Christmas at Rosie Hopkins' Sweetshop

by Jenny Colgan

  Rosie shook her head.

  “No,” she said. “Me and Mr. Dog take it very seriously indeed, don’t we, Mr. Dog?”

  And she made his little head shake.

  “Put that dog down,” said Stephen. “You’ll turn him into a lapdog and he’ll get too big. And give him a proper name, like Ludo.”

  “Ludo is not a proper name!” said Rosie. “It’s the name of some ghastly little dweeb whose father shoots grouse and wants to bring back hanging.”

  Stephen sighed as he stomped out, the road clearers had just been, but in their gritted path, new flakes were already beginning to fall. There were fewer children at school every day; it was simply too risky to bring the children down in the morning from the more remote farms and outposts if they couldn’t be absolutely sure they could get picked up again at night. Tina already had a spare room made up, and Rosie likewise made sure Lilian’s bed was ready in case they were faced with any stranded waifs and strays.

  Cough sweets and comfits—­anything long lasting—­had gone through the roof in the shop. Nobody wanted fondants or pastel colors; that felt like sunshine. Even the chewy ice creams had fallen completely out of favor. And, Rosie noticed, the boxed chocolates had started to sell. That was a slightly worrying sign because it meant Christmas was approaching. Her email was full of jolly messages from her mother, telling her how much the kids were looking forward to seeing snow and playing out in the garden, and Rosie didn’t know what to say, apart from telling her she should make sure they were properly dressed. But if you’d grown up in a hot climate as the children had, how would they even believe her? It was impossible to imagine one climate when you were in another, and how on earth did you tell a small child there could be such a thing as too much snow?

  Rosie was worrying about exactly this when Edison came in. Just once, she thought, just once she’d like to see him march downtown like the other children did, the girls in pairs with linked arms, admiring each other’s snow boots, and the boys in great groups, hurling snowballs and making a huge cacophony.

  “Hello, Edison,” she said. Edison eyed Mr. Dog warily.

  “Oh, don’t be silly,” she said. “He’s only a puppy.”

  There was, at the back, a connecting run between the shop and the cottage. Stephen had decreed that that was where the dog was going to go; he had brought home a smart new kennel (Rosie had noticed that even though they didn’t have a lot of money to spare, it was absolutely top of the line. Nothing more had been said about giving their supposedly below-­par dog back to Stephen’s mother) and lined it with straw and a blanket. The puppy was meant to run about there until he was old enough to get taken outside on a lead and taught how to behave, but he didn’t spend much time there. Rosie washed her hands frantically and used plastic gloves when serving, but nobody seemed to mind at all. Dogs were, Rosie now realized, everywhere in Lipton. The lawyer had his in his office; the barber’s dog strolled around the place making friendly enquiries of clients; and the Red Lion of course was full of them, partaking liberally of the water provided for them outside, snoozing gently under their owners’ stools at the bar and occasionally guiding them as they meandered home slightly wobbly. So nobody batted an eyelid about Rosie’s puppy, and the children, on the whole, adored him.

  “Strange dogs are dangerous,” said Edison.

  “Yes, but he’s not a strange dog,” said Rosie patiently. “Is he? He’s my dog. And he’s not the least bit strange.”

  “He could bite off my nose,” said Edison.

  “He could lick off your nose, possibly,” said Rosie, laughing. “I promise, he doesn’t bite. Look at his tiny teeth. You can barely see them.”

  Edison sidled closer.

  “When I am a pinering scientist, I will need to get used to things like this,” he said glumly to himself, straightening his glasses. “I’m not sure I want to be a pinering scientist.”

  “What do you want to be, Edison?”

  “A pinering scientist who will break new barriers in astrophicks for the good of mankind,” repeated Edison, clearly by rote.

  “Not a vet, then?”

  Edison shook his head fiercely.

  “Animals are our friends,” he said. “I couldn’t fix a pig to get eaten.”

