Three Christmases
A Christmas bonus for readers of
Things We Never Said.

Dear Readers.

This is a little sequel to Things We Never Said, a feel-good, short-story-length (52 pages) glimpse into the future for all those readers who have been begging to know what happens next. Hopefully, the answer to that is, not what you expected.

It will be offered free of charge for five days every quarter (the maximum permitted by Amazon), including over the Christmas period, so you don’t need to pay for it (unless you simply can’t wait until the next free period).

Above all, please, PLEASE, DO NOT READ THIS if you haven’t read Things We Never Said yet. IT DOES CONTAIN SPOILERS.

Love to all. Nick.

One: The Bittersweet Christmas.

Sean:

I hadn’t intended to buy a tree at all. It was April who’d insisted.

“Christmas isn’t Christmas without a tree, Dad,” she said. “So, you can either have a spotless, minimalist Christmas on your own in your spotless, minimalist new pad, or you can buy a bloody tree, cover it with sparkly things, and spend Christmas Day with the wrecking crew.”

I knew she was right, of course, but I was struggling with the fact that it was only my second Christmas without Cathy. That first Christmas, the previous year, had gone by in such a blur of grief, expectation of Jake’s birth, and the myriad hassles of packing up ready for my move, that I now realised I hadn’t been entirely present. This year, Cathy’s absence weighed heavily upon me and I wondered if I would cope. Yet, at the same time, I desperately wanted to go the whole hog and celebrate baby Jake’s first visit from Santa.

That ambivalence towards things – towards life, really – pretty much summed up the year. I’d be busy doing something like putting up shelves or painting a wall and I’d pause because the light in the room had suddenly changed. I’d turn around to see that the sun had come out and was pouring in through the wall of glass at the end of the lounge, and I’d remember how lucky I was to be living here. And then, literally milliseconds later, I’d think about the fact that Catherine would have loved to doze on that sofa in the sun, and I’d be swamped by a tidal wave of sadness; I’d feel emptied, eviscerated, really, by the loss. This sensation of gaping emptiness was generally followed by a depressing belief that I’d never be happy again, not truly. I’d often note the shocking about-turn my emotions had just performed and feel guilty that I had felt so happy just a few moments before, and then sometimes I’d even feel a complex, perverse double-layered sense of guilt at the fact that I was beating myself up over something as essential to survival as momentary happiness. At this point, I’d note the absurdity of even attempting to analyse it all, widen my frame of reference to the absurdity of life itself, and then get back up, brush the wetness from my treacherous eyes, and continue putting up the damned shelves, but with a fresh sense that my desire for shelves was in reality as absurd as everything else. I really was all over the place.

At least work, and the move – the worst of which was not moving, per se, but disposing of three-quarters of my (our) possessions – kept me busy. As, of course, did decorating and furnishing the flat.

Any gaps in the month that weren’t filled by work or moving or painting or shelves were rapidly filled by April and baby Jake. That busyness was my saviour really, because it kept moments of calm and reflection to a minimum. Moments of calm and reflection were generally horrific, plunging me quickly into a state of utter misery I sometimes doubted I was strong enough to survive.

Jake, when he was around, was like an antidote, though. Or at least a damned good treatment.

April had surprised me by being a capable, up-beat, no-nonsense mother. After Catherine’s somewhat hysterical mothering technique, this came as a great relief.

My daughter seemed as happy as she had ever been, but essentially unchanged by motherhood. She simply had a new and rapidly growing bundle slung over her shoulder as she went about her day. And whereas Catherine had been terrified to take April out of the house in the early months, April had strapped Jake into his car-seat and driven him up to see me before he was even a month old.

March was undoubtedly the horror-month of the year. I had told myself that I didn’t believe in dates or anniversaries. I had all-but convinced myself that I would be immune, that the 28th of March would be like any other day. But the truth was that I counted down to it for an entire month. In fifteen days, I’ll be fine, I told myself. In fourteen days’ time. In thirteen...

On the morning of the 28th, I found myself unable to get out of bed. This was a surprise to me because it had never happened to me before. Not even illness has ever managed to keep me bed-bound for an entire day. But on the 28th, from the second I opened my eyes, I knew that today simply wasn’t going to happen. It was raining gently outside, and my legs were refusing to launch me into the rhythm of a normal workday. My arms felt leaden, my eyes, moist.

At about ten o’clock, I got a text from April. “Are you OK?” it asked, simply.

“I’m fine,” I replied. “At work. Masses of meetings.”

But it wasn’t true. Instead, I was lying in bed, staring watery-eyed at the ceiling. After a couple of failed attempts at getting up, I gave in to it. “Fuck it,” I thought. “I’m allowed this.”

So I plumped up the pillows and the quilt so that they felt at least a little bit like a body, there, beside me, and then I nestled against them and slept pretty much all day.

By summer, I was feeling a little better. I’d had fifteen months to get used to the fact of my loss, and was having more ‘up’ days and feeling less guilt over them, too. Work was busy, Cambridge was sunny. Friends dropped in for brunch on my new balcony. April, Ronan and Jake would come up once a month and we would head across the green and throw a blanket out for baby Jake to crawl on while we picnicked.

Surprisingly, as other friends reappeared, Maggie faded into the background.

Things felt awkward, that was the thing. It was as if we were rehearsing for a dodgy theatre piece, and though we knew what our roles were supposed to be, we could only acknowledge our inability to act them out.

Neither of us ever tried to put words to either the awkwardness or the roles themselves. I don’t think we had any idea how to express any of it. No mention was made of the strange conversation we’d had in the car park, and more and more, even thinking about it made me feel inexplicably uncomfortable.

So when we did see each other, which was an increasingly rare event – usually baby Jake was the catalyst around which such get-togethers occurred – we acted, quite simply, as if it had never happened. In the back of my mind, I suppose, if I’m honest, I was holding on to the idea that there was at least a possibility of something there, and that if it was meant to happen, at some point, it probably would. And occasionally that idea, that feeling of vague promise, would help me through a moment of extreme loneliness.

But the only times I ever tried to remember the exact context of that car-park conversation, the only times I tried to imagine what form that promise might take, the overriding sensation was that thinking about Maggie in that way made my teeth hurt. And as, like most human beings, I’m quite adept at not thinking about things which make me feel uncomfortable, I thought about Maggie less and less.

Anyway, for Christmas, there had to be a tree. And this is why, just three days before Christmas, I found myself out at Homebase looking through the sad leftovers – the trees that no one else had wanted.

“How much are these?” I asked, holding one of the less-dead looking six-footers upright.

“Fifty,” the salesman replied, sounding overwhelmingly bored.

“Fifty pounds?” I exclaimed.

“It’s Norwegian Spruce,” he explained in the same tone of voice. “They don’t drop their needles ‘n shit.”

When a voice behind me commented, “It looks like it already has dropped all its needles ‘n shit to me,” I turned to find Maggie grinning at me.

“Hello!” I said. “What brings you out to the Homebase winter wonderland?”

“Not the trees,” Maggie said, “that’s for sure.” She then pulled a box of tree-lights from a carrier bag and added, “Lights, actually. Mine packed up. Well, I may have stepped on them whilst trying to untangle them.”

I smiled. “Well, ours still work, which is always a bit of a miracle. Now I just need the tree.” I frowned momentarily at my use of the word ours, but then decided, forcefully, that I had meant mine and April’s.

“You’re not going to actually buy that thing, are you?” Maggie asked, raising an eyebrow and nodding at the tree I was holding.

“No... No, I don’t think so,” I replied, leaning the tree back against the wall.

“You need to go out to Barton,” Maggie told me. “They have trees that actually look like trees.”

“Would you mind not doing that, Madam?” the salesman said, edging towards us, his hands in his pockets.

“Doing what?” Maggie and I asked, in unison.

“Would you mind not sending my clients elsewhere?”

