“I’ve got your hamsters!” I say, marching out of the stockroom, clutching the box—then stop dead.
The place is dark. It’s empty.
I look around in disbelief, clocking the dead till. The sign on the door. The metal grille across the frontage. It’s closed? They closed it? With me inside?
Thoughts start thudding into my head like missiles. What do I do? What do I do? The turkey’s arriving in fifteen minutes. If I’m not there, they’ll take it away again. I need to get out. But how? Call someone. But there’s no signal.
I switch on all the lights, then hurry over to the till to use the landline phone that the guy was using earlier—but the phone’s vanished from the counter. Where is it? Where’s the bloody phone? I try the drawers, but they’re all locked. Oh God…
I hurry to the door and start banging on it, yelling, “Help! Help! Let me out!” But the street is empty. After five solid minutes of shouting and banging, my throat feels hoarse but no one has appeared, let alone come to help me.
And now a series of even worse thoughts starts to thud into my head. What if no one walks past the shop? What if no one sees me? Luke doesn’t know I’m here. No one knows I’m here. I could be trapped here over Christmas. I could miss Christmas altogether, trapped in a shop, with only small animals for company.
As I peer out at the empty street, I feel surreal and a bit faint. I was wrong before. This is the number-one Christmas nightmare. And I’m in it.
* * *
—
Five o’clock comes and goes. Half past five comes and goes. Six o’clock comes and goes. It’s dark outside, and I haven’t seen a single passerby and I’m starting to resign myself to my nightmarish fate. (If I’d known I’d be stuck in a shop over Christmas, I’d at least have chosen one with clothes.)
I’ve started marking lines on my hand with Biro—five for every half hour. Because you have to keep your morale up somehow. You have to give yourself structure—otherwise the insanity gets to you. I’ve seen Cast Away, so I know these things. I don’t want to end up painting a face on a hamster ball.
I’ve also made a careful note of my supplies, and thankfully there’s a water cooler in the corner. I can survive on sunflower seeds—and if they run out there’s always hamster food. If it comes to rationing, so be it.
And in a funny way, the animals are keeping me going, with their brave and comradely spirit. I’ve made friends with them all—the hamsters, the gerbils, the fish—and when this is all over, I think we’ll be bonded for life.
Every five minutes I hammer on the door, shouting my head off—then sink back in despair. This is the emptiest road I’ve ever known. Or maybe it’s just that everyone’s inside, in their cozy homes, watching The Muppet Christmas Carol and singing along, so they can’t hear my cries.
My throat tight, I reach for a handful of sunflower seeds and crunch them miserably. Thinking about The Muppet Christmas Carol reminds me of all the Christmas films I could be watching right now, snuggled up on the sofa. Elf. Or It’s a Wonderful Life. Or, if it’s Luke’s choice, Die Hard, which he always claims is a Christmas film and I say it’s not and we argue about it.
It’s time to bang on the door again, so I summon all my energy, crash my fists against the glass, and yell as loudly as I can. There’s no response from the empty street. But as I eventually come to a pause, my mind is whirring in a weird way.
Die Hard. I can’t stop thinking about Die Hard. Why? I don’t usually think about Die Hard, but now I can’t stop.
I keep seeing Bruce Willis crashing through windows, shooting six people at once. Refusing to take no for an answer. Knowing what the right thing to do is and just doing it.
And suddenly I know why these images are in my head. I know what my brain is telling me. I feel ashamed at my total feebleness. Why have I resigned myself to my fate? Why am I thinking Cast Away? I should be thinking Die Hard! If Bruce Willis was trapped in a pet shop on Christmas Eve, he wouldn’t sit there and put up with it, would he? He’d climb up the vents with a gun or explode his way out or something.
I’m not a castaway victim, I tell myself firmly. I’m not a prisoner. I’m not going to molder away here, eating sunflower seeds for Christmas lunch and hoping to be rescued.
I survey the hamsters, my jaw set.
“I’m going to spend Christmas with my family,” I tell them, in a growly Bruce Willis-y voice. “And no one can stop me.”
