The Mistletoe Pact: A totally perfect Christmas romantic comedy

by Lovett, Jo

  He still, after all these years, hated seeing Max in running kit. He hated being reminded of the outstanding sportsman Max had been and the glittering future he’d missed out on. He hated seeing the scars on his legs and his limp. Because it was all Dan’s fault. The guilt was crushing. Every time. Nearly ten years now.

  It felt particularly harsh because Dan – broadly – loved his job, while Max was a sports physio, and realistically who wanted to be a physio to the stars when you should have been one of those stars yourself?

  His heart twisted and he started backing out of the kitchen, and then Max said, ‘Morning, stranger. Want some breakfast? Hardly ever see you now.’

  Dammit.

  He was clearly going to have to stay and chat.

  ‘I’m about to go for a run myself,’ Dan said, ‘but a cup of coffee would be great if you’re putting the kettle on.’

  ‘I’m making my legendary pancakes,’ Max said. ‘Just one. With maybe a bit of sugar and lemon? Give it fifteen minutes to digest and you’ll be good for your run?’ Not really possible to say no without looking purposely unfriendly. Shocking, actually, that Dan had no real idea whether Max could cook or not.

  ‘You’ve twisted my arm.’ He pulled a chair out and sat down with Greggy at the table in the middle of the room.

  ‘So where do you normally go for your runs when you’re here?’ Greggy asked. ‘We just did a circular one via Little Bishop.’

  ‘That’s a great one,’ Dan said. ‘I hadn’t decided. I was going to do either that one or one from the opposite end of the village past the church that follows the little stream and some more gentle hills. I was going to wait and see how I felt once I got going.’

  ‘Not a lot of hills where you are in London?’ Greggy smiled up at Max as Max put a pancake down in front of him, and Max ruffled Greggy’s hair when he’d let go of the plate.

  ‘Exactly. I live between Earl’s Court and Fulham, which is very flat.’

  ‘Great area, though.’

  ‘Yeah, it is. My flat’s a shoebox and it’s above a very fragrant Indian restaurant, which is the only way I could afford to buy in the area, but I love it. And luckily I love curry, and theirs are all delicious.’

  ‘We should come over and visit you some time. And you should come to us. We can tempt you with hills.’ Greggy and Max had recently moved into a flat together near Alexandra Palace in North London. ‘And Max’s cooking of course.’

  ‘Or a barbecue when it’s a bit warmer. That’s Greggy’s speciality,’ Max said, flipping the next pancake.

  ‘That’s a nice way of saying that I’m a rubbish cook in an actual kitchen,’ Greggy said.

  ‘Hey, probably better than me.’ Dan stood up and took his plate over to Max. ‘I seem to have fallen into the cliché junior-doctor-bad-diet trap recently.’ Amazing how much less difficult it was talking to Max with Greggy around.

  Half an hour later, he’d stayed chatting for a lot longer than he’d thought he would and had had three pancakes and had realised that he was going to have to postpone his run for another half hour or get some serious indigestion.

  If he was honest, he was looking forward to Manda leaving later this morning to spend Christmas with her parents, and maybe he’d stay around after that for a while, spend some more time with his mother and siblings.

  Greggy put another cup of coffee in front of him and he took a sip. Yeah, maybe he should actually stay until this evening instead of leaving this morning. This was really nice.

  ‘Morning, morning.’ His father strode into the room, doing his usual lord-of-the-manor impression. He clapped his hands together and said, ‘So who’s in for a family game of golf today?’

  Dan looked at him briefly, decided that he was leaving this morning after all, chugged half of his too-hot coffee and burned his mouth – he wasn’t going to be able to taste anything properly for days now – and stood up to leave the room.

  Ten

  Now – January 2022

  Evie

  ‘Miss, have you taken your husband’s surname?’ Jake, one of Evie’s Year Ten pupils, yelled as she walked into the classroom on the first morning of term. Yep, there was nothing like a drunken Vegas one-night marriage for making the first day back at work after the holidays even more of a joy than usual. Why had she and Dan posted so much stuff on social media and why had the mother of one of her pupils had to stumble across it via a mutual friend and tell the world about it?