“Oh, that’s funny,” Maggie laughed. “I was just about to ask you not to do something as well. I was just about to ask you not to sell half-dead overpriced trees to my friends.”

Which is how it ended up that Maggie and I followed each other out to Barton to choose a tree.

It was a good call, though, because the trees at Burwash Manor, though still unreasonably expensive, did at least look like Christmas trees. There was something surprisingly romantic about choosing a Christmas tree together, too.

It was a cold day and we could see our breath in the air. Many of the other shoppers had children with them and that special pre-Christmas excitement, that kids seem to manufacture, seemed to infuse everyone and everything.

Even three days before Christmas, there were hundreds of trees to choose from and Maggie giggled as I haggled with the man in charge of sales. He was disguised as a Christmas elf.

“You’re a hard man,” Maggie whispered in my ear once the deal was concluded. “Haggling with an elf, indeed! I hope you’re not hoping for any favours from Santa this year!”

As we carried the tree back to the car park, it crossed my mind that Maggie might be alone for Christmas and that because I’d seen so little of her recently I hadn’t, in fact, invited her.

On reaching the car I opened my mouth to pop the question but was interrupted when Pete, a friend from our quiz-night team, spotted me.

“Are there any left in there?” he asked.

“Oh, hello,” I replied. “Yes, loads.”

“We were supposed to go to Sylvia’s sister’s place,” Pete explained, as he reached us and shook first my, then Maggie’s hand. “But they fell out over Christmas dinner. Her sister’s gone vegan now, and you know Sylvia. She’s, like, a one-hundred-percent carnivore. Anyway, we’re doing it at home now – turkey and all the trimmings – so I thought I had better get my skates on and sort the tree out.”

“We planned ours ages ago,” I explained. “But I’ve only just got around to it. You know how it is.”

“Yes,” Pete said, somehow with meaning, as he glanced between Maggie and me. “Yes, well, that’s great.”

It took a moment before I realised that he had understood the “we” in my sentence as referring to Maggie and myself.

“My, um, daughter’s coming up,” I said, cock-handedly trying to explain without sounding as if that was what I was doing. “With her partner. And baby.”

“Great,” Pete said, looking, if anything, a little more confused. “One big happy family then.” He smiled tightly at Maggie as he said this and, clearly sensing the same pressure to explain, Maggie opened her mouth, shook her head, and eventually spoke.

“I’m not… you know… part of this. I’m, um, actually going to my brother’s place for Christmas.”

“Oh,” Pete said. “That’s a shame. Still, commitments, eh? Just pray he isn’t vegan.”

Maggie grimaced in frustration at this, then said, “Anyway, great to, um, bump into you like this, Sean! But I really do need to get back home and, um, wrap some presents. Lovely to meet you too, er…”

“Pete.”

“Yes, Pete. Lovely. Um, have a great Christmas, then.” And then, forgetting her handbag, which she had rested on the roof of my car, she started to bustle away.

“Mags,” I called out. “Your bag!”

“Yes,” she said, turning back and swooping it up. “Right, thanks.”

“I’d better get going, too,” Pete said, nodding towards the gate. “Before they’re all gone, I mean.”

Once I got home and had wrestled the tree upstairs, I send Maggie a text saying that if she changed her mind about her brother’s place, she was welcome to join us for Christmas.

“Oh no,” she replied. “I’m absolutely going to Brian’s place. I’m leaving tomorrow morning. But have a good one.” I somehow didn’t believe her.

Christmas Day was like a concentrated version of the rest of the year, a mix of crazy ups and downs.

Jake gurgled and spluttered and took particular delight in ripping up bits of wrapping paper while Ronan and I cooked up a Christmas dinner that Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall would have been pleased with. This we ate on the big swivel-out dinner table that I had designed some twenty years previously and which was now, finally, mine. I felt surprisingly proud of the whole thing.

When we reached coffee-time, I realised that we’d managed a Christmas without tears, and it was only then that I noticed that April had been missing for the last ten minutes.

“April?” I inquired of Ronan.

“Bathroom, I think,” he said.

I found her in my bedroom, gripping the sill and staring out at the landscaped grounds behind the building.

“Are you OK?” I asked, and by way of reply, April merely shook her head.

Joining her at the window I could see that her cheeks were wet with tears. I slipped one arm around her waist.

“I miss her so much! ” she said, quietly. “It’s like a pain, you know? Like a real physical pain in my chest. It feels like there’s a hole or something – a big bloody hole right in the middle of me.”

“I know,” I told her. “I know exactly what you mean. Especially today.”

“Yes,” April croaked. “Yes, today’s really, really hard.”

We stood in silence for a moment and then April pulled a towel from the radiator and dabbed at her eyes. “Sorry about that,” she said. “But I’m done, now.”

“Please don’t apologise. It was bound to happen at some point.”

“You know, I kept…” April started. “Actually, never mind.”

“No, go on.”

“Oh, it’s nothing… It’s stupid. But I kept thinking of things I could get her. For Christmas, I mean. I kept thinking she’d like this, or that… in shops and stuff. It’s daft, like I say.”

“It’s not,” I told her. “I keep doing that, too.”

April exhaled jaggedly. “It’s so hard,” she said again. She pursed her lips and blew through them. “Right,” she said, taking my hand and pulling me back towards the lounge. “Onwards and upwards, eh?”

Ronan had moved to a chair by the window and was jiggling Jake up and down on one knee. “Here she is!” he said, leaning in to Jake’s ear. “Here’s that mummy you’ve been so worried about.”

Jake smiled and gurgled and reached out with his right hand, stretching his fingers in April’s direction. And then, to everyone’s surprise, he said, “Mumumum.”

We all froze for a second, then April, crouching down, whispered, “Did you hear that?”

“I did,” I said. “He’s never said that before, has he?”

April shook her head. “Say it again, sweetie,” she urged. “Mummy. Say, Mummy.”

But Jake merely grinned and gurgled some more.

“You did hear that, right?” April asked again. “He definitely said Mummy, didn’t he?”

“Well, he said, Mumumumum,” Ronan laughed. “So he was either trying to say Mummy or mumble. Or Mumbai. Or it could have been Mummification.”

“Stop it!” April admonished. “You’ll confuse him.”

Eventually she hid back in the bedroom for a few minutes, in the hope that her return after an absence would inspire a repeat performance.

But it would be January before Jake would make the Mum sound again.

All the same, it was the best Christmas gift he could have given us.

Two: The Awkward-Kiss Christmas.

Maggie:

Sean and I saw surprisingly little of each other following Jake’s birth. I think it was just because we felt so awkward around each other.

To be honest, I was wishing that conversation had never happened. Because whether something ended up happening between us one day, or whether it didn’t, it seemed to me that everything would be have been easier, somehow, if we hadn’t pre-empted the whole thing by talking about it.

When Jake was about eighteen months old – it was July, I think – April dropped by, unexpectedly. She was visiting Sean, she explained, but he had popped into work for the morning, so she’d decided to come to see me instead.

I was incredibly happy about that. Because of the awkwardness of things with Sean, I’d seen far less of Jake than I’d hoped or, indeed, expected when he was born. I had kind of thought I’d be an unofficial aunty to him, but that didn’t seem to be happening.

He was at a gorgeous age, running around my flat, grabbing everything, chattering and gurgling and laughing almost constantly.

I made two mugs of tea and warmed a bottle for Jake and then April asked me what was going on.

I told her about my job and all the rubbishy contracts the architecture practice where I was working had accepted. I told her how they’d dropped me to three days a week but that for the moment, I was rather enjoying the extra time off. I explained I was taking Tai Chi classes on Mondays and Wednesdays and made her giggle with a short demonstration of some of the movements I’d been learning. Jake, bless him, tried to copy some of them which was cute beyond belief.

But then April said, “That’s all really great, Mags, and I am interested, honestly, I am. But I actually meant, what’s going on between you and Dad? Because I can’t work out if you’ve got a secret thing going on or have fallen out with each other.”

