The Little Christmas Kitchen

by Jenny Oliver

  At the end of the corridor was a model red bus and a stack of fliers for a London city tour. A man in a chauffeur’s hat and a badge saying, ‘Ask me about the Christmas bus! All aboard!’ was leaning up against the edge of the stand, surreptitiously checking his phone. When Maddy took a flier he didn’t even look up.

  ‘Is it good?’ she asked, turning the flier over and seeing pictures of Regent Street and the London Eye all glowing with lights.

  ‘Dunno. Never been.’ he said, sliding his phone into his pocket and then readjusting his hat. Maddy raised a brow. ‘You’re really selling it to me.’

  He shrugged.

  ‘Well I’ll take my chance.’ she said with a laugh as she walked away, folding the flier into her pocket – even he couldn’t tarnish the shine. She wandered on, joined the snaking queue for passport control and whiled away the time thinking about open-topped bus rides in the snow, walking into the Royal Albert Hall in some kind of full length gown and pearls, and sipping vin chaud along the Southbank while buying trinkets and… what was that picture on the flier? She turned it over – yep, ice-skating in front of the London Eye.

  It was going to be the best Christmas ever.

  ‘I’m sorry madam, that’s all the baggage that’s been unloaded.’

  Maddy bit her bottom lip. She’d been watching the hatch, waiting for her luggage to appear for the last forty minutes. ‘It can’t be. My bag’s not here.’

  ‘That’s all the baggage that was on the plane, madam,’ a woman in a creased white shirt and black trousers said with just enough sympathy to make sure it all stayed official. ‘I can give you a form to fill in and we can send the bag to you when we’ve located it.’

  ‘Well, where is it?’ Maddy said, plaintive. Tiredness was beginning to catch up with her.

  The woman gave a tight smile. ‘I assure you madam, we’ll do everything we can to locate the luggage.’

  Maddy looked at her name badge. ‘Janice. Please. I really need my bag. It has my clothes and stuff.’ The bag had Maddy’s life in it. It had her music, it had her favourite books, her clothes for her new job, it had her Christmas presents, all bagged up by her granny. She closed her eyes because for a moment she thought she might cry. She was exhausted, it was late, she hadn’t eaten the plane food, that man had shouted at her, one of her favourite jumpers was torn, and she suddenly remembered that at the bottom of her bag was her mum’s recipe book that she’d swiped at the last minute to remind her of home.

  Her leaving hadn’t been quite the Hollywood send off she’d hoped for. It had all been ok until Dimitri had appeared with his Jeep and thrown her bag into the back. Her mum had stood in front of her and said, ‘If it doesn’t work out Maddy, just come straight back. Just get on a plane. Ok?’

  And Maddy, about to give her a hug, had pulled back and said, ‘Why can’t you just say, good luck? Why do you have to presume that I’m going to fail?’ She’d looked away for a moment, seeing the fronds of the Christmas branches sticking out from the taverna doorway, the big gold star wobbling from its precarious perch on the top, and realising with a jolt that for the first time in years she wasn’t going to be home for Christmas.

  ‘I don’t think you’re going to fail, Maddy, I’m just–’ Her mum paused, wiped her hands on her apron, ‘I’m going to miss you is all.’

  For a moment Maddy wanted to wave Dimitri away, tell him that she no longer needed a lift. But then Ella stepped forward out of the darkness and leaned against the doorframe, watching. And something rose up inside Maddy. The same thing that had made her apply for the job in the first place. The need to prove herself. Like finally she had to go and see who she could become, just as Ella had done. Seen through Ella’s eyes, she felt weak.

  ‘I’d better go.’ she’d said, ‘I don’t want to miss my plane.’ Then she’d smiled and stepped forward and given her mum a hug. Felt the familiar sharpness of her shoulder blades and softness of her waist, the enveloping comfort of Penhaligon’s Orange Blossom and Pantene and the warmth of the kiss on her cheek. ‘Bye Mum.’ She’d had to look up to the sky with big wide eyes to dry the moisture.

  ‘Bye honey. Good luck.’ Her mum had taken a step back and smoothed down her apron.

  Maddy had jumped into the Jeep and when Dimitri was clearly about to ask if she was ok, she’d given him a look, and he’d slipped into first and they’d driven off up the hill. Her mum and the taverna getting smaller and smaller in the wing mirror.

