by Sue Watson
‘Don’t?’ was all Bella said on the other end of the phone, I looked up to see her large face on screen, lips still quivering, eyes now darting around. Even I knew this would make good TV.
‘Yes…’ I cleared my throat. ‘I was inspired by you,’ I started, before going in for the kill, ‘I read once in an interview that you said you spend most Christmas Days at a homeless hostel near where you live.’
She nodded, uncertainly, clearly worried where this was going.
‘The thing is, I recently started to volunteer in my spare time at a local homeless shelter too – sadly there have been massive cuts made this year…’
She put her hand to her mouth in mock horror and I almost laughed.
‘…and there won’t be any money for Christmas dinner…’
‘Oh, aren’t you lovely?’ she gushed all over my words, mouth smiling, eyes dead, her voice filling the air with such sticky-toffee sweetness it made my jaw ache. ‘What a wonderful human being you are, Amy, fancy giving up your own time to help the homeless when you’re almost homeless yourself.’
‘No,’ I said firmly, ‘I don’t have much, but I have enough. It’s crazy to say I’m almost homeless, I’m a teacher, I have a roof over my head, I’ve had a tough time but I’m not destitute. Me and my kids will eat at Christmas, my mum taught me how to make a wonderful Christmas dinner on a shoestring, she was a wonderful cook,’ I added pointedly. ‘Therefore I would like to donate my prize to the St Swithin’s Shelter for the homeless…where I would like you to come and spend some time cooking Christmas dinner with us all.’
The shock on her face was pure joy to see. ‘No, no, no,’ she blurted, too quickly, ‘we want this Christmas to be all about you. I want to give YOU a Bella Christmas,’ the camera closed in on her face, a study in horror.
‘But Bella, these people have nothing, and nothing to look forward to except Christmas dinner at the shelter…’
‘NO,’ she almost shouted.
‘Okay…it’s your call, you can make that happen. Or not.’
She looked like she was about to collapse. Someone was obviously giving her instructions in her ear and she huffed and puffed. ‘A percentage of the proceeds from Bella’s Books is always donated to deserving charities at this time of year,’ she suddenly piped up, her composure coming back as if she’d been given the lifeline she needed to get out of this.
‘Yes, but having you there, helping them cook and give them back some dignity will mean so much more than a cheque in the post. We can show the country their plight at Christmas…well you can Bella…surely this isn’t asking too much of a woman who gives so much.’
‘No, I’m sorry …’
‘Not only could you provide 100 homeless people with Christmas dinner, but if you bring your cameras, with your celebrity we can draw attention to the problem. You can give them the Christmas gift of a future,’ I said, completely over-dramatising.
I heard voices in the background, saw her anxiously shaking her head on screen. She was listening to instructions in her ear again.
‘Look, Amy,’ she started, her voice as steely as her kitchen knives. ‘If you insist on doing something for the…homeless,’ she said through gritted teeth, ‘then let me send them some of my Bella’s Bakes? They are now available online,’ she added brightly, giving out the website address without missing a chance to plug the merchandise.
‘So what are you saying…let them eat cake – Christmas cake perhaps?’ I asked, knowing this comment wouldn’t be lost on the public, or any bloggers and journalists watching.
‘No…no…’ she stared at the screen, panic rising in her eyes, lips twisting into a grimace. She’d never encountered conflict or questioning on her cosy cookery programme, she’d only ever been feted by fans, and faced with me she was lost.
‘I don’t want to seem ungrateful,’ I went on, ‘but anyone can cook a family lunch, and Christmas lunch for under ten people is like a Sunday lunch with knobs on. But Bella, this lunch could involve up to a 100 people – maybe more, all hungry, all poor, all probably cold – and all deserving.’
‘Oh no… oh, hang on, my producer’s telling me…oh fuck!’ she said, giving an audible gasp, as did Sylvia.
‘It’s live, please don’t say “fu…”’ I started.
‘Oh God, stop… no. Oh yes, yes,’ she cried, looking almost tearful.
‘Wonderful,’ I said. ‘So that’s a yes. Thank you, Bella, I’m so looking forward to this…’ But I’d already been cut off, and when I looked at the screen Bella was now talking about ‘swollen fruits’ in her Christmas pudding like she hadn’t just said the F-word live on air.