April had always been incredibly straightforward – it was one of the things I liked about her so much – but this time, she’d really thrown me.

I stuttered and stumbled my way through the conversation explaining that neither was the case, that we most certainly didn’t have a thing going on and nor had we fallen out. “We’ve just, you know, been busy, I expect,” I said vaguely. “Your dad with the move and his job and everything...”

“And you with your three-day-week,” April laughed.

“Well, quite,” I said.

“Oh, well, as long as there’s no bad blood between you. I’d hate that.”

“There really isn’t,” I insisted.

After they had left, I sat for the whole afternoon trying to figure it all out.

I wondered if Sean had sent April to find out how I felt. I wondered if it was his way of sending me a sign that he was now “ready”, whatever that meant. I asked myself if I wanted a sign, if I wanted him ready. And finally, I forced myself to ask a question which had become taboo, even in the privacy of own mind – I asked myself if I wanted Sean in that way at all.

There had been moments, over the years – not many, I could probably count them on my fingers – but there had been moments when I had looked at Sean and found him sexy. Of course there had been. He’s a good looking, fit, clever, friendly kind of a guy.

But I had never considered it a possibility, that was the thing. He had been married to Catherine, after all, and I had loved Catherine to bits. In fact, I wondered, that afternoon, if I hadn’t loved Catherine even more than I loved Sean. I certainly was missing her enormously.

These days, I’m not so sure that I was right about that. Nowadays, I’m tempted to say that I loved them both equally. Or perhaps that they were simply so fusional that one never really knew where one ended and the other began – so perhaps it was the two of them together, their humour, their fusion, their energy, that I loved so much.

But when Sean had told me that day what Catherine had said, it had thrown me. It had made me wonder if she was right, if perhaps I had been in love with Sean all along.

It’s ridiculous, I know, not to know one’s own mind, but for the longest time, I couldn’t decode even my own feelings, let alone anyone else’s.

And though I sat, for that whole afternoon, trying to decide how I felt, it remained a mystery to me. The only thing that seemed sure was that Sean and Catherine had been a huge, integral part of my life, and that I missed them both individually, and, perhaps even more so, as a couple.

None of this eased things with Sean in any way, though. In fact, as that second year passed by, I found myself avoiding him more and more. Maybe avoiding is too active a term for what was going on. After all, not seeing someone is so much easier to achieve than seeing them. It’s the seeing that requires the phone calls and emails and dates and rendezvous. The default state, if one is lazy or hesitant, or confused, is always one of not seeing.

But I phoned less, I suppose. I stopped dropping in with food parcels, too.

In the old days, I had called by as much to see Catherine as I had to see Sean. And then after her death, I had dropped in because I was worried about him and because I felt that Catherine would have wanted me to keep an eye on him.

But increasingly, Sean seemed fine. He seemed to be coping as well as could be expected without Catherine, and he seemed to be doing fine without little old me, too. Perhaps it suited me to decide that he was best left to it, but that is what I came to believe.

When I thought about Sean, and from time to time, I can’t deny it, I did, I felt a sense of love for him, it’s true. But the less time we spent together, the better I was able to identify it, and it wasn’t sexy love after all, it was far closer to a kind of brother/sister sort of thing. And when I tried to imagine myself with Sean – in a physical sense – I merely felt embarrassed. Perhaps I’d known him for too long, but he felt like family, and those visions of us together, when I forced them to manifest, felt more like incest than anything else.

I couldn’t, for the life of me, imagine how to explain such a thing to Sean though, and I worried that I’d perhaps led him on in some way, only now to have to let him down. So I steered clear – albeit automatically, subconsciously – of any situation where that awkward conversation might have to happen.

The following Christmas, April invited me to London and because I’d spent the previous Christmas not with my brother, as I had claimed, but drunk and maudlin and alone in my flat, and because I was missing them all like crazy… And because I had a feeling it was time, perhaps, to normalise my relationship with Sean, I accepted.

April pointed out repeatedly that Jake hardly knew me, and not only did that make me feel guilty, but it provided the justification I needed to be there.

All the same, as I travelled down on the train, my jumbo bag of gifts at my feet, I felt as nervous as I’ve ever been.

On arrival, I went straight to my hotel – I’d found a great deal at Camden Lock.

I checked in, showered and changed, and then headed over to April’s place. It was a lovely crisp December day and I enjoyed the walk, half of which was through the park.

On breakfast TV that morning, Carol Kirkwood had promised snow, but it hadn’t happened after all. It smelt as if it might still come to pass, though – the air had a strange metallic taste to it that reminded me of other snowy days, in any case.

It was just after three when I got to the flat, and Jake was having his afternoon snooze with April, so Ronan, Sean and I headed back out for a Christmas drink at a nearby pub, The Queens.

The conversation was stilted at first – I didn’t know Ronan well and hadn’t seen Sean for months – but by the time the boys had started their second pints and I was sipping a repeat G&T things seemed to feel much more normal.

We chatted about Jake and how Ronan was coping with his new work/life balance (he wasn’t coping at all) and how he and April had agreed to swap roles again after the New Year so that Ronan could get his career back on track. Looking after a baby wasn’t, he said, compatible with freelancing after all. He actually seemed surprised about that.

As we walked tipsily back home, Ronan asked me how I was, so I told him about working part time and that I was enjoying it, but how, financially, it couldn’t go on forever.

And then Ronan asked me if I was seeing anyone at the moment. There was something peculiar, something premeditated about the way he had said it, and I glanced, without thinking, at Sean to see if he was complicit in this in some way.

Sean spotted and understood the context of my glance: he gave me an open handed shrug which meant, Sorry, nothing to do with me.

“No,” I replied, eventually. “No, not seeing anyone at all.” I was glad that it was dark enough that they couldn’t see me blushing.

Back at the flat, Jake was awake and tearing around the apartment, yanking at the branches of the tree, which they had securely attached to the wall, thank God, and squeezing and punching the gifts beneath it. He was a welcome distraction for all of us, I think.

“I’m glad I left my gifts at the hotel,” I said. “I’m not sure they would have survived an evening with Jake.”

I helped April serve some Christmas Eve snacks and I drank another couple of glasses of wine, which was probably one too many, but hey, it was Christmas Eve, after all.

By eight, both April and Jake were in bed and Ronan was snoring in front of the television, so I said that I’d order a taxi back to my hotel.

Sean offered to walk me back instead. “It’ll do me good to get some fresh air,” he said. “Plus, this way we can talk.”

Because the darkness of the park scared me a little, we walked around the edges instead. It was incredibly cold and our breath hung in the air like fog.

We walked in silence for a while, which made me feel uncomfortable, so when we turned onto Regent’s Park Road I steeled myself and spoke. “So, did you want to talk about anything specific?” I asked.

Sean cleared his throat. “I suppose I do, really, yes,” he said. “I suppose I think it’s time we had a conversation about us.”

“Us?”

“Yes, it feels like… I don’t know. Like we’ve been avoiding each other? Maybe? Just a bit?”

“Yes,” I agreed. “Yes, I know what you mean. We have, really, haven’t we?”

“Ever since the hospital. You know, when Jake was born.”

“Yes.”

“I’m thinking maybe that was a mistake, saying what I said. I’m wondering if perhaps I offended you?”

“No!” I said, stopping walking now, so that I could turn and face him properly. “No, don’t think that. Nothing you said ever offended me, Sean.”

“Right,” he said. “OK, then.”

“I think we need, perhaps…” I stumbled. “Perhaps we need to be clearer about the kind of relationship we have.” I was trying, but failing, to nudge the conversation in a more useful direction.

Sean touched my elbow then. “And what kind of relationship is that, Mags?” he asked.

