One Perfect Christmas and Other Stories

by Paige Toon

  A few nights ago, we spoke on FaceTime…

  ‘I dreamt about him last night,’ Leo tells me as I cradle Max in my arms. He’s just had a feed and he’s drowsy, content to snuggle.

  ‘Did you?’

  ‘Yeah.’ He smiles sadly. ‘I dreamt that I was in bed and it was morning, but he was still fast asleep. I was holding him on my chest and I swear I could feel the weight of his body. I miss him. I miss his chubby legs, his tiny ears, his fluffy hair, his little back…’

  I can’t help but giggle as Leo wistfully lists a few more random body parts.

  ‘Aw,’ I say gently. ‘It’s been a long two weeks.’

  ‘I don’t want to be away from you guys like this ever again,’ he states seriously.

  ‘What about Marty’s wedding?’

  ‘I’m coming.’

  ‘Really?’ I ask with delight.

  ‘Yep. We’ll block out those two weeks in the diary. I’ve missed you both too much.’

  My heart melts. ‘We’ve missed you, too.’

  ‘I love you, Maxi!’ he calls in a sweet voice, leaning in closer to the phone.

  Max’s eyes have been growing increasingly heavy-lidded, but now he perks up and looks at the screen.

  ‘Hey,’ Leo says to him warmly. ‘I miss you, Maxi.’

  Max reaches out, making a noise of dissent. I let him take the phone, but he cries out again, because it’s not his daddy, just a piece of tech.

  ‘Give Mummy’s phone back, darling,’ I say softly, trying to take it from him. But he begins to cry. ‘I’d better go,’ I tell Leo regretfully.

  He looks utterly miserable as we end the call.

  That was the last time Max saw his daddy’s face.

  Max points towards the field where my old horse, Pandora, is kept. She’s retired now and hasn’t been ridden in years, but she ambles over to say hello to us. I forgot to bring an apple and the ones on the nearby tree are too green to eat, so I bend down and scoop up a handful of grass instead, making Max giggle with the dipping motion.

  ‘Well, hello, there…’

  Glancing over my shoulder, I spy Mrs Trust, who lives in the big country house next door, coming from the direction of the village church. She’s wearing a tweed coat which is far too warm for this weather and is carrying a plastic jug in her right hand. The sight makes me think of something my mother said a while back.

  ‘Hello, Mrs Trust,’ I call.

  I’ve known her since I was a girl and I dated her son for years, but she’s still ‘Mrs Trust’ to me. I’ve always felt like a child putting on her best behaviour when I’m around her.

  ‘Who’s this, then?’ she asks as we walk over to her and come to a stop on the small, dusty footpath.

  ‘This is Max.’ I’m sure my parents will have told her this, plenty of times. Mum said she’s a bit doolally these days. It’s not surprising, with everything she’s been through.

  I tickle my baby under his chin to try to tempt out a giggle. It works.

  ‘My, aren’t you a strapping, fine lad,’ she says, her smile not quite meeting her eyes. I wonder if any of her smiles do anymore. ‘How old?’ She glances at me.

  ‘Six-and-a-half months,’ I obligingly reply.

  She nods. ‘Are you back for the ball?’ Her question prompts guilt to streak through me.

  I shake my head regretfully. ‘I’m afraid not. We were supposed to fly home today, but our flight’s been cancelled.’

  ‘Your fella here with you?’ She looks around, thankfully not dwelling on the fact that it’s been years since I last attended the charity ball I set up in her son’s name.

  I’ve had to let that part of my life go. I needed to, in order to be able to move on. It was the same with Matthew – we stayed in touch for a while after the split, hoping we could remain friends. He got in touch when he and Tessa decided to give their relationship a go, and he also informed me when it didn’t work out. She’s now engaged to someone else and Matthew himself is in a serious relationship, but I only heard that on the grapevine. We haven’t spoken in years. Friends was too much of a stretch, sadly. But I’m glad it no longer hurts when I think of him.

  I wish I could say the same for Will, Mrs Trust’s son.

  ‘Leo. No. He couldn’t come with us this time, unfortunately,’ I reveal. ‘He had to stay in Key West to run our guest house.’ My parents will have almost certainly told her this, too.

