Two King’s Roads down and no Maria. There had been plenty of suspicious looks as she asked people for information, one or two life stories, and even a leering offer of a drink from a man whose house smelled of stale urine and old cabbage (or perhaps that was just him). The night was getting colder and tentative flakes of snow had started to fall. It was late – Phoebe glanced at her watch under a streetlight to see that it had gone seven. She hadn’t seen many buses run this way during her door-to-door enquiries, and the final King’s Road on her list was across town; it would take at least an hour to reach by foot. She didn’t know what time little kids went to bed but she guessed that it wouldn’t be much later than eight.
It would be a good idea to come back tomorrow, perhaps. But tomorrow might be too late. What if something happened tonight, or tomorrow evening while Phoebe was trying to find their house? There was no coming back tomorrow, Phoebe decided, it had to be tonight. Holding onto that thought, she gritted her teeth, pulled her coat tighter, and prepared to brave the atrocious weather for what she dearly hoped would only be a little longer.
Now freezing cold and iced in a thick coating of snow, Phoebe looked up at the street sign. The final King’s Road had been trickier to find than Google Maps had suggested (it seemed Google thought that scaling the electrified fencing of an industrial estate was an acceptable route and stubbornly refused to show any alternative) and now Phoebe was convinced that Maria would be in bed. Perhaps, however, in the circumstances, that would be best. It might make it easier to explain to her dad what the problem was, although she wasn’t quite sure how that conversation was going to start: You may not recognise me out of context, but I’m that crazy elf-woman from Hendry’s and I may have inadvertently given your cherished daughter a gift that could burn your house to a crisp.
Long rows of well-kept thirties semi-detached properties flanked both sides of the quiet road, each with its own short driveway. Phoebe pulled her snow-covered coat tighter around her (for what little warmth it offered now) and started to trudge to the first house.
The place seemed to be in darkness, but there was a strong, spicy smell percolating through the closed door so Phoebe thought it fair to assume that whoever owned it had cooked recently. After a moment’s hesitation, she knocked at the door. From within came the muffled sounds of banging doors and after a short wait, a light went on in the hallway and the front door opened. A tiny woman wearing a sari greeted Phoebe cautiously.
‘Can I help you?’
‘Sorry to bother you,’ Phoebe began, the enquiry now well-rehearsed. ‘This is going to sound a bit strange but I’m trying to find out where a man and his young daughter live. I know their address is King’s Road but that’s all the information I have… I don’t suppose you know of them? Their name is Andrews…’
The woman shook her head. ‘I know a lot of people to say good morning to but that’s all. There is a man and a little girl who live down at the other end. I don’t know which number and I don’t know what their name is.’
Phoebe’s heart leapt. It wasn’t much to go on but better than she’d had all night.
‘Are they both dark haired? The little girl very pretty?’
The woman smiled. ‘Aren’t all little girls very pretty?’
‘Yeah, of course. Down the other end of the street, you say?’
‘I think so.’
‘Thank you so much,’ Phoebe called behind her as she hurried down the drive.
Down the other end of the street. It had seemed like a simple direction but now that Phoebe was racing down the street, slipping and sliding on the treacherously icy slabs, she wondered just how far down the other end she was supposed to go? Without a better plan, she hurried all the way and found herself standing at the very last house of the row, intending to knock there first, then cross over and knock at the last house on the other side, working her way along in a zig-zag until she’d covered them all. The snow was steadily worsening and the cold now seeped right through into Phoebe’s bones. With a deep breath, she decided to get through these next few houses now and sort this mess once and for all so she could get home for a well earned bath and glass, or two, or maybe half a bottle of wine…
‘Hello, sorry to bother you but –’
‘Whatever you’re selling I don’t want it.’
Phoebe’s mouth fell open as the old man slammed the door. ‘Good evening to you too,’ she muttered as she stalked down the drive and made her way across the road to the next house.