As I tried to construct the perfect response, as I tried to forge a phrase that would be clear, concise yet friendly, respectful yet unambiguous, I momentarily closed my eyes. “I think,” I started, “that we’ve been perhaps trying to make…”

Sean lurched at me and pecked me on the lips.

“Oh,” I said, genuinely surprised. I hadn’t been expecting that at all.

He leaned back just far enough that I could see his features lit by the streetlamp opposite. He looked confused and serious, an expression I struggled to understand in the context of the kiss.

“I don’t think I…” I began, hesitantly.

“Hang on,” Sean interrupted, raising a finger to my lips. “I’ve had a bit to drink, I know, but do you mind? Would you mind if I just…”

I laughed awkwardly. “I don’t mind, Sean. It’s just that…”

He leaned in and kissed me again, more forcefully this time. He placed a hand on my neck, too. His hand was icy cold on my skin and I shivered.

After a few seconds Sean pulled away. “Oh,” he said.

“Oh?”

“That didn’t work really, did it?”

“No,” I agreed. “No, not really. Not for me, anyway.”

“No, me neither,” Sean said, sounding matter of fact, as if he was perhaps stating the result of a scientific experiment. “Sorry, but I had to know. I had to find out.”

“It’s OK,” I told him. “I understand.”

“Do you?” Sean asked, looking somehow boyish in his confusion.

“I think so,” I said.

I suddenly felt overcome by embarrassment. “I think I’ll…” I said, pointing vaguely and starting to walk. “It’s fine. My hotel’s just there, Sean.” My voice had gone all wobbly and I felt desperate to end this interaction, desperate to be alone in my room with my thoughts.

“Right, if you’re sure,” Sean said. “I’ll, um, see you tomorrow then.”

By way of reply I gave a little wave over my shoulder.

When I got to my hotel room, I sat on the bed and cried.

I’d struggle to explain precisely why I cried because it was for a whole jumble of reasons and emotions, but I cried, I think, because I thought my friendship with Sean was now definitively ruined forever. I cried because it was Christmas Eve and I was fifty years old, and yet still alone. I cried because I knew that I wasn’t going to April’s place the next day, after all, and because I’d be spending Christmas Day on my own. Again.

Eventually, I dried my face, touched up my makeup, and headed downstairs to the bar. I’d have a better chance of sleeping, I reckoned, with a double whisky inside me. I was feeling hungry, too.

At first, I sat at the bar, but as the only other people on barstools were men, an old guy in a suit to my left, and an overweight chap to my right, nursing a pint, I quickly relocated to one of the tables while I waited for the Halloumi brochette I had ordered.

The few tables that were occupied had been taken by couples and I hesitated for a moment over whether I felt more or less uncomfortable seated at a table, alone, than at the bar. But then I took a hefty swig of my whisky and thought, “Fuck it.”

Frank Sinatra came on the loudspeaker system singing Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas. I sighed deeply and looked at the bar in case my snack had arrived. I needed something to do with my hands and the food would be a welcome distraction.

One of the two men (the overweight one) had swivelled on his chair to face me. He was staring straight at me. Balding. Bearded. Big brown eyes.

He sighed exaggeratedly and raised an eyebrow. “Christmas, huh?” he said, softly, and I laughed in a dry, understated kind of way. He hadn’t said anything that profound, but I felt that I couldn’t have put it better myself.

He lifted his empty glass and nodded vaguely at mine with his chin, silently asking a question.

I blinked slowly and then surprised myself by shrugging, silently transmitting my answer. He turned back to the bar to order for us both.

“Thank you,” he said earnestly, as he placed the drinks on the table and pulled up a chair to join me. Close to, he was younger than I had thought. Late thirties, perhaps early forties. Now smiling, albeit sadly, he was cuter, too. His size seemed less important – he somehow seemed to carry it well. With the beard and everything, the overall impression was of a friendly, if slightly sad, teddy-bear. And those brown eyes really were enormous – I could see the whole room reflected in them.

“I thought I was about to cry if I had to drink another pint on my own, on bloody Christmas Eve,” he said.

There was something so honest about that opening statement that it touched me. Perhaps it was just the alcohol and the emotion of the day but my eyes were watering again in sympathy. I swallowed with difficulty. “Me too,” I said.

“Dan,” he said, offering his hand.

I reached out and shook it. His grip was warm and firm. “Mags,” I told him.

“It’s snowing!” someone said, and we both turned to look at the young woman seated by the window. “Look,” she said again, addressing her boyfriend. “It’s snowing.”

“Merits a closer look, I’d say,” Dan said, standing.

I followed his lead and took my drink with me to the window. Outside, tiny snowflakes were drifting past the streetlights.

“Merry Christmas, Mags,” Dan said.

“Merry Christmas, Dan,” I replied.

Three: The Kerala Curry Christmas.

Sean:

About two weeks before Christmas, April phoned me. We had decided to have Christmas dinner at my place, so I assumed that she was phoning with last minute suggestions or requests.

“I need to ask you something, Dad,” she said.

“I need to ask you something, too,” I replied. “I was about to phone you, actually.”

“Oh, OK,” April said. “You go first then.”

I laughed. “No, no, after you.”

“Right,” she said, sounding worried. “Well, it’s about Maggie, actually.”

“Ah,” I said. “Maggie, is it?”

I had spoken to Maggie only a handful of times since the previous Christmas, and I hadn’t seen her once.

She had phoned April to cancel on Christmas morning. She’d invented some cock-and-bull story about having to visit a friend in distress, but April had seen through it, so, when pressed, I’d invented a story of my own about a random drunken argument to excuse her. Because of course I knew perfectly well that it was my fault she had cancelled. I knew that I’d made her feel uncomfortable with that stupid kiss.

I have no excuse for what I did, except to say that even the silliest action can seem perfectly logical after a few drinks. I know that’s a cop-out, but it’s true.

The papers that year had been full of sexual harassment, inappropriate behaviour, and even, occasionally, full-blown rape accusations against a slew of well known personalities. And every time I had read about one I’d squirmed a little and wondered if I hadn’t crossed a line with Maggie. After all, she hadn’t exactly invited me to kiss her, had she?

So I’d phoned her to apologise on New Year’s Day and I’d emailed her again to grovel some more in March. But though she insisted that everything was fine, I knew, from the simple fact of her complete absence from our lives, that it wasn’t true.

“Now, I know last Christmas went off like a damp firework and everything,” April said, “and I know you had a bit of a tiff, but I still feel weird coming to Cambridge and not seeing her at all. And if I do go to see her, I can’t see how I can avoid asking her what she’s up to for Christmas, can I? And if Dan’s not there, if she’s on her own, I mean, then I’ll…”

“Dan?” I asked, interrupting her.

“Yes, Dan. Her boyfriend.”

“Maggie has a boyfriend?”

“Yes, of course she does. You know that, right?”

“Um, no, I didn’t.”

“Don’t you ever look at her Facebook page, Dad?”

“Not really,” I admitted. “No. I never look at Facebook at all.”

“Oh,” April said. “Well, they’ve been together for a while, I think. So my question is, if I do go to see her, can I invite them?”

I licked my lips. This news had produced a curious pick and mix of feelings. There was undoubtedly a fair dose of jealousy in there, but the overriding sensation was one of profound relief. “You should definitely invite them both,” I said.

“Really?”

“Absolutely.”

“Your argument thing is all forgotten now then?”

“I don’t even remember what it was about.”

“Really?”

“I probably could, if I tried. But I’d rather not,” I said. “It was pretty silly.”

“Right,” April said. “You’re right. Don’t try to remember. And you’ll cook for five, if they come? That’s not a problem?”

“Three or five, it makes no odds,” I told her. “You still want curry?”

“Oh, totally. Ronan’s been telling everyone for weeks about our Kerala Curry Christmas.”

“We may even be six,” I said. “Seven with Jake, of course. I may have to buy a couple of folding chairs.”

“We can bring those,” April said. “But why? Who else is coming?”