  ‘Key West,’ she repeats. ‘Is that where you call home now?’

  ‘Yes.’ Home is where the heart is, I sing inside my head.

  ‘Well, enjoy the rest of your holiday,’ she says brusquely, making to leave. She seems to have forgotten that I said my flight was cancelled.

  ‘Thank you,’ I reply. ‘Please give my best to Mr Trust!’

  She gives me a curt nod in response and walks away, swinging the jug in her hand.

  I stare at her departing back for a moment and then turn to look up the hill at the church. On impulse, we walk that way, and sure enough, there’s a fresh bunch of red roses in the vase in front of Will’s headstone, filled to the brim with clean, cold water. Mum told me that she replaces the flowers every couple of days.

  She was so austere in life, cold and often disinterested. But how she cherishes her son in death.

  Tears prick my eyes and I wrap my arms around Max in his baby carrier and give his small body a squeeze. If anything happened to my son…

  I know Leo is right. The safest place for Max to be is here. But how I wish Leo were also here with us. The thought of losing him… I couldn’t bear the pain of another loss.

  I turn my face up to the sky and close my eyes.

  Home is where the heart is.

  Once my heart was here, with Will. A part of me will always love him, and I’ll never stop mourning him. But now my heart is in Key West. If Leo was taken from us, would we go back there?

  I try to picture myself living and working in the Keys, running Lorelei and raising our son singlehandedly, but I can’t. I imagine putting Leo into a box in the ground and leaving America to live here with my parents and pain lances my heart.

  How I wish you’d gone to Miami, Leo! This is no time to be dancing in the storm!

  I need to stop torturing myself. I take one last look at Will’s headstone before turning away, brushing my fingers against it as I go.

  It is the longest day. Every time I check my phone to see if there’s any news of the hurricane, Mum tells me off because it’s no way to distract myself. I feel chilled to the bone at the sight of one satellite image, which shows Key West in the eye of the storm. I stare at the angry red circle going around and around until Mum takes my phone away and replaces it with a cup of tea.

  That night, I lay Max down in the cot in my old bedroom, which still has the nightlights I used as a child when I was scared of the dark. I consider climbing into my old bed so I’m close to him, but I’m drawn back to the guest room where Leo and I usually stay when we’re here together. I lie down, my eyes on the ceiling and my hand on Leo’s side of the bed, wishing I could feel his warm, solid body instead of the cool, empty sheet.

  It’s not long before my mind drifts back to the past…

  The very first time I saw Leo was from the sun deck of our hotel, which was right next to Lorelei. It was late at night and I was restless with jetlag and misery over what Matthew had done. I heard music and laughter coming from nearby, so I went to investigate and saw Leo and his friends lazing on his battered old sofas in his untidy backyard, smoking one of his now long-gone cigars. I thought he looked like a film star with his olive skin, dark features and chiselled good looks. I couldn’t believe it when he turned up on our dive boat a couple of days later – Bridget, Marty and I had gone on a snorkelling excursion. It inspired us to do a full scuba diving course and Leo was partnered with me. Jorge was our instructor – Leo was still only a dive master at the time – but now he’s a fully qualified instructor himself.

  I’m full of pride at the t
hought of how many people he’s now taught to dive, how many minds he’s opened to the astonishing underwater world that’s all around us. It’s been over a year since we dived together, but we’ll go again when Max is old enough to leave with someone, and I know Leo will still hold my hand and the experience will still take my breath away.

  Leo often used to make me feel breathless. My skin would spark under his touch and shivers would travel up and down my spine whenever he held my eye contact. He still makes me feel like that at times, but my love for him has risen to a whole new level.

  When we first met, I was a mess. My heart was broken, I was beyond devastated that my husband had created a child with another woman, I had no idea what our future would hold, and on top of all of this, my attraction to Leo was very confusing. My head was all over the place.

  But now we have a wonderful life with a little family of our own and I have never felt more settled or more complete.

  I still remember the night we decided to take the next step in our relationship…

  ‘Let’s have a baby.’

  I lift my head from where it’s been settled in the crook of Leo’s arm and stare at him. ‘Really?’ I ask, my fingers pausing from where they’ve been stroking his chest.

