by Annie O'Neil
Best xW
22 December
02:27
To: [email protected]
From: [email protected]
Subject: RE: Drea Zamboni UK Visit
Dear Spencer –
I am so, so sorry. Shit. I can’t send this can I? Because then I’d be sending yet more personal stuff to your work email and you literally asked me not to do that. Fuck. Your mum really, really, wants you to come. You told her you’d come. I hope that’s true. Please come.
Yours sincerely
Delete delete delete
22 December
07:07
To: [email protected]
From: [email protected]
Subject: RE: RE: PIES!!!!!!
Dear Will,
Jess(ica) here!!!
Sugar crumb fairies. You’re not the only one reeling from new information. Gosh. I’m so sorry you have had such an awfulmiserablerotten time. It’s like we’re kindred spirits in the misery
Delete delete delete
Hey Will
Jessica here. (Obviously) *big hugs!!!!*
Delete delete delete
Dear Will,
Even though this may seem a bit You’ve Got Mail, I think I’m falling for you.
Delete delete delete
Computer will power down in 3 … . 2 … . 1 … .
‘What if you kept it simple? Maybe … ordered a few dozen mince pies from The Merry Victualler—’
Mr Winters’ gaze sharpened.
Jess hadn’t been quite as subtle as she’d planned. The combination of snipping a big chunk of her old life adrift, absorbing the contents of Will’s email, then completely and utterly failing to offer any sort of cognisant response meant she was in a bit of a tizz. (Falling for him? What was that about?) So she’d bundled up her hot mess of mixed emotions and poured it into her mission to make Christmas Eve magic at Mr Winters’.
Mr Winters, however, was not playing ball.
‘Okay … so maybe not mince pies, then. How about …’ Jess tapped her pencil, complete with felted Christmas tree covered in jingle bells, against her notebook. ‘How about …’
‘How about you give up the ghost, duck?’ he said, not unkindly. ‘I know how folk are and how high expectations will be, what with the snow machines and wreath-making and Broadway concerts.’
Jess smiled. That was sweet that he thought of Martha as a Broadway star.
‘But the truth is,’ he continued, ‘I don’t want people traipsing about the place expecting hospitality I don’t feel comfortable giving.’
Ah.
‘I already have a reputation as a Scrooge, so I think, for now, it might be best if I live up to their expectation.’
He tacked on a forlorn bah humbug that was so fragile-sounding she felt as though she’d been pierced through the heart.
He couldn’t give up now! Just last night he’d been upbeat (for him anyway) and tapping a finger to the side of his nose and, dare she say it, walking with an octogenarian lilt to his gait.
‘You’re not a bah humbugger!’ Jess protested, pointing at the cup of hot chocolate he’d made her. ‘Ebenezer Scrooge would not go to the shops to buy something he doesn’t like so that he can make it for a guest who he knows does.’ She nodded at his own, untouched mug as proof of his generosity of spirit.
‘I don’t—’ He began, then stared at his hot chocolate mug for a bit before looking up at her with those lovely, kind blue eyes of his and saying, ‘I’m out of practice is what I am.’
‘I’ll help you,’ Jess said in as measured a tone as she was capable of. Pouncing on the possibility that he might like to practise needed to be treated with caution. They did, after all, only have seventy-odd hours to figure out how to defy the entire neighbourhood’s expectations. ‘I mean, if people do think those mean things, which they shouldn’t, it means the bar’s pretty low, right? So … I don’t think we have to do, like, a fireworks display or anything.’
He shook his head, clearly uninterested in exploring his options.
‘Mr Winters … Arnold. Is there something that happened between last night and today that’s made you change your mind?’
‘I’d never made up my mind in the first place, young lady,’ he intoned.
Okay. Fair enough, but …
A shot of fear lanced through her. Maybe, as Will’s email to her had been written in the early hours of the morning, he’d dropped a note by to say reaching out was probably a bad idea and that he’d made a mistake.