  Rosie tried to untangle this in her head.

  “Well, what would you REALLY like to do?”

  Edison looked around.

  “I’d like to have a sweetshop just like you. Except without the black bombers.”

  “Well, some ­people like black bombers.”

  Edison shook his head. “Strange ­people.”

  Rosie filled a bag with his beloved Edinburgh rock and sent him on his way.

  THE DAY HAD hardly gotten light with the heavy clouds and the flakes still coming down fiercely. Once the school and work rush had passed, Rosie set about refilling stock and cleaning seriously. Mr. Dog sat in the corner looking at a newspaper.

  All of a sudden the bell tinged with some urgency, and a rather portly balding middle-­aged man rushed in, all in a panic. Rosie straightened up.

  “Can I help you?”

  “Could I . . . could I possibly have a glass of water?” said the man, out of breath. His voice was educated, and from Yorkshire, the next county along. Rosie had only just begun to be able to make the distinction. Up until very recently, the way Derbyshire ­people discussed Yorkshire ­people as a completely different species had been a total mystery to her.

  “Of course,” she said. “What’s up?”

  The flustered man swallowed, glancing around nervously behind him, trying to see into his car, a gray Vauxhall Astra that he had parked outside.

  “It’s my dad,” he said. “He’s having some kind of . . . a bit of a turn.”

  “Bring him in,” said Rosie immediately. “It’s okay, I’m a nurse. Auxiliary nurse. Bring him in. Let me take a look at him now.”

  She pulled out the chair that Lilian sat in when she came to visit.The man darted out, and after a lot of cajoling, brought into the shop a tall, stooped figure, very thin, with white hair.

  “Come on, Dad, sit down. Sit down,” he said.

  Rosie brought a glass of water. The old man was muttering incomprehensibly. She helped him sip it and checked his heart rate.

  “I’m just going to call our local doctor,” she said. “He’s only down the road.”

  “Are you sure that’s necessary?” said the man. “He seems to be quieting down.”

  The man was gesticulating and talking feverishly. Rosie couldn’t understand a word he was saying.

  “It’s dementia,” said the son. “Sorry. He’s not well.”

  “I can see that,” said Rosie, speed-­dialing Moray. “Has this happened before?”

  “All the time,” said the man, and as Rosie looked at him more closely, she saw the marks of strain around his eyes and mouth. “All the time, and getting worse. And this one came out of the blue. There is . . . there is no getting better.”

  “I know,” said Rosie softly, hanging up the phone after talking to Moray’s receptionist, Maeve. “He’s on his way. Would you like a cup of tea?”

  The man nodded, then glanced apprehensively out the window at the weather.

  “Although maybe we should get on.”

  The old man was moaning now, rocking himself back and forth. Rosie found the new blanket they’d bought for Mr. Dog and put it around his shoulders and gradually, with the man’s arm around him, the old chap’s breathing slowed, and he stopped jabbering, although not before a great tear had rolled down his cheek.

  “It’s a horrible disease,” said Rosie sympathetically. “A total pig.”

  The man winced in agreement.

  “Yes. Yes, it is rather.” He held out his hand. “Edward Boyd. And my father’s James.”

  “Nice to meet you,” said Rosie. “
Rosie Hopkins.”

  By the time Moray arrived, the kettle was whistling, and he gave the old man a thorough check over.

  “He’s stopped . . . he’s stopped recognizing me at all,” said Edward, sadly. “He keeps shouting things that don’t make sense.”

  “That’s very common,” said Moray, assessing his vital signs.“His pulse is a bit thready , but that might just be the shock. What caused him to react like that?”

  “I’ve no idea,” said Edward, gratefully accepting the tea.

  “I’ll cool it down for your dad,” said Rosie quietly, adding cold water.

  “I had to take a detour through this town because we normally take the Hiftown road, but it’s shut . . . I don’t even know where we are.”

