Christmas Under a Starlit Sky

by Holly Martin

  Ivy put the chocolate box back and hopped down from the chair.

  If only her own love life was as simple to sort out.

  There was a knock on Neve’s door later that day, after she had spent the rest of the day lying on the sofa, feeling sorry for herself. She opened it and was delighted to see Oakley standing on her doorstep. Maybe he had forgiven her though that hope was quickly quashed when she saw his angry face.

  ‘I’m not here for you, I’m here to read to my son.’

  Neve blinked in surprise.

  ‘I bumped into Finn and Joy in the village and they lent me some children’s books. I know that babies can hear voices and music in the womb and it’s important that my son hears my voice too.’

  Neve swallowed down the lump of emotion in her throat. She didn’t dare explain that babies couldn’t hear until at least eighteen weeks, she was just glad he was there.

  ‘OK,’ she said, quietly.

  She sat down at one end of the sofa and Oakley sat awkwardly next to her for a moment. She didn’t say anything, she didn’t know what she could say. She had ruined everything and she didn’t know how to fix it.

  Oakley shuffled around so he was lying on his front and his face was next to her stomach. He picked up one of the books from the bulging bag and opened it to the first page. He cleared his throat, obviously embarrassed about reading in front of her.

  ‘Just pretend I’m not here,’ Neve suggested, gently.

  ‘Oh, I will,’ Oakley muttered, angrily, and Neve looked away so he wouldn’t see the hurt on her face.

  She jumped suddenly, when she felt his hands on her, gently rolling up his shirt she was wearing and exposing her tiny baby bump. He ran his fingers softly over the bump, which was hugely intimate, and he must have realised that because he immediately stopped.

  ‘So, little bear, you got really unlucky and ended up with me as your dad. I’m not good at the practical stuff, I’ll probably fail spectacularly at changing your nappy and I’ll probably make your bath water too cold because I’ll be scared about getting it too hot. I won’t always be around a lot as I’ll be in America and your mommy will be over here but I promise to love you with everything I have and I’ll come and see you as often as I can. I’m going to read you a few stories now. You’ll have to let me know which books you like.’

  Oakley started reading about a daddy bear who couldn’t sleep and Neve smiled at the wonderful singsong tone of voice he used. He even used different voices for the characters. He was a complete natural. Once or twice he turned the pictures towards the bump as if the tiny baby had the powers to see through the walls of the womb, though knowing his dad’s superpowers he probably could.

  He got to the end of the story and immediately picked another book from the bag. Judging by how many books were inside, Oakley planned to be there a while. He could stay as long as he wanted as far as she was concerned. Hopefully for the rest of the night.

  He opened the book and started reading The Gruffalo to the bump. She wanted this life with him, she wanted to raise their son with him, to have him there to read the baby stories every night. She couldn’t deny their baby that. Even if they weren’t together, she needed to make sure the child had this wonderful man in his life, not just once every few months but every day.

  He got to the end of The Gruffalo and picked up another book, clearly not leaving any time for her to talk to him, but for once she was happy to be quiet and listen to him.

  He started reading a book called Guess How Much I Love You. As he read the first page, which was about a baby hare trying to tell Big Hare how much he loved him, Oakley reached out again and rested his hand on her bump. As Baby Hare and Big Hare competed with how much they loved each other, tears filled Neve’s eyes and fell down her cheeks. Sobs tore from her throat but Oakley carried on reading but as he turned the pages she noticed he was crying too, his voice was choked, tears filling his eyes, and by the time he reached the last page and Big Hare declared that he loved Baby Hare to the moon and back, Neve was nearly full-on wailing.

  Oakley tossed the book to one side and pulled her into his arms as she sobbed against him.

  ‘I’m so sorry,’ she cried into his chest.

