One New York Christmas

by Mandy Baggot

  ‘Are you wearing a dress?’ Dan asked, his face moving a little closer to the screen as if it would help.

  ‘Yes,’ Lara admitted, looking down at the red premiere-destined gown she still had on. ‘Quite a lot has changed here.’

  ‘Listen, let me say. I have been …’

  ‘An arsehole?’

  ‘I was going to say …’

  ‘A dickhead?’

  ‘Well …’

  ‘Honest?’

  ‘No, but, Lara, you can choose any word you want to tell me what an idiot I’ve been.’

  Was he really about to say sorry? To tell her that he wanted her back? Hadn’t this been what Lara had longed to happen since the minute he broke her heart? Except now it didn’t feel right at all.

  ‘You have been an idiot,’ Lara said. ‘But, I think, so have I.’

  ‘No, Lara, you haven’t. You’ve just been you and …’

  ‘And I’m not the person you want to spend any more time with.’ She breathed out, a pent-up, hard burst of air it felt like she had been unknowingly carrying around inside her for so long.

  ‘What?’ Dan sounded really shocked. Like she had been when he’d told her he wanted a break. But this wasn’t a case of getting her own back. This was something else completely.

  ‘Listen, Dan, I think we both need to be honest with each other. Things between us, they haven’t been quite how a relationship should be, have they?’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Well … you hate the Appleshaw events now,’ Lara said. ‘And to begin with, you enjoyed them, either because you thought things like the welly-throwing were crazily funny or because you knew I enjoyed them. And I’m not criticising now, really I’m not. But you stopped caring and you stopped coming.’

  ‘Lara, we can start again. A clean slate, a new …’

  She adjusted herself on the changing room pouffe. ‘I made excuses not to come to Spa South’s events.’ She swallowed. ‘And I never admitted that even to myself.’ She took another breath. ‘And I don’t like most of your friends and I know the feeling is mutual. It’s no wonder you didn’t invite me to Scotland.’

  ‘Lara, please, it wasn’t quite like that.’

  ‘Dan, we both need to tell the truth. No judgement.’

  There was silence then and Lara looked at Dan’s furrowed brow, the slight droop of his mouth as if he was considering what she had said.

  ‘I did love you and I know that you loved me but, I think, we’ve really been each other’s comfort blankets. You were someone I had that was outside of my family, the only person I had outside of my family, and you helped me make my first steps out of that unit.’ She smiled now. ‘You were the first non-Weeks I trusted.’

  ‘And I destroyed that.’

  ‘We both deserve more though, Dan. Don’t we?’

  ‘I hate myself for how I ended things.’

  ‘But things have ended. I think we both need to agree on that.’ Lara took another breath. ‘For good.’

  There was another silence, Dan’s eyes meeting hers over the connection and the distance. ‘I thought we could try again,’ he said.

  ‘But, I think you only thought that because it felt safe,’ Lara said softly. ‘Because we were easy and it was routine. Comfortable.’

  ‘Are you really seeing that guy who played Dr Mike in Manhattan Med?’ Dan bit.

  ‘Are you really seeing Chloe?’

  He sighed. ‘I don’t know yet.’

  ‘Neither do I,’ Lara said. ‘But this isn’t about either of them. This is about us. What we were … what we had … it was good, wasn’t it?’

  She watched Dan nod. ‘Yes, it was good.’

  ‘But, if we’re talking about forever, I don’t think it was ever going to be good enough.’

  And, at that moment, tears began to fall from Lara’s eyes. She knew saying goodbye to her relationship with Dan was the right thing to do, but that didn’t mean it didn’t hurt. She sniffed away the emotion and forced a smile.

  ‘We have to say goodbye, Dan. You know we do.’

  He nodded a little soberly. ‘Yeah, I know.’

  ‘But, will you do me one last thing?’ Lara asked.

  ‘Of course, anything,’ Dan said.

  ‘Can you find Aldo those missing stickers for his football book? It might mean searching eBay or somewhere and I’ll pay … when I get my money next month but …’

  ‘Lara,’ Dan said. ‘I’ll get the stickers. I promise.’

  Lara sighed and looked at the boyfriend who had broken her heart, seeing only all the good things that had made her fall for him in the first place.

