Laurie tuned out as Clara led her into the hallway, and thought back on how she had come to be here. She had refused Danny’s offer of a cab, and instead had walked straight out of the Seamless offices into the bitterly cold November wind. Pulling her wool coat around her, she’d walked down the Strand until she got to Charing Cross, then found herself standing in the middle of the train station gazing at the departure board.
Unable to face going home alone to her flat in Brixton, staring at her four walls and waiting for her neighbour Siobhan to get back from work, she’d decided to go and see her aunt and cousin instead. Acting quickly, so she wouldn’t be able to change her mind, she’d dried her tears and caught a train to Bromley.
‘Laurie!’ Andrea dashed towards the door and offered a warm embrace. Laurie hugged her back.
‘I didn’t know if you’d be here,’ Laurie said.
‘Night shift last night,’ Andrea explained, pointing to her discarded nurse’s uniform in the laundry basket.
Andrea was more like a sister than a cousin to Laurie. They were both in their mid-thirties now and had grown up together. They’d both inherited dark hair and olive skin from their Spanish mothers, but the resemblance between Andrea and Aunt Clara ended there – everything about Andrea was natural, from her womanly curves to her make-up-free dark eyes.
‘Come and sit down,’ Andrea said, clearing a place for Laurie to sit on the sofa – there were so many fluffy cushions that the floral-print furniture underneath was barely visible.
‘So what’s up? What brings you here, at –’ she checked her watch – ‘ten-thirty in the morning? I thought I was the one working weird hours.’
Laurie leaned back into the squishy floral sofa and the morning’s events flooded back. ‘I did a terrible thing at work.’
‘But I thought things were going really well?’
‘So did I,’ Laurie said, biting her lip. ‘But they aren’t.’ The sting of humiliation was still fresh. Four years Laurie had worked at Seamless, steadily building her reputation, and now, because of a couple of foolish mistakes, it all seemed to be crumbling.
‘What happened?’ Andrea asked, with a concerned look in her eyes.
‘I messed up, big time,’ Laurie said. When Andrea put a comforting arm around her, the tears she’d been fighting to hold back came and she started to sob.
‘It’s OK,’ Andrea said comfortingly. ‘It’ll be OK.’ In the warmth of her cousin’s arms she cried until her throat was raw. Finally, she pulled back.
‘Do you want to talk about it?’ Andrea asked.
‘I don’t know,’ Laurie said. ‘Not yet. It’s horrible.’
Andrea nodded. ‘Of course. Whatever you want. You’re with family now. Why don’t you stay over tonight?’
‘Thanks,’ Laurie said, sitting up straighter and wiping her eyes. ‘I might take you up on that, just this once.’ She forced a smile and tried to lighten the atmosphere. ‘What about you, how have you been?’
‘Ha, well this will make you feel better,’ Andrea said, with a laugh. ‘Back living here again, saving for a flat deposit. All day, every day: Mum.’ She nodded to the kitchen, where Clara was preparing tea, and feigned exhaustion. ‘Can you imagine? Dad’s snuck out to walk the dog – for the second time today – really can’t blame him.’
Laurie smiled, then looked around the room. Photos lined the shelves and mantelpiece – she could even see one of Andrea and Laurie together up there, posing as pop stars when they were kids. It was so different to her own stylish, minimal flat.
Clara came back into the room with tea and biscuits, then placed them on the table. ‘I spoke to your mother at the weekend,’ she said.
‘Oh yes?’ Laurie responded, realising it had been a couple of weeks, at least, since she and her mother had last been in touch. ‘How’s she doing?’
‘Oh, Laurie, these men she chooses,’ Clara said, her voice despairing. ‘I mean, your father – he was bad enough, with his big exit. What that man put your mother through, it’s a miracle she’s still here – but now it’s getting even worse, darling.’
‘Don’t exaggerate, Mum,’ Andrea said, taking a biscuit from the plate and then looking at Laurie. ‘She sounded fine when I talked to her.’
‘Fine?’ Clara said. ‘She obviously didn’t give you the full story, Andrea. Believe me, she’s far from fine. She and Javier broke up, she’s very lonely.’
‘Javier?’ Laurie asked.
‘Yes – an old flame. They’d only been together a few months. But you know, for your mother – another heartbreak, for the collection,’ Clara said, lifting her hands into the air and shaking her head.
Andrea caught Laurie’s eye, mouthing ‘Ignore her’.