‘Hello,’ she said with as much politeness as her now waning patience could muster as the door was opened, ‘this is going to sound strange, but I wondered if you could tell me whether you know of a man and a little girl by the name of Andrews? I think they live on this street –’
‘Oh!’ The woman’s pleasantly round face lit up. ‘You mean Jack?’
‘His daughter is Maria?’
‘Yes. Such a sweet little thing. Always offers me sweeties when I see her. Jack feeds the cat for me when I go away. Friend of Jack’s, are you? He never mentioned he had a lady friend…’
Phoebe waited with growing impatience for a break in the stream of words issuing forth, but it didn’t seem as though the woman was planning to breathe any time soon. Finally, she cleared her throat loudly and the woman stopped momentarily, Phoebe taking advantage of her hesitation to get a word in.
‘Do you know which house they live in?’
The woman looked faintly surprised. ‘Why, they live next door…’
‘Next door?’
The woman leaned out from her porch and pointed to the adjoining house. ‘Just there…’
‘Brilliant! Thanks!’ Phoebe turned and ran down the drive. The woman continued to speak, but Phoebe had stopped listening.
Standing at the door of the right house, Phoebe suddenly found herself gripped with nerves. What was she going to say? She stepped backwards away from the door, and glanced around to see that the neighbour she had just been speaking to was still watching her with interest. Phoebe rapped at the door and waited, now beginning to shiver uncontrollably. Every part of her body felt cold, even beneath her clothes. The door opened… And there he was.
‘Hi!’ He stared at her, a look of incomprehension on his face.
Phoebe gave him a weak smile. ‘This is going to sound so weird, but –’
‘Coooeeee! Jack!’
They both turned to see the neighbour lean over the fence waving.
‘Doreen, you’ll catch pneumonia out in this snow,’ Jack said, raising his eyebrows.
‘Oh I’ll be okay… I was just telling your lady friend, how you feed my cat and Maria gives me sweeties…’
Jack glanced at Phoebe and shrugged apologetically. ‘Do you want to step into the hall for a moment?’ He inclined his head very slightly towards his neighbour and mouthed something. Phoebe couldn’t tell what it was, but she understood the meaning just the same.
‘Oh, thanks.’ Phoebe stepped into the porch while Jack called out to his neighbour.
‘See you later Doreen. Thanks for helping.’
Doreen was still waffling as the front door closed.
‘What brings you here?’ If Jack was surprised about how she had come to find them he didn’t let it show, he simply waited patiently for her reply.
‘I know this is going to sound a bit crazy, but… is Maria in bed?’
Jack nodded.
‘It’s just that the pony I gave you… I mean, the store gave you… there was a product recall on it. I had to find you because it’s dangerous, it might catch fire if it’s near a naked flame…’
‘Well…’ Jack replied thoughtfully, ‘it’s very good of Hendry’s to send people round. Usually there’s just a notice up in the shop and hard cheese if you don’t see it.’ He gave her a warm smile. ‘A bit above and beyond the call of duty for you, though, eh?’
‘You could say that,’ Phoebe replied, shivering again.
‘You look freezing,’ Jack said. ‘You want a
hot drink?’
‘Um… what about the pony?’
‘Oh… We don’t have any open fires. No fire at all, in fact, only radiators.’
‘Oh,’ Phoebe replied, suddenly feeling foolish.
‘So you think the toy will be alright?’
Phoebe shrugged. She’d come all this way… for what?
‘Please…’ Jack said, breaking in on her thoughts. ‘Have a warm drink and get dry before you go. Did you come on foot?’
Phoebe nodded.
‘I thought so. The snow seems to be getting worse.’ He frowned slightly. ‘I’d offer to run you to wherever you need to be but Maria is in bed and I can’t leave her alone in the house…’
Phoebe waved away the apology. ‘God, I wouldn’t ask you to do that.’
‘I know. It would have been my pleasure, though, any other time. But a hot drink I can definitely do.’
Phoebe followed him into the kitchen. It was clean and bright – white units with glass doors, pastel walls and a delicately patterned roman blind at the window. Phoebe wondered who had chosen it – had it been Maria’s mother?
