by Mandy Baggot
‘There we go,’ Emily said softly.
‘O–K,’ Ray replied.
‘You have to trust that your specialist isn’t going to kill you,’ Emily stated in a matter of fact manner. ‘And worrying about whether he’s going to kill you or not isn’t going to change the outcome. You’ll just have spent the time you could have been living your best life worrying about something that probably won’t happen.’
‘Probably,’ Ray said with a sigh. ‘It’s not a great word.’
‘Ray, do you think Simon spent time worrying that maybe one day, when he was walking out of work to catch the Tube he might possibly be run over by a drunk-driver?’
When she put it like that, he sounded like a lunatic for even starting this conversation. What was the matter with him?
‘Hey,’ Ray said quickly. ‘I didn’t mean to correlate any of that to Simon. I’m not looking for sympathy here. I… really don’t know what I’m looking for. Probably someone to end this conversation right now so I don’t carry on making an arse of myself.’
‘Listen to me,’ Emily said solidly, still holding onto his hands, strength in those petite fingers, dwarfed by his. ‘I trust that the universe is not going to deliver you to the shed at my school, make me fall for you and then take you away from me. That really would mean my life was a horrible twisted rom-com Paramount would never touch.’
Her words drew a smile and he felt himself relax a little.
‘When are you going into hospital?’ she asked him.
‘That’s the thing,’ Ray said. ‘Emily, I really couldn’t bear to think that someone else was playing the piano for you.’ He took a breath. ‘I want to see the kids do their thing. I want to see you do your thing. I was crazy to think I could miss it.’ He smiled. ‘I told them I can’t go in until the 21st. I might be in there for Christmas Day, but you know, I’m not all that struck on Christmas Day anyway.’
‘And here was I thinking I’d turned opinion tonight.’
‘You’ve done more than turn opinion, Emily Parker,’ Ray breathed. ‘You’ve turned my world back the right way.’
He could feel his heart beating in his chest. Her hands were in his, her body so close… was it too soon to share everything?
‘Play for me?’ Emily begged. ‘And this time, if you need me to, I’ll do all the singing.’
Sixty-Four
In the Stable – to the tune of ‘Shallow’ by Lady Gaga and Bradley Cooper
Will he be born tonight?
Lying underneath a star so bright
Or will it take some time?
Will Mary wish she’d had a glass of wine?
God’s calling
My son is coming, it’s time to stop and listen
We all need change
Time for a new start to turn the page
The shepherds bring their flock
The Three Kings tire but they do not stop
Mary’s trying hard
Joseph’s there for her, a constant guard
God’s calling
The hour is nearing, it’s time for destiny
We all pray
And when he comes alive the earth will cry
Here in this stable
A baby will scream out
His life will save the world
Conquering evil, bring us together
We’ll never feel the fear
Chorus
He’s in the manger, manger
In the manger m-m-m-manger
In the manger, manger
We’re all in the stable now
Oh oh oh oh…
Jesus is born now
Look at his cuteness
He’s sweeter than Meghan and Harry’s son
A king for the whole world, marking a new dawn
We’re all in the stable now
He’s in the manger, manger
In the manger m-m-m-manger
In the manger, manger
We’re all in the stable now
Ray hadn’t been able to stop himself from joining in with Emily. They had spent the past hour putting this song together and the ideas had sprung mainly from her. He had seen it in her eyes. She was thinking about her class of children and making this show special for them. In the beginning it might have been about creating a spectacle for her boss to try and earn promotion, but right now, it was about those kids she cared so much about. This was the perfect song to end the nativity tableau scene in Stretton Park’s play.
He played the final chords and then he looked at Emily. He was shaking, the emotion of what they had created simply blowing his mind. Their legs were touching, and he could feel it from her too. He was too scared to speak, for fear of breaking the connection that was pulsing in the air between them. Energy, sparks, tension, those few centimetres had it all going on. But how long could they sit this close and not say anything? Action was out of the question, wasn’t it? They should go slow given the current situation…
‘Ray,’ Emily breathed, her voice ragged.
