How to Stuff Up Christmas

by Rosie Blake

  ‘They won’t be lies.’

  ‘That’s what they always say. I’ve been messed around before so it’s really not a big surprise.’

  Messed around? Is that what he had done? He didn’t want to be lumped in with these anonymous men. ‘I’m not “they”,’ he said, anger swelling in his chest.

  ‘We barely know each other anyway.’

  He didn’t hear her then, replaying that sentence, the sting of it, over and over. He thought back to the times they’d spent together; their closeness hadn’t simply been in his head. She wasn’t even letting him tell her what was going on and suddenly he felt as if he was twelve years old again and the world wasn’t fair and he wasn’t being heard. The words were tumbling out of him now, all the pent-up rage he’d felt staring at his mum surrounded by beeping machines and equipment, anger at not telling Eve about it all in the first place that had got him to this point. What an idiot.

  ‘… God forbid I dare to contradict you.’

  She thought he was with someone else. The thought was almost laughable; he’d been avoiding people for months, dreading their repetitive questions, the same looks. With her he hadn’t felt the need to pretend; he’d found himself relaxing with her, dropping his guard. It had been an enormous relief.

  ‘… I don’t have any claim on you.’

  ‘You don’t.’

  Stop this, Greg, apologise, she has every right to be angry, you have just disappeared with no explanation. He was about to say it, to step forward; he wanted to cup her face in his hands, take it all back. She looked amazing in that dress.

  Her friend emerged from the boat as he took a breath.

  ‘Hi, sorry.’

  He lifted a hand, feeling absurd now with this audience. ‘Hi.’ He looked up at Eve, her mouth set, her eyes darting away from him. What was she thinking?

  ‘I’ll get out of your way,’ he said, feeling the fight drain out of him.

  ‘Fine, that’s probably best.’ She said the sentence in a small voice and he wanted to be back on the boat, on another day, alone, the sun behind them, sitting on the top of it playing backgammon and drinking coffee.

  He was gabbling something at her, realising her face had closed off and she wasn’t listening to him. Her mouth was in a line; she was looking out over the common to the car park. He needed to get out of here.

  ‘I… I actually thought… I was wrong.’

  He turned before he could carry on making a tit of himself, feeling his chest hammering, Eve’s eyes on him as he walked back the way he came, knowing he’d blown it, knowing he had screwed it up.

  Daisy and Eve were bundled next to a stone pillar, the whole church heaving with enormous bunches of pale-pink roses, pine cones and privet berries. The scent was intoxicating, mixing with beeswax polish and tickling the back of Eve’s throat. She pulled on her skirt, the shift underneath riding up every time she sat down. She had shrugged off her wool coat, the radiators must have been blazing overnight, it was boiling. Daisy was fanning herself with her programme.

  ‘I’m melting, I’m melting,’ Eve whispered in her best Wicked Witch of the West voice to make her laugh. Daisy looked like she’d caught the laugh in her mouth, her cheeks suddenly blooming, which nearly set Eve off. She was pleased to feel more herself, had been quiet on the journey, regretting her abrupt dismissal of Greg. She didn’t want Daisy to think she was going to be a downer; she’d been miserable enough these last few months.

  ‘How many minutes late do you think she’ll be?’ Eve asked. ‘I bet you ten pounds it’ll be more than half an hour.’

  Daisy looked down at her lap and didn’t respond as Eve noticed a woman in a very large hat had turned to stare at them.

  She knew she should be better behaved, but this was the first wedding she had been to since she knew she wouldn’t be having one any time soon, and she hadn’t seen Daisy for days and she was bored and…

  ‘What the hell is he doing here?’ Eve asked, looking in horror as Liam walked down the aisle in a petrol-blue suit, his sandy hair gelled down, his face newly shaven. She ducked behind Daisy so she was shielded from view. The woman in the hat glared at her again.

  Daisy, turning to see who she meant, spun round, pale under her make-up, licking her lips. ‘He must have been invited.’

  Eve rolled her eyes. ‘I know that but by who? Ro-Ro wouldn’t do that. Is he gate-crashing?’

  ‘Maybe Hugo invited him.’

  ‘They barely know each other.’