  ‘No husband, just a joke,’ she said, giving Jake the evil eye. ‘And can I ask why you were yelling?’ Evie had developed an amazing glare over the years, and, thank God, it was working right now. She glared at everyone else, for good measure, and then clapped her hands. ‘Right. I’d like to see everyone’s Christmas coursework, now.’

  Unfortunately, she couldn’t glare at her colleagues in the same way.

  ‘Oh my God, Evie,’ her friend Priya said, really loudly, as soon as she set foot inside the staff room at morning break, ‘no-one gets pissed-married in Vegas. He was total sex-on-legs. Who is he?’ The heads of the majority of the people in the room, including two of the three deputy heads, turned in their direction.

  ‘Ha,’ Evie said, thinking Shut up. ‘Old friend. Just one of those things. You know.’

  ‘No, I don’t know. You’re the first person I’ve ever known to get married in Vegas. And pissed-married. That had to have been a big morning after.’

  ‘Yeah, it was,’ Evie said. ‘But, you know.’ She moved in nearer to Priya and hissed, ‘Shhh.’

  ‘Oops, sorry,’ Priya said, grinning in a very un-sorry-like way. She pulled Evie over to a table in a corner and, at least speaking at normal – instead of fog-horn – volume, said, ‘So tell me everything. Your messages were far too short.’ Priya had been one of the many people who’d WhatsApped Evie asking for details and Evie had gone very succinct on her replies.

  ‘Honestly, there’s nothing to tell. Just a one-night stand that involved a ridiculous joke marriage that turned out to be legal so we have a bit of admin to do to sort it out and that’s all.’

  ‘So are you seeing him again?’ Bloody hell. Good job Evie liked Priya a lot, otherwise right now she’d be finding her really irritating.

  It was a relief to get to Friday evening after what had felt like a very long four-day first-week-back full of drizzle, over-lively kids and staffroom gossip about Evie. Hopefully by Monday morning they’d have stopped talking about her, because surely there was nothing more to say now.

  Evie was going out tomorrow evening, to a Mexican restaurant with some old university friends who also lived in London. This evening, she was knackered and she was going to be firmly on the sofa in the sitting room of her shared flat, with the remote, a takeaway and a large glass of wine, hoping that her flatmate Josh wouldn’t get home with his latest ‘shag-for-the-night’, as he called his succession of very handsome boyfriends, before she’d gone to bed. Their other flatmate, Mia, was away on business.

  Her phone rang as she was grappling with Netflix decision-making: film or start a drama series. She picked it up and saw Dan’s name on the screen. And, pathetically, she felt it right to her centre. Literally. Just reading his name. A tiny flicker of hope and warmth.

  She swiped right and said, ‘Hi, Dan.’

  ‘Hey, Evie. How are you? How’s your week been?’

  ‘Good, thanks. Happy New Year. How are you?’

  ‘Also good. And happy New Year to you too.’ Dan paused and Evie curled her legs under her so that she was more comfortable. She always enjoyed talking to Dan and it was nice to hear from him. That was an understatement, actually. ‘I’m calling with good news.’

  ‘Okay, great.’ News. The annulment, obviously. He hadn’t called for a chat after all. It had been stupid of her to think that he would have done.

  ‘The attorney just called me and we just need to sign some documents, which he’s sent over, and then he’ll submit everything and the courts should decide within hopefully a
couple of weeks and then we should officially be no longer married. I’ll sign them and send them on to you.’

  Evie uncurled her legs, sat up straight, and said, ‘That’s fantastic. Great. Thank you for letting me know.’

  ‘No problem. So, yep, I just wanted to set your mind at rest. I’ll let you get on with your evening now. I hear that Sasha’s planning a big engagement party, so I might see you there.’

  ‘Yep, probably. Thanks again. Have a lovely weekend.’

  ‘Bye, then.’

  ‘Bye.’

  And that was that.

  Evie felt really lonely all of a sudden. Why had she thought it would be a good idea to stay in by herself this evening?