“Just someone I met,” I told her. “That’s what I wanted to talk to you about. Just a friend who’s alone for Christmas. Someone I feel a bit sorry for. You know.”

“Go for it,” April said. “Invite whoever you want. It’s your place, Dad, and you’re cooking, after all. Does this mystery friend have a name?”

“She does,” I said. “Her name’s Cora.”

“Cora?”

“It’s Greek. She’s Greek.”

“Oh,” April said. I could hear the cogwheels turning as she wondered whether to inquire further. “Um, OK. You know, the more the merrier. Should I, um, buy Cora a Christmas present?”

“Yes,” I said. “Something little, some chocolates or something, but yes. I’m sure she’d be really touched by that.”

I had met Cora a month previously. I had gone straight from work one evening to quiz night at The Brook, and had arrived early.

The pub had been almost empty so I had ordered scampi and chips and a pint from the new barmaid. While I’d eaten at the bar, we had chatted.

Cora was a fifty-something Greek beauty with grey, soulful eyes and a thick Greek accent. She reminded me of the old photos of Maria Callas and had a presence about her that struck me from the moment I saw her.

There was something solid about her, that was the thing. There was something about the way she held herself, and the way she held your gaze when she spoke, that implied that she knew exactly who she was – she seemed to know where she came from and where she was going.

Though she was new to the pub, she served me – and those who followed – as if they were old friends she had known forever. There were no fake smiles, no service clichés, learned by rote. But nothing implied that she resented having to serve either. It all seemed totally natural. I liked her immediately even as I struggled to define quite why.

Between pulling pints, we chatted easily and I asked her how a Greek woman like her came to be pulling pints in a pub in Cambridge. I sensed there was a story there, and I wasn’t wrong.

Everything was awful back in Greece, she told me, ever since the financial crisis. She’d been a university professor in Thessaloniki – her subject was philosophy – but she’d been laid off due to cutbacks.

Her brother, a microchip developer, had found work on Cambridge Science Park, and out of work and with no hope of ever finding work, she’d come over to join him.

She was working two jobs, she told me. She was serving coffee in Starbucks by day and pulling pints in The Brook by night. “I like this better,” she said. “Starbucks is like… you know… a factory line, yes? Sometimes I make coffees for eight hours and I’m saying, please, no more coffee!”

I had thought about her all week. I had tried again to analyse what it was about her that seemed so different, but other than a certain nobility in the way she held herself, as if the top of her head was attached, by a cord, to the ceiling, and the combination of the gentle smile with those grey eyes, I couldn’t really put my finger on it. There was something interesting, too, I thought, in the way she seemed to approach her life, her changed circumstances, without any hint of resentment.

A week later, I was back there, even earlier, to chat to her about it.

“Why would I resent?” she said, matter of factly. “I like it. Life is for experience, and this is all new experience. At first I am trying to find work in the university. But you know, I think this is more happy. And what is life, if not for happy, huh?”

It was then that I’d asked her what her plans were for Christmas. When she’d told me that she was staying, that Argus – yes her brother’s name was Argus – was going home, but she was staying, I’d known what I had to do. I merely had to run it by April.

Today, Christmas Day.

The first people to arrive on Christmas morning, are April, Ronan and Jake. It’s raining gently as they carry their stuff from the car.

“I’m dreaming of a wet Christmas,” April says, as she dumps her box of wrapped packages next to the tree and pulls down the glistening hood of her parka. “Yuck.”

“Hello miserable, moaning daughter,” Sean says as he crosses the room while wiping his hands on his blue chef’s apron. “Merry Christmas.”

“Merry Christmas,” April says, kissing him on the cheek and then wriggling out of her coat. “In full flow, I see,” she adds, nodding towards the kitchen area where every surface is covered with pots and pans and cooking ingredients.

“Of course,” Sean says. “These things don’t cook themselves.”

“I’ll give you a hand in a bit.”

“No thanks.”

April laughs. She knows only too well how her father hates to have help in the kitchen. “Then I’ll tidy,” she says.

“Ooh, yes please to that!” Sean replies. “Where are the boys?”

As he says this, the door to the flat opens and Jake appears, closely followed by a heavily laden Ronan.

Jake pauses in the centre of the room and looks around. “See, no chim-er-ley,” he says, putting his hands on his hips. “I told you, Dad.”

“Jake’s extremely concerned about your lack of a chim-er-ly,” Ronan explains. “He’s worried about Santa’s access strategy with his sacks of presents and all.”

“Oh, well, don’t worry about that,” Sean tells Jake. “He’s already been. Look.”

He plucks Jake from the floor and carries him, wriggling, to the tree. “He brought all those presents.”

“But how?” Jake asks.

“I left a window open,” Sean tells him. “I think he landed on the balcony and just walked straight in. I even put lights out there so he could find us, see?”

“Did you feed the rain-horses?” Jake asks.

“The rain-horses?” Sean laughs. “Yes, I did. I left them mince pies and chocolates.”

Jake nods at this thoughtfully. “Was there any chock-lits left over?”

“No there weren’t,” April tells him. “But we’ll see if we can find some later.”

By twelve, when Maggie and Dan arrive, Sean’s three curries are bubbling away nicely and the surfaces have been cleared. The dishwasher is chugging rhythmically.

Maggie hands Sean her wet umbrella which Sean carries out to the balcony. “Still raining then,” he comments.

“Just spotting,” Maggie says. “But we walked.”

“Exercise,” Dan says, flashing the whites of his eyes at Sean and patting his stomach.

“Yes, we’re trying to walk more,” Maggie says. “So hello everyone! This is Sean, April, Rolan… sorry, Ronan – I always call him that... Brain problems… And Jake. And this is Dan.”

“Can we open them now?” Jake asks.

“No,” April tells him. “Not until everyone’s here.”

“Actually, we can,” Sean tells her. “Cora’s not coming till late. She’s working till two, so…”

Ronan serves everyone with drinks and once Sean has given Dan a brief guided tour of the apartment, the adults gather in the lounge to hand out the gifts.

There’s a pullover for Sean and a scarf for Maggie. Some perfume for April and a whole heap of plastic for Jake. It’s standard Christmas fare.

Within half an hour, Jake is overwrought at the sheer volume of gifts and is showing more interest in the wrapping paper than the gifts themselves. So despite a brief flood of tears, April removes the remaining gifts to the bedroom. “You can open the rest with Cora when she arrives,” she tells her son.

“I don’t want to,” Jake says, stamping his little feet.

“Well tough,” April laughs. “Because that’s what’s happening.”

At two, Sean switches on the rice cooker and starts to lay the pull-out-table. “I’m glad you could come,” he tells Dan, as he hands him a pile of plates. “I know it was a bit last minute, but none of us knew what we were doing for a while.”

“Oh, you had me at curry,” Dan says. “I was about to buy two ready meals from Iceland.”

“He so wasn’t,” Maggie comments, rifling in the cutlery drawer for knives and forks. He cooks like Gordon Ramsay.

“Yeah,” Dan laughs. “It’s a kitchen nightmare and I swear a lot.”

“Right, that’s all done,” Sean says, once the table has been laid, and decorated by Maggie with tinsel and candles. “Now, if you’ll just excuse me, I’m going to have a Christmas ciggy.”

“I’ll join you,” Maggie says, following Sean towards the picture window and then out onto the balcony.

“I’m loving these Christmas lights,” Maggie comments.

The multicoloured fairy lights that Sean has attached along the underside of the balcony railing are twinkling festively.

“They’re landing lights for Santa’s sleigh. A bit kitsch, I know, but Jake loves them. That’s the great thing about having children around. No one tells you off for being too Christmassy.”

As Sean slides the window closed behind them he sees Dan looking momentarily anxious without Mags at his side, but then sees that April has noticed too, and is engaging him in conversation.

“You haven’t started, I take it?” Sean asks, turning and pointing the cigarette packet at Maggie.