She glanced round the warm, cosy kitchen. Nothing. She hadn’t recalled seeing anything in the entry hall, but it wasn’t exactly like one put out an ‘I don’t want to see you any more’ card in pride of place, was it?
She forced herself to can the fear. The Will she absolutely, definitely, wasn’t falling for wouldn’t do something that harsh. Even if he was stinging from the cruel hand of history repeating itself. No. Will struck her as someone who, when hurting, needed a bit of time and space, but after that? He wanted resolution to the conflict with his own father, and a relationship with the grandfather he’d never known. Shame he hadn’t reached out months ago. This house was so roomy, there had to be loads of spare rooms upstairs, unless Mr Winters changed rooms every night. Her heart cinched tight. It must be lonely, living in this big house all on his own, which did beg the question … why had he never married again? Or, at the very least, begun a friendship with someone?
She thought back through the previous night’s events trying to divine something, anything, that might have made him retreat back into his shell. It hadn’t been so awful that he was shutting her out of his life, so it must be something …
She replayed the moment when he’d waved to Martha and tapped his finger to the side of his nose.
Had that … had he … had Arnold been flirting? Maybe that was it. He’d accidentally flirted then felt off-footed by it so, like any out-of-practice widower, retreated to the turf he knew best? His own.
‘What if …’ Jess tapped her chin trying to look as if her sole interest in the Christmas Eve event was to keep the neighbourhood holiday spirit humming along rather than doubling it up as a match-making evening. ‘What if you had a carols night?’
Mr Winters frowned. ‘I don’t sing.’
‘No, but Martha does and Tyler does and, apparently the children have all been practising for a carol service at church, so, maybe they could have a dry run at yours? Or … an encore, depending upon what time you want to host it?’
‘I told you, I don’t want to host anything.’
‘What are you afraid will happen if you do?’
The question caught him off guard. Jess, too, to be fair. Was she able to pinpoint exactly what it was that terrified her most?
Right now it was screwing up Christmas. Something that seemed pretty guaranteed to happen, judging by this morning’s emails and the lack of progress she and Mr Winters were making.
‘Ach.’ He waved his big old hand between the pair of them. ‘Folk don’t want to come to mine. You know they don’t, Jessica. They want to celebrate with their families and friends. People they care about. I won’t be held responsible for ruining everyone’s Christmas Eve by pretending I know the first thing about showing someone a good time.’
And there it was. His biggest fear. Being unlovable. This in the ever-growing wake of grief and guilt that had trailed him since his wife had died and son had left never to return. Jess’s throat went all scratchy. She excused herself to the cloakroom so she could swallow back the tears that were itching to fall. Part of her wanted to ring Will and demand that he come over and tell his grandfather just how excited he was to meet him and how deeply Robert felt the loss of not having Arnold in his life. How he, from the sounds of it, had bullied his own son
s into a mandatory relationship so that they would never suffer the years-long separation he and Arnold had endured. The other part of her, the part that was still trying to figure out how to interpret Spencer Zamboni’s email, told her to cool her jets.
When she returned to the kitchen she came armed with an idea. ‘I know this sounds a bit left-field and I need to check with Kai and Rex that they have some left in stock, but I was thinking as the weather’s been so horrible and, as you say, everyone usually has something they regularly do on Christmas Eve, how about you do something to make their day “merry and bright”.’
Mr Winters shot her a hooded look with a hint of Go on. I’m listening.
‘Kai and Rex had these great little sparklers down at their shop in the shape of Christmas Trees. What if your ‘event’ was handing one out to everyone to use in their gardens as a signal to Santa before they went to bed?’
‘And …?’ Mr Winters asked.
‘And that’s it.’ Jess said. ‘Like you said, why put more pressure on people than they’re already feeling?’
He took a distracted sip of his hot chocolate and then stared at the mug as if surprised at what he’d just swallowed.
‘You make a mean cup of chocolate.’ Jess said, meaning it.