  She shook her head and pointed the remote again. She could totally find something absorbing and uplifting to watch on Netflix.

  The front door crashed open and the sounds of Josh’s voice and another man’s filled the hall. Evie turned the sound up on the TV. She really wasn’t up for being around two people on a first date right now.

  ‘Hi, Evie.’ Josh and his partner – a tall, slim man wearing a well-fitting navy suit and a well-trimmed beard – walked into the room. ‘I thought you were out this evening. This is Marc.’

  ‘Hi, Josh, hi, Marc. In this evening, out tomorrow.’

  ‘Oh, okay, well, in that case we’ll take ourselves into my bedroom. Don’t mind us.’

  ‘See you in the morning,’ Evie said. She did love Josh – they’d been friends since uni and she’d lucked out massively when, a few months after she’d moved to London, he’d offered her the single bedroom in his Wimbledon flat at well below market rent. He’d been fantastic to live with during lockdown, because never a dull moment, but also he was kind of similar to her mum as a housemate; she’d basically gone frying pan to fire when she’d moved to London from her mum’s. Josh was not tidy and he went through men at about the same rate Evie went through magazines (and she liked a magazine).

  Right now, she could really do with a celibate, anally tidy flatmate.

  Especially because Josh’s success with men reminded her that she really, really did not have a man herself, and that she was really, really bad at one-night stands, because she was still feeling bereft after the Vegas-Dan thing. She needed to move on from it as soon as possible.

  * * *

  The following Tuesday, Evie arrived slightly late for the regular weekly badminton group session that she’d started in September on a get-fit drive for the new school year. If she was honest, it hadn’t had much of an impact on her fitness, but it was strangely addictive. There was a seventy-two-year-old ex-GB player in her group, and Evie was going to beat her one day if it killed her.

  There was also a lovely man called Matthew, who had an astonishing memory for not-that-funny-but-very-clever one-liners – literally at least five of them on the subject of badminton alone – and wore pristine and – as far as Evie could see – different kit every single week. He’d asked her out before Christmas, which was lovely of him, but she’d turned him down because she didn’t really feel a spark with him. Maybe she’d been too hasty, though. He was nice, very nice; going by the pristine kit and his extreme punctuality for their sessions he didn’t live a remotely chaotic life; and he was very good-looking in a classic way. Maybe she should have gone out with him. The whole love-at-first-sight thing was clearly nonsense. Attraction and love grew as you got to know people.

  He’d been very sweet to her when she’d said she wasn’t sure about a date. And he was smiling away at her now from the other side of the court.

  ‘We’re going to practise volleying today,’ their coach told them when they’d finished warming up. ‘Evie, I want you to focus on hitting the shuttlecock harder and more cleanly.’

  Matthew manoeuvred things so that they were partnering each other for the volleying, which gave Evie a little thrill, like, actually, she was desirable. If she was honest, Dan’s blatant horror at how things had panned out in Vegas had dented her confidence quite a lot.

  ‘Harder, Evie,’ yelled the coach.

  Matthew fed the shuttlecock gently to her and she whacked it back in as aggressive a volley as she could manage.

  ‘Ow,’ he howled, as it hit him squarely in the eye.

  ‘Oh, no.’ Evie sprinted round the net to see if he was okay. ‘I’m so sorry.’ This was reminding her of the time she’d inadvertently headbutted her ex-fiancé.

  Matthew, his hand over his eye socket, shook his head. ‘It’s fine. Don’t worry.’

  ‘Are you sure? I think we should put ice on it.’

  ‘I’m sure I’ll be fine.’

  ‘Ice is a good idea,’ the coach said.

  A couple of minutes later, Evie was sitting with Matthew by the side of the court while he held an ice pack over his eye area.

  ‘You don’t need to sit here with me,’ Matthew said. ‘I’ll be completely fine in a minute. I don’t want you to miss the session.’

  ‘Don’t be silly.’ Evie smiled at him. Thoughtfulness could really make someone a lot more attractive. ‘Probably better if I stay here anyway until the volleying practice has finished. I don’t want to injure anyone else.’