She shakes her head. “No, and I’m surprised you’re still smoking. You really need to stop that nonsense.”

“I bought this packet in August,” Sean says. “So, I wouldn’t worry overly.”

“How nice that you can sit out here when it rains, though,” Maggie comments.

“Yes,” Sean agrees, glancing up at the balcony above them. “Whoever designed that overhang was spot on.”

“You’re such a clever pumpkin, aren’t you?”

Sean winks at Maggie and then lights his cigarette.

“I just wanted a moment to thank you, properly,” Maggie says. “For inviting us, I mean. I was touched.”

“Touched?”

“Yeah… Especially after last Christmas and everything. I am sorry about all of that.”

“No, I’m sorry about all of that,” Sean says. “I was out of order.”

“You really weren’t. And it all worked out for the best, actually, so...”

“Did it?”

“Yes, it really did. I’ll tell you all about it some day. I’ll tell you about the weird Christmas Day I had.”

“Tell me what?”

Maggie wrinkles her nose. “Not now. But I’ll tell you one day. I promise.”

“So, Dan,” Sean says. “Tell me about Dan.”

“Ah, Dan,” Maggie says.

“He seems nice.”

Maggie laughs at this and Sean suddenly expects that she’s going to tell him all the ways that Dan isn’t nice. He’s had that many conversations about that many men with Maggie in the past. In anticipation, he starts to feel surprisingly angry on her behalf.

Instead, Maggie says, “You’ve no idea. I think he’s probably the nicest person on the planet. Present company excepted, of course.”

“Well, thank God for that,” Sean says. “How long have you known him?”

“Quite a while, actually.”

“So you’re fairly sure?”

“Yes, I’m sure. He’s generous and funny, he’s thoughtful and kind. He’s worried about – well, you know… all the things people are supposed to be worried about.”

“Which things are people supposed to be worried about?” Sean asks.

“Oh, you know: the polar bears and the factory farms and what have you. All those poor refugees drowning in the Med. All of it.”

“A man with a social conscience, then.”

“Exactly. And he never argues with me, which is a miracle, really.”

“That is exceptional,” Sean mugs.

“Of course, I still argue with him,” Maggie says, “but even then he just smiles at me and waits for me to stop. Plus he’s not gay. Which, after Ian, is hugely important.”

“Hugely! So, sounding a bit like love, here, Mags,” Sean says, fighting an unexpected pique of jealousy.

Mags frowns lopsidedly as she thinks about this. “I’m smitten,” she says. “I love that word, don’t you? Smitten.”

“Is smitten more or less than in love?”

“I don’t know… Oh, I might as well admit it. I’m in love, too. He’s so easygoing. And funny. Did I already say funny? But anyway, enough of Dan. His ears will be burning. Or his head swelling... What about you? April tells me you have a mystery guest coming.”

“A mystery guest?”

“A-huh. Cora, is it?”

“Yes,” Sean says slowly.

“Are you just friends? Or is this something more?”

Sean laughs. “I’m not sure, really,” he says. “We’ll see. Early days and all that…”

“Hum, well… I’m looking forward to meeting her. I feel a bit jealous, actually. A bit protective about you, too.”

Sean laughs again. “Yes,” he says. “Well, I know those feelings.”

Maggie reaches out to stroke Sean’s arm. “I know things have been… strange… between us. But I do care about you, you know.”

“I know, Mags,” Sean says. “Me too.”

“So, I suppose I had better get in there and quiz her.”

“And I’d better interrogate Dan!” Sean says. “I hope you’ll like her, anyway. I think you probably will. Shall we?” Sean gestures towards the interior and stubs out his cigarette on the underside of the railing.

“Yes,” Maggie says. “Let’s.”

Once everyone is seated, Dan gestures towards the curry bowls and claps his hands. “So tell me about these!” he says. “They smell incredible.”

“Well, this one’s Kerala chicken,” Sean tells him, tapping the lid of a cook-pot to his right. “That one’s Koottu, which is chickpeas and plantain. And that one’s a mushroom Thoran. They shouldn’t be too spicy, in deference to your girlfriend’s tastebuds.”

“I like the spices,” Maggie says. “I just don’t like it when I need reconstructive surgery for the roof of my mouth afterwards.”

“How come I haven’t heard of any of these?” Dan asks. “I mean, I’ve eaten a thousand Biryanis in my time, and quite a few Baltis, but I’ve never heard of Koo… what was it?”

“Koottu. They’re Kerala recipes, that’s why. It’s a region. On the coast. In the tropics. And the food’s quite different. You’ll see.”

“Dad grinds all the spices himself,” April explains.

“Well, if you’re going to follow a Kerala recipe, that’s pretty much the only option. So come on. Dig in! Before it all goes cold. Maybe you can serve that one, Dan? They’re a bit hot to pass around.”

“You’re sure you don’t want to wait for your friend?” Dan replies.

“I’m sure,” Sean says. “She could be ages. So go for it.”

“And Jake?” Maggie asks. “What’s Jake eating?”

“Oh, he’ll eat some of mine,” April says, jiggling him up and down on one knee. “He loves curry, don’t you?”

Jake nods exaggeratedly. “But I like chock-lit better,” he says.

“Can almost-three-year-olds eat curry?” Maggie asks.

“Apparently so,” April says. “But then our paediatrician is called Doctor Patel, so her answer to that particular question was always going to be a foregone conclusion.”

They have just finished passing their plates back and forth when Sean’s intercom buzzes. “Perfect timing!” he exclaims, jumping up and crossing the room. He buzzes Cora in and then vanishes into the stairwell to greet her.

“Have you met her?” Maggie whispers to April, nodding towards the door.

April shakes her head and pulls a nervous face.

Sean reappears and ushers Cora into the room. “You’re just in time,” he’s saying. “We were just about to eat. Or maybe you already ate, at the pub?”

“I had a snack, but this smell wonderful,” Cora says, handing Sean her coat and turning to look at the expectant faces around the table. “Hello everyone!” she says, giving a little wave.

“The presents!” Jake exclaims. “Can we get the other presents now?”

“After dinner,” April tells him, wrapping one arm around him and yanking him back onto her lap.

Sean does a round of introductions and then serves a final plate of food for Cora.

“This is so very nice of you,” she says. “I’m a little bit over... over well?”

“Overwhelmed?” Maggie offers.

“Yes, overwhelm.”

“Sean tells me you’re Greek, yes?”

“I am.”

“I loved Greece,” Maggie says causing Sean to raise an eyebrow.

“I did!” Maggie insists. “It wasn’t the most successful holiday, perhaps, but the place itself was stunning.” She turns back to Cora and continues, “I went years ago. With Sean and Catherine. To the Greek Islands.”

“The Cyclades,” Sean explains. “Santorini. And Mykonos. Classic stuff.”

“It was beautiful,” Maggie says. “Especially Santorini.”

Cora is looking confused. “But not success,” she says. She looks at Sean. “You went together?”

“Oh, sorry,” Maggie says. “We’re going too fast, aren’t we? I was with a boyfriend, Ian. It didn’t work out. So that spoilt things a bit for me. And Sean was with Catherine, of course.”

“Catherine was my wife,” Sean explains.

Cora now looks even more confused, so April says, rather, abruptly, “Catherine was my mum. But she died, nearly four years ago. Now, can we move on?”

“Of course,” Maggie says, looking chastised. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s fine... It’s just... you know,” April says. “Let’s eat.”

Amidst groans of pleasure, everyone samples the food. “This is delicious,” Cora says, tasting the Thoran. “This is an English tradition? Curry on Christmas?”

“No, not at all,” Sean tells her. “But people get bored with turkey and potatoes, you know?”

“Plus we all love curry in this family,” April adds.

“Of course,” Cora says, delicately forking a piece of chicken.

“Can I ask you something?” Maggie says.

“Of course.”

“Are you a dancer?”