‘Yeah.’ He didn’t trust himself to say anything else.
‘You said something else in that message you sent me,’ she carried on, her body seeming to get even closer to his.
‘Yeah,’ he replied. He remembered all the stupid things he had said in that message. Which one was she wanting to talk about now? Now, when desire was sprinting through him.
‘You said,’ she paused, wetting her lips with her tongue. ‘You said you loved me.’
Her voice whispered to him, those words falling first on his skin, then quickly beginning to soak inside him. That part of the message hadn’t been stupid. That sentiment he had meant with every fibre of him.
‘Yeah,’ he replied. ‘I remember.’ If he thought he was scared about his upcoming operation, then this moment was something else entirely. He currently felt like someone was churning up his insides with a blender. He loved her. He had let his heart accept that feeling, admit to it, now he had to decide whether he wanted to own it. He knew the answer but, what was more important was how Emily felt.
‘Did you mean it?’ she asked him.
He finally took his hands from the keys of the piano. They were shaking, like every nerve-ending. He put his palms to the flat of his thighs, nervous. But then he looked directly at her, drinking her in, taking a little time to admire every soft line and delicate edge. That auburn hair framing her features, that cute chin she’d told him she didn’t like, her lips he already knew every contour of…
‘I meant it,’ he finally said, exhaling a breath and all the emotion that was quickly gathering.
‘Tell me again,’ Emily said, putting her hands to the lapels of his dinner jacket, smoothing down the fabric then holding it captive.
Ray swallowed, feeling his heart throbbing in his throat, desperately trying to control his breath. ‘I love you.’
‘Say it again,’ Emily whispered, shifting even closer to him, fully connecting their bodies on the piano stool.
There was no hesitation this time, but his voice was even thicker with desire. ‘I love you, Emily.’
*
A rush had been building inside Emily since they’d started singing the song together. Here in this intimate studio, the gorgeous Christmas tree making the moment even more festively romantic, Emily had completely lost her heart to him. Through these past weeks she had gone from feeling that she was never going to get over Simon, let alone love again, and here she was, experiencing unchartered territory but, now, unafraid to venture forth and explore.
She pressed herself to him but held back from connecting their lips. She wanted to look into those eyes again, see what was expressed amid that sparkling amber. It was hard to stop her body from shaking, simply keep still and be, but, although she was sure about what she wanted to happen next, she wanted to give Ray that time. Ensure he was certain about the next step.
‘Ray,’ she whispered, finally reaching up and putting her fingers to his hair. She watched him close his eyes as s
he toyed with the strands, tucking them behind his ear.
‘Yeah,’ he answered in a deep rumble, eyelids opening.
‘I love you too.’
She watched his reaction to her words, saw the realisation in those eyes, the pupils reacting. It set fire to her soul. She kissed him then, firm but slow, then with all the force of the passion she was feeling in this moment.
Ray kissed her back, his mouth responding to hers, hungry, fast and she edged his jacket from his shoulders as the stool became suddenly too small to host this embrace. He shrugged a little, lips still locked with hers, helping her to remove the shirt as they continued the kiss.
And then Emily’s fingers were pulling away the loosened bow tie and working on the buttons of his white dress shirt. She stood up, losing his mouth for a second, then quickly reconnecting as she hurried to undress him.
‘Hey,’ Ray said, drawing his mouth away from hers as he stood too, pushing the stool back from the piano with his knee and giving them a little more room.
‘What?’ Emily asked, successfully unfastening another two of his shirt buttons.
‘Taking off my shirt,’ he breathed. ‘I mean… are you sure?’