  ‘Are you all right, madam?’ She felt Janice’s hand on her shoulder. Her bottom lip wobbled.

  Come on, Maddy. She shouted at herself in her head. Grow up. This is your big adventure. FFS. Don’t you dare cry. Don’t you dare.

  ‘Yes, thanks, I’m fine.’ Maddy nodded.

  ‘Come on.’ Janice said, giving her arm a little squeeze. ‘I think I’ve got some mince pies at the desk.’

  CHAPTER 11

  ELLA

  ‘You tie it up behind you.’ Ella saw Dimitri’s lips twitch in a smile as she picked up her apron.

  ‘I can see that, thank you.’ She thought of her last holiday where she’d stayed at a five-star boutique yurt in the Serengeti. She’d complained because the wifi didn’t work and Max had thrown a tantrum when he hadn’t seen all of the Big Five. She stood in the entrance to the taverna, the sky a sharp wintery blue, the remains of old swifts’ nests cluttering the eaves of the awning, Dimitri sitting with the ankle of one leg crossed over the knee of his other, sipping an espresso, the smells of home baked croissants, thick cut toast and gloopy marmalade, strong coffee and cigarettes swirling like smoke through the cool of the morning – making her nose suddenly wrinkle up with unexpected emotion. She had a sudden flash of her ten year old self here on holidays, belting into the sea dragging a windsurfer behind her, the only complication in her life being how to get the bloody sail to stay up as she wobbled in the water.

  She was fumbling trying to tie a bow in her apron round her back, realising that her white jeans might not have been the best idea for her first day waitressing, when a young, good-looking couple walked past and said, ‘Hi there.’ The woman was in a thin black cashmere top and long shorts while the man wore chinos and a polo shirt with the collar turned up, a sweater was slung round his shoulders and aviator sunglasses looped into his button hole. They were clearly staying at the hotel round the corner and Ella thought that her and Max had quite possibly had dinner with them one summer. The woman, she thought, was called Susan… no Suki, yes that was it, because that was the name of their cat when they’d been growing up. Suki and Pedro. He was a banker. Big guffawing laugh. Max had played golf with him.

  ‘Hi,’ she smiled, pushing her hair out of her eyes and thinking now that she was glad she’d made an effort with her appearance. ‘How are you?’

  ‘Fine.’ The guy, Pedro, smiled. ‘And you?’

  ‘Great, thanks. It’s good to see you.’

  ‘You too.’ He nodded.

  Ella nodded back, still smiling, they all looked at each other for a second or two, but then Suki glanced at Pedro and Pedro looked at Ella and when still no one said anything, Pedro said, ‘A table for two.’

  ‘Oh.’ Ella felt her cheeks start to pink. ‘Of course.’ They had absolutely no idea who she was. She grabbed two menus and started to walk towards a table at the jetty edge. ‘You know we er–’ But she stopped when she saw that they weren’t looking at her at all. In fact they seemed to see straight through her, like she was simply a dark outline obscuring their view of the glistening water.

  She heard Dimitri snigger as she stopped what she was saying mid-sentence. The couple sat down and Pedro said, ‘Boiled egg for me, fruit salad for my wife. Yoghurt on the side, grape juice, one orange – freshly squeezed, a couple of days ago we had the carton stuff and I don’t want that again. And a pot of strong tea – real milk, none of that UHT crap.’ Then he smiled, handed her back the menu without having looked at it, and slipped his aviators on.

  It took Ella a second to
realise that this was her job and she should write it all down on the pad her mum had given her.

  ‘Hey Ella,’ Dimitri called as she walked back, a little stunned, to the kitchen. ‘Tell your mum that Maddy texted, all good apparently, she’s loving it.’

  Ella nodded, images of Maddy – lounging on her beautiful charcoal velvet sofa, drinking her Vita Coco, and spritzing herself with Chanel Mademoiselle while Ella schlepped around taking breakfast orders from her peers – made her lips tighten in frustration.

  ‘Maddy’s apparently having a wonderful time.’ she said as she walked into the kitchen.

  Her mum looked up from where she was grilling strips of thin streaky bacon so it snapped, crisp. Pans of eggs were sizzling and fat red tomatoes spat and hissed in bubbling olive oil. The big table at the end of the jetty was filled by a group of artists who came every winter to paint, and couldn’t start without one of Sophie’s infamous full English breakfasts.