  ‘Don’t cry, Freckle, it kills me to see you cry. It was never going to work between us, you know that. My job would mean I’d be travelling a lot and your work is important to you here. And I was too immature for you. We’re too different. We had fun and it was silly of me to want something more than that. But we’re going to have a child together so we need to be friends if we’re going to make this parenting thing work but we can’t be more than that.’

  ‘I ruined everything.’

  ‘No, it never would have lasted. I was trying to force it and you kept pushing me away. You knew we weren’t meant to be together, that was why you were so reluctant to come with me to America, but we can still be friends. I’ll come over here as often as I can and maybe you can bring our little bear over to see me occasionally. I’d pay, of course.’

  Neve could do nothing but cry as he gently extricated himself from her arms and stood up.

  ‘I’m staying in Mistletoe Lodge in the village tonight and my helicopter is picking me up early tomorrow morning so I better get my things and leave now.’

  She watched as he moved upstairs and came down a few moments later, stuffing his clothes in his bag.

  ‘Will you let me know what date your twenty-week scan is?’

  She nodded numbly.

  He leaned forward and kissed her on the head. ‘Take care of yourself, Freckle.’

  And with that he walked out of the house and didn’t look back.

  As Adam strolled through the village towards Ivy’s house, he looked up at the vast sky that seemed to stretch on forever. In London he never saw the stars and sky as clearly as this. There was too much pollution to ever be able to sit back and enjoy it. Everything felt so much cleaner here. Coming here was the best decision he had made in years so he knew he had to make this work with Ivy. He refused to let it fizzle and die before it had properly started.

  As he approached Ivy’s door, he was sure he saw the curtains flicker next door, where Deborah was no doubt watching him with her beady eyes. He felt like giving her a cheery wave but decided against it.

  The door was unlocked and as he could see Ivy moving around in the workshop out the back, he let himself in. She looked up and smiled at him, which he took to be a good sign. Ivy wiped paint off her hands and then walked over to him, sliding her hands round his neck before he’d even uttered a word.

  ‘Hi.’

  ‘Hello,’ Adam said, mystified by this sudden change in direction. The morning before things had been so tense, even if Ivy had pretended everything was fine, and last night she hadn’t even wanted to see him.

  ‘I’m an idiot,’ she said, leaning her forehead against his chest so she didn’t have to look at him.

  ‘You’re definitely not that.’ He tilted her chin back up to face him.

  ‘I’m so scared of the future that I’m stopping myself enjoying the present.’

  ‘I obviously said something to upset you yesterday morning, want to tell me what it was?’

  She nodded. ‘We need to talk, I know that. I haven’t been in a relationship since my divorce and I just don’t know how to deal with all the fallout from that marriage. I’m so scared of getting hurt again and of you walking away from me just like Callum and I feel like I’m overthinking everything. I know I’m not making any sense.’

  ‘Not really, but you’re not going to scare me away.’

  ‘You seem to have infinite patience. Why don’t you come and have a shower with me?’ She smiled as she stepped away from him and took his hand, leading him upstairs. ‘We can talk after, I promise.’

  He smiled. ‘After what?’

  Ivy laughed. ‘After the shower, of course. Get your mind out of the gutter, I’m not that kind of girl!’

  Adam caught up with her, wrapping his
arm around her stomach and kissing her neck. ‘I think, after the other night, we’ve already established you are that kind of girl.’

  Ivy giggled and wriggled from his grasp and ran up the stairs ahead of him. He laughed and ran after her.

  There was another knock on Neve’s door later that evening. She had cried for hours since Oakley had left, her eyes were red and sore and she felt so exhausted. She didn’t have any hope that the person at the door was Oakley, all hope had now gone. So she wasn’t disappointed to see Gabe and Pip standing there.

  Pip took one look at her face and immediately stepped forward and enveloped her in a big hug.

  Gabe shuffled them both in and closed the door behind them, then he was hugging her too.

  ‘It’s really over,’ Neve said, wiping away her tears. ‘There’s no way back from this now.’