  “Lipton,” said Moray

  Edward looked worriedly out the window. It was so overcast that it felt like night. “I’ll need to get on.”

  Rosie gave the old man his tea, holding the cup while he sipped it.

  “Thank you,” said Edward again. “Okay, well, we drove into town and he got very, very agitated and took off his seatbelt and was all over the place.”

  “Could he have been here before?” asked Rosie.

  “I don’t think so,” said Edward. “He was born and raised the other side of Halifax.”

  They regarded James quietly. He now seemed perfectly happy and at home in the chair and was looking around approvingly.

  “Does he live with you?” asked Moray. Edward turned to face him and, just for a second, Rosie caught sight of the tiredness and anguish behind the polite mask.

  “Yes,” he said, his face stricken. Then he straightened up again. “I mean, yes, he does. It’s fine, we have some home care, and of course my wife helps a lot, of course . . .”

  “There’s no shame,” said Moray quietly and kindly, “in getting someone the help they need. You know, after a certain point, many of the nicer homes won’t take dementia patients.”

  “He’s my dad,” said Edward stoically and swallowed. Rosie decided that she liked this Edward Boyd. Lilian had had to go into a home after several falls and a minor stroke; Rosie couldn’t look after her and work at the same time. She admired this man who had clearly tried to do both. And Lilian had kept her marbles, which made everyone’s lives so much easier.

  “Come on, Dad,” said Edward, looking at his watch. “It’s time to go.”

  James looked around confusedly, his hands gripping the sides of his chair.

  “No!” he spat hoarsely. “No!”

  His face was full of confusion and panic.

  “Come on, Dad. We’re going to go home. You can see Doreen, okay? We’ll have vegetable soup for lunch. I know you like that.”

  “NO!” said the old man, looking surprisingly strong. “I’m staying here!”

  Moray and Rosie exchanged looks, but Edward just looked downtrodden and resigned.

  “We have to go, Dad.”

  James looked mutinous.

  Finally, Moray stepped forward and took out his card.

  “If you need someone to talk to,” he said, “ give me a call and I’ll talk to your GP about making a referral, okay? It doesn’t have to be like this.”

  Edward looked down at the card as if he might cry.

  “Thank you so much for your kindness. Oh, let me take some sweets, that might help tempt him out.”

  “Of course! What does he like?” said Rosie.

  “Mixed boiled usually,” said Edward.

  “NO!” came the quavering but determined voice again. “Caramel!”

  “You don’t like caramel” said Edward. “It sticks to your teeth!”

  “Caramel.”

  “You can have caramels if you get in the car.”

  “Don’t want to,” said the old man.

  “Caramels in the car?”

  Rosie made up a bag, and Edward paid for them and once again thanked them profusely for their kindness. Then he led the old man, the caramels clutched in his hand, out of the shop and back to the car. As they left, Rosie noticed another tear rolling down the old man’s cheek.

  “That’s it,” she said as she came back to pick up the tea cups. “I never want that to happen to me. Never. Honestly, I think I’d rather . . . I think I’d rather be dead.”

  “Stephen will do it,” said Moray, waving his hand. “Doctors get into trouble for that kind of thing.”

  Rosie shook her head. “How awful. It’s just such a horrible thing. I wonder what set him off.”

  “Probably nothing,” said Moray. “Stumbling across an old memory in the brain that just happened to coincide with passing by. It’s a filthy disease, dementia. I see the guilty grown-­up children in my office all the time. They should really do what’s for the best and get him somewhere nice. No point in everybody’s life being ruined.”

  “Poor chaps,” muttered Rosie again, and she put the old man and his son out of her head.

  ROSIE WENT RIGHT on decorating. She had found a box containing some old Christmas decorations in the attic and was considering dragging them out. Among them were a ­couple of lovely old wood carvings that were clearly handmade—­seeing their varying degrees of proficiency, she wondered if they’d been done at school by Lilian’s brothers. Lilian confirmed this, so Rosie saved them while letting the disintegrating tinsel and tarnished baubles head for the bin.