I can escape from this place, of course I can. It’s only an unfamiliar building, with a locked metal grille barring the front entrance and a heavy bolted door at the back. Come on, Becky, don’t be wet.
For the first time since I entered the shop, I look upward—and there’s a trapdoor in the ceiling. It must lead somewhere. Oh my God. Why didn’t I think of this before?
It takes me a few minutes to locate a pole with a hook on the end of it, and soon I’m hauling down a folded-up loft ladder. Hastily, I climb up to a kind of attic room with grotty carpet and piled-up boxes and search for an easy way out, maybe labeled WAY OUT.
OK. So there isn’t an easy way out labeled WAY OUT. But there’s a skylight. I can use that. The catch is stiff, but I finally manage to wrench it open, find a chair to stand on, and poke my head into the cold air. I’m out! Kind of. I breathe in the evening air greedily, surveying the street below, feeling almost emotional. I will never take my freedom for granted again. Never.
The only thing is, the skylight’s pretty narrow. But maybe I can squeeze through it onto the roof. And then get down from the roof…somehow.
With an almighty effort, I lift myself so that my head and shoulders are protruding through the skylight. I squeeze and squash, desperately edging myself up…but it’s no good. My hips definitely won’t fit through. Stupid Myriad Miracle workout.
At last I decide to go back inside and think of a different plan. But as I try to descend…somehow I can’t. After a lot of huffing and desperate pushing, I realize the awful, embarrassing truth: I’m stuck. I’m wedged in the skylight, half in, half out.
OK, don’t panic, I tell myself firmly. So I’m stuck in a skylight on Christmas Eve and no one knows where I am. There’ll be a solution. There’s always a solution.
I wait for the solution to present itself—but it’s obviously feeling shy. I’m starting to lose my optimism. And hang on…was that a snowflake?
I stare up in disbelief as tiny dots of white fluff start drifting down, falling on my hair and down my neck. Really, sky? You’re choosing now to present me with my White Christmas fantasy? What if I get frostbite? What if I freeze to death? I should never have listened to my inner Bruce Willis. I’m an idiot….
And then a sudden thought comes to me. There’s one more teeny-weeny outside possibility.
My heart thumping with hope, I retrieve my phone from its pocket. I lift it up, as high as I can, stretching my arm out and squinting at the display—and it’s a miracle! It’s a miracle on Woodford Street! I have one bar of signal! I immediately type a text:
Luke! At Pete’s Pets. Stuck. Woodford Street in Bickersly. Help!!! xxx
I press SEND and stare at it breathlessly—then see Delivered appear on the screen. And every particle in my body collapses in relief. He’ll see it. It’s all OK. I’m saved.
Now that I’m in signal, a whole bunch of texts and messages start arriving in my phone, and as I read them, my face grows a little hot. Becky, can we talk?…Becky, we feel terrible!!!…Becky love, your dad and I are coming over, we need to explain everything….Becky, WHERE ARE YOU??? We’re WORRIED!!!!
If ever I thought my friends and family didn’t care about me, this is the proof that they do. And I know you shouldn’t need proof. But even so…I’m not going to delete these anytime soon.
As I’m reading, a noise attracts my attention, and I look up and gasp. People! Actual people, in this st
reet! My saviors! It’s a couple and a little boy, on the other side of the road, and they’re pointing and smiling at me. I stare back at them resentfully. Why are they smiling, for God’s sake?
“Help!” I yell, but I don’t think they can hear me, because they just smile again, and the father lifts up the little boy to see me better. For a moment I don’t get it at all—till it hits me. I’m in my Mrs. Santa outfit. They think I’m some kind of festive stunt?
“I’m stuck!” I call. “I’m not Mrs. Santa, I’m stuck!”
But they’re too far away to hear me properly. They smile and wave back and the dad takes a photo of me—bloody nerve—then they all wave cheerily again and walk on.
Great. Just great. So you see someone dressed in a Santa costume, on the roof on Christmas Eve…and it doesn’t occur to you to save them? What kind of twisted world do we live in?
I’m just composing a tetchy letter to The Times about it when a car screeches to a halt below me and out gets Luke. He strides to the pet shop and bangs on the door. “Becky?”