He turned around from the sink where he was filling the kettle. ‘You could hang your coat on the radiator for a while. And stick your shoes underneath. They won’t be perfectly dry but it might make them feel a bit more comfortable when you get them back on.’
‘I don’t want to get your chairs all wet though,’ Phoebe replied, aware that her jeans were also soaked through.
He smiled. ‘Don’t worry about that. You came all this way to do a good deed; the least I can do is let you sit down for a bit.’
A good deed? Phoebe hadn’t really looked at it like that. She removed her coat and shoes; Jack took them from her, arranging them around the radiator as she sat gingerly on a lacquered wooden chair. The house was quiet and tidy; she never imagined a house where a young child lived could be this calm.
‘I think you deserve a hot chocolate, too, if you’d rather that than tea or coffee?’ Jack rattled around in the back of a cupboard. ‘Ah! Maria hasn’t quite finished it all.’
He turned to Phoebe and held up a tin of Cadbury’s with a warm smile that jolted into life some long forgotten feeling in Phoebe, something that she had thought would never come back, and that she felt she didn’t deserve again.
Oh no you don’t, lady…
‘Chocolate would be lovely, actually, as long as I’m not depriving your daughter,’ Phoebe said, unable to prevent her own smile.
Jack pulled his face. ‘I don’t think she gets deprived of anything. There’s enough sugar in this cupboard to induce an instant coma if you were stupid enough to eat it all.’
‘I’ll make sure I don’t get too tempted then,’ Phoebe laughed.
The kettle clicked off and Jack busied himself preparing a drink for them both as Phoebe gazed at her surroundings. The fridge was covered in bright drawings held on by cute animal magnets. Jack turned to her and noticed the direction of her gaze.
‘That’s supposed to be me,’ he said, nodding at a particularly large picture. ‘Looks more like a mutant zombie with spades for hands.’
‘Don’t let Maria hear you say that.’
‘Thing is, it’s a scarily accurate representation.’
Phoebe’s laughter became louder, and then she checked herself quickly, remembering that Maria was asleep. ‘It really isn’t,’ she said with an inexplicable sudden shyness.
‘Here you go,’ Jack said as he placed a sweet smelling mug in front of her. ‘I hope it’s not too watery… and I’m fresh out of cream and marshmallows.’
Phoebe cupped her hands around the mug, the warmth in her hands instantly making her feel much better. ‘Thanks, it looks just the job. Marshmallows are overrated anyway.’
Jack took a seat across from her with his own mug.
‘Your house is nice,’ Phoebe said, casting around for something to talk about and instantly regretting her choice of subject. What if Maria’s mother had designed all the décor?
‘I can’t take the credit for that, I’m afraid,’ Jack said with a warm smile. ‘Maria and I only moved here this summer. Lucky for us the previous owners of the house had such good taste that we didn’t need to do much to make it habitable.’
‘That’s good.’
‘Do you have to get back to work?’ Jack asked.
‘No. I finished hours ago, actually.’
‘I thought it was a bit late. But I just wondered, you know, as you were here…’
Phoebe shrugged. ‘I suppose it could have waited until tomorrow, but I’ve never been one for waiting.’
Jack smiled. ‘I wish I could say the same.’
‘Maria’s a little spark, isn’t she?’ Phoebe said, sensing a change of subject was needed.
‘She’s amazing. If it hadn’t been for her…’
What? If it hadn’t been for Maria, what? So much for a change of subject… Now the question burned to escape from Phoebe’s mouth, even though it was probably strictly out of bounds and none of her business anyway. Why was he still alone? ‘It’s just you and her then?’ she asked instead.
‘She needs me and I need her,’ he said with a fond glance towards the doorway, beyond which, at the top of the stairs, Maria slept. ‘She’s my little rock.’
‘That’s good…’ Phoebe paused. A little rock would have been a nice thing to have after Vik’s death, instead of guilt, eating her from the inside out.
‘Do you mind me asking…?’ Jack began, filling their silence, ‘why did you come around here?’
‘I don’t know what you mean.’ Phoebe frowned. ‘I came because of the recall notice.’