  ‘Is that a new order?’ her mum said without any comment about Maddy, and nodded her head towards the top sheet of Ella’s pad.

  The atmosphere between them had been frosty since Ella had offered Maddy the money. She’d booked the next available flight to Heathrow so they’d only spent one night together in the room above the taverna – Ella in the big bed, Maddy on the small single. Ella had got undressed in the bathroom and then got into bed with her book. The only thing they’d said to each other was, ‘Night’ before rolling over to face in opposite directions.

  But when Ella had woken up in the middle of the night, the room so black that she couldn’t see her hand in front of her face, she had turned over and heard Maddy say, ‘Are you awake?’

  She hadn’t replied.

  ‘I’m kind of scared.’ Maddy whispered. ‘Not really scared, just a bit.’

  Silence.

  ‘You remember when we flew to see Dad and Mum made us wear sticky name badges with our address and phone numbers on them?’ She laughed softly, ‘I kind of want a name badge. I think I’ll be ok though. I hope so. When I imagined going I had you there in my imagination. You know, just in case.’

  Ella heard Maddy roll over, bunch the covers up around her. ‘I suppose there’s always Dad…’ she carried on, then paused before she said, ‘I don’t know if he’d see me though.’ Her voice going up at the end of her whisper as if it was a question.

  Ella still didn’t say anything. But she had lain awake for hours afterwards thinking that she should have replied.

  ‘Ella–’ her mum called, ‘Can you make the coffee?’

  ‘What?’ Ella looked up from where she’d been staring at her pad.

  ‘The coffee? The jugs are in the corner, remember I showed you?’

  ‘Oh right. Yes.’ Ella and Max had a housekeeper who came most mornings to clean their flat, iron Max’s shirts and make them breakfast. As a throwback from Max’s boarding school days, he liked a bowl of porridge followed by a bacon sandwich and HP sauce every morning and when he’d realised that Ella could make neither porridge nor coffee or make bacon just the way he liked it, he’d hired Rose – a middle-aged woman with a huge chest who reminded him of his house mistress.

  ‘Ella, what are you doing?’ her mum asked as she walked past her carrying a tray piled high with plates of eggs, bowls of glistening mushrooms and stacks of golden, buttery toast. ‘That’s too much. You take the plunger out before you put the coffee in. Jesus, Ella do you not know how to make coffee?’

  Ella didn’t drink hot drinks. She never had. She couldn’t understand why people would want to drink anything hot. Her mum had always given her an orange juice when everyone else had had tea.

  The idea that her mum had forgotten that made her silent.

  ‘I don’t know how you and Max live sometimes.’ She shook her head. ‘Here, coffee, water, plunger. Ok?’ Then she strode out, clearly stressed, balancing the tray of food while scooping up two jugs of freshly squeezed juice that clanked together as she walked.

  Ella’s phone rang as she was spooning out coffee powder.

  ‘Max?’ she said, the line was crackly.

  ‘Ella?’ She heard him say. ‘Ella–’

  ‘Hang on Max, I can’t hear you. Let me just go outside.’ She hurried out the back door and stood by the sea wall, looking out at the fishing boats. ‘Max, hi.’

  ‘Ella I think Amanda’s husband is going to call you. Don’t believe anything he says. He’s been looking for a way to stop her getting a penny.’

  ‘Max, he said–’

  ‘It’s bullshit. Whatever he said, Ella, it’s bullshit. He’s set this whole thing up. It’s divorce tactics. The sly bastard is just securing his cash. Ok? Listen to me, Ella. When are you coming home?’

  ‘Christ as soon as I can.’ She sighed. ‘My mum has me waitressing.’

  There was a pause and then a booming laugh down the other end of the phone. ‘I like that idea. Are you wearing a pinny?’

  Ella smirked. ‘Maybe.’

  ‘Love it.’ Max laughed again and then the signal cut out.

  ‘Damn this island.’ Ella sighed, looking at the one bar on her phone.

  ‘Ella!’ Her mum was in the doorway. ‘The coffee?’

  ‘Oh sorry.’ She sauntered back in. ‘Sorry, I had to take a call.’

  ‘You never have to take a call on your shift.’ Her mum’s cheeks were pink, brown curls were falling loose from the elastic band she tied them up in as she took over the coffee making duty.

