Christmas at Rosie Hopkins' Sweetshop

by Jenny Colgan

  “Fine,” said Rosie. Moray didn’t say anything; he was occupied down at the business end.

  “And . . . PUUUSH!” he shouted. “AND again. And—­”

  With a sudden rush, the baby shot out, straight into Moray’s arms.

  “Thank FRICK for that,” said Hester loudly. “Frick. Bloody hell.”

  Arthur and Edison crowded around as Moray toweled off the baby.

  “It’s a girl!” he said, as the tiny new person who had suddenly appeared in the room opened her little tiger’s mouth and let out a wonderful full-­throated roar.

  Rosie handed the boiled scissors to Arthur, who handed them to Edison and, very carefully, they cut the cord together.

  “A girl!” said Moray, handing her over to Hester, who was noisily throwing up in a bowl.

  Downstairs, the doorbell rang. They all looked at one another wondering who on earth it could be.

  ‘The midwife!” said Rosie finally. “Oh, well, she’s a bit late.”

  “No, she isn’t!” said Moray out of the corner of his mouth.

  “I hate birthing the placenta. I know I’m meant to be an emotionless medic and all that, but it’s completely gross.”

  “Ssh,” said Rosie reprovingly, washing her hands and going down to answer the door.

  But none of the little family could possibly have heard him, so rapt were they—­even Hester, in between shouting for a fricking cup of tea, the least she expect after what she’d been through—­gathered around their perfect tiny human, who even now was feeling blindly for Hester’s nipple.

  “Quick, give me a whisky,” said Hester, “before my milk comes in.”

  “I seem to like her a lot more today,” said Rosie as she and Moray shared the soap.

  THE MIDWIFE WAS full of apologies, as well as praise for what they’d managed. She took over efficiently upstairs while they sidled off to the kitchen to start on some epic tea making. Moray did indeed find some whisky and poured them both a jolly measure.

  “Merry Christmas,” he said. “You can wipe those tears off your face now.”

  “I’m not crying!” said Rosie. Then she touched her face. “Oh,” she said. “So I am.”

  “Miracle of nature,” said Moray, smiling. “Just because it happens to basically everyone doesn’t stop it being extraordinary.”

  Rosie nodded.

  “Amazing. Like, ‘How many ­people are in this room? . . . And NOW how many?’ ” She glanced down at her hand. It was shaking slightly. “Oh,” she said. “I’m all jittery.”

  “Are you so excited about whether Santa’s been?”

  “Oh my goodness!” she said. “It’s Christmas morning!”

  For a second her face lit up, then she remembered everything.

  “Oh yes,” she said. “I have a really busy, miserable day ahead, then tomorrow I have to say goodbye to everyone I love!”

  Moray chinked whisky mugs with her.

  “I’m here,” he said.

  “Thank you,” said Rosie. She looked into the cup. “Maybe I’ll just drink ALL DAY” she said.

  “Yeah, YOU aren’t on call,” said Moray.

  Then they went upstairs to say their goodbyes to the new arrival, who was already looking happy and contented on her mother’s breast.

  “What are you going to call her?” asked Rosie.

  Edison was looking very serious.

  “I am going to name her,” he said “because I am now a big brother.”

  “Well, that makes sense,” said Rosie, hoping he wasn’t going to go for something like “Robotrix.”

  “I think she should be called Marie,” he said, pronouncing it MAH-­ri.

  “Oh, that’s lovely,” exclaimed Rosie, surprised. “Because it’s Christmas Day?”

  “Like Marie Christmas?” added Moray.

  “No,” said Edison, furrowing his brow. “After Madame Curie, first lady of science.”

  Rosie and Moray swapped looks.

  “I think that’s perfect,” said Arthur.

  “And at least I got to be the first person in the history of the world ever to make that joke to you, little dove,” said Moray, leaning tenderly over the tiny red-­faced baby. Her fist was clenching and unclenching. “But not, I suspect, the last.”

  Rosie smiled.

  “I think . . . we’re just going to go.”

