When Josie talked about her dad her tone was different. No confusion, no wariness. ‘Dad says he’ll …’ or ‘Dad says we’ll …’ littered her sentences.
And every time delivered with no doubt that whatever Dad said, it could be relied upon.
Chapter Twenty
The hospital smelled of chemicals and people, with the occasional whiff of bowel.
Nico had driven the hire car to Jönköping. Mattias was working in the museum until two and would go home to Huskvarna after visiting Lars. He, Nico and Carina converged on the ward as it opened. Carina hugged her sons, Mattias gave Nico a wintry smile and turned to his dad, lying in bed with an impressive number of wires emerging from his gown to create bleeps and graphs on various machines.
‘The doctors have told me off,’ Lars said. His hair stuck up and his face looked rumpled. His smile was marginally less tired than yesterday. ‘I have coronary heart disease and a bad diet. Once I stopped coaching professionally I let myself have all the pizzas and chocolate I once preached against.’
Not thinking it was for him to comment on someone else’s relationship with food, Nico patted his dad’s hand, noticing the age spots. ‘So, what next?’
‘Angioplasty, where they put a balloon in your arteries to widen them, and possibly stents. I’ll be here a few more days.’
‘When will these procedures happen?’ Mattias, this time.
‘Tomorrow.’ Lars pulled a comical face. ‘They’re in a hurry to fix me.’
‘And get rid of you, I expect,’ Carina joked back. But tears stood in her eyes. Nico felt torn. It was good to see his parents close again but it made him wish they’d never parted. Maybe then Mattias wouldn’t treat him like a stranger. On the other hand, if they’d stuck together then maybe he’d never have lived in England. He couldn’t imagine that, much as he loved Sweden.
He listened as his family chatted, smiling at Lars’s jokes or when Carina termed him and Mattias ‘the boys’ as if they were still children in primary school – småskola. Lars asked Nico to go to the rink at Jönköping at six to take the ice hockey under sixteens skills training.
Wondering at the flash of anger he caught in Mattias’s eyes, Nico groaned, but agreed. He kept hockey gear at Lars’s house and his dad knew that.
‘And I have four tickets for the HV71 home match on Monday,’ Lars sighed, referring to Jönköping’s Swedish Hockey League team. ‘I planned for you to come, Nico, with Mattias, Felicia and me.’
Mattias interrupted, ‘Now you’re in hospital, let Nico take his family.’
‘But—’ Nico protested but Mattias was grabbing his coat and muttering about how busy he was.
Later, Nico strolled back to the car park with Carina. ‘Do you know what’s bugging my little brother?’
Carina gave an elaborate shrug. ‘Ingen aning.’ No clue. She didn’t deny Mattias’s remoteness, though.
Nico sighed as he saw Carina back to her car and hugged her goodbye. ‘I’ll try and talk to him.’
The journey back to his dad’s place was slow. The snow lay six inches thick now and when he eventually swung into his dad’s driveway he was cautious of the snow that had accrued since he left.
The sound of laughter from behind the house drew him to the back garden where he found Josie, Maria and Hannah, bright-eyed and rosy from the cold.
‘Look, Dad!’ Josie squealed as soon as she saw him. ‘We’ve made snowmen to remind Farfar of us when we’ve gone.’
He moved closer, pausing to absorb the rugby tackle Maria sometimes bestowed as a hug. She shouted, ‘Look men, Mydad!’ The lying snow was scraped and trampled now and from the centre of the welter rose four snowmen – or snow persons – beneath the snowy pines. One tall; one a little smaller with what looked like a swollen chest; and two smaller still, one Josie-sized and one the height of Maria. He grinned, realising the snowy figures were, indeed, them, with pebble eyes and carrot noses. The one with the swollen chest must be Hannah and he could imagine Josie’s literal mind at work there.
‘Fantastic,’ he pronounced. ‘I’ll take photos and send them to Farfar.’
‘It was my idea!’ Josie boasted, bouncing gleefully. ‘Take our photo with them.’
He obliged, and they all crouched down for a selfie, ears and noses stinging in the cold. Then he said, ‘I’ve let Farfar persuade me to take under sixteens’ hockey skills training at six. Do you guys want to watch? Or stay here?’
