The Sight of You

by Holly Miller

  I jerk my head back toward the garden center. “I have never in my life been anywhere more joyless than that wonderland. On which I think they’re overselling themselves, by the way.”

  “I think you’re just upset you didn’t get to meet Santa.”

  “I’m definitely not. He was wearing sunglasses.”

  “Too many lights?”

  I shake my head. “Too many last night. He was hanging, one hundred percent.”

  Callie laughs. “Poor guy. Imagine his torment.”

  “I’m trying not to. Screaming kids. Christmas music on loop. The overwhelming urge to hurl . . . Now you come to mention it, sounds a bit like Christmas with my family.”

  Finally we reach the car and lean the tree against the bumper. I put my hands at the small of my back, reel in fresh air. Steve would be horrified if he could see the full extent of my poor upper-body strength. I’m not sure I’d last five minutes doing Callie’s job (unlike me, she’s barely broken a sweat).

  “Anyway.” She hooks a foot over the rear tire, ready for our first attempt at launching the thing onto the car roof. “The best thing about a real tree is that it will make your flat smell gorgeous.”

  “Hang on, when did we say it was going in my flat?”

  She smiles. “Um, how do I put this?”

  “You’re thinking I’ll never make it up the stairs, aren’t you?”

  * * *

  • • •

  She was right, actually. So we stand the tree in my living room’s bay window. Adorn the branches with tinsel and trinkets, fairy lights, tiny chocolates. It makes me feel slightly wistful for times past.

  My dad pretty much abandoned the idea of Christmas after Mum died. There were never any decorations, no special food in the fridge. The extent of the effort he went to was buying us all gift cards for the shopping center in town.

  I think everyone was quietly relieved when Amber was born and Tamsin offered to host. She’d inherited Mum’s appetite for fun, after all. I knew things were looking up when she confessed, tipsy one night at mine, that she planned on “tearing Christmas a new one this year.” The sentiment, at least, was bang-on.

  We’re finally out of shiny stuff. I step up behind Callie, cocoon her with my arms. She leans back on my chest, and I rest my face against the fragrant flourish of her hair. We stay like that for a couple of moments, trading heartbeats. You must feel mine going crazy, I want to say. I’m falling for you, Callie.

  “You know,” she whispers, “I’m starting to think . . . that this year, Christmas might actually be enjoyable.”

  The sentiment’s achingly familiar. “Guess your last one was pretty rough.”

  She turns to face me. Her eyes are nightlight-soft. “It must be a hard time of year for you too.”

  “Easier since the kids came along. We just make it about them now.”

  She smiles. “I bet they love it.”

  “It’s all down to my brother and sister, really. I just show up with the gifts. Let the children clamber all over me. Try not to drink too much.”

  “Ah. The mantra of doting uncles everywhere.”

  “Oh, and I referee as well. My lot almost came to blows last year. Charades.”

  “What else?”

  “The clue was ‘Good Vibrations’ by the Beach Boys. My brother was drunk. Thought he’d try and make it dirty.”

  She starts laughing. “Oh, no.”

  “Yeah, it was pretty funny. Me and Tamsin had our hands across the kids’ eyes. Dad was stone-cold sober and appalled. They took it out to the garden in the end. I had to intervene.”

  Callie smiles, like I’ve just told her a really heartwarming story. “I’d love to meet your family.”

  “It’s a bit hard . . . spending time with them right now.” I try to swallow the sadness away, caught out by a tripwire of nostalgia that might soon mean something else to me entirely. Though I’ve not yet uncovered any evidence about my father, I still can’t shake the potency of my dream. “Knowing what I know about my dad—or think I know—I’m not sure how I feel.”

  She gives my hand a supportive squeeze.

  “But it’s Christmas,” I concede. “So I’ll definitely see them at some point, and you should come.”

  “I’d like that.”

  We sit down on the sofa together. Across the room, the log fire roars molten lava. “How about you? You going to your parents’?”

  “We usually go to my aunt’s on Christmas Day. It’s a sort of family tradition. But my cousins are a bit obnoxious. I’m just not sure I’ll feel fully . . . festive if I spend it with them.”