  It felt a bit strange making polite conversation after everything they’d been through together.

  “That’s fine,” said the midwife.” I think we’re basically okay here. I might see if anyone fancies any toast.”

  “I’m so hungry I could eat Edison,” said Hester. She looked pointedly at Arthur. “Oh, and by the way, I shan’t be doing THAT again.”

  “Oh, nonsense,” said the midwife. “Next one will walk out.”

  And Arthur beamed benevolently, and Rosie and Moray exchanged smiles at the look of abject horror on Hester’s face.

  “Thank you for my baby sister, Rosie,” said Edison as she went to give him a cuddle.

  “That’s all right,” she said, kissing his soft boy hair. “I’m pleased there are two of you.”

  “I hope she really likes robots,” said Edison. “And having Wolverine for a big brother.”

  “You’ll help her,” said Rosie. “And when she’s three, you can bring her in for her first bit of Edinburgh rock.”

  His face brightened. “I’m going to love being a big brother.”

  “I think it’s going to be the making of you,” said Rosie, and she kissed him again and settled him down on the bed with the rest of his family before taking Moray’s arm and heading out into the slow dawn of a crisp, clear, shockingly cold Christmas morning.

  Chapter 25

  MRS. LAIRD WAS, amazingly, up when Stephen, red-­eyed and slightly frantic, turned up at six A.M., having broken every speed limit between Chelsea and Derbyshire in absolutely filthy weather conditions. She turned around in surprise from the front of the range, then rallied immediately to pour him the best cup of tea he’d ever tasted in his life.

  Stephen had done a lot of thinking on the drive along the deserted motorways. He had thought about how he had dealt with his first accident, how Rosie had saved him. And how he had kept himself so bottled up this time for fear of coming apart. But if he’d shared more with Rosie, he knew, he knew for certain that it would have been okay. Yes, she was distracted, but they were partners, they were a team. And he had never met anyone in his life who was more there for him than Rosie. There was no point in getting jealous that she was there for other ­people too.

  All he could see were little flashes of their life together: kissing under the tree at Lilian’s home; knitting on the sofa; making love in the upstairs bedroom, her pale skin flushed as bright red as the spring hollyhocks that knocked against the window. The look on her face the first time she’d met that stupid dog; her ready smile whenever the bell of the sweetshop dinged—­but never so wide, never so happy as when the person walking through the door was himself.

  “Is her ladyship stirring?” he said when he’d downed the tea and eyed the bacon and mushrooms Mrs. Laird was getting out of the fridge. But he didn’t have the stomach to eat, not right now.

  “She is,” said Hetty from the stairs. She was wearing a dressing gown he recognized with something of a shock as having been his father’s. Two dogs were groggily circling her feet, sniffing the air for bacon. “With the ludicrous noise you made arriving, I don’t know how I could have been anything else.”

  “Yeah, sorry,” said Stephen, feeling a bit dampened. “Happy Christmas.”

  He realized with a horrible start as he said it that he hadn’t done any Christmas shopping for his mother in London. Ah, damn it, damn it damn it.

  “I’m afraid I didn’t bring you anything,” he said shamefacedly, remembering guilti
ly that he had a bottle of champagne and a new sweater for Mrs. Laird in the car. He never forgot her.

  “Good,” said Hetty. “Totally overrated, gifts. Bringing a bunch of pointless new stuff into the world. I didn’t get you anything either. You can have another dog if you like.”

  “No thanks,” said Stephen. “I think we’re all right for dogs right now.”

  He remembered Rosie looking up the quarantine laws and his eyes prickled.

  “Um,” he said.

  “Yes?” said Hetty. She took the proffered cup of tea from Mrs. Laird without a thank you. “Out with it.”

  Mrs. Laird somehow contrived to make herself scarce. Stephen realized he could really do with a shower and a bit of a lie-­down—­he could still smell the perfumed smoky club on his jacket—­and, under ideal circumstances, his mother would not be wearing a dead man’s dressing gown. On the other hand, under ideal circumstances he supposed he’d be something big in the army, a colonel or something, and sharing brandy and cigars and regimental stories in the library with his father, who was incredibly proud of him and delighted that he was seeing Squire Phillips’s daughter from down the way . . .