“Hi!” I shout. “Luke! Up here! On the roof!”
“Becky?” He takes a pace or two back and stares up at me, his jaw slack. “What the hell? I’ve tracked down the owner; someone’s coming to let you out….Are you OK?”
“I’m fine!” I call back, just as another car screeches to a halt and disgorges Suze, Janice, my parents, and Minnie.
“Becky!” screams my mum in horror as she sees me. “Be careful, love! Don’t fall! Graham, look, she’s on the roof!”
“I can see that!” replies Dad testily. “I’m not blind. Becky, hold on, darling!”
“Becky, I’m so sorry,” calls up Suze. “We never meant to hurt you!”
“We all want to spend Christmas with you, love!” calls Janice, her thin voice carrying up on the evening air. “Oh, Jane, will she be all right?” She grabs Mum’s hand and then Suze’s, too, as though for comfort. “What if she falls to her death?”
“Don’t worry!” I call down. “I’m just glad everything’s sorted out!”
“That Nadine character is a monster!” shouts Dad. “Shocking behavior!”
“We got everything wrong!” chimes in Suze, at top volume. “We’re such morons!”
“We’re all coming tomorrow!” adds Mum. “Everyone! And we don’t care about the food or any of that, love. We only care about you! Can you hear me, Becky, love? You!”
They all gaze up at me, standing in a row, holding hands, snowflakes falling on their heads, looking for all the world like the Whos in Minnie’s Grinch book. And suddenly there’s a kind of expanding feeling in my heart, which blocks out all my worries. I haven’t got a turkey. Nothing’s going to be perfect. But gazing down at the people I love…I realize I don’t care.
I have got a turkey!
As I haul it out of the oven, all golden and crispy and succulent, I can’t quite believe it. I’m here. On Christmas Day. With everyone. And the lunch looks good. And everyone’s in a brilliant mood…
And I’m wearing an Alexander McQueen dress that fits!
Luke presented it to me this morning, just after we’d watched Minnie greet her hamster with wondrous joy. He handed me a gift-wrapped parcel, saying, deadpan, “I know we’re doing presents later, but I understand you like this style of dress?” I stared at the package in confusion, then ripped it open and my jaw dropped.
It was exactly the same gorgeous dress I bought in the sale—only two sizes bigger! (Luke said he “tracked it down,” which must have been almost impossible, but of course he downplayed that.) It’s such a fantastic, thoughtful present.
OK, yes, maybe I would slightly have preferred to fit into the teeny one. But one must remember the point of Christmas, as the vicar so wisely told us in church this morning. The point of Christmas is not being a size minus-6. Or squishing into a dress and not being able to breathe and dying and everyone saying, “Oh no, and on Christmas Day too.” The point of Christmas is wearing a dress you can breathe and move your arms in, because it turns out you need to do both on Christmas Day—what with all the hugging and exclaiming and cooking and toasting one another.
And it was while I was admiring myself in the mirror that Luke gave me the best Christmas present of all. He came out of the bathroom, freshly showered, and I peered at him, thinking, Something’s different…something’s changed….Till it hit me. The mustache was gone!
“Your mustache, Luke!” I exclaimed cautiously. “It’s…Did you…”
“You don’t mind, do you, Becky?” Luke said. “You’re not too upset? I know you loved my mustache, but I just don’t think it’s me.”
“It’s fine,” I said in generous tones. “You need to do what makes you feel happy, Luke.”
“You did love it?” he added, meeting my eye—and there was suddenly a teasing note in his voice.
“Of course,” I replied with dignity. “I said so, didn’t I?”
“Yes, my love,” he said, looking amused. “You did say so.”
I still don’t know how he worked it out—but I don’t care. I have a husband with no mustache! Result!
And now it’s 2:00 P.M. and I feel as if we’ve already done a million things. We’ve heard the vicar’s carol medley, which went disastrously wrong but was covered up by spirited tambourine playing. The children have bashed at the piñata and screamed with delight as sweets cascaded down. Mum and Janice have put candles on their hair to sing Swedish songs, although that only lasted thirty seconds, because they both got a bit unnerved. Then Janice gave us all our “Christmas makeovers,” so everyone now looks a bit shiny and streaky and weird.