  Pip took her hand and led her to the sofa, sitting down next to her, and Gabe sat on her other side.

  ‘He hasn’t left yet,’ Pip said. ‘He came over here, flew thousands of miles to fight for you. Now it’s your turn to fight for him.’

  ‘What can I say that I haven’t already said?’ Neve asked, hopelessly.

  ‘Luke said you were worried that you weren’t good enough for him,’ Gabe said.

  ‘I did think that,’ she admitted.

  ‘Why on earth would you think something like that? You’re an amazing, fantastic person. Oakley would be very lucky to have someone like you in his life.’

  ‘Some of it came from his mum. She said I wasn’t pretty enough or famous enough to go out with Oakley. She said that if I cared for him, I would let him go as he deserved to have someone much more glamorous in his life.’

  ‘She did not say that?’ Pip said, her eyes wide and angry.

  Neve nodded, sadly. ‘And as I was feeling vulnerable when I first started going out with him after what happened with Zander and fearful that it would happen all over again I allowed myself to think maybe she was right. I started to have doubts. Zander dumped me for someone beautiful and famous and I could suddenly see myself falling in love with Oakley and it happening all over again. His mum said that I had nothing special enough to keep him interested, that I was nothing more than a novelty to him after all the dancers, models and actresses he’d slept with over the years and that novelty would soon fade away. She said the best thing I could do for him was to finish things with him. I didn’t want to hold him back in his career because of his association with me and all the travelling he would do to come and see me, so when his time came to an end in London, I thought the best thing for him was for me to let him go.’

  ‘Does he know she said all that stuff to you?’ Gabe asked.

  Neve shook her head. ‘I didn’t want to come between them. I know he resented her interfering with his work but he’s still close to her.’

  ‘But he needs to know. All of this dumping him, pushing him away, came about because of her. If you have any chance of saving your relationship, he needs to know the truth.’

  Neve hesitated.

  ‘You were so happy with him and then she came to the hotel to visit him and you were never the same after that,’ Gabe continued.

  ‘She caused your fear of the past repeating itself to rear its ugly head,’ Pip added. ‘The one thing that I learned from what happened with Gabe, I think the one thing we both learned, is that you can’t let what happened in your past define what happens in your future. If we had both let our fear of the past happening again stop us from getting involved with each other, we would never have what we have now and I would have missed out on this incredible loving man being in my life, my soul mate.’

  Gabe grinned at her, reaching across Neve to take Pip’s hand. ‘Oakley’s mum might have been the catalyst but that fear that you weren’t good enough was there for her to be able to poke at in the first place. Don’t let it rule you and don’t let it ruin your life. If you do then Zander wins all over again.’

  Neve stared into the flames of the fire. They were right. She wasn’t going to let Zander win, and she wasn’t going to let Oakley’s mum win either. She and Oakley belonged together and she had to do everything in her power to get him back.

  It was the very early hours of the morning when Adam got out of bed, leaving Ivy to sleep. Outside of the confines of the duvet it was cold and, not entirely sure where his clothes had been thrown, he grabbed her pink towelling robe and pulled it on before heading to the kitchen to make himself a drink. They hadn’t talked. They had kissed and made love and laughed, but Adam couldn’t escape the feeling they were just papering over the cracks.

  He poured himself a cup of coffee and as his feet were cold against the wooden floor, he pulled his boots on and padded down the stairs. He looked around the workshop at all the paintings stacked up against the wall, ready for framing or displaying in the shop. Ivy had so much talent. At the back of the shop were loads of photos, some in frames, others pinned to the walls. He stepped closer to take a look as he sipped his coffee.

  There were several landscape photos of the island and several others of various unknown locations; some of them looked very tropical and others extremely remote and barren. She clearly used them for her inspiration.

  There were other photos of people in frames and he picked one up. They were photos of one young couple and their children in various stages of growing up. He realised these weren’t just photos of random people but obviously people that Ivy knew and cared about. As he looked around the back of the room, he saw there were loads of them, particularly of the children.