Another heartbreak, Laurie thought. All her life she’d strived to be different from her mum – more independent, successful, resilient. She would never rely on men for her happiness. But now, single at thirty-five, heartbroken and struggling to hang on to her job, Laurie wondered if the two of them had more in common than she’d been willing to admit.
CHAPTER 2
Tuesday 21st November
Rachel stirred awake as the front door of the cottage clicked shut. Her bedroom was in pitch darkness, only a slim shaft of moonlight on the carpet breaking the gloom. Her mobile phone was beside her on the pillow, the space next to her in bed empty, as it had been when she’d nodded off. She checked her phone for messages – none – then the time, half-past twelve. She got up and pulled on her dressing gown, opened the bedroom door and listened out for sounds – she heard the hum of the fridge downstairs, the clatter of crockery as someone got a plate out.
Her teenage daughter Milly’s bedroom was next to hers. She gently pushed the door to look inside, then put her hand to her heart, relieved. Milly was asleep there, dark-red hair splayed out on her pillow, her breathing heavy enough to hear. Milly was home. Milly was safe. How silly to have worried, Rachel thought.
She stepped down the winding, uneven wooden steps of the seventeenth-century cottage, ducking under the beam at the bottom. In the kitchen, with a plate of food in his hand, was her husband Aiden, in jeans and a checked shirt, his usual outfit when he was managing one of his barn conversions. Her heart warmed at the sight of him.
‘Caught you,’ she whispered, with a smile.
‘Rumbled,’ he said, raising one hand with a wry smile. ‘I was trying to be quiet. Just got back. Having a midnight feast. Again.’
He put his plate down on the counter and gave her a hug. ‘It’s good to see you,’ he said, pulling her close and stroking back her dark-blonde hair. She stood on tiptoe to kiss him on the mouth, running a hand gently over his stubbled jaw.
‘You too,’ Rachel said, pressing her cheek against his chest.
She led him over to the living room, and made space on the sofa. ‘So, how did it go today?’ she asked, keeping her voice low so that they wouldn’t wake Milly or her little brother Zak.
‘Busy. But you know how it is, every day’s busy at the moment,’ Aiden said, the strain evident on his face. ‘Who knows when we’re going to get the Westley barn finished – the twentieth of December is what we promised, but that’s only a few weeks away and there’s a lot still to do. There was that rain in the autumn that set us back, and this week we’ve had some issues with the interiors too … I should never have sourced so much from abroad, all the deliveries are running late. But enough about work,’ he said, waving his hand, and his face relaxing a little. ‘I get so little time with you at the moment I don’t want to waste it talking about that. How was your day, how are the kids doing?’
Rachel curled up on the sofa and tucked her pyjamaclad legs under her. ‘Oh, fine,’ she said. ‘Your mum was over earlier, she’s helping with a Christmas charity collection this year, she said.’
Aiden raised an eyebrow. ‘More volunteering? I thought people were supposed to do less when they retired?’
‘Bea’s not other people,’ Rachel smiled. ‘She’s unstoppable
. But we always knew that. She picked Zak up from football practice too, while I was getting dinner ready. Godsend.’
‘And Milly?’
‘She’s fine. She’s been over at Kate’s, studying.’ Rachel went quiet for a moment.
‘What is it?’ Aiden asked.
‘Nothing. It’s just – when you came home just now, I thought it was her.’
‘At past midnight?’
‘Yes. She wasn’t home by eleven, which is when we agreed she’d be back. I called her twice, but her phone was off. I was waiting up for her, but … I don’t know how, I must have fallen asleep.’
‘And now … ?’ Aiden asked, concerned.
‘Oh, she’s fine,’ Rachel said, hurriedly, with a smile. ‘She’s upstairs, asleep.’
‘Well, that’s OK then, isn’t it?’ Aiden said, finishing off his sandwich.
‘Yes. Of course.’
‘But …?’
‘It’s not like her, is it? Coming home late,’ Rachel said. ‘It’s not like her not to call.’
‘Kate’s is only round the corner, they probably just lost track of time. You know what those two are like when they get together. And Milly’s been saying that she doesn’t get to see Kate as much now she’s changed school.’
‘You’re right,’ Rachel said, dismissing her doubts. ‘I’m sure you are.’
‘Milly’s home now. Don’t worry,’ Aiden said, putting his arm around Rachel and kissing her on the cheek. ‘Now let’s go to bed.’
‘I brought The Book with me,’ Bea said, taking a seat in the kitchen of Hawthorne Cottage the following afternoon. ‘I thought we could give ourselves a reminder before we do the school run.’