‘It’s my wife’s recipe,’ Arnold said. ‘Her technique, anyway. She never threw the powder in on top of the milk like most people do. Always did a bit in a mug to make up a paste before the milk. Said the extra TLC was what made it taste so good. It’s science, of course, what makes it taste so good. Chemistry, but …’ He stopped and looked out the window with such a hopeful look in his eye it was almost as if he was expecting to see her there. His Anne. ‘I’ll take your idea on board, lass. If you’ll have a word with the two lads about these sparkler things, I’d be grateful.’
‘Consider it done,’ Jess beamed, barely able to sit still long enough to finish her hot chocolate before bounding down the street, into her car and down to Berry’s Blooms before they shut for the day.
Hours later, in the company of an utterly glowing Drea, Jess was impatiently waiting for the festivities at number 22 to wrap up. She glanced at her watch. They’d already done four rounds. One more to go, then a winner would be announced and she could go home to delve further into the Mr Winters Sr and Jr problem.
‘Left foot on a green sprout.’
‘Why does Martha get to be the referee?’ Someone complained.
Martha answered before anyone else could, ‘Because Martha is the oldest and the ricketiest and isn’t, for one blessed second, going to play this accursed so-called game.’
‘It’s not that bad, is it?’ Emma, or possibly Gemma, asked.
Everyone looked down at the large bedsheet spread out in the emptied conservatory, the corners pinned down with an assortment of children’s toys. It had been mocked up into a huge Christmas Twister. The Gem’n’Emm had clearly spent a better portion of the day sewing on the green sprouts, red reindeer noses, brown Christmas puddings and gold Christmas stars. They were now coming off, gone skew-wiff or, in the case of one gold star, being worn as a hat by a three-year-old. She looked exhausted.
Everyone told her it was wonderful.
Jess spun the dial.
‘Right hand on red nose,’ Martha announced.
Oh, God.
With a left food already on a gold star, this meant she was going to have to somehow manoeuvre her body between Chantal and Josh, who had been giggling away like a couple of schoolchildren as they bent and twisted round one another’s limbs. Eli was standing on one mismatched sock foot on a Christmas pudding, looking so far away it was as if he’d actually teleported himself elsewhere.
Jess looked down at the free red noses. The only one available was directly by Josh’s rather lovely left hand, which was disturbingly close to his Christmas-sweater-clad chest and his perfectly formed face (freckles included) … *sigh*.
Did she really fancy him? She was well and truly dumped now that Amanda was shacked up with her ex. It would mean crossing the parent–teacher line. She caught Drea staring at her. A pointed reminder that chasing Josh when she didn’t really know if her heart was in it was one of those moves that could instantly alienate her from all of her new friends and neighbours when things inevitably went wrong.
And then, there was the weird email she’d written and deleted to Will who was, she’d possibly erroneously thought, much younger than her. Either he’d been a boy genius or he was more around her age. But there were flies in that ointment, too. He was working his socks off and trying to sort out his own emotional baggage, which involved Mr Winters, who would definitely never speak to her again if she hurt Will. And he was stranger, really. Could you fall for someone you’d never met?
Conversation swirled round her like glitter in a snow globe as Jess tried and failed to find the right place to position herself.
‘C’mon already! Let’s get this game over and done with.’
‘Is anyone else struggling to get all of their food shopping into their refrigerator?’
‘I’ve had to leave some things in the garage. I’m just praying it doesn’t go off.’
‘My deep freezer out in the shed decided to pack up last night.’
‘Oh, well, now that is an actual disaster.’
‘Any chance of getting a new one?’
‘There’s probably room for a bit of something in ours. Something small. We’ve bought enough food for an army!’
‘Caitlyn! Leave Violet alone, please. She doesn’t want your fingers in her mouth. Sorry. Too much sugar this week.’
‘Just put your hand on the red nose already, Jess. It’s not the Olympics.’
‘There is a prize. There’s a prize right, Gemma? Sorry. Emma.’