  My heart backflips as an idea lands. “Well, hey, since we’re both avoiding our families, why don’t we spend it together?”

  She kisses me. “I’d love that. Just got to . . . let Mum and Dad know.”

  “I don’t want to cause any—”

  “No, it’s fine,” she says quickly. “It won’t be a problem, I promise.”

  A few moments pass. Then she gets up and moves toward the window. Lowers the blinds, asks me to switch off the lights. I oblige.

  She squats down and plugs in the fairy lights we’ve draped across the tree. A mini supernova erupts, washing the walls with a multicolored glow. “Maybe this is the year we start seeing Christmas differently,” Callie whispers.

  I push away all thoughts of the future, and the past. Because in this moment, tonight, I’m happier than I’ve felt in a long time. “I think you could be right.”

  41.

  Callie

  In the end, the only way I could square spending Christmas Day with Joel was by agreeing to go to Mum and Dad’s for dinner on Christmas Eve so they could meet this mystery man of mine. I think a small part of Mum didn’t believe he even existed.

  Joel delighted them, of course. He asked all the best questions, laughed at Dad’s jokes, spoke warmly to Mum.

  Before we left, as Joel was using the bathroom, Mum whispered to me, “Well, I think he’s lovely, darling. Very down-to-earth.”

  Meanwhile Dad, with his arm around Mum’s shoulders, said, “Nice lad.” And their shared smile in that moment was all the approval I needed.

  * * *

  • • •

  I wake on Christmas morning to the sound of clattering in the kitchen. Heading in there, I find Joel barefooted in jeans and a checked shirt, staring blankly at a saucepan. Murphy’s sitting hopefully at his feet.

  Joel glances over his shoulder and smiles. “I was going to ask how you like your eggs, but there’s a flaw in the plan.”

  I hop onto a stool. “What’s that?”

  “I have no idea what to do with eggs.” He breaks into a grin, passes me a Buck’s Fizz. “Will this make up for it? Happy Christmas.”

  * * *

  • • •

  Lunch goes more smoothly than breakfast, mainly because Joel’s had the foresight to purchase the entire contents of a supermarket freezer aisle, so it’s simply a case of dividing it between oven and microwave. I get a twist of guilty pleasure as I think of what my mum—home cooking’s sternest advocate—would say if she knew we were cooking preroasted potatoes, gravy from granules, and bread sauce from a packet that pings when it’s done. Something about it feels deliciously rebellious.

  When I tell him this on the sofa after lunch, Joel grins. “If using a microwave is what you think of as rebellious, your parents got very lucky.”

  “Oh, they still haven’t seen my tattoo.”

  “Don’t think they’d approve?”

  “You do remember my tattoo, don’t you?”

  For a few moments he holds my gaze, then says softly, “Not sure. Maybe I need a quick reminder.”

  My stomach is all flames as I smile and oblige, lowering my jeans to reveal the inked patch of skin. Joel leans forward and then his mouth is on mi
ne, the most heartfelt of kisses, before he draws away, starts to trace the bird’s outline with a single finger. At least a minute passes before slowly, gently, he works his hand down inside my jeans, inching lower and lower without once breaking eye contact. He lets his fingers brush the edges of my underwear again and again, a tease so prolonged it’s almost unbearable. And then, finally, he moves his hand between my legs, whereupon I roll back my head and close my eyes, soar off high into the sky.

  * * *

  • • •

  “I got you something,” he murmurs later, breath sweet and warm against my hair, one finger still tracing the ink on my hip.

  He fetches a gift from beneath the tree. Sitting up, I feel his eyes on me as I unwrap it and break into a smile. It’s a carafe and two tumblers, identical to the ones we drank from that night at the Italian restaurant, before my interview at Waterfen.

  “So you can always be at a pavement café,” he says, “somewhere in the Med.”

  I’m touched almost to tears as I lean across and kiss him, whisper my thank-you.

  “Oh, and . . . there’s this.”