I put down the phone, feeling slightly uncomfortable about what I’d just done. It wasn’t in my nature to be so forceful, so assertive, but anger was driving me – I just kept thinking about my mum and the people of St Swithin’s. I’d also thought about the Neils and Bellas of the world, who’d hurt me and left me behind without even looking back, and felt justified. I was determined to turn the tables for once and make some of my own demands on behalf of me and my mum, who’d always been a doormat for the likes of Bella’s family.
‘You bloody dark horse,’ Sylvia said, hugging me like I’d just run a marathon (I felt like I had). ‘I don’t know what that was all about, I bloody love you right now. Beatrice is going to have a heart attack when she finds out and the residents are going to think they’ve won the lottery. I don’t believe it.’ And after mauling me into another bear hug she preceded to jump around the postage-stamp size office like a woman possessed. Fortunately Paul Watkins wasn’t around to film this - or the moment the TV fell off the wall.
Later that day I received a call from Crimson. ‘Lucky girl,’ she started, sarcasm dripping down the phone. ‘A car will pick you up at your home tomorrow morning at 7 a.m. and bring you to Dovecote – it’s only about twenty miles, so you should be here by 7.30. It will take a couple of days to film, so bring something to wear. Bella’s looking forward to a big old catch-up.’
I bet she is, I thought, and so am I. ‘That’s good, because there’s a lot to talk about,’ I said, and put down the phone. I immediately texted Sylvia to confirm it was all happening, then I texted the kids, who said ‘Go Mum!’ (Jamie) and ‘OMG that’s fantastic! What are you going to wear?’ (Fiona). I hadn’t even had chance to think about clothes – perhaps it was time to treat myself to a couple of TV outfits after work?
I wandered around the local retail park that evening, fighting with frenzied Christmas shoppers just to find something to wear. I wanted something understated but colourful to wear for my TV debut, but it wasn’t easy amid the mass consumer panic. I couldn’t concentrate on shopping, I just kept wondering how Bella would greet me after all these years. What would the dynamic be? If the phone call was anything to go by I reckoned she might push my face in one of her ‘naughty’ custard tarts! Whatever happened, I couldn’t wait to see Bella Bradley unplugged, in her own home without cameras and make-up. Perhaps under all that slap and botox I’d be able to dig deeper. Who knows, I might find my old friend in there somewhere?
7
Baubles, Bangles and Baileys
That evening after I’d eaten supper I looked outside the kitchen window and through the darkness was a light sprinkling of snow. I held my mug of tea and wondered what the next few days would bring.
I was still looking out onto our tiny lawn when Fiona called my mobile; ‘I rang because I’m really excited for you, but I’m worried too, Mum. I hope you get there safely in the morning, before the snow sets in,’ she’d said.
‘A professional driver’s taking me, I’ll be fine.’
‘Has the snow made you sad, Mum?’ she asked, which was probably the real reason for her call.
‘Yes, I’m a bit sad, sweetie, but I’m fine.’ The snow always made me sad, because it reminded me of the worst day of my life.
I’d been fifteen when my auntie had woken me on a cold, December morning to tell me it was snowin
g… and that my mum had died. I’d never imagined this in my worst nightmares, despite Mum being ill for some time, and at first I refused to believe it.
‘No, not before Christmas, she wouldn’t,’ I kept saying, refusing to let any more information in. It was Mum’s favourite time of year, and despite it always being about hard work and financial worry, she’d be as excited as us kids on Christmas day.
My life changed forever the day Mum died and our home was never the same again. It seemed to hold onto the cold of that desolate wintry December morning and I felt as though I would never be warm again.
I thought about that first Christmas without Mum later as I watched a recording of Bella decorating her own tree at Dovecote. She was threatening to make us all feel very unworthy as she stood by the huge piney fronds threatening to ‘glitter every single one,’ later in the show.
I was settling down to watch when Sylvia popped round with a bottle of Baileys and some jewellery she’d offered to lend me. She said the prospect of seeing one of her necklaces on TV was just ‘orgasmic’… a very Bella word.