  Eve hardly took in the service. Ro-Ro arrived to a line of trombones. She looked spectacular. Tiny in a full ivory skirt and tight-fitting bodice, small breasts impossibly high, hair pinned back tightly into a low chignon, a cathedral veil falling over her shoulders. She sashayed down the aisle as if she were on a catwalk. She was made more prominent by Hugo’s sisters, two sweating bridesmaids dressed in peach puffball skirts so that they resembled rather hot pumpkins.

  Eve didn’t have the energy to care, unable to shake her nerves at coming face to face with Liam. Even the verses of Jerusalem couldn’t rouse her, only made her despair as she remembered it was Liam’s favourite hymn. She was pathetic; she felt that she had been transported back to the early days when they had just broken up, her mind on a continual loop, wondering where he was, what he was doing. She found herself craning and twisting to catch sight of him in a pew ahead. At least he looked like he had come alone. She watched the back of his head as he dipped it for the prayers.

  ‘Please God let me get over him,’ she thought, suddenly angry at herself for caring, and clamping her eyes closed. Daisy sneaked a hand over hers and held it, giving it a squeeze.

  ‘Don’t think about the bastard.’

  This made Eve stifle a giggle. Daisy rarely swore and they were in church. She squeezed her hand back. The woman in the hat turned and tutted at them. Eve kept her head down.

  She managed to escape the church without bumping into him. Grabbing Daisy, they made their way along the road past polished cars, muddy 4x4s perched on the verge, to Ro-Ro’s parents’ house where the reception was being held. Moving through the gateway, flanked by two stone pillars with ball-post finials, they crunched up the driveway, their heels making for a wobbly route. Large iron poles were stuck in the ground, jam jars with tea lights hanging from hooks, a thin rope in between them covered in holly lining the pathway to an enormous marquee on the front lawn.

  The marquee was wonderfully warm and smelt of spices from scented candles littered on occasional tables. Patterned rugs in rich colours lined the floors and through an enormous curtained entrance Eve could see the tables laid out ready for the meal, cutlery gleaming, light reflecting off wine glasses, enormous centrepieces bursting with roses and winter berries spilling over the pots they were in. A small group of red-robed carollers started singing in soft voices, their voices warming too.

  ‘Back soon, need the loo,’ Daisy said, tottering out again, following hand-painted signs. Eve accepted a glass of champagne from the silver tray of a waiter with oiled-back hair.

  ‘Thanks,’ she said, taking a gulp and wondering whether it would be possible to avoid Liam for the entire night. There were certainly enough guests. The marquee was filling up, people mingling, kissing, talk and laughter filling the air. Eve weaved her way through the crowd and then almost tripped over the cathedral veil.

  ‘Ro-Ro,’ she said, leaning forward.

  ‘Not the face.’

  She kissed the air next to her cheek, marvelling at her eye make-up, the pristine flick of liner, the tiny eyelashes individually glued on. ‘You look very elegant,’ Eve said, having to look up at Ro-Ro, who was around four inches taller than usual. ‘How are you walking around?’ Eve asked in amazement, momentarily distracted from her questions.

  ‘They’re Jimmy Choo and barely hurt.’

  ‘So,’ Eve said, knowing she had to ask and trying not to squeeze her champagne glass too tightly, ‘how come Liam is here?’

  Ro-Ro looked up to the sky. ‘
I invited him, remember.’

  ‘Well, yes,’ Eve said slowly. ‘But then we found out he was sleeping with someone else and I assumed he would be dis-invited.’

  ‘That didn’t seem fair.’

  Eve swallowed down the stamping-foot tantrum she wanted to produce. Hmm fair, fair, fair, I know what isn’t fair.

  ‘I didn’t want you to be a Drama Queen about it,’ Ro-Ro said, as if she had heard Eve’s thoughts. ‘Can you straighten it?’ she said, spinning round to snap at one of her bridesmaids and indicating her veil. ‘And, Eve, honey.’ She turned back round. ‘It’s been four months.’

  Eve wanted to step forward and slap her. She felt heartened that the bridesmaid made a hashed job of the veil, too busy chatting to a gaunt bloke in sunglasses as she also tried to put a salmon canapé in her mouth whole.

  ‘We were going to get married,’ Eve said through gritted teeth, a photographer choosing that moment to appear in front of the two of them.