  ‘Goodbye, Dan.’

  ‘Goodbye, Lara.’

  Fifty-Nine

  Lara and Susie’s Airbnb apartment, East Village

  ‘You look stunning,’ Susie commented as Lara entered the main room dressed in the red, floor-sweeping dress that had put a large dent in her credit card. She felt different. Still her, just a slightly more exotic version of herself.

  ‘Not like a contestant from Ru-Paul’s Drag Race?’

  ‘The only sashaying you should be doing tonight is towards Seth, not away from him.’

  Lara held her breath. Seth had phoned her, told her about the articles she already knew about, assured her they were not direct comments from him, that Trent was responsible. And he’d sounded so worried, so truly apologetic, that she didn’t have the heart to tell him she’d already seen them and had gone through a mini-crisis. She asked him about meeting his mum and he had told her how scary it had been at first, but how great it had ended up and how he was half Puerto Rican. He said it was another place to add to their Around the World list and they needed to find a great Puerto Rican restaurant to go to, with the best authentic beer.

  She hadn’t told Seth about her conversation with Dan but she would. Because having spent this time in New York, away from everything she’d known, including the cosy confines of Appleshaw, experiencing the build up to Christmas in another country, she knew that nothing would ever be the same again. Without knowing it, she had been coasting in life. It wasn’t that she wasn’t happy with her lot, she was, in lots of ways, but unless she broke her patterns, did things outside of her comfort zone, beyond her self-made borders, how would she ever know what made her happiest? And the truth was, her relationship with Dan wasn’t what made her happiest.

  ‘Well, I didn’t see my going to a New York movie premiere in my future when we were trialling the vicar’s festive pork pies a few weeks ago.’

  ‘Oh, the rancid jelly stuff. It was worse this year, wasn’t it?’ Susie said.

  ‘Yes,’ Lara answered. ‘It really was. And no one tells him.’

  ‘Not even us.’

  A car horn beeped from outside and Susie rushed to the window, pulling up the blinds. Ron, Harry and Hermione’s faint glow filtered into the room. ‘It’s a large black car. Not quite a limo but definitely smarter than your bog-standard Uber.’

  ‘I should go.’ Lara picked up the small clutch bag Susie had insisted she buy. It was pearlescent and tiny, to be fair, snugly fitting in her phone, key to the apartment and wallet. But she had already decided she wasn’t going to keep it. When tonight was over she was going to give it to Susie. ‘Listen, call David, and go and practice making Spanish babies with him in an outfit of your choosing.’

  ‘Hmm,’ Susie responded.

  ‘I really like him, Susie, I’ve always liked him. He’s fun and he’s kind and he’s full of life, and he adores you.’

  ‘He didn’t adore me enough to buy me a ring from Tiffany’s.’

  ‘Not yet,’ Lara said. ‘But give it a New York minute. I mean, you said yourself, you don’t even know whether you’re ready to get engaged really.’

  ‘But it would be super-romantic at Christmas.’

  ‘And that isn’t the best reason I’ve ever heard for a step towards forever.’

  Seth stood outside the car, catching his breath beneath the glow of th
e streetlights that made the snow on the sidewalks seem like a layer of white glitter. Further down the block kids were playing in the street, rolling up snowballs and chasing each other, a man was clearing paths, then stopping to join in with the battle. Seth smiled at the display of December New York life going on like normal. Whereas, for him, today had been the kind of day that didn’t come along all that often, a game-changer of a day, a day where so much had gone right and equally so much had been challenging. Meeting his birth mother was something he had never really believed would happen and it had all happened so fast. Two hours had sprinted by while they tried to fill each other in on what had happened over the past twenty-eight years. But the most important highlights were that Candice was no longer a prostitute, she worked cooking meals at a local high school and she was married, to a landscape gardener called Dwight. She was happy. They were comfortable. She had no other children. They had tried, but it hadn’t happened. And another highlight was Seth was going to meet up with her again, soon, when they had both had time to take a breath and settle in to the fact that they had found each other.