Bea’s Countdown to Christmas, or The Book for short, was famous in the Murray household. In there, handwritten by Bea, was everything from turkey-cooking timings to Yule-log recipes, mini chocolate wreaths to marzipan holly leaves. It was an essential part of the festive season at the Murray family home.
‘Sure. Is it nearly December already?’ Rachel said, glancing over at the wall calendar to check the date: 22 November. ‘I guess it is. Time to make the whisky cake, at least. Let’s have a look, then.’ Rachel let the washing-up water drain away, dried her wet hands roughly with a teatowel and joined Bea at the table. In a striped navy and cream sweater, her cropped ash-blonde hair neatly blow-dried, Bea looked particularly young today, Rachel thought, as she reached out for the book.
‘Actually I made the whisky cake last night,’ Bea said. ‘I was at a loose end. I’ll just keep feeding it from now. I had a glass or two for myself last night,’ she confessed. ‘Probably shouldn’t do that every time.’
‘Perk of the job, I reckon,’ Rachel said, with a wink.
Rachel tucked her hair behind her ear and leafed through the book, settling on her favourite page: Bea’s gingerbread cottage.
As she looked at the familiar illustration, the smells of Christmas baking came back to her – ginger, cinnamon, cloves – and she recalled the very first time she’d made it. It was the year she and Aiden had moved out of Bromley, where they’d grown up, to make a new start together in the Yorkshire village that was now their home.
‘Are you sure you should be …?’ Aiden had said, as he walked into the cottage kitchen and spotted Rachel surrounded by cooking ingredients, laying out pieces of gingerbread on a baking sheet.
‘… cooking, Aiden?’ Rachel had replied, looking up from the cookbook and turning around to face him. ‘I’m pregnant,’ she smiled, ‘not made of crystal. And anyway, with the due date so close, I want to keep busy.’ He had leaned in to kiss her, Rachel’s large bump keeping them apart.
He rested his hand gently on what was, within a month, to be their first baby. ‘Next Christmas is going to be a bit different, isn’t it?’ he smiled. His hazel eyes danced with a mixture of excitement and nerves, the energy they’d both been running on since they found out she was pregnant.
‘Yes, but starting a family can’t possibly be tougher than moving to Yorkshire, can it?’ she had said, with a gentle laugh.
‘Not really where either of us expected to be at twenty, is it?’ he had replied. His expression turned serious for a moment. ‘Rach, I know it’s not been easy, but thank you. For moving here, for trusting me.’ He smoothed back her hair with his hand. ‘I’ve got a really good feeling about this. From the moment we arrived I knew Skipley was the right place to start up the business, and the response so far has been brilliant. I’m hoping that within a couple of years we’ll have enough money to live comfortably up here, give the baby everything she needs. Everyone says the first year or two is the hardest part. And things for you are better now, aren’t they – now you’ve found the NCT group and everything?’
‘Oh, yeah,’ Rachel had said. ‘I mean, I still miss everyone. Friends, Laurie mainly. But things were changing, anyway. Laurie moving to London, starting fashion college, most of our other friends going to university – I wouldn’t have wanted to be the only one stuck at home. God, can you imagine that? And my family … well, after the way my parents reacted to the pregnancy … it feels better to be starting somewhere new.’
A lump had come to Rachel’s throat when she thought of her mum and dad. Aiden noticed and drew her towards him for a hug.
‘The thing is,’ she said, after a moment, pulling back, ‘even before all this, I had my doubts. You know I never really wanted to go to Bristol. I wasn’t ever that set on going to uni, full stop. I just didn’t want to be a disappointment to my parents. Well, now I am –’ she had said, putting her hands on her bump. A smile had broken out on her face – ‘and I really couldn’t care less. I’m sure they’ll change their minds, but if Mum and Dad decide they don’t want to be part of our baby’s life, then that’s their loss. There’s nowhere I’d rather be than here with you, starting a family together.’
‘Do you want to do the gingerbread house this year?’ Bea asked.
Rachel looked up at her mother-in-law, taking in the cottage kitchen as it was today. Fifteen years, and two children on from those early days, with Aiden’s mum living nearby, Rachel was happier than ever.
‘Zak and Milly love doing that with you,’ Rachel said. ‘You keep that. But give us a bit more to do this year. You know Aiden worries about you doing too much.’
‘OK,’ Bea said reluctantly, peering over at the book. ‘Well, you two can do the cinnamon stars … and the Stollen this year. And the bread sauce and sprouts, never liked them.’
Rachel raised an eyebrow, waiting for more.