‘Watch,’ said Hannah and Josie simultaneously, Josie adding, ‘Can we have supper out afterwards?’
‘Supper?’ repeated Maria expectantly.
‘Deal,’ said Nico. It was already after five so he went to his dad’s garage to take down his skates from the wall, unsurprised to find them sharpened and ready. In a box was his practice gear and he brought it indoors to warm up. It smelled musty but that proved you were a hockey player.
It was weird driving to the rink or ishall in Nässjö because butterflies fluttered in his stomach. He’d assisted his dad a few times when he was home for his winter visit but he hadn’t taken a group himself since college in the US when he’d helped coach a junior team, those far-off days of trying to keep up his training and his grade point average simultaneously.
Lars had got someone at Nässjö rink to inform the parents of the change of coach but some would have encountered Nico when he’d helped Lars before. A couple he knew from school.
Hannah ushered Josie and Maria to the seating area behind the boards and a few parents stayed to help with gearing up. One, Henrik, acted as assistant coach and Nico shook his hand. The level of teenage chatter, mostly in Swedish, was enough to pop an eardrum. Nico answered questions about Lars or about college hockey in the States. As he talked he pulled on protective undershorts then strapped on his shin pads and huge hockey oversocks that attached to the undershorts. Stepping into hockey pants, he pulled them up and with familiar, automatic movements, secured lacing and belt. Skates next, snug but not cutting circulation, then the shoulder pads secured at chest and bicep. Elbow pads, checking the slash guard was on the outside, then emerald green jersey. Helmet with face cage but no mouth guard as he’d be talking to the kids. Gloves and stick – it had taken so much energy to dress he almost needed a nap now – and for the first time in a year he was ready to hit the ice.
A check of the kids’ equipment, removal of blade guards, then he slid through the gap in the boards under bright rink lights, the kids spilling onto the ice after him, sticks in hands. Henrik was the last, juggling a tower of cones and closing the boards behind him.
For an instant, Nico was super-conscious of Hannah, Maria bouncing on her lap and Josie waving. Then he snapped into focus and sent the kids for a couple of warm-up laps while he and Henrik set out cones at the corners, the pitch lines showing colourfully through the ice.
‘OK,’ he shouted, and the kids slowed and joined him in the centre, the showier ones being sure to visibly shave the ice as they halted. ‘Speed around the rink. I’m looking for a smooth, galloping stride and you need to pass outside the cones. Number one, go!’
Everyone did an individual lap, Henrik on the stopwatch, Nico skating in a smaller oval shouting, ‘Weight forward! Really push against that ice,’ over the sound of panting breath and swishing skates. As each kid started their second circuit he dropped a puck and flicked it into their path shouting, ‘Pass it back!’ It was an old trick of Lars’s so the team members took it pretty much in stride. Then he set up a slalom with uneven spacing culminating with a slapshot at goal, the two goalkeepers on the squad taking turns at guarding the short, squat net. He did a couple of runs himself, flipping the puck into the back of the goal then feeling guilty that he’d once hoped to play National Hockey League or Swedish Hockey League so it wasn’t a fair contest against the Nässjö under sixteens. But, hey. He was so rusty he creaked. The red, sweaty, smiling faces told him that everyone was enjoying themselves, which was the most important thing.
Hannah and the girls me
t him in the foyer when practice was finally over and he got away from the stream of questions about why he’d never turned pro. ‘You’ve been ages!’ Josie said accusingly. ‘We’re starving. Can we have burgers?’
His instinct was to go for a healthier choice and he saw Hannah’s eyebrows twitch as if anticipating a negative answer but he could cause problems in the kids by over-forbidding and instead of saying, ‘But you went to McDonald’s in Bettsbrough less than two weeks ago,’ said, ‘OK, for a treat.’
Instantly, Josie moved on to her next request. ‘Can we go skating this week?’
He nodded. ‘If we can fit it in.’
‘Can we hire skates?’ Hannah asked doubtfully. ‘Everyone in Sweden seems to have their own and mine are in England.’ She swung a lagging Maria up into her arms.
Nico took Josie’s hand as they walked through the sliding doors to the car park. ‘Dad runs a skate exchange for the kids he coaches because growing teens sometimes need to change twice a year. I expect we’ll find something for everyone in his collection.’