  So. Not everything was perfect in life. But he had one chance, he knew. One shot for one thing—­which could be perfect. Or pretty damn close.

  He sat down, and his mother followed suit.

  “I hope those eggs are from Isitt’s. She may be a difficult bugger, but you can’t argue with the produce.”

  “No,” said Stephen, unwilling to be drawn into local gossip. “Um, Mother . . .”

  Hetty rolled her eyes. “Spit it out, boy. I can read you like a book, you know.”

  “Well,” he went on. “I know you don’t exactly approve, and I know you don’t really like her and that the family isn’t ideal and she probably isn’t the best person to help run the house one day and I know she isn’t from any of those deb families you like and—­ . . .”

  “Oh God” said Hetty. “I did wonder when you vanished.”

  Stephen swallowed. He felt like a boy again.

  “Are you sure?” said Hetty. “You know she hasn’t a clue what she’s marrying into. Not just you, but everything that goes with it. And you are no picnic, you know?”

  “I know.”

  “And you’ll have to do things her way too; she’s not a pushover. She looks soft, but she isn’t.”

  “I know that too.”

  “And your personalities can really clash at times—­marriage is difficult, you know that?”

  “Yes.”

  “And your backgrounds are completely different. Maybe too different. When things get tough, you won’t understand how the other one is coping.”

  “I think we might.”

  She looked at him and snorted.

  “Well, young ­people think all kinds of crazy things.”

  “So . . . so I can’t have the ring?”

  Hetty sighed and took a long slurp of her tea.

  “Of course you can have the bloody ring. I looked it out for you a year ago. Never seen anything clearer in my life.”

  “You’re serious?”

  “Of course I’m serious. I can’t think of anyone that could possibly make either of you happy apart from being together.”

  Stephen leaped up.

  “Oh my God.”

  Hetty smiled.

  “I really wish everyone wouldn’t treat me like a bloody idiot.”

  Stephen wasn’t sure what to say next.

  “I suppose . . . hm, do you think I should ask her mother?”

  “Ha!” said Hetty. “Her mother will have an orgasm at the very thought.”

  “MOTHER!” said Stephen. “Stop being disgusting.”

  “Stop being bourgeois, darling.”

  IN FACT, HETTY would never relate to anyone the painful conversation that had ensued after Stephen had vanished.

  Angie had turned up on the doorstep—­the back doorstep, of course, she wasn’t going to make that mistake again—­and Mrs. Laird had let her in. Then Angie had let her have it. How her son was being cruel to her daughter; how she was going to take Rosie home to Australia; how badly Hetty had raised him and how dare she let him do this to her. Angie had delivered her speech fluently, then turned around and marched straight out again, and although Hetty would normally have brushed it off like a fly, this time the words had hit home. And the idea of Rosie’s going to Australia truly worried her. Her boy had flourished so well with her; he might be doing an unsuitable job, but he was happy and, more than that, he was at peace. She had healed him in a lot of ways, that Rosie. She didn’t want to have to deal with the fallout if she drove her away.

  Penitent, she had called Peak House, wished them a Merry Christmas. and invited everyone over to lunch on Christmas Day. Angie was slightly hungover and extremely doubtful until Hetty swapped some private words with her, promising to turn on the heating and get someone else to do the cooking, and that was that.

  DAYS STARTED EARLY at the nursing home, and Stephen knew he’d not be in the way. He took out the soft woolen beret in palest baby blue that he’d bought for Lilian and ho ho ho-­ed his way in. They were at breakfast—­kippers and kedgeree and champagne. It made him realize how hungry he was. Cathryn immediately insisted he take the empty place. It was Henry Carr’s, he realized. Next to Lilian.

  Lilian looked at him suspiciously.

  “What do you want?” she asked.