  ‘You did whack it impressively hard. When we do our matchplay, can I be your partner so there’s no risk of you hitting me again?’

  Evie laughed. ‘It’s a deal.’

  An hour later, at the end of their session, they strolled outside together.

  ‘I’m so excited to have beaten Ruth,’ Evie said. ‘I mean, I know it was all down to you and the fact that she was partnered with Gerald.’ Ruth was the seventy-two-year-old ex-GB player and Gerald was well into his seventies too, and by the signs of things, not an ex-GB player. ‘But still very satisfying.’

  ‘It absolutely wasn’t down to me. You played a couple of killer winners. Fancy a quick drink now in the pub over there to celebrate our stunning win?’

  ‘I actually would,’ said Evie, banishing thoughts of drinking with Dan in Vegas. ‘That would be lovely.’ A good way of celebrating the fact that their annulment had come through yesterday. She’d felt a bit low since then, and going for a drink with a nice man would be a good thing to do.

  Eleven

  Now – February 2022

  Dan

  Dan sucked in a big gulp of cold February evening air as he left the hospital by its wide revolving doors. That was a welcome head-clearer. He’d spent the last couple of hours with the parents of a girl with suspected leukaemia and it was hard not to take some of their devastation home with him. They’d caught it early and the prognosis was fairly good, but it was still not news that you ever wanted to have to share with anyone.

  He could do with a drink. He pulled out his phone to call his friend Zubin, one of the other emergency doctors at the hospital, who he’d trained with. Thursday evening: he’d hopefully be free.

  He had a couple of email notifications and a message from his ex, Hannah. Odd. He was vaguely surprised that he still had her number in his phone; they’d literally only dated for a few weeks, in the autumn, and then they’d split up by what had felt like very mutual agreement and hadn’t been in touch since. Hannah had actually been the one to say that she wasn’t sure things were going anywhere, but Dan had just been relieved, really.

  Maybe she’d messaged him by mistake.

  Dan, hi, it’s Hannah. I have something important to tell you. Could you call me?

  She must know more than one Dan, and have texted the wrong one. She clearly didn’t have anything important to tell him.

  Hi Hannah. Just to let you know that I think you sent your message to the wrong Dan

  She pinged straight back before he’d even managed to find Zubin in his contacts to call him.

  Not the wrong Dan. I have something to tell you, Dan Marshall. Is now good for you to talk? Hannah

  Shit. It felt like there weren’t many things an ex who you’d only been with briefly might have to tell you. All of them related to sex and none of them were good
.

  He pressed the call button.

  ‘Hi, Dan.’

  ‘Hi, Hannah. Is everything alright?’

  ‘Yes, it is, actually, from my perspective. There’s no obvious easy way to say this, so I’m just going to launch straight in.’

  ‘Okay.’

  ‘I appreciate that you won’t necessarily be particularly happy about this, but I’d like you to know that I don’t want or need anything from you. I’m just over three months pregnant with your baby. I’m keeping it.’

  ‘Okay. Um.’ Shit. ‘Congratulations.’ Wow. Huge. Better than some terrible disease but really not what he wanted right now. Ever. God. A baby. She was pregnant. He was going to be a father.

  ‘I can understand that it’s a huge shock. I was shocked myself when I found out. And surprised that I wanted to keep it. I never saw myself as a mother, you know?’

  Dan did know, because he’d never seen himself as a father.

  ‘So I assumed that I’d terminate it, except I just couldn’t. I want this baby. I’m thirty-eight and this might be my only chance to have a baby and so I’ve decided to go ahead with it.’ Thirty-eight. He’d thought she was younger than that. And that was very much a side-issue here.

  ‘Yeah, I get that.’ Dan moved out of the way of a group of teenagers walking several abreast on the pavement. ‘I mean, of course. And I’d like to be involved.’ Gut reaction. He’d never imagined that he’d be a father, but now that he was going to be, he already couldn’t imagine not being involved.

  ‘Well, that’s great. Thank you.’

  ‘Well, thank you for letting me know.’ Stupid thing to say, but life hadn’t prepared him for this moment.