The burger bar visit was brief as Maria was almost too tired for food. Nico ate a modest-sized burger and enjoyed it without experiencing a knee-jerk reaction to get rid of it after. He drove home, Maria drowsing in her car seat. Indoors, he pulled her out of her snowsuit, which made her giggle sleepily, ready for an abbreviated bedtime routine. He was pretty sure she was asleep by the time he switched out the light.
Downstairs Josie had found Daddy Day Care on an English-language channel and they vegged out in front of it, Hannah drinking coffee and he and Josie drinking milk as they laughed at Eddie Murphy. He was very conscious of Hannah. The three of them were squeezed together on the sofa. Josie was in the middle but Hannah was close enough to touch. Her hair was messy from wearing a hat but glossy as it tumbled down her back. Last night he’d made the most tentative of tentative overtures towards her and she’d jumped up and run like a frightened cat. He’d learn from that and wait to see if she became comfortable being alone with him.
He would have thought she wasn’t interested if it hadn’t been for those slow dances in November, when, her body plastered excitingly against his, her silky hair flirting with his skin, interest had pulsed off her. He cursed Rob for jolting him out of that heat haze. He wanted it back.
Sunday was the thirteenth of December, St Lucia’s Day. Carina was busy readying the church and helping the children of the procession. Lars had his angioplasty and two stents put in place in the morning and called Nico to say he needed a nap but wanted to see Nico and co later in the afternoon.
‘We’ll come,’ Hannah listened to Nico assure him. ‘See you at four.’
Hannah felt doubtful. ‘I’ll wait outside. He’ll be exhausted.’
Nico tucked his phone away, golden stubble accentuating the determined shape of his jaw. ‘Dad will want to see you too,’ he declared firmly. ‘He says he’ll be fine after a rest.’
‘It would be lovely to see him again so maybe for a few minutes,’ she agreed cautiously. The UK ice hockey leagues had restructured at around the time Nico left for the US so Lars had returned to Sweden, leaving the ice rink to a new team and a new coach.
The girls behaved well at the hospital, though Nico had to act swiftly to prevent Maria grabbing the drip of a patient being wheeled down a corridor. He apologised profusely but when he turned away made an ‘OMG!’ face at Hannah that made her smother giggles.
Lars occupied a room with three other men. Hannah let Nico go first, stooping to give Lars a gentle hug. ‘Hej, Pappa,’ then switching into English so the girls could understand, ‘How are you?’
‘Rubbish earlier, sluggish from the anaesthetic but good otherwise,’ Lars said. His hair was wispier and he was pale and lined but Hannah had no trouble recognising his kindly eyes and round face.
Josie, who talked to her grandfather frequently on Skype bounced into the conversation to tell him about their visit to the rink last night. ‘And Daddy kept skating backwards. He’s going to teach me. And he scored two goals.’
‘I wish I’d seen it, Josie.’ Lars gave Josie’s name the Swedish pronunciation, very like Maria’s ‘Yozee’.
Hannah watched Nico blush. ‘I hope the under sixteens didn’t mind me trying a couple of shots,’ he said apologetically, making Lars’s face crease into a smile.
Hannah, seeing Lars’s wires and tubes and mindful of the near-miss with the drip was happy to stay back with Maria hanging around her neck.
But Lars spotted her. ‘Hannah Goodbody? You’ve grown up beautiful.’
Hannah’s cheeks heated. She laughed. ‘It’s good to see you again. Rob sent his best regards.’
His gaze fell to Maria. ‘Who is this little pixie?’
‘I Maria,’ Maria cooed, and waved at Lars when Hannah asked her to.
Despite Lars’s protestations of being ‘fine, now,’ after fifteen minutes Hannah took the girls to the cafeteria for a drink so they didn’t tire Lars out.
Nico joined them after a while. He had a smile for the kids but murmured to Hannah, ‘He’s tired. He needs time to heal and maybe return to the healthy eating he used to preach about. It’s good that he’s always been active.’ He paused. ‘Mattias turned up. I felt he wanted one-on-one time with Dad, so I came away.’
Although he spoke lightly enough, Hannah saw his shadowed expression. She covered his hand with hers and he returned the pressure. Then they headed home for a snack before driving to Älgäng church for Lucia.