  ‘Yes,’ he whispers. ‘We’re in a good place, aren’t we?’

  ‘A really good place.’ The house is finally finished, bar a few things we’d still like to do to the garden, and Leo and Jorge are full of enthusiasm about the prospect of setting up their own dive school. Everything is coming together.

  ‘I want a family with you,’ he says.

  I edge away from him slightly and he takes the hint, turning on his side to face me as I rest my cheek against my pillow and look into his eyes.

  ‘You still want to get married,’ he notes regretfully.

  I don’t say anything. I don’t even nod. He knows what I want, what I’ll never stop wanting. And I know that I’ll never get what I want, nor will I ask for it. I respect Leo’s wishes too much.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he says, his dark eyebrows drawing together.

  Now I do shake my head. ‘Don’t be. I understand.’

  ‘I’m still sorry,’ he says.

  I reach over and smooth the frown lines away from his brow. ‘I understand,’ I repeat.

  ‘I swear, I’m yours until the day I die.’

  ‘And even then,’ I whisper.

  ‘Even then,’ he repeats, pulling me closer.

  He kisses me lovingly, tenderly, and then his lips move downwards, across my neck and my collarbone. He slides my vest top up over my breasts and kisses me again before continuing his downwards journey to my stomach, where he pauses. He kisses me slowly, three, four, five times, making me feel adored and cherished. I run my hands through his hair, feeling wave upon wave of love for this beautiful man.

  ‘I want to put a baby inside you,’ he says in a low voice, and I lift my head from the pillow to stare at him. Seconds pass, and then goosebumps shiver into place all over my body.

  ‘Okay,’ I say.

  His eyes widen. ‘Okay?’

  ‘Yes.’ I nod.

  He grins and hooks his fingers under the hemline of my knickers, pulling them down. I help to kick them off, but he catches my ankles in his hands and pushes my knees apart. He’s not done with kissing me, yet, it seems…

  To our surprise, I fell pregnant quickly, but my pregnancy seemed to go on forever. I was so hot in the humid, tropical heat. I felt like a whale, waddling round the house, standing under the ceiling fans and wishing to God that we had prioritised air-conditioning over that blasted hot tub. I had to manage the guest house while Leo was at work, but he did what he could to help, coming home at lunchtimes and finishing work early whenever possible. But I was desperate for it all to be over. And then, not-so-suddenly, it was…

  ‘Hey,’ Leo says softly when I open my eyes. I must’ve dozed off. He’s sitting in the armchair next to my bed and is cradling Max in his arms. He’s bare-chested, I realise, and our tiny baby is completely naked, not even a nappy adorning his backside.

  ‘Skin on skin.’ I smile with delight.

  I told Leo that, if I had to have a C-section, he needed to have plenty of skin-on-skin contact with Max until I woke up. It’s good for the baby, they say.

  I didn’t need to have a C-section, but I love that he’s followed my advice, anyway.

  ‘How are you feeling?’ he asks, and there’s an expression on his face that I don’t recognise. He looks kind of shell-shocked, but in a good way.

  ‘Okay,’ I reply, although in truth I’m sore.

  ‘Do you want him?’ he offers, and I do, of course I do, but I can tell he’s reluctant to let him go.

  I shake my head. ‘He looks happy there with you.’

  He smiles, pleased, smoothing his big hand over the dark fluff gracing our baby’s tiny head. He bends down to kiss him and when he straightens back up, I can see that the expression on his face has intensified. He’s not shell-shocked, I realise; he’s awe-struck. His mind has been completely and utterly blown.

  My heart is so full at that moment that I’m not sure my ribcage is big enough to contain it.

  My nose prickles as I roll over onto my side and reach for Leo’s pillow, pulling it close to my chest. It’s no substitute.

  The longest day is followed by the longest night – I can’t sleep for the life of me – and then, at five o’clock in the morning, twenty-four hours after the hurricane struck Key West, my mobile phone rings.

  ‘Leo?’ I ask into the receiver, my pulse jumping unpleasantly.

  ‘It’s okay, I’m okay,’ I hear his warm voice spilling down the line.