  As if on cue, Ro-Ro linked arms with her, turning her grey eyes to the lens and speaking out of the side of her mouth. ‘Think of it as a good thing,’ she said, releasing Eve as the photographer wandered off. ‘It had to happen some time. You can move on now.’

  ‘I am moving on,’ Eve said, more loudly than she intended.

  ‘Well then.’

  ‘You could have warned me,’ she grumbled, feeling that Ro-Ro might actually be right, and it didn’t seem nice to bitch to someone on their wedding day anyway. She would have to save it for another day; she couldn’t be the girl that made the bride cry. She stood there, biting on her tongue, trying to quell the anger that was bubbling.

  ‘He was my friend too, you know,’ Ro-Ro continued, smoothing her hair down and looking over Eve’s shoulder. ‘Oh, Piers,’ she called out as a man in a grey top hat walked past, and she was off, tottering on her designer heels.

  Eve stood, dejected, nodding numbly at the waiter with the slicked-back hair who topped up her glass. The carollers had stopped and the marquee seemed strangely cold all of a sudden, voices clashing, laughter braying, while every man seemed to look like Liam. Why did Ro-Ro still have to invite Liam? Had she done it simply because she hadn’t been thinking?

  Eve tried to push the thoughts out of her mind. She didn’t want him to ruin the night. She vowed to avoid him; there were enough people to mask him. As she found her seat, she was gratified that he wasn’t in her eyeline for dinner. Ro-Ro had seated her on a table of people she hadn’t met before, perhaps an attempt to ensure all her friends mingled. She looked over at Daisy who was nodding at something the man next to her was saying.

  Eve introduced herself to the two married men on either side, who spent most of the meal drinking red wine and talking over her about the stock market. Their wives could be peeked through the centrepiece on the other side of the table, deep into a chat about breastfeeding. Eve found herself knocking back a large amount of Pinot Noir, the speeches after the main course melting into one as she struggled to stand up to toast the bridesmaids.

  Hours later, it seemed the meal was finished and, getting up, wobbling uncertainly in the direction of Daisy’s table, Eve careered into a loose chair and landed in the lap of Liam, his petrol suit jacket off, tie loose.

  ‘Eve!’ he said.

  ‘Gah!’ Eve said, springing up from his lap as if he was on fire. ‘Liam.’

  She looked at him, his hair mussed up, his eyes not quite meeting hers. They were a bit wonky; how had she never noticed? Then again, maybe it was just the wine.

  Liam’s eyes narrowed. ‘You look nice.’

  ‘Thanks,’ Eve said, pulling on her dress.

  ‘I knew you’d be here,’ he said.

  ‘Of course I’d bloody be here,’ Eve said, snapping, gratified to see Liam’s shock as she swore at him. She never swore at him. ‘Didn’t know YOU’D be here,’ she said, her earlier anger rising to the surface again.

  ‘I wanted to see you.’

  The words stopped Eve short, her mouth half-open, her mind a fuzzy mess, the wedding singer calling for the newlyweds in the background, the other guests clinking, chattering, laughing. He wanted to see her. She shook her head in an effort to untangle her thoughts.

  ‘I’m glad you’ve come over,’ Liam continued.

  God, why did he have to confuse her like this. She felt her heart softening, then forced herself to stand taller. ‘I didn’t come over,’ Eve bristled. ‘I was going to dance.’ She went to point to the dance floor and poked a man with a moustache in the chest. ‘I’m so sorry,’ she gushed.

  The man glared at her and moved on.

  ‘Well, I’m glad you did come over,’ Liam said.

  Eve couldn’t help it; she felt a spark of pleasure as he repeated it. Was he about to erase the last few months, tell her he missed her, beg her to return? She prepared herself to be frosty. You must be cool with him, Eve, you can’t melt if he professes to miss you, think about what he did…

  ‘Christmas is round the corner…’ Liam said slowly.

  Was it the early nights, the log fires, the carols in the shops, the tinsel and the candles? Were they reminding him of last year? Was he back there in their family home asking her to marry him? Had he planned this speech, knowing she would be at the wedding, the whole day reminding him they had wanted the same thing? She felt her brain grow fuzzy with questions, mouth dry, palms damp.

  ‘And I want my dog back,’ he slurred, clutching a wine glass to his chest.