‘Shops don’t usually track people down individually over product recalls.’
‘This was a pretty dangerous one.’
He shrugged. ‘Even so…’ he said carefully. ‘It’s good of you to go to so much trouble.’
‘It was no trouble.’
‘Really?’ He raised his eyebrows. ‘But you would have had to find out our address?
‘Santa knows everyone’s address.’
Jack smiled. ‘So he does. And I suppose that goes for his elves too?’
‘His elves have no magic but they do have a nifty sideline in detective work.’ Phoebe sipped at her drink. ‘I suppose it seems a bit stalkerish, me turning up like this, but it isn’t meant to be.’
‘I appreciate that you didn’t want Maria to come to any harm. It’s sweet.’
‘She’s sweet.’
‘I get the feeling you would have done the same thing for any child.’
‘You think? You obviously haven’t met my nephew then.’
There was a pause. ‘You gave Maria that pony, didn’t you?’
Phoebe stared at him. Her mouth opened and closed but no sound came out as she tried to formulate a reply that wouldn’t sound nutty.
‘In case you’re worried, I don’t think it’s weird,’ he said.
‘You don’t? Most people would.’
‘I suppose Maria got to you. People always feel sorry for her like that when they find out she has no mum.’
‘So she gets showered with guilt gifts wherever she goes?’
Jack laughed. ‘I wouldn’t put it quite like that. And no, not exactly showered with gifts – certainly not as generous as yours anyway. People take pity on her though. She has a knack of appealing to their better natures.’
‘She’s so cute,’ Phoebe excused, feeling herself blush slightly. ‘And it seems like you do a great job of looking after her alone, because she clearly adores you.’
He smiled as he took a sip of his drink. ‘She’s looking forward to Christmas so much this year. I think it’s the first year she really understands what it’s all about.’
‘It must be lovely to have that to look forward to.’
He watched Phoebe carefully as she took a drink. ‘Despite the elf get-up, you seem as though you’re not looking forward to Christmas very much. Not a fan?’
Phoebe shrugged. ‘I used to love it. But now it has bad memories.’
‘I know what you mean. But I try to make it good for Maria. We lost Maria’s mum around the beginning of December.’ He held her in a questioning gaze. ‘Who did you lose?’
Phoebe paused, measuring her own reply, astonished at his guesswork. She hardly knew Jack and she wasn’t sure she was strong enough to talk about Vik without crying – at least, not in her currently agitated state. The last thing she wanted to do was burst into tears in front of a virtual stranger. As Jack had already volunteered information about Maria’s mother, it seemed safer territory to be in. ‘Does Maria remember her mum?’
‘She died in childbirth.’
Phoebe clapped a hand to her mouth. ‘God, I am so sorry…’
‘I know, people are always shocked. You think that women don’t die having babies anymore. Not true.’
‘I don’t know what to say.’
‘There’s nothing you can say. It happened and we deal with it. You didn’t answer my question, by the way…’
There was a noise from the doorway, and they both turned to see Maria rubbing her eyes.
‘Elf lady!’ she squeaked, suddenly wide-awake as she saw Phoebe. ‘You came to see us!’
‘Hey Maria,’ Phoebe said, glancing at Jack to see if he was annoyed that Maria was up, but he simply smiled at her.
‘What are you doing awake, Pumpkin?’ Jack asked, getting up from his chair and gathering Maria into his arms. He took her back to the table and sat her on his knee.
‘I heard you laughing and talking,’ Maria replied.
‘Sorry,’ Phoebe said, ‘I think that was me.’
‘I don’t mind.’ Maria grinned at Phoebe and then peered into Jack’s mug. ‘Is that chocolate?’
Jack pushed it towards her. ‘You want to share it with me?’
‘Uh huh,’ Maria nodded. She turned her huge eyes to Phoebe. ‘I knew you’d come.’
‘How could I refuse you?’ Phoebe laughed.
The Spring of Second Chances : An absolutely perfect and uplifting romantic comedy Page 45