of Colm’s input he’d probably like that. ‘Perhaps for the time being,’ he said.

  There was a brief lull in the debate, and Nina glanced to her side to see that Robyn was walking towards the railings, looking up to where they were topped by iron points. She reached on tiptoes to retrieve the scrap of cloth they’d noticed earlier.

  ‘It looks like a coat – parka or something,’ she said, looking pensively at it.