‘That’s your lot, Rachel. I’ve always done Christmas round here and I’m not going to put my feet up just because I’m picking up my pension. However much my son might moan about it.’
Rachel looked at the hand-drawn cinnamon stars. Once Aiden’s project was completed, they might even have time to bake them together. Christmas in Hawthorne Cottage would be chaos, it always was – with six-year-old Zak there was never a quiet moment – but with everyone together, and Aiden taking a break from work, it would be their own kind of perfect.
Milly got into the back seat of Bea’s Mini Cooper, next to her younger brother, and strapped her seatbelt on.
‘Are you allowed to wear jewellery at school, Mills?’ Rachel asked suspiciously, looking over her shoulder at her daughter in the back seat. Large, star-shaped silver earrings shone out from under Milly’s dyed-red hair, and it looked like she’d rolled her skirt up at the waist.
‘Yes,’ Milly replied. ‘Well, no one said anything, anyway. It’s way more relaxed than my old school.’
Rachel decided to let it go for the moment. She and Milly had already had one confrontation over breakfast that day, about why she’d got back so late the night before, and she and Aiden had to choose their battles. Once Rachel had wondered if, as a young mum, she and Milly might be like friends during her teenage years – but it seemed that with each passing month, Millie was growing more distant.
‘Hi, Mills,’ Zak said, turning to his
big sister, a smile on his lightly freckled face. ‘Tom’s going to EuroDisney for Christmas, you know.’
‘Really?’ Milly replied, flatly.
‘Yes. And Mark’s getting a Wii.’
Bea turned to Rachel from the passenger seat and silently lifted her eyes to heaven, bringing a smile to Rachel’s lips. It wasn’t the first time Zak had brought up the extravagant Christmas presents his classmates were going to be getting. Rachel glanced back at her two children in the rear-view mirror as she pulled out of the car park.
‘Well, good for them,’ Milly said. Rachel caught a glimpse of her in the mirror, brushing her dark-red sweeping fringe out of her eyes. ‘Their parents must be really rich.’
Rachel thought briefly of the Christmas they’d had last year, when Aiden’s business had been weathering the storm and they had bought Milly and Zak everything on their Christmas lists. Before they’d had to move Milly from her private school to the local comprehensive, and stop her riding lessons. Rachel turned left on to the high street and joined a queue of traffic at the lights. ‘You know that things are a little bit different for us this year, right?’ she ventured.
‘I knowwww,’ Zak said, ‘It’s the astronomic downturn.’
‘Economic, dumbo,’ Milly said, giving him a playful jab in the ribs. ‘Santa’s petrol prices have gone up. No cash for carrots for Rudolph. It’s OK, Mum. We get it, don’t we, Zak? About Dad’s business and the mortgage and stuff
‘Ok, good.’ Rachel said, thinking anxiously of the latest stack of bills. The lights turned green and she drove on.
Milly and Zak were downstairs playing Monopoly with Bea, their contented shrieks and giggles rising up the stairwell, and Rachel took the opportunity to get the Christmas-decoration boxes down from the cupboard by her bedroom. The first one was full of the red and green baubles and white lights they used each year.
As she opened the flaps on the next box, she realised right away that it hadn’t been opened for ages. The first thing she pulled out was a small tinsel Christmas tree. She smiled – she and Aiden had bought it when Zak was a newborn and they’d been too caught up in midnight feeds to organise getting a real one. She looked at the frayed and balding branches. It was time for that one to go, she decided, putting it fondly to one side. Underneath it was a tangle of fairy lights, Christmas candles and other decorations. As she took out the lights to untangle them, she saw a sleeve with some loose photos in it, out of place among the other things. Rachel flicked through the pictures – the kids as babies, Aiden standing proudly in front of one of his first completed barns. And one of Rachel as a teenager, with her best friend, Laurie. Standing outside the school gates on the last day of Sixth Form. They’d taken the photo themselves, so it was blurry and too close up. Nineteen ninety-five, it must have been, the day they finished their A-Level exams. Rachel lit up at the memory. Her unruly, dark-blonde hair was loose and she had bright red lipstick on, while Laurie’s hair was dyed pale pink, chunks of dark showing through at the roots. They were hugging, faces pressed together, big smiles on their faces. The feeling of elation – Rachel could still recall it. To celebrate their first day of freedom, she and Laurie had driven to the coast in Rachel’s car, blasting Pearl Jam and Alanis Morrisette out of the stereo and singing their hearts out.
Meet Me Under the Mistletoe Page 2