  Unwrapping his second parcel, my fingertips make contact with the soft white cotton of a T-shirt bearing a black tractor motif and the slogan MY OTHER CAR’S A TRACTOR. I laugh. “Excellent choice.”

  “Saw it, and thought of you.”

  “You just happened across this?”

  “Well, no. I had it specially made at the screen-printing place.”

  Of course he did. “Thank you. I love it.”

  He takes my hand. “All right. Come on. I reckon it’s dark enough now.”

  “Should I . . . be nervous?”

  He laughs. “I’d say, with me, that’s never a bad policy.”

  So with Joel’s hand across my eyes, I walk as erratically as a minutes-old foal into the garden. I enjoy the sensation of it—the warmth of his palm against my face, guiding me safely through the blackness.

  Eventually I feel a cold clamp of outside air, and Joel removes his hand. I inhale sharply. The back fence is aglow with hundreds of fairy lights, our own tiny galaxy of fireflies.

  “Now, that . . . is an achievement,” I murmur, after a couple of moments. “To make a criminally ugly garden look so beautiful.”

  “Yeah,” he says softly. “Doesn’t scrub up too bad, does it?”

  But before I can reply, he’s taking my hand, leading me round to the shed. Hitherto redundant, its door is welded shut by an impenetrable crust of ivy. Now, though, there’s a brand-new wooden nest box peeping out from beneath its eaves. “Thought we might get some chicks to watch next year. Robins, maybe.”

  Oh, I’ve been waiting to meet you my whole life, I think, as I pull him toward me for a kiss.

  * * *

  • • •

  Later, Joel goes out to walk Murphy. He takes him round the block sometimes, late at night—another way, I suppose, to help him ward off the wind-down toward sleep.

  While he’s out, I call Grace. I know it’s crazy, but we never failed to speak on Christmas Day, so I need to dial her number, at least. That’s been one of the toughest things about losing her—to train myself out of those everyday reflexes.

  I imagine, as I always do, that tonight will be the night she’ll answer. That I’ll ask her where she’s been all this time, and she’ll tell me she got held up chatting to so-and-so, one of the infinite number of people who loved her.

  But I’m greeted only by the flatline beep of her voice mail.

  “Happy Christmas, Gracie. It’s going really well here. I wish you could meet Joel. I think . . . I think you’d really like him. Anyway, just to say . . . I love you.”

  And then for a little while I let myself cry, because I miss her, because it’s Christmas.

  42.

  Joel

  Deep into Christmas night and I’m still awake. Callie’s nestled against me, twitching in her sleep like an animal dreaming.

  I was overcome with anger, earlier. Not toward Callie, but myself. For not being able to take pleasure in the present she’d given me. The pamphlet and voucher, printed on paper so thick and creamy it seemed more like wedding stationery.

  A wellness retreat for a week, food and expenses included. Just for me, not her. I guess she couldn’t afford the package for two.

  They major on sleep therapy, she told me, so enthusiastic she kept tripping over her words. (I didn’t have the heart to remind her I’ve no interest in sleeping deeply, now or in the future.) They’ll teach me how to meditate, practice yoga. She asked me again about Diana, mentioned perhaps getting in touch with Steve to get the ball rolling. She said next year could be the year everything turns around.

  I’d forgotten what it was like to be hopeful, optimistic about change. The idea of it seems so strange now. Like viewing somewhere I once lived from high up in space. I think again about the time and money I’ve devoted to experimenting, over the years. To the lavender and white noise. The sleeping tablets and hard booze, and God knows what else I’ve ordered online. And I’ve come up short every time. This problem has no solution, Callie.

  For a while now the drug of spending time with her has been numbing my fear of consequence. But (well-intentioned as it was) her gift has only really reminded me that my dreams are going nowhere.

  After she fell asleep, I Googled the retreat on the iPad. My heart seared silently in two: the whole thing cost her almost as much as three months’ rent.

  I turn to my nightstand and pick up my Christmas card from her. Two polar bears rubbing noses, signed inside with love.

  I stare at the word until it burns a hole in my brain.

  43.