  “Happy Christmas,” said Stephen. “Can’t I come and see my favorite great-­aunt?”

  “You’re being charming. This isn’t like you. What’s the matter? You’re being horrible to Rosie, therefore I hate you. Go away. That’s not your seat anyway.”

  Stephen sat patiently. He knew he deserved it.

  “Well,” he said. “Here’s the thing. I have been a bit distracted, yes. But . . . I’m better now. And also, I had to think about something very important.”

  The excitement that had begun bubbling up in Lilian as soon as she’d seen his tall, spare frame stride through the door, only the slightest limp visible, now threatened to boil over, but she kept her face absolutely poker straight.

  “What’s that then?” she asked. “How to sulk in more than one language at once?’

  Stephen collected himself.

  “I’m sorry about James . . . about Henry.”

  Lilian’s eyes took on a misty expression.

  “Well,” she said. “I would say he’s in a better place.”

  “He’s still my husband, Lilian Hopkins,” growled Ida Delia from across the table, on her third glass of champagne, jealous of the attention. “It’ll be me he’s with in the afterlife.”

  “Only if he was actually really really bad and goes to that other place. The DOWN one,” returned Lilian serenely and turned her attention back to Stephen.

  “Now, where were we?”

  “Well,” said Stephen. “You know Rosie doesn’t have a dad, and I need to ask permission about something from someone who is in loco parentis kind of thing”

  Lilian smiled complacently.

  “Yes,” she said. “I suppose I am the most important person in her life.”

  “Well, after her mum, but I thought it would be respectful—”

  “GET ON WITH IT!” said Ida Delia and one or two of the other old women around the breakfast table, who were all speechless with excitement.

  Stephen opened the box. Hetty had not only looked out the ring, she had had it cleaned and polished up and suggested, rudely, resizing it.

  It had been given to Stephen’s maternal grandmother when she got engaged, and had come down a fair way before that. It was Victorian, a twisted beautiful design of four stones in a larger diamond shape. The stones were small, but of absolute perfect quality, and the gold, worn soft and smooth by years of steady wear
, glowed with its own soft light. It was exquisite.

  “I’ll marry you!” said Theodore Bell, who was a bit of a wag.

  “Alas,” said Stephen. “If only I’d known.”

  But the ghost of a smile was beginning to creep across his stubble.

  “Well, you’ll need to clean yourself up a bit,” grumbled Lilian, but her hands were reverently lifting the beautiful jewels out of their box.

  “I remember your grandmother wearing this,” she said.

  Stephen nodded. “Me too. And it was pretty ancient then.”

  Lilian looked as if she were going to try it on her own finger, then thought better of it.

  “Well,” she said. Then she looked at him, fixing him with her pale eyes.

  “If you ever,” she said. “If you ever dare stop that girl from being happy . . . if I ever so much as see her without a great big beaming smile on her face every single day for the rest of her life, I am going to cripple your other leg. Do you understand?”

  “Yes, ma’am,” said Stephen.

  “And if I am dead and gone, I will come back and haunt you for the rest of your life. Do you understand that too?”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “Actually,” mused Lilian, “I think Henry and I might rather like going around haunting ­people. When we’re together in the Catholic afterlife.”

  Stephen decided it was best just to ignore this.

  “So you give me your blessing?”

  “My darling, stubborn pig-­headed boy, she loves you and you love her and anyone who thinks that kind of thing is easy to come by or worth messing about with is an even bigger idiot than they appear. And they should teach THAT in schools.”

  Stephen kissed her gently on the cheek and thanked her. Then he retreated back into the early-­morning wintry chill.

  THE LAND ROVER was making odd noises, he observed half-­heartedly as he drew closer to the cottage. That was odd: there was no smoke coming from the chimney. As he pulled up outside the door, it was apparent there was nobody there at all. Bugger bugger bugger, she must have gone up to Peak House already. Stephen didn’t really want to do this in front of everybody, but he would have to deal with the fact that if he wanted Rosie, he got her family too—­just as she got his, he reflected.