  When they had left Candice, Seth had held Kossy for the longest time before they headed back to the subway. He had so much to thank his mother for. Taking on someone’s child, making him nothing but her own and supporting him every step of the way with every hope and dream, and now this. Helping him discover another part of his life and being more at peace with it then he had any right to expect. And the culmination of the day was now, tonight, taking Lara to this event. He felt like the luckiest person alive.

  He headed towards the steps, but, as he did so, the door opened and there was Lara, looking nothing like she had ever looked before. She took his breath away, partly because he had convinced himself she would be wearing jeans, and partly because the dress fitted her so perfectly. He had been an admirer of her curves since the day they met halfway up a tree, but this outfit seemed only to highlight every beautiful inch of her.

  He rushed up the steps before she could make her descent, holding out his hand to her. ‘May I escort you to the car?’

  ‘You may.’ She took his hand and let him lead her slowly down each step, the snow crunching beneath their feet.

  ‘You look incredible,’ he said, his voice wavering a little.

  ‘You,’ she said, in low sultry tones. ‘Look incredibly hot.’

  ‘I think there’s a possibility we’re gonna set that red carpet on fire tonight.’

  ‘Are you promising me an evening of carpet burns’ Lara asked him. ‘Because I am expecting to watch this film.’

  ‘Whoa, keep that talk up and we might not even make the theatre.’

  ‘We do get to watch the film, don’t we? It isn’t all just holding in my stomach for the paparazzi and smiling until the Aquafresh shine drops off my teeth?’

  He stopped at the car door and looked at her again, drinking in the way her hair framed her face, her beautiful eyes, her perfect neckline down to the rounded edge of the dress …

  ‘And don’t look at my feet,’ she whispered.

  ‘Your feet.’

  ‘Susie wanted me to buy toe-squashing shoes and I wouldn’t. We compromised on this bag. I’m still wearing my boots.’ She moved the slash of the dress a little and held up a foot. ‘But I told Susie that Agyness Deyn has definitely rocked boots on a red carpet before and, I also said that I thought you would rather I wore these and be able to walk and not fall over than I wear the skinny shoes and not be able to walk and fall over.’

  ‘You were right,’ Seth told her. ‘Absolutely right.’ He leaned forward, not wanting to wait any longer to kiss her mouth.

  ‘Hey, Lara. Are you going out?’

  He felt Lara extricate herself from his kiss and suddenly there was David.

  ‘Oh, hello, David.’ She looked down at her dress. ‘Um, yeah, we’re going out.’

  ‘Is Susie inside?’

  ‘Yes, she is.’

  ‘Do you know if she’s eaten?’

  ‘I … we had something at lunchtime. I’m hanging on for an after-show diner visit.’

  ‘You are?’ Seth asked her.

  ‘Is that cool?’

  ‘Yeah, that’s cool,’ Seth replied.

  ‘Do you know why Susie’s pissed with me?’ David asked bluntly.

  ‘Um … I think maybe you should talk to her.’

  ‘I’m talking to you. Come on, Lara, catch me a break here. I know there is something wrong. There were no messages today, no emojis of giraffes or—’

  ‘Eggplant?’ Seth offered. Lara shot him a look and shook her head. ‘Sorry,’ he said.

  ‘We went shopping the other night and then—’

  ‘Diamonds,’ Lara blurted out. ‘That’s all I’m going to say. Think about the diamonds.’

  ‘And, on that note, we’d better go,’ Seth said, pulling open the back door of the car. ‘Don’t worry, when we get to the theatre the driver will open our door. I just felt a bit stupid getting him to do that now while only those three snowmen up there are watching.’

  ‘Diamonds?’ David said, as if still mulling over Lara’s answer.

  ‘Diamonds,’ Lara repeated. ‘And … it’s not a Rihanna perfume.’ She ducked down into the car and Seth closed the door and walked around the opposite side.

  ‘Diamonds,’ David said again, then his expression seemed to say that he had had some sort of realisation. ‘Oh, bueno! The brooch! Susie, she wants a brooch!’