Cora laughs and points over her shoulder. “I was. When I was younger. But you can still see, yes? That’s funny.”

“Was it ballet?”

“I trained for ballet, yes. Until I am eighteen. Then I do modern and jazz for a while. Nowadays not so much. Just for staying fit, you know?”

“Now, you see, I didn’t know that,” Sean says, nodding appreciatively.

“It’s the way you hold yourself,” Maggie tells her. “Only dancers have poise like that. And yoga teachers, I suppose. People like that.”

“I do yoga, too,” Cora says. “I love yoga. It calms me.”

The conversation drifts from yoga to Maggie’s Tai Chi classes, and onto rowing and then sports in general.

Once Jake has eaten a few spoonfuls of curry and rice, April retrieves the bag of gifts from the other room and sets him up with them on the big grey sofa while Maggie dishes out her Christmas pudding.

It’s five o’clock and pitch black outside by the time Cora hands round her traditional Greek melomakarona biscuits to go with the coffees Sean has served.

“Oh, shit,” Ronan suddenly exclaims. “We forgot the Christmas crackers. They must still be in the car, aren’t they?”

“God damn it,” Dan says, sounding theatrical and unconvincing. “I forgot mine too.”

A minute later, both men have reappeared with their boxes of crackers.

After some discussion about whose crackers to use – a surprisingly heated issue – Dan and Ronan hand out a mixture. But when Maggie tries to pass hers on to Cora, Dan puts his hand on it. “Can’t mix them up,” he says. “They’re nominative. Well, that one is.”

“And this one is...” Ronan says, carefully examining one of his, and then handing it to April. “It’s a special one for you.”

“Do we have to cracker them with specific people then?” Maggie asks.

“You do,” Dan says. “You have to cracker yours with me.”

As tradition requires, only half of the crackers pop. The other half remain completely silent.

“Here,” Dan says, handing the larger half of Maggie’s back to her. “Have a dig inside there and see what you can find.”

Maggie, looking dubious, fumbles inside the paper tube. “Oh!” she says, finally. “Oh, oh, oh!”

Her fingers slowly withdraw. “God,” she says, putting the ring down on the table in front of her and, suddenly pale and watery-eyed, looking up at Dan.

Everyone leans in to look at the ring, a simple white-gold band with a single blue sapphire.

“Oh, Dan!” Maggie says, now gently picking up the ring.

Dan pushes his chair back and stands. He clears his throat and then begins to speak. “Dearest lovely Mags,” he says. “It’s a year to the day since I met you, and it’s been the best bloody year of my whole life.”

“Aww!” April says, soppily.

“So what I want to know is, will ya marry me?” he asks.

Maggie scans the faces around her and chews her lip. “Talk about pressure!” she says.

Jake chooses this moment to run to the table holding an enormous fluorescent orange super-soaker. “Look, Mum,” he says. “A gun!”

“Hold on,” April tells him.

“But look!” Jake says.

“Shotgun wedding!” Sean comments.

“Wait! Just... wait!” April shouts. “Please, Maggie... the floor is yours.”

Maggie shrugs, then slips into a grin. “All right then,” she says.

“All right then?” Dan repeats, mockingly.

“Then, yes please,” Maggie tells him. She turns to Cora and shrugs cutely. “I’ve never been engaged before,” she says.

Cora reaches out to stroke her back, and smiles.

“Kiss, kiss, kiss,” Ronan chants, and so, to much applause, Maggie and Dan kiss.

Once the furore of congratulations has calmed down, Ronan turns to April. “Have you looked in yours?” he asks.

She laughs. “Well, whatever’s in it, it’s going to be a bit of a disappointment after Dan’s, isn’t it?”

Ronan shrugs. “I know. But have a look anyway,” he says.

April shakes hers at the table then peers inside. “Nowt,” she says. “Mine’s empty. What a rip-off.”

“Is there not even a joke?” Ronan asks.

April shrugs. “Yeah, there’s a joke,” she says, pulling out the slip of paper. “But nothing else.” She casts the scrap of paper aside, and reaches across the table to take Maggie’s hand.

“Read it out,” Ronan says.

“I don’t want to read it out. I want to look at Maggie’s ring,” April retorts, testily.

“Well, I think you should read it out,” Ronan says again.

April studies the ring for a moment. “That’s beautiful, Mags,” she says. “That’s stunning.”

“I know. I’m a bit in shock, I think.”

“The joke,” Ronan says again, now picking up the slip of paper and waving it in April’s face.

She rolls her eyes and reluctantly takes it from his grasp, then studies the slip of paper. “I don’t get it,” she says, after a moment.

“Read it out,” Ronan says. “What does it say?”

April sighs. “What did the Irishman say to the English girl worried about Brexit?” she reads, in a bored tone of voice. Checking the rear of the slip of paper, she adds, “That’s all it says.”

“And?”

April pulls a face. “And... I don’t get it,” she says.

“What was the question again?”

April shakes her head in frustration. “What did the Irishman say to the English girl worried about Brexit?” she says again. “But there’s no answer.”

Dan, who is now breaking out in a grin, says, “Oh, I get it!”

“Don’t you say a word,” Ronan tells him.

“Oh, I wouldn’t dare.”

April shakes her head. “OK… bored now,” she says. “So come on, clever clogs. What did the Irishman say to the English girl worried about Brexit?”

Ronan winks at her, and then produces a small box from his pocket. “He said, ‘Marry me,’ you eejit.”

April looks wide-eyed at the box in Ronan’s outstretched hand. Her mouth drops open.

“You, um, might want to repeat that without the word ‘eejit’, mate,” Dan, who has pulled his phone out, and is now filming, says. “Just for, you know, posterity’s sake.”

Ronan nods at him. “You’re not wrong,” he says, then turning back to April, he flips the box open, revealing another ring. “Marry me?” he says. “Please say, ‘yes’.”

April glances at her father, then turns back to face Ronan. “You’re supposed to ask Dad, aren’t you?” she says.

Ronan laughs. “I don’t want to marry your father,” he says. “No offence meant, Sean, but you’re just not my type.”

“You know what I mean,” April insists.

“April’s Dad,” Ronan says, with bored theatricality. “May I please take the hand of your beautiful, clever, funny daughter in marriage and make her both my wife and an Irish citizen?”

Sean nods and then, with unexpected tears welling up in his eyes, croaks, “Yes. Absolutely.” He stands awkwardly and knocks his chair over. “There’s, um, a bottle of champagne still lurking somewhere, I think.”

“There are two,” Dan announces, knowingly. “They’re on the balcony in a freezer bag. I’ll get ‘em.”

“Hold your horses,” April says. “I haven’t said ‘yes’ yet!” She reaches out to take the box from Ronan’s grasp.

“It won’t be your size, yet,” he explains, softly. “It was my grandmother’s. We’ll have to get it adjusted.”

April lifts the ring from the box and inspects it delicately. It has a filigree design, woven around a small central diamond.

“That’s very, very beautiful,” Cora says, leaning across the table and peering in.

“It is,” April agrees. “It’s stunning. This is from when… the twenties? Thirties?”

“Nineteen twenty-three,” Ronan tells her. “It’s platinum, apparently. And a real, actual diamond. Grandmother was high society, it would seem. Jesus only knows what happened afterwards, because we sure weren’t.”

April slips it onto her finger and laughs lightly. “It fits,” she says, holding her hand out to show everyone. “Look, it fits perfectly.”

“Shall I take that as a ‘yes’ then, Cinderella?” Ronan asks.

April nods and looks up at him, tears in her eyes. “Yes,” she croaks. “Definitely!”

Just after six, Maggie and Dan make their excuses and leave.

April takes this as the signal to start tidying up, but Sean takes the cups from her hands and puts them back on the table. “There’s no hurry for that,” he says. “Leave it.”

“It’s fine,” April insists. “Plus, we need to get going soon. Jake’ll be asleep in a minute – and that makes the drive so much less stressful.”