  Eve blinked. Her thoughts came to a screeching standstill, a lump forming in her throat as she realised he hadn’t been thinking any of these things. He hadn’t been thinking about their last Christmas together, the selfies in matching Christmas jumpers, the excitement as they’d clinked glasses, the hugs round the Christmas tree, the air smelling of pine needles as she’d torn open his present, not caring what it was as her eyes caught sight of the new diamond ring on her finger.

  ‘Well, you can’t,’ she said slowly, hoping her voice wasn’t giving her away as the words choked out. ‘Anyway,’ she tried to compose herself, swallowed, ‘I don’t want to get into all that here.’ Eve heard her voice, laced with self-importance, not caring.

  ‘Where are you hiding him?’ Liam asked, and Eve felt a flush of relief that she hadn’t told him where she was now; her hideaway in Pangbourne was hers.

  ‘I’m not telling you.’

  ‘I’ll find out,’ he said, stumbling to the side.

  ‘Liam, mate,’ Hugo said, pumping his hand and barrelling straight into their conversation. ‘Oops,’ he said in a pantomime way when he realised who they both were. It allowed Eve to make her excuses, knowing they were watching her as she moved away.

  She suddenly really wanted to be back on the boat; Marmite on her lap, dressed in her pyjamas, the woodburning stove on, baking something with cinnamon and gossiping on the phone to her sister who would be calling Liam names. For a second, another face flashed in her mind but she swatted it away. She didn’t need another man to confuse things. She couldn’t keep falling for untrustworthy people. Liam had made so many promises and now here he was, this stranger, in a suit she didn’t recognise and an unfamiliar expression on his face, as if they really had only just met.

  Ro-Ro and Hugo cut the cake and danced their first dance, Hugo staring straight at her breasts as she towered over him in heels, her model friends like swaying Twiglets all around them.

  *

  Hours later, Eve had come off the floor, her feet aching from dancing rather too energetically with a man in a kilt. She had avoided Liam for the rest of the night, despite noticing him brooding, slumped in a chair on the side of the dance floor at one point. He was nowhere to be seen now and she looked around for Daisy, realising she had barely seen her all night. She thought she saw her in a corner, whispering urgently to a man who seemed mostly hidden in shadow. Eve started walking her way, skirting round a couple snogging just off the dance floor and a five-year-old being swung in a circle.

  She
was still some way off when she realised Daisy had turned, her floral dress lifting as she spun round and marched away from the corner. Stepping back into the room, her eyes glittered darkly, her mouth in a thin line, Eve went to call to her, briefly set off course by a small girl in plaits racing past her in a netted skirt. When she looked up again, she saw Liam just behind Daisy, ruffling the back of his hair and looking about him. Eve frowned, the image not quite adding up.

  Daisy stepped across to her, brightening. ‘Shall we escape?’

  ‘Was that…?’ Eve couldn’t finish the sentence as the five-year-old from the dance floor was sent flying into her legs and she doubled over.

  ‘I’m so sorry,’ said a man with such rosy cheeks that he looked to be on the verge of a cardiac arrest.

  ‘Just an accident,’ Eve said, feeling tears springing into her eyes. ‘Let’s go,’ she said to Daisy, hobbling away, wanting to get out, wrap herself up in the winter night and head home.

  ‘Definitely,’ Daisy said in a steely voice.

  Returning to the boat after the wedding, Eve felt utterly desolate. She had planned to stay with Daisy in her B&B but she made her excuses, not wanting to be around anyone, catching the last train back from Didcot to Pangbourne, wanting to see Marmite, return to the safety and comfort of the boat.

  The weather was dreadful, water bashing the boat at every angle, the river churned up and running furiously along, reeds flattened on the surface almost pulled from the silt, the trees stripped of leaves, the branches creaking all around her at night. The temperature seemed to have plunged by ten degrees and no amount of jumpers or coats could stop Eve’s teeth chattering, her toes like little ice cubes, numb with it through socks and boot slippers. She spent the rest of the weekend feeding the woodstove, cuddling Marmite to her as they watched a string of dreadful films.

  She appeared at class on Monday, sitting quietly at the wheel, wishing Danny was there to grin at her. Aisha came over at the start of the lesson, wearing a new blue nose stud that caught the light.