‘You’ve been watching too much Bella already,’ I smiled offering her a seat at the kitchen table.
‘Yes, I love her – and I always have to watch ‘Bella’s Christmas Bake Off’ with a Baileys at Christmas,’ she said, plonking the bottle on the table and emptying out a million years’ of baubles and bangles.
I took two small glasses out of the cupboard and turned the volume down on the TV.
‘You practising your Christmas with Bella?’ Sylvia asked, pointing to the TV.
‘Yeah,’ I smiled, ‘like I need to glitter every branch of my Christmas tree – I ripped it down when Neil left.’
‘Ah really? He’s ended your marriage, don’t let him take Christmas from you too, love,’ she sighed.
‘You’re right, but I don’t have the energy to reclaim Christmas tonight,’ I said.
‘Oh forget about him, just look forward to tomorrow when you’re stood with Bella Bradley telling us how to create Christmas Charlotte Russe,’ she laughed, squeezing my arm excitedly. My stomach dipped, I was so nervous, I knocked back the Baileys in one – it was warming and creamy and delicious and tasted of Christmas.
I’d drunk Baileys last Christmas with Neil – now just thinking about him sucked away all my Christmas spirit. He had rung me earlier and I’d told him all about my trip to Dovecote and that I’d be on Bella’s programme.
‘You?’ he said, like he didn’t believe it.
‘Yes, why are you saying it like that?’
‘Well, you’re… you’re no Bella Bradley are you, I mean she’s gorgeous?’
That stung. ‘I’m not trying to be her – and it has nothing to do with looks, I’ve just won the prize to cook with her and then she’s coming to cook for the hostel on Christmas Day.’
‘When is it being filmed – at the hostel?’
‘Christmas Day… I just told you.’ He never listened.
‘Oh… it’s just that I thought I’d come home for Christmas Dinner and see the kids and…’
‘Well they aren’t here – and neither am I.’
‘But what will I do?’ he said in all seriousness.
‘I don’t know, Neil. Maybe you could help Jayne grease her pole?’
I slammed the phone down, too enraged to talk.
‘I’m worried what I’ll look like on TV,’ I said to Sylvia as we pored over her ‘statement jewellery’ and shared the Baileys. ‘Neil said Bella’s gorgeous and it made me think about how I…’
‘Stop that right now,’ she said, wagging her finger at me.
‘You’re an attractive woman, Amy, and don’t worry, you can hold your own against Bella Bradley anytime. What would Neil know – he lost his taste in women the day he left you.’
I glanced up at the TV screen, the Silver Fox was now massaging oil into Bella’s baking tins; it was quite distracting. At least Bella had finally found her Mr Right – but then she always landed on her feet.
‘Neil is a dickhead – if you want to know, I never liked him,’ Sylvia was saying as she poured us both another couple of drinks. I’d told her ‘no thanks’ after the last one, but Sylvia was on a roll. Was this the second or third glass? – I wasn’t sure but I had a very early start and could hardly turn up on national TV half-baked. Generation YouTube already had me down as a homeless drunk.
Sylvia had been through a nasty divorce herself, but always stayed cheerful, helped others, and when it wasn’t the homeless or some kid at school she’d identified as neglected, she was helping me. Just thinking about all the support and kindness she’d given me recently made me reach out and hug her.
‘What’s that for?’ she said, hugging me back.
‘Thanks for helping me through all this - I’m so grateful to have you in my life,’ I said. After everything that had happened with Bella I had been wary of making friends, becoming too close. But since meeting her several years before, Sylvia had restored my faith in friendship, she was uncomplicated and selfless and I loved her for it.
She was half watching Bella on TV and smiling. ‘Funny to think you’ll be there tomorrow, actually at Dovecote… in her gorgeous kitchen. Everyone at school’s recording it, I can’t wait.’
‘Yeah… it’s exciting,’ I said. ‘Nerve-wracking, but exciting.’
‘Look at her, she won’t be rushing round Debenhams at ten to five on Christmas Eve, will she? I bet she has everything delivered and wrapped and she just “does” Christmas,’ Sylvia sighed as she gazed longingly at Bella on screen.