  ‘My nieces and nephews,’ Ivy said, from behind him.

  ‘They look beautiful. I bet they’re real characters,’ Adam replied, turning and noticing she was wearing his jumper, which came down almost to her knees, and big bear paw slippers.

  ‘They are.’ She stepped closer and picked up a frame of a lanky boy, covered in mud, with a rugby ball under his arm and the biggest grin on his face. ‘Archie is ten and the most amazing artist. He does comic book graphics and drawings and he is so talented at it. He creates all his own comic books and makes up the stories. I’m sure he’ll be working for Marvel or someone like that one day.’

  Adam smiled at the fondness she obviously had for her nephew as he handed her a photo of a little blonde girl dressed as a pirate.

  ‘That’s Quinn, she’s seven and I’m sure she’ll be on the stage when she’s older. She sings all the time, loves getting dressed up and is the most confident child I know. The one you have there is of Imogen, Rachel and Drew. I love them all to pieces. Do you have any nieces or nephews?’

  He nodded. ‘Oliver is eight and Megan is five.’

  Ivy smiled, sadly, and put the pictures of Quinn and Archie back on the shelf and Adam knew he had to be honest with her.

  ‘I always wanted a child of my own. My ex-girlfriend got pregnant and I was over the moon. I went out and bought all the stuff straight away, a cot, the car seat, all the nappies and baby clothes, probably a hundred teddies. When she miscarried we were both absolutely devastated.’

  Ivy stared at him with wide tear-filled eyes.

  ‘I’m so sorry.’

  ‘It’s OK. I was heartbroken. We never recovered from that and we broke up soon after. I threw myself into my job and I’ve not been with anyone since. I tell myself and anyone else that asks that I don’t really mind if I don’t have children as it’s easier than telling people how disappointed I am that it never happened for me.’

  ‘You broke up with your girlfriend because of the miscarriage?’ Ivy said, her voice no more than a whisper.

  He nodded and to his surprise she took a step away from him and then another, staring at him as if she didn’t know him any more.

  ‘I think you should go.’

  She walked to the front door and flung it open.

  ‘Wait! What?’ Adam said, beyond confused.

  ‘You need to leave. This. Us. It was a terrible mistake.’

  ‘What are you talking
about? I don’t understand.’

  She walked out onto the street and he followed her.

  ‘Ivy, what’s wrong?’

  She put her hands to her face and screamed into them in frustration. ‘I’m such an idiot! I did it again, I fell for it again.’

  ‘Ivy, please, talk to me.’ He reached for her but once more she stepped away from him.

  ‘I don’t want to see you again.’

  Ivy walked back into the shop and closed the door, locking it behind her. Adam stood out on the street in shock as he watched her move back upstairs. It took him about five seconds to realise that the only things he was wearing were her dressing gown and his boots.

  Chapter 19

  The sun hadn’t even risen when Neve banged on Oakley’s door. She had spent hours trying to come up with the perfect speech to get him back but still she had nothing and she was running out of time. There was no movement from within and she suddenly got scared that he had already left.

  She turned the handle and was relieved when the door opened. She let herself in just as Oakley came running down the stairs, wearing only his jeans. Halfway down he stopped and stared at her. He looked dishevelled and as if he hadn’t slept either.

  ‘The door was open,’ Neve explained, lamely.

  ‘Security is lax round here.’ He came down the last few stairs and stood in the lounge, his hands in his pockets.

  ‘I thought you might have gone.’

  ‘The helicopter comes at half nine, that’s not for another five hours yet.’

  ‘We need to talk.’

  He gestured to the sofa and she sat down. He sat down on the sofa opposite her.

  She had to say something, anything to give them another chance. She thought of what she could say, something that would make him forgive her. A hundred possibilities ran through her mind but none of them seemed good enough.