Emily answered him by undoing the last of the buttons and parting the cotton, her hands moving over his torso, across his abs and up over his chest. When she reached his clavicle she stopped, her fingers finding the scar on his right shoulder. Running her index finger over the small knot of scar tissue, she looked deep into his eyes. And then she took her hands away and put them to her black and gold dress, gently easing the figure-hugging fabric up her body, all the while keeping her gaze on him, this gorgeous man standing in front of her. She pulled it up, over her breasts, over her head and then off, finally standing before him in just her underwear. It was cream silk, circa 1950, something she’d never worn before.
‘I’m sure,’ she answered, shivering as she watched his eyes appraise her.
She gasped as Ray kissed her then, his arms coming around her and lifting her up, over the piano keys, and up again, onto the very top of the grand piano. She watched him, moving to lean over her, still seeming uncertain whether this was what she wanted. Perhaps she needed to be clearer still.
‘Make love to me,’ Emily begged him. ‘Make love to me, Ray.’
It was all the cue he seemed to need, and Emily pulled him towards her, knowing that any crescendo they had made during the performance of their song was about to be eclipsed by the music their bodies were going to make when they finally came together.
Sixty-Five
Stretton Park Primary School
20th December
Emily wasn’t usually a nail-biter, but her nails were currently down to the quick. She was blaming a combination of Olivia Colman plus her pre-show nerves. She had taken her class on a visit to see Idris, Idris’s babies and Olivia yesterday. All were doing ridiculously well for hedgehogs who should be hibernating. It couldn’t be explained. One of the animal welfare volunteers had suggested it was climate change, but seeing as London had been as cold as always this winter, Emily was sceptical. Anyway, as she had gently petted Olivia Colman’s nose, the creature had nibbled at one of Emily’s nails, thus starting the downfall of the rest of them. Who cared? She was too busy for handshaking with the bishop and his suffragans. She had props and scenery that were falling apart and Allan hysterically shouting ‘you’re another meme’ approximately every six seconds. Since the photo of her and Ray kissing on London Bridge had been printed, she had been made into a gif a day. It had been enough for even her and Ray to get bored of it and they’d decided that kissing in a few other places might mix things up a bit. So, they’d gone on a tour, ignoring the presence of reporters and simply enjoying the beginnings of their relationship. On a moonlight cruise up the Thames. By the locks at Camden. Christmas markets for gifts. New North Road. Emily had met Len and Brenda and had been treated to three hours of Home and Away episodes that Ray seemed to be frighteningly excited by, and they had been guests of honour at the unveiling of the new purple spare room that really was something to behold. She hoped Brenda’s sister was bringing sunglasses with her when she came to visit.
‘Felix!’ Emily hissed. ‘Come away from the curtain. We don’t want any of the audience to see you before the start of the show, do we? We don’t want to spoil the surprise.’
‘Surprise! Surprise!’ the carrot-coated boy chanted, still ruffling the thick red stage curtain with his orange arms.
‘Felix,’ Cherry called, her Queen Number Two costume ironed to pristine and looking like it was so starched and stiff she was going to have trouble walking. ‘Come away from the curtain until the actual performance!’
‘Thank you, Cherry,’ Emily said. ‘But I’m still the teacher here until you get your degree.’ She swallowed. She needed to try and calm down. Each and every one of her performers was in varying degrees of anxiety and had been the whole day. Rashid was uncharacteristically quiet. Alice hadn’t mentioned death once. Makenzie hadn’t corrected anyone on their wrong use of gender. Matthew hadn’t twirled his hair around his finger. Charlie hadn’t picked his nose…
‘Hey.’
Emily looked up to Ray and couldn’t help the smile that seemed to instantly break out whenever he was around. She didn’t hesitate. She threw her arms around him, holding him tight, inhaling the scent of musk and winter spice and something uniquely Ray that seemed to just rise up from his skin and catch her unawares.
‘Woooooo!’ every member of Year Six cooed, laughing, some of them clapping.