  Callie

  We lie in on Boxing Day morning but chink the blinds, suffusing the room with glacial light. I’m running an unhurried fingertip across Joel’s bare chest, mapping the contours of his muscles, the lovely landscape of his bones. His notebook’s lying closed on his lap, a pen tucked into the elastic that holds it shut, so I guess he must have had a dream last night.

  “How are you feeling about today?” I ask him. I’ve tried and failed to picture being in Joel’s position, unexpectedly having cause to question my paternity.

  “Good. I’m looking forward to them meeting you.”

  Eight whole members of a brand-new family—as nerve-racking as a panel interview for a job you really, really want. I think of Joel impressing my parents on Christmas Eve, and hope I can do the same.

  Still. “No, I meant . . . about your dad.”

  He turns to look at me. “Well, aside from anything else, ten hours in his company could be challenging.”

  I have a feeling he’s skirting the subject. It’s too painful, perhaps. “Surely he won’t give you a hard time at Christmas.”

  “I’m sort of hoping you being there will help.” He grimaces. “Although I should probably warn you, my brother and his wife are going to fall out after lunch.”

  “Oh, do they—”

  “I dreamed it,” he clarifies quietly. “Something about rationing the kids’ chocolate intake. But if we do the washing-up, we can duck it.”

  “Good idea.” But though I’m smiling, inside I’m blown away—his foresight still astounds me every time.

  Unsurprisingly, Joel’s not dwelling on it. Instead he’s exhaling, glancing at the clock on his nightstand. “We should probably get ready.”

  “Soon,” I whisper, letting one fingertip linger against his bare chest before winding it slowly down toward his stomach.

  “Yeah, you’re right,” he murmurs, as his eyes flutter closed. “I mean, it’s Christmas. No need to rush.”

  * * *

  • • •

  The contrast between Joel and his siblings, when I meet them, is hard to ignore. Not only in mannerisms, but appearance too—darkness against copper, like a bloom out of season, a rare
bird on home soil.

  I notice a subtle shift in his demeanor when we arrive. As I watch him crouch to kiss his nieces and nephew, shake hands with Neil and clap his brother on the back, there’s no trace of unease. It reminds me just how practiced he is in keeping his feelings to himself.

  Tamsin’s brought lunch—a mountainous feast of leftovers from yesterday, crammed with flavor in the way food is when infusion’s had a night to work its magic. As soon as we sit down, Joel’s foot finds mine beneath the table while, above it, our gazes tango. Thank you, he seems to be saying, for doing this.

  As we eat there is some gentle jibing, mainly from Doug. “Don’t plants have feelings too?” is how he reacts to the news that I’m vegetarian like his brother. And then, when I’m talking about using chainsaws, “Bet you run away when the tree falls over, ha.” Later, though, there’s a settled breath of silence around the table when Lou asks about my parents, and I reveal that my dad used to be an oncologist.

  After lunch, as Doug starts handing round chocolate selection boxes, Joel and I escape to do the washing-up. Once in the kitchen, I can’t help listening out for evidence of an argument—and, sure enough, it comes. Raised voices, slammed doors and, at one point, the sound of someone running upstairs.

  Eventually there’s talk of going for a walk, I guess in the hope that the fresh air will calm everyone down. So I offer to show Joel’s family a nearby field where I happen to know you can watch red kites flying in to roost at dusk. The kids seem disproportionately excited by the idea, until Tamsin explains to them with a smile that, no, we’re not going out to fly kites. I feel awful, as if I’ve just proposed a trip to the cinema, then downgraded it to the supermarket. Still, I’m sure the birds will win them round.

  * * *

  • • •

  A twilight tide laps the corduroy furrows of the field, chasing down the sinking sun. At its far edge, against the sky’s fiery shoulder, the birds are circling above a copse, gliding on the breeze. They spread like smoke, growing in number from two to eight, then twenty. Twenty-five. Thirty. With Joel by my side, I crouch next to Buddy as he strokes Murphy’s head, share the tricks and twists of the kites’ winged wizardry. Spellbound, Buddy watches them carried on the hands of the wind, like specks of soot in the gloaming, until slowly, one by one, they begin to spill from the sky.