Hannah had never attended St Lucia Day service. She found it beautiful. The church was elegantly vaulted and though ornamented with touches of plaster and gilt, not weighed down by acres of it as she’d seen in churches in Italy and Switzerland. Carina flitted around the handmaidens and star boys, checking clothes and angles of hats. They processed up the aisle, their beautiful young voices lifted in the chorus of the famous song, ‘Sa-anta-a Lu-ci-yah, Santa Lucia,’ candles in their hands and in the crown of the young woman selected to play Lucia to bring in the light at the darkest time of the year. Carina slipped into the pew next to Mattias and Felicia, behind Hannah, Nico and the girls.
Hannah, serenity sinking into her, stopped thinking about the hardness of the pew or the chilliness of the church as song followed song. Josie and Maria, seated between her and Nico, were so enraptured by the sweet young voices that Hannah found a tear trickling down her cheek. Nico slid his arm around the girls until his hand came to rest on Hannah’s shoulder. It squeezed, then remained, gently comforting through the thickness of her parka.
After the service, they gathered at Carina’s for cake. Maria and Josie cuddled up together while Josie played a game on Nico’s phone. Nico tried to start a conversation with Mattias and Felicia, though Mattias didn’t seem to have much to say. Hannah went into the kitchen with Carina to make drinks.
As she took down cups and saucers Carina said thoughtfully, ‘I’d love to see Nico really happy.’
Hannah nodded, though she wasn’t sure why Carina was sharing. ‘He seems relieved to have left his job.’
Carina shrugged. ‘Happiness is more linked to people.’ She arranged tarts and a cake on a rectangular platter and Hannah carried it into the other room. Josie and Maria instantly revived and tucked into bruin-brown Körsbärschokladtårta or chocolate cherry cake.
Carina addressed Nico as she passed around napkins. ‘I have something to say to you.’
Nico lifted an enquiring eyebrow. Hannah fielded a half-chewed cherry Maria was trying to drop beneath the table as if feeding an invisible dog.
After a moment to take one of the hazelnut tarts called Kejsarkronor, Carina went on. ‘Before I knew Maria and Hannah would be with us this week and Lars fell ill, I’d arranged a surprise – to take Nico and Josie to Stockholm on Tuesday and Wednesday. Mattias and Felicia will be at work, of course.’ She smiled at Josie’s sudden indrawn breath. ‘I promised you a visit to Skansen to learn more about Sweden, Josie, didn’t I?’
Hannah instant
ly perceived herself and Maria to be the flies in this plan’s ointment. ‘Don’t cancel it unless you think you need to be near Lars. I’ll stay with Maria.’
Carina smiled comfortably. ‘But I’ve talked to the hotel and they can add another room to the booking for you so we have one family room and two singles. Finns det hjärterum så finns det stjärterum.’
Hannah giggled because that translated to if there’s room in the heart there’s room for the bottom. Then she sobered. ‘Actually, I’d hoped to make contact with my ex while here and he does live in Stockholm.’
Carina looked taken aback, the smile fading from her dark eyes. ‘Ah. There’s someone in your life.’
Hannah snorted. ‘He’s only “in my life” in that he owes me money. I’d like to encourage him to settle up.’ Briefly, she outlined the story of Hannah Anna Butik. ‘The ratbag’s declining my calls. Tracking him down in person might make him realise I’m not going to be meek.’
Carina’s smile returned full force. ‘We’ll make time for you to “encourage” Albin.’
Josie was bouncing in her seat, obviously awaiting her turn in the conversation. ‘Is Skansen the place with the animals, Farmor?’
‘All the Swedish animals like elk and wolves, lynx and bears,’ Carina agreed, gently staying Josie’s movements in case it joggled her plate from her lap.
Not quite able to believe this opportunity to chase Albin down Hannah said, ‘But will it be OK to leave Lars?’
‘We’ll only miss Tuesday because we’ll be back in time for Wednesday-evening visiting and then Lars will come out of hospital on Thursday,’ Carina said. ‘Mattias will see his father on Tuesday, I’m sure.’
Christmas Wishes: From the Sunday Times bestselling and award-winning author of romance fiction comes a feel-good cosy Christmas read Page 24