  ‘Oh my God, Leo!’ I cry, sitting up in bed, and then I literally do cry. Sob.

  ‘Hey, hey,’ he soothes. ‘Baby, I can’t talk for long. I’ve borrowed someone’s satellite phone. But I’m okay. Okay? You just stay safe and I’ll keep you updated when I can.’

  ‘Have you spoken to Jorge?’

  ‘Yes, he’s fine.’

  ‘How’s Lorelei?’

  ‘She’s currently under several inches of water, but I boarded up the windows really well and managed to get most of our stuff upstairs.’

  Relief surges through me. ‘Well done. What about the boat?’

  ‘It’s a bit battered, but it survived.’

  ‘Thank God!’

  ‘We were lucky, very lucky. Others weren’t. Listen, there’s a queue of people waiting to call loved ones so I’ve got to go, but I’ll call you again as soon as I can.’

  ‘When can we come home?’

  ‘Not for a while. Weeks, at least.’

  ‘Weeks?’

  ‘It’s not safe, Laura,’ he tells me with regret.

  ‘Then you be careful!’

  ‘I will be, you don’t have to worry. I love you. I love you both. I’ll call again soon.’

  ‘I love you too.’

  The line goes dead.

  The longest day that was followed by the longest night is then followed by the longest month, because that’s how long Max and I have to stay in the UK after the hurricane. I’m itchy with frustration and utterly miserable at being separated from Leo for so long, but he persuades me to remain with my parents so he can crack on with repairs without having to worry about us.

  ‘The island was battered by 100-plus mile-per-hour winds for almost forty-eight hours,’ he told me on one of our earlier phone calls, when I heard the airport had reopened and wanted to jump on a plane. ‘Lots of stuff went flying. Boats crashed onto the streets with the storm surge and there was shit everywhere – literally: the sewage systems failed. The rain hasn’t stopped, the high winds are still blowing crap around, and there’s rubbish and debris everywhere. I’m going to be boiling water for a long time to come, and the power’s not even fully back on. You can’t bring our baby son back to this mess.’

  That was me told. But I felt so helpless, and I hated the thought of him going through that hel
lish time alone.

  We fly into Key West on a hot, sunny afternoon. After clearing customs in Atlanta, we’re able to walk straight off the plane and into Leo’s arms. His face is a picture of relief at the sight of us.

  Max fell asleep as we were coming in to land, and he’s out cold in my arms, thanks to the kind lady who carried my not insubstantial hand luggage off the plane for me. I say a grateful thank you to her as she places my nappy bag at my feet and I drop my handbag beside it before stepping into Leo’s embrace. His arms come around both Max and me, but it feels awkward due to the bundle in my arms. It nowhere near quells my craving to be close to him.

  Leo pulls away to look down at Max, stiffening with shock. ‘He’s grown so much!’ he exclaims in a whisper, meeting my eyes. A strange feeling of shyness comes over me then, like I hardly know him, which is ridiculous considering how long we’ve been together.

  ‘Do you want to hold him?’ I ask, and even my voice sounds funny.

  ‘Will he mind?’ he asks in return, and all at once, I realise he’s also feeling unsettled, like we’re the strangers and he’s the outsider.

  ‘Oh, Leo,’ I erupt suddenly, as a wave of emotion crashes through me.

  And then he pulls me back into his arms, cradling my head against his chest so I’m pressed against him sideways, and this time, we fit better.

  Max opens his eyes and stares up at us both. I smile down at him and a tear splashes onto his cheek, which hasn’t come from me. I glance at Leo to see tears streaming down his face and then I stand on my tiptoes and kiss them away, loving him like never before.

  My actions make Max giggle, and then we all begin to laugh, beside ourselves with joy and relief at being back together again.

  It’s been a month since the hurricane tore through here, but the signs of its devastation are everywhere. Debris is piled up on the sides of roads, including furniture, washing machines and other appliances that were wrecked in the salt water storm surges. There are capsized boats in the water and wrecked boats on land; holes ripped in the sides of buildings and branches and leaves shredded from trees. The fronds of the palm trees – what’s left of them – are still facing away from the direction of the wind.