  ‘Excuse me–’ a voice said from the doorway. ‘Just wondering on our breakfasts.’ Pedro was standing, legs apart, arms crossed.

  ‘Oh shit.’ Ella looked down at her pad. ‘Sorry I didn’t give you the order…’ she said to her mum.

  ‘We have been waiting.’ he said curtly.

  ‘I know, I’m really sorry.’

  ‘This is pretty shoddy. We have a boat trip booked.’ He glanced at his watch.

  ‘Pedro, I’ll make it now.’ her mum said with a huge, apologetic smile as she poured boiling water in the percolator. ‘Don’t worry it’ll be quick. You’ll get the boat, it’s – what – at quarter to isn’t it?’

  Pedro clearly liked the fact her mum knew his name, had remembered him as a customer, ‘Thanks Sophie.’ he said, chest puffed out.

  ‘Come on,’ she ushered him out the kitchen, taking the pots of coffee with her. ‘And it’ll be on the house,’ she said, ‘how’s the holiday going? Nice to see you off-season.’

  ‘Well, with these prices and this weather, I mean, who can resist. And the hotel’s doing turkey. Christ knows where they’ve got them all. Do they even have turkeys in Greece?’

  At the end of her shift Ella slumped down on one of the chairs that faced out to sea, pushed her sweaty hair out of her eyes and retied it in a big scruffy ponytail, then shut her eyes and put her head back. When she opened them she saw all the coloured lights strung above her and the curled brown leaves of the vine.

  She had never been so exhausted in all her life. She kicked one of her shoes off and saw that the back of her heel was rubbed raw. Her hand was burnt where she’d pulled the grill pan out without considering how hot it would be. Her arms were stained with splodges of coffee and her fingers sticky from the remains of jam on people’s plates.

  A shadow fell across her table.

  ‘Ok?’ Dimitri asked.

  ‘Never better.’ She raised a brow then turned to look out at the sea as he kicked a chair out and sat down. ‘Please do, join me.’ she muttered, sarcastic.

  ‘Woah! Someone’s had a bad morning.’ He laughed.

  Ella was so tired she couldn’t really open her mouth properly to reply, so instead she watched the waves, the tumbling, rolling blue as it crashed against the wall. The fishermen sitting on the ledge, their rods bobbing, their hats pulled low. The white cat was prowling the rocks.

  She heard the soft pad of plimsolls on the concrete floor, then Dimitri say, ‘Hey Sophie.’ Then, ‘Ooh that looks good.’

  ‘It’s El
la’s lunch. Hands off, you.’ Her mum laughed, then said, ‘Ella, you’re back on in an hour and a half so you’d better eat this. Lunch will be busier because we have a boat trip docking at one. But Agatha will be here, so–’ she held her arms wide as if that may or may not make things better. ‘I’m sorry but I’ve had to take Pedro’s breakfast out of your wages.’

  Ella was sometimes hired out to clients by the minute. She had earned a twenty percent salary bonus last Christmas and was due a lump sum incentive for bringing in one of their most lucrative clients at the beginning of the year. But, it suddenly hit her, the wages she’d earned that morning seemed like the most important she’d ever received and the idea of them being docked, because of her laxness, was unimaginable. Had Maddy ever had her pay docked, she wondered?

  Her mum slid the plate of Greek salad, taramasalata, humous and pitta bread along with plump olives, roasted garlic and strips of oily, soft red peppers onto the table and walked away.

  ‘She really hates me.’ Ella sighed.

  ‘She doesn’t hate you.’ Dimitri leaned forward and scooped some humous onto an olive, ‘She’s testing you.’

  Ella shook her head. ‘Rubbish.’

  Dimitri shrugged a shoulder. ‘Whatever you say.’

  Ella looked at the food, she was starving, the tzatziki was calling to her. But she was blowed if she was eating in front of Dimitri, showing him how hungry she was. And… what was that about another shift? She glanced back towards where her mum was sitting with her granny, filling little pastry parcels with chopped mushrooms and onions.

  As she turned back to look out to sea again her stomach did a massive rumble and Dimitri laughed. ‘Eat something for god’s sake, you look like you’re about to collapse.’

  She glanced at the food, then out to sea, then back at Dimitri who was urging her on with his brows raised. And then it just seemed too much effort to hold back any longer.