  Sixty

  Beacon Theatre, Tribeca

  Lara had focused on every festive decoration on every building as they had travelled in the car to the Beacon Theatre for the premiere. There had been all colours of stars, animatronic reindeer, a terrible sign advertising Walt’s Winter Wonderland that reminded her of Carlson’s Christmas World and a flashing hula girl whose grass skirt was missing some LEDs. She was trying to distract herself from the fact that she was about to step out of a car like someone she’d watch on TV, with someone she used to watch on TV. Who was going to be there? Was there anyone in the world who was going to stick out like a sore thumb more than her? This was so out of her haulage yard. And in the time she had spent in New York – granted, Seth had been for auditions and been an ambassador for the zoo – but the rest of the time his life had seemed pretty normal. He wasn’t trailed by the paparazzi, there wasn’t a fleet of screaming fans on every corner but one day there might be, and tonight was part of his world too and his world was Hollywood. She wasn’t sure how a girl from Appleshaw fitted into that. She wasn’t the kind of woman who shaped her eyebrows or ate fist-sized portions. Would she had to conform somehow? Change? Shrink?

  ‘Are you OK?’ Seth asked her as the car drew to a stop.

  ‘I’m thinking the boots might have been a mistake,’ Lara said, nose pressed against the blacked-out window. No one standing on the red carpet posing for the dozens of photographers were wearing anything on their feet sturdier than two toothpicks … except the men. You are not Cheryl Cole … not Cole, something French-sounding … no, Payne … no, they weren’t married and they were split up too now … Nicole Scherzinger. You are not Nicole Scherzinger. You should not be here. You should be in the apartment talking to three fake snowmen. She pressed her forehead to the glass.

  The theatre was whimsical, just like the US theatres from movies she had seen about small towns and homecoming queens. There was a black sign with bright lights spelling out ‘World Premiere: The End of Us’ and, right now, Lara hoped it wasn’t some sort of premonition.

  ‘Hey,’ Seth said, taking her hand in his. ‘Don’t be nervous. We’re gonna get out. We’re gonna stand and smile for some photos and then we’re gonna go inside, meet a few people, then watch the film. That’s it.’

  ‘That’s it,’ Lara said. ‘It’s not shopping for baked beans though, is it?’ She suspected no one on the red carpet under the lights had even ever eaten baked beans.

  ‘No,’ Seth agreed. ‘But think of it as … the trailers before the main
event. We’re there, enduring it, because once it’s all done we get to watch a great movie and when we’ve watched the great movie we get to go and eat the best all-American diner food you’ve ever tasted.’

  She couldn’t help but smile as the thought of all those comforting carbs hit each and every sense all at once.

  ‘Come on,’ Seth said as the driver left his seat and went outside. ‘The sooner we get out, the sooner we can go in and the sooner we get in, the sooner the movie will start.’

  ‘You don’t like this part of your job?’ Lara asked him.

  ‘I hate this part of my job,’ he admitted. ‘But, if Ryan Reynolds can do it …’ He squeezed her hand. ‘Just follow my lead.’

  The driver opened the door and, as well as the cold wind of the night, there was almost a roar from the crowd that took Lara’s breath away. Seth left the car and immediately there were cameras flashing, shouts of his name, it was all so disorientating and she felt stranded. Until …

  ‘Come on,’ Seth said, smiling, ducking his head back into the car and holding his hand out to her. ‘You get out, we get in, right?’

  ‘Right,’ she answered with a nod. She took his hand and thought ‘elegant’. After all, she had jumped down from many a lorry, how hard could it be to get out of the back of a car? Except what she was wearing was not jeans and was as big and cumbersome as a wedding gown. She stepped out and up onto the kerb, lifting her dress as she moved. Was this how actresses rolled almost every day of their lives? And on needle-thin stilettos? She swallowed as she straightened her frame, eyes going to the doors of the theatre. Was that Mark Wahlberg? Right there? Was she about to step on the same carpet as Mark Wahlberg? This was insane! But she had to stay composed, not run up and ask for a selfie …

  ‘Seth! This way! Seth!’

  ‘Seth, Martin Faulton from The Scene magazine. Tell us about your character, Garth.’

  Seth looked at Lara. ‘I’ll answer a couple of questions. I won’t let go of your hand.’

  She nodded, feeling a little bit sick and a lot overwhelmed. ‘OK.’ What else could she say? She was here, in the limelight, being snapped by a million lenses.