We’ve served champagne, Baileys, sweet sherry, festive mojitos, and organic kombucha (Jess). I’ve passed around a selection of canapés, consisting of smoked salmon on bread, smoked salmon on crackers, smoked salmon on blini, and smoked salmon on cocktail sticks.
And now it’s time for our big turkey lunch, and I feel…what do I feel?
“I feel sprygge,” I say, realizing it only as Suze comes into the kitchen. “Totally, utterly sprygge.”
“Me too,” says Suze in heartfelt tones. “You know, we thought you’d been kidnapped last night! I think my heart’s only just stopped juddering.”
I tuck tinfoil round the turkey like Mary Berry says to do, and say, “OK, it’s resting,” in my most knowledgeable Christmas-hostess manner. (I’m not sure what this whole “resting” thing is, actually, but I would trust Mary Berry with my life.)
“How many kinds of stuffing are you doing?” asks Suze, peering into the oven.
“Three. Plus spicy falafels,” I add, pointing at the top baking tray.
“Spicy falafels?” Suze stares at me.
“Everyone likes spicy falafels for Christmas,” I say defensively. “And they’re ethical. Come on, time for some presents.”
“Well, the turkey looks wonderful, Bex,” says Suze as we head out of the kitchen, back to the sitting room. “It all looks wonderful. Thank God for Steph!”
Because it was Steph who saved the day on the turkey front. When we finally got back home from the pet shop, all feeling a bit hysterical (and bruised in my case, because being hauled out of a narrow skylight isn’t as much fun as you would think), there she was. Sitting on the front doorstep. With the massive turkey next to her and Minnie’s costume on her lap.
“I took delivery!” she called out as we came in the garden gate. “Don’t worry, no substitutions!”
“Steph!” I exclaimed, feeling staggered. “You’re amazing! Thank you so much! But…your family…”
“It was the least I could do,” said Steph. “Luke called to say you were missing and ask if I’d heard from you. He said he was heading out to find you—and I thought, ‘Well, at any rate I can make sure they get their turkey.’ So I came straight round. My mum agreed I should. She’s…we’re a
ll grateful to you, Becky.”
“Bex, why is Steph Richards at your house?” said Suze, looking bewildered. “What’s she talking about?” And for a moment I didn’t know how I was going to explain our friendship without giving too much away. But I needn’t have worried, because as we got near, Steph stood up and said resolutely, “Hi, Suze. I don’t know if Becky’s mentioned it, but my husband’s just left me.”
“Oh,” said Suze, looking taken aback. “Right. No. I had no idea. I’m so sorry to hear that.”
“Well, I was keeping it secret,” said Steph. “But I’m not anymore. Anyway, Becky’s been kind of a rock in recent weeks, so I’m glad I could give something back.” Then she held out the blue silk costume and added, “Minnie should wear this for Christmas Day. It’s hers. You made it, Becky. You should enjoy it.” Whereupon Suze’s eyes got even wider and she said, “That’s Minnie’s? But, Bex—”
So it all had to be explained. Whereupon Suze said she knew I must have made a better costume than that Denny and George one. But then she instantly backtracked, in case I was offended, and started saying how, actually, in many ways she preferred the Denny and George one and it was terribly imaginative.
At last Steph said she’d better go, but she gave me a tight hug and said in my ear, “Let’s have happy Christmases, shall we?” And as she drew away, for the first time she looked as if she actually might.
As for me, I’m having the happiest Christmas I can remember, despite the fact that all the snow has vanished. (Typical.) Carols are playing. The food smells sensational. Minnie is in seventh heaven. Mum and Janice are best friends again, and Mum’s even wearing one of Janice’s old two-pieces, with a tinsel necklace. She said over a Buck’s Fizz this morning, “We do enjoy Shoreditch, love. Like you enjoy a holiday. But it’s not…” and she bashed her heart. She didn’t say any more, but I think I knew what she meant.
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