We both sat watching Bella ‘sparkle’ a tree branch, lost in our own thoughts.
‘Bloody hell, I wish I had the time to add glitter to individual branches,’ Sylvia laughed.
I nodded; ‘Christmas is stressful enough without having to do that. While she’s glittering fronds, the rest of us are cleaning the house, out shopping and worrying if we’ve got enough money for everything.’
‘And drinking Baileys,’ she laughed, holding up her glass before becoming more serious. ‘Amy, don’t let Bella’s life get to you while you’re there,’ she said. ‘Money, beauty, a handsome husband, a mansion and a successful TV career isn’t everything.’
We both laughed and she poured us another Baileys… though I couldn’t remember finishing the last one.
8
Bella on Broadway
The following morning I woke and for a few seconds my mind was blank. Then I remembered what was happening that day and I almost threw up with nerves and a slight hangover. I looked around my room at the dated floral wallpaper, the old bedside tables Neil and I had bought together years ago – and thought perhaps it might be time for me to move house after all.
At the age of forty I’d be starting a new life on my own, which was scary, but exciting too. Why couldn’t I have just a little bit of happiness, like Bella? Why did my life always have to be dull? I put on my old dressing gown, absently thinking that too needed to be replaced.
I’d bought a lovely below the knee brown skirt, an autumnal blouse and a long cardigan for the first day’s filming. I’d spent money I didn’t have but I was going on national TV and I’d worry about that when my credit card payment arrived in January.
I dressed quickly, made a cup of tea and breakfasted on Christmas cake. Tasting the moist fruitcake and nutty, buttery marzipan made me feel quite Christmassy, but the house showed no sign of the season. I thought about the decked halls and holly boughs that would greet me at Dovecote and what Sylvia had said the previous evening about not letting Neil take away my Christmas. I checked my watch; the driver was due in half an hour and I was ready, so I quickly ran upstairs and dragged out the Christmas tree I’d taken down days earlier. I grabbed a bag of baubles and put the tree back up in the living room, adding a few ornaments, but this time leaving any ‘Neil related’ ones in the bag. Then I poured myself a glass of sherry – yes it was early, but I needed it for my nerves – and it was almost Christmas. Sittin
g by the tree drinking the sherry renewed my faith in the season, and that morning as the snowflakes drifted slowly past the window I felt a little bit excited about Christmas. This was going to be a very different Christmas than the one I’d been expecting – and perhaps that wasn’t such a bad thing after all?
The car collected me as arranged with a lovely driver called Frank and we set off to travel the twenty-odd miles to Bella’s country retreat in the Cotswolds. I knew from the glossy photos and breathless descriptions I’d read in magazines that Bella lived just outside Broadway, described as ‘The jewel of the Cotswolds, a little village nestling beneath the Worcestershire hills’. I sometimes took the kids for daytrips in the summer when they were little, and just coming back here where nothing had changed made me feel safe. I loved the cosiness of the past and could feel my nerves calming slightly as we drove down the country roads we’d travelled as a young family.
I missed those days with the kids – being parents to twins had been total madness – everything happening at once – and in double doses. From first steps to first schooldays to first loves – to university, everything was in twos. Since their birth our lives had been transformed from calm to chaos and only in the past year when they both went off to uni had the calm descended again. Funny how you can get to love chaos though – I’d once complained of the noise of loud music and constant arguing, but now I had a whole house to read a book in and it felt empty. Be careful what you wish for, I thought, feeling as if everyone had gone to a great party and left me behind. Perhaps now, with Neil gone, it was time to find my own party?
I wound down the window and despite the freezing cold took huge gulps of country air, calming my nerves and filling my lungs with a tingly chill. The child in me was excited to see the snow really begin to come down – it made me sad because of Mum, but at the same time she loved this time of year and I had to stop seeing snow as a reminder of something bad. I smiled thinking of mum’s joy when she’d look out of the window and shout, ‘It’s snowing, kids!’ Neil’s leaving meant there were going to be great changes ahead for me – but in order to make the most of my future I had to allow myself to enjoy any drop of snow or happiness that came my way. I was determined to try and shake free the guilt and sadness of the past – at least for Christmas.