“I won’t,” Jake says. “I’m wide awake.”

April laughs. “He will. He’ll be asleep by the end of the road,” she says.

“If you want,” Cora offers, “I can stay and help with the clean. If you want to get driving. You have to go to London, yes?”

“Yes,” April says. “It’s only an hour, but…” She glances at her father who nods almost invisibly.

“OK then,” she says lightly. “If you’re sure, Cora?”

As Ronan drives away, April looks up at the balcony and sees her father, and Cora, side by side, waving.

“So, what do we think about Cora?” April asks, as she closes her window against the icy night air.

“She seems all right,” Ronan says, turning onto the main road and accelerating away. “She’s pretty, and smart. She seemed pretty fine to me.”

“Yes,” April says. “And it’s a romance-kind-of-thing, yeah?”

Ronan glances at her and wrinkles his brow, mockingly. “You did see how they were looking at each other, right?” he asks.

“Yes,” April says. “Yes, I think I did.”

“Are you OK about that?” Ronan asks. “You sound a bit put out.”

“Oh, I’m not put out,” April says. “But it does feel weird. Leaving them together, like that. Waving. As if they’re a couple or something... oh, I don’t know.”

“You don’t like her?”

“No, I do. But, well, she’s not Mum, is she?”

“No one is,” Ronan says. “No one else ever could be.”

“No,” April says. “No, I suppose not. Of course not. I’m just being silly, aren’t I? And in such a cliché way.”

They drive on in silence for a moment, then she adds, “Do you think they’re going to... Oh, actually... never mind. Forget I asked that.”

“Absolutely, totally, definitely, they are,” Ronan says.

April laughs. “You’re always so wishy-washy about everything. That’s what’s so annoying about you, Ronan. Just try to have an opinion sometimes, yeah?”

“You only had to look at the body-language to...”

“Stop!” April says. “I’ve decided it’s best not to think about it, actually.”

“But it’s a good thing, babe.”

“Yes, I suppose it is. But I really don’t want to think about it.”

“You wouldn’t rather he was on his own, now would you? Not on Christmas Day.”

“No,” April says, glancing behind her seat at Jake who is already asleep. “No, of course not.”

“Well then.”

“And she is nice. It’s true.”

“And pretty. And clever.”

“Yes, and pretty. And clever.”

“So, Merry Christmas, Sean.”

“Yes,” April says, through a snigger. “Yes, Merry Christmas, Dad.”

“You are daft sometimes,” Ronan says. “You’re so daft sometimes that the only thing I can think to do with you is to marry you.”

“Yeah, I’m struggling to believe you did that,” April says. “Especially in front of everyone. And you didn’t organise it with Dan? The whole double proposal thing?”

“Swear to God,” Ronan says. “Your man there totally stole my thunder. I could have killed him for that.”

“You poor baby.”

“But you are glad I asked you? You are happy about it, are you not?”

“Oh, Ronan, of course I am!” April says. “I’m over the moon.”

“Because if you don’t want to...”

“Oh, stop, Ronan. I’m thrilled to bits. I’ve been wishing I’d never said I didn’t want to. I was thinking you’d never ask.”

“Well, that’s good, then.” He reaches out and squeezes April’s hand.

“I’m chuffed for Maggie too,” April says. “I never thought I’d see the day, to be honest. Old Mags, getting married. Imagine that.”

“Quite a successful Christmas, all things considered.”

“Yes,” April says. “Yes, not bad. Not bad at all. All things considered.”

“You’re missing your ma, though, huh?” Ronan says.

April looks across at him. His face is blurred by her sudden tears. “Yes,” she croaks.

“But, that’s good, too,” he says.

“Is it, do you think?”

“Of course. Because it means she’s here with us in a way, doesn’t it? You wouldn’t want to forget your ma. Not at Christmas.”

April sighs deeply and rests her hand on his thigh as he drives. She turns to look out through the windscreen, at the shiny road and the streetlights whizzing by. “If she were here, then at least I think she’d be pleased,” she says, softly.

“Yes,” Ronan says. “Yes, I think it’s a safe bet to say she’d be right chuffed to see everyone so loved-up on Christmas Day.”

“You’re right. And I am loved-up, too. I love you so much, you know?” April says, suddenly, urgently.

“I know,” Ronan replies, matter-of-factly. “But I bet I love you more.”

***

Have a wonderful Christmas, everyone!

Peace and joy to all.

Nick xxx

The Other Son

A novel by Nick Alexander

Selected by Amazon as one of the best fiction titles of 2015.

From Nick Alexander, the author of the #1 ebook hits, The Photographer’s Wife, The Half-Life of Hannah and The French House.

Alice has been lying to herself for years, holding fast to the belief that the needs of her family far outweigh her own.

But her outwardly successful marriage hides dark secrets, and for much of her life, the children were the only reason she stuck around.

These days, though her successful banker son lives nearby, his young wife seems to do everything she can to keep Alice at bay. As for Alice’s other son, he has always been something of a stranger and has been traveling for so long that Alice isn’t even sure what continent he is on anymore.

Alice can’t help but wonder if the effort she expends presenting a united front to the outside world is actually helping anyone and what would happen if she suddenly stopped pretending.

Could life, like the novels she devours, hold surprises in its closing chapters? And if she did shake everything up by admitting the truth about her marriage, would anyone be on her side? Has the time finally come for Alice to put her own needs first?

For the first time in years, her heart is racing. Can Alice really change her life?

Dare she even imagine such a thing?

The Photographer’s Wife

A novel by Nick Alexander

A number #1 hit.  Over 180,000 copies sold.

From the author of The French House, The Half-Life of Hannah and The Case of The Missing Boyfriend, Nick Alexander’s #1 bestseller, The Photographer's Wife, is an epic tale set in two eras, a tale of the secrets one generation has, rightly or wrongly, chosen to hide from the next.

Barbara – a child of the Blitz – has more secrets than she cares to admit. She has protected her children from many of the harsh realities of life and told them little of the poverty of her childhood, nor of the darker side of her marriage to one of Britain's most famous photographers.

With such an incomplete picture of the past, her youngest, Sophie, has struggled to understand who her parents really are, and in turn, Barbara sometimes worries, to build her own identity.

When Sophie decides to organise a vast retrospective exhibition of her adored father's work, old photos are pulled from dusty boxes. But with them tumble stories from the past, stories and secrets that will challenge every aspect of how Sophie sees her parents.

The Bottle of Tears (or Let the Light Shine)

A novel by Nick Alexander

Penny and Victoria are about as different as two siblings can be, one with a smart London lifestyle, the other struggling to make ends meet.

But they are joined by more than blood, and their shared past is affecting the present more than they realise.

When events begin to tug at the fabric beneath which dark secrets are hidden, the resulting chaos threatens to tear the two families apart.

Could there be aspects of the past that youngest child Penny doesn’t remember?

Could the truth of Marge be more complex than the beloved mother the girls choose to perceive?

And could the true story of Christmas 1975 be the key to understanding Victoria, Marge, and much much more?

"A moving family drama, a tale of siblings, resilience and hope."

Legal Notice

Three Christmases.

Nick Alexander has asserted his right to be identified as the author of this work in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents act, 1988. Text by Nick Alexander, Copyright © 2017

The characters and situations in this book are entirely imaginary and bear no relation to any real person or actual happenings.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication can be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publishers and/or author.

While every precaution has been taken in the preparation of this book, the publisher assumes no responsibilities for errors or omissions, or for damages resulting from the use of information contained herein.

This edition, Copyright © BIGfib Books, 2017

Table of Contents

Three Christmases

One: The Bittersweet Christmas.

Two: The Awkward-Kiss Christmas.

Three: The Kerala Curry Christmas.

The Other Son

The Photographer’s Wife

The Bottle of Tears (or Let the Light Shine)

Legal Notice