Jess looked at Josh again. He winked and said, ‘C’mon. I believe in you.’
A whorl of gratitude warmed her chest.
It was nice to be believed in. It was also nice to not rely on another person’s opinion to feel good about herself. Particularly the day after she’d found out her ex had shacked up with her London bestie. Her feelings weren’t reliable right now. That was the one fact she could rely on.
Pushing all of her do-I-don’t-I-fancy-him thoughts to the side, Jess got on with it. She went up on tiptoe, apologising to Chantal as her sock foot slipped off the gold star and onto her sprout as she reached across Josh towards the red nose, only to bring the three of them down in a jumble of limbs and giggles. When she fell, she was nose to nose with Josh. Their eyes met and locked, that semi-uncomfortable zing of electricity whizzing up her spine. He smelt of oranges and gingerbread tonight and was close enough to find out if he tasted the same. Would a holiday snog hurt anyone?
‘Right!’ A familiar voice called out. ‘Give us your hand, Jess. Let’s get you up and out of that mess.’
Jess took Drea’s hand and, though she was looking cheery as ever, Jess could see impatience creasing her features. She hoped Spencer hadn’t changed his mind. That he was still coming. Drea would’ve told her, right? Or had she, as Spencer had intimated, crossed into territory that wasn’t hers to venture into? ‘Only forty-eight more hours.’ Jess said with a bright smile.
‘Tick tock,’ Drea replied with a tap on her wrist. ‘Tick tock.’
23 December
‘Christ Almighty, woman!’ Drea blew into Jess’s hallway with a huge gust of wintry wind. She went into the lounge, stopping so quickly Jess almost ran into her. ‘I thought you said you were going to wait to open your parents’ presents.’
Jess looked round the lounge at all of the open boxes. ‘I thought it was time to unpack.’ That, and she was buzzing with nervous energy. She was planning on paying a visit to Mr Winters later, but had wanted to formulate a game plan before she did so. The storm had given her the perfect excuse to buy some more thinking time.
‘It’s blowing
a proper gale out there,’ Drea glowered as another round of icy rain lashed against Jess’s front windows. ‘Unpacking, eh?’ She fixed Jess with a stern look. ‘Does that mean you’re going to take that bloody For Sale sign down?’
Jess nodded. She was. Not today because it was revolting, and the only place she could put it was her back garden and the only way there was through the house; but it was definitely time. Mr Winters had lived here over half his life. In good times and in bad times. Mostly the latter, but his house stood for so much more than maybe even he recognised. It was a homing beacon. For his son, hopefully. But more pressingly, his grandson, who Jess was crossing absolutely everything would find the time/compassion/strength to visit his lovely grandad. She wanted her house to be the same. With her parents’ house gone and the first Christmas without them looming, she realised she wasn’t just untethered from her life in London, she wasn’t connected to any of it. No more childhood bedroom to lock herself away in. No unicorn duvet to hide under. No more access to Mum’s larder, where she could comfort eat the secret stash of iced-ring biscuits or, even better, Wagon Wheels. It was time to make her own foundation now. Her own traditions that might, in a reversal of the parent–child relationship, lure her parents to her every now and again while Jess made her imprint here on Christmas Street.
‘Coffee.’ Drea demanded.
‘Want some hot chocolate in it as well?’
Drea pulled a face.
‘It’s Christmas time,’ Jess sang à la Cliff Richards, adding. ‘Chocolate is totally keto.’
Drea fuzzed her lips. ‘What do you know about keto?’
‘Next to nothing,’ Jess grinned, holding up a finger. ‘But the last time I read Heat magazine I got the impression putting a pat of butter or cocoa nibs into whatever it was you wanted to eat made it keto.’
‘Yeah, that’s about right.’ Drea said distractedly, instantly making Jess panic that Spencer had told her about Jess’s email, said he wasn’t coming after all, pointing the finger of blame soundly at Jess. But Drea wouldn’t be bothering with coffee if that was the case. She’d be trying to kill Jess.