  She made up the vast Christmas order for the shop, and while she was doing so, Tina, who was an online shopper extraordinaire, came in and showed her a picture of the most amazing half-­price Santa she’d found.

  “But online merchants aren’t delivering,” said Rosie. “Because of the weather.”

  “Yes, they aren’t delivering to normal ­people. That’s why it’s half price before Christmas,” said Tina, who’d nearly gone bankrupt from her bad habit. “But they’ll always deliver to me.”

  Rosie smiled and looked at it again. It really was lovely: a miniature Santa train with empty carriages they could fill with sweets, tootling around a little model village with its roofs all covered in snow and little candles in all the windows.

  “It looks like Lipton,” she said.

  Tina nodded. “I know,” she said. “We must get it. We’ll cause a scrum.”

  Rosie thought briefly of the amazing bright lights and astonishing designer displays on Oxford Street in London. It was hard to imagine a small tootling train being the center of attention. But then, Malik’s was currently displaying a pyramid of discounted tinned macaroni and cheese, so she supposed things could be worse.

  “You’re on,” she said.

  “It whistles!”

  “I said you’re on!”

  “Yay!” said Tina, who wasn’t really allowed to shop anymore. “I ordered it last week.”

  Rosie rolled her eyes.

  “So what are you getting Jake for Christmas?”

  “Oh, nothing interesting,” said Tina sadly. “I wish I were a millionaire. No offense.”

  “None taken,” said Rosie promptly. “I do too.”

  “But I saw this beautiful Burberry shirt he’d look amazing in, and this really gorgeous cashmere scarf.”

  “Jake wouldn’t like any of that stuff.”

  “No,” said Tina. “But fantasy Jake I go out with in my head does.”

  “I thought Jake was your fantasy Jake.”

  Tina’s face softened.

  “Oh, he is. he is. But, you know.”

  Rosie did know. Jake was gorgeous and charming and worked as a farm laborer. His usual outfit was a rubber waistcoat to avoid stains and a hacking jacket that Rosie strongly suspected was older than he was.

  “What do you think he’s going to get you?”

  Tina shrugged. “I don’t know. Last year he got me a pair of socks.”

  “But you’d only been
going out five minutes last year.”

  “Still.”

  “And it was a very nice pair of socks.”

  Tina rolled her eyes.

  “Okay, okay.”

  Rosie sold two pounds of Parma violets and said hi to Anton, the fattest man in town. Formerly, he’d been going for the fattest man in the country. The fact that he was now only the fattest man in their village was, Rosie felt, a credit to him. And slightly to her, given that she controlled his sweet intake in a way that frankly counted as an act of charitable giving.

  Anton looked around.

  “Christmas decorations!” he said cheerfully.

  Mr. Dog came padding up to lick his hand, as he always did. He was growing bigger and hairier by the week but was no less lazy and affectionate. Rosie was madly in love with him, to Stephen’s alternate amusement and slight annoyance. He kept banging on about how their dogs were bred to work. But every time Rosie turned her back, if she whipped around quickly enough, she would catch Stephen skritching the puppy behind his ears or secretly telling him he was the best fellow in the world, yes, he was, yes, he was.

  “He likes you,” said Rosie to Anton.

  “He likes fish and chips,” said Anton.

  “Anton!”

  “A small! I had a small!’

  “What’ll it be? I feel like a drug dealer.”

  Anton smiled dreamily, his face slack as he perused the shelves.

  “We’re pushers,” said Tina. “I think we just need to deal with that fact.”

  “Never,” said Rosie.

  “How’s that young boy of yours?” said Anton without taking his eyes off the shelves he must have known by heart.

  “Not so young,” said Rosie, still going pink even now, nearly a year after they’d started dating. “Actually, he’s really well.”