Emily suddenly came to, remembering where she was and she stepped out of Ray’s embrace, brushing down her smartest red and blue striped dress with the fabric belt that tied in the middle. To her it had always shouted ‘Deputy Head’ when she got it out of her wardrobe. No news on that promotion and unlikely to be for the foreseeable future. It was apparently one thing to have worked your socks off for weeks maintaining equilibrium in the classroom as well as managing the equivalent of West End Kids Week, but another to have done all that and turned the Head’s head…
‘Thank you, Year Six. Now let’s concentrate on remembering our lines and the words to the songs now there’s only—’ Emily looked at her watch ‘—fifteen minutes to go.’ She literally felt her complexion blanch. ‘Oh my goodness, there’s only fifteen minutes to go! And there’s so much I need to do! Frema!’
‘Yes, Miss Parker,’ Frema called, half of her dressed as a vicar, the other half rabbi, a line drawn down the middle of her face in a sparkling gold. She did look tremendous.
‘Can you check the llama is OK?’
‘You have a llama?’ Ray said, laughing.
‘Don’t ask,’ Emily begged. ‘We had a last-minute sponsorship for the “after party” from Lakeside Llama Petting Zoo. Guess who had to squeeze that mention into the script about an hour ago?’ She sighed, wringing her hands together nervously. ‘Dennis is going to be laughing for at least the rest of the school year.’
‘Well,’ Ray said, taking hold of her hands. ‘There’s something else you need to do before any of that.’
‘Oh God!’ She put a hand to her mouth and side-eyed the children. ‘I mean, oh goodness, what’s happened in the auditorium? Those decorations haven’t fallen off the ceiling again, have they? Ray, they can’t fall down because some of them are quite heavy and Lucas’s grandma turned eighty today. Having a Harvester meal and coming here is her big celebration. I can’t kill her! And how old is the bishop? Is he wearing his big hat?’
‘Take a breath,’ Ray ordered, squeezing her hands.
‘I haven’t got time for breathing. Breathing has been scheduled for around an hour and half’s time when this is all over.’
‘Hey,’ Ray said, forcing her to look into his eyes. She both loved and loathed when he did that. It was like being hypnotised in the sexiest of ways…
‘Living in the moment, right? We talked about it.’
They had talked about it. They had talked about
it a lot in between teasing the paparazzi on festive riverboats and having sex on pianos. And tomorrow Ray was going into a private hospital for surgery that could change everything. But Emily believed the only change would be a positive one. Ray’s vocal cords would be stronger. His voice fixed, maybe even improved. They hadn’t talked about the nitty gritty of his operation, she had focused on making plans for when he came out of it, starting with Christmas Day. If he was out of hospital, they were going to have a relaxed dinner with Jonah and Allan, plus Jonah’s parents and Allan’s parents, followed by sandwiches and cakes with Len and Brenda at teatime. If he wasn’t out of hospital, she was going to bring turkey and all the trimmings to him and annoy him intensely with Christmas music exactly as she had been doing from the very start of their relationship.
‘We did talk about it,’ Emily answered with a nod.
‘So, you need to come now and help with a situation with… your parents,’ Ray told her.
‘My parents?’ She was completely astounded that Alegra and William were actually here. She had truly expected them to not turn up like usual, even after them making inquiries about ticketing options.
‘Yeah,’ Ray said. ‘Just come with me a second.’
‘But, I need to stay with the children,’ Emily told him.
‘Jayden,’ Ray called.
‘Yes,’ the boy answered, toying with his innkeeper waistcoat. His hair was freshly washed and tamped down with a lovely smelling product Emily definitely recognised the scent of from somewhere.
‘You’re in charge for two minutes,’ Ray said seriously. ‘Be nice. Be cool. And don’t set fire to anything.’
‘Wait! What?’ Emily said as Ray pulled her to the stairs that led the way off the stage.
Emily held her breath as she reached the floor of the hall. The whole space was packed with people, almost every chair filled, and the other teachers were setting up more chairs in every-not-governed-by-fire-regulations-space for the last-minute influx. There had never been this many people at a Stretton Park show before. The pressure to get this right suddenly rose inside of her.