“Okay,” Elliot says, his jaw tight with some suppressed emotion. “That’s it.”
I look on incredulously as he slams on the brakes, before jamming the car into reverse and starting to execute a three-point turn — only it ends up being more of a 15-point turn thanks to the narrowness of the road and his inability to steer on the slippery surface.
“Um, I was just joking,” I say. “You know, trying to break the tension? You don’t have to take me at my word and try to throw us into the middle of some thriller plot, you know.”
Elliot curses again as the car’s wheels spin under us.
“Please tell me we’re not at the start of a movie right now,” I say pleadingly. “Please tell me I’m not the one who dies first, because she wore the wrong shoes for the snow.”
I glance down at my leather boots, chosen this morning because they make my legs look longer, and because Paris deems them to bealmostacceptable.Notchosen for their usefulness in the snow, needless to say; and I’ve already had one footwear-related incident this week — I’d really prefer not to have another.
Elliot pauses in the act of wrestling with the steering wheel, and his dark blue eyes lock onto mine.
“No, Holly,” he says. “I’m not kidnapping you, and we’re not in a thriller movie. I’m trying to get us off this road and back to my rental, so we can talk. I think it’s time we had this out once and for all; don’t you?”
The Airbnb Elliot’s staying in turns out to be just off the road we were traveling on, and about half-a-mile back, which explains his decision to take us there, rather than trying to drive the rest of the way into town in the blizzard.
What’s slightly less clear to me as we bump our way down the short driveway is what, exactly, he’s hoping to achieve by us ‘having it out’, as he puts it. It’s not like I’m going to forgive him for leaving me the way he did; or for using me as material for the dislikeable ‘heroine’ of his book, either. No, I absolutelywill notbe accepting any apologies about that.
Not even if he begs me.
Which I’m secretly hoping he will, if we’re being totally honest.
No, I’m just going to be polite but distant, and show absolutely no interest whatsoever in —
“Oh my God, look at this place!”
The words burst out of me as Elliot brings the car to a stop in front of a long, low building, which looks a lot like a box with windows. Even theroofis made of windows; it’s one of those sloping ones that’s made almost entirely of glass, and there’s another wall of glass which takes up almost one whole wall of the single story building, allowing the light to flood in. Once we’re inside the gigantic, open-plan living area, which has a dining table on one side and a sofa on the other, I see that the house looks out onto a snow-covered valley, all rolling hills and frosty treetops.
“Wow, look at this,” I say, wandering over to a desk which has a laptop sitting open on top of it, and a row of black and whitephotos of the local area on the wall behind. “It’s Bramblebury, years ago. And this one’s…”
I stop in mid-sentence, realizing I’m looking at a photo of the village pond with its surface coated in thick ice. It must be from the same year Elliot and I skated on it; it has to be, in fact, because the pond hasn’t iced over again since then. But here it is, frozen in time; maybe even on the same day I dropped my phone on its surface and Elliot told me he loved me.
But Elliot lied. The ice melted. Everything changed; which makes this particular ghost of Christmas past feel a bit like a slap to the face.
“Um, is this your new book” I ask, turning my attention to the laptop instead, to get the memory of that night out of my head.
“No,” says Elliot, stepping up behind me and snapping it shut. “No, that’s just some emails I need to answer. Do you want something to eat? Drink? There’s a complicated-looking coffee machine in the kitchen. And something that looks like an old-fashioned stove.”
“An Aga,” I confirm, seeing the corner of it through the open door that leads out of the huge living area we’re standing in. “I’ve always wanted one. Elliot, this place is amazing.”
He shrugs modestly.
“It’s not mine,” he replies, smiling nevertheless. “I can’t take any credit for it.”
“No, but you can take credit for writing the book that paid for it, I guess,” I say, thinking out loud. “My books don’t even make enough to pay for the Aga.”
“Your books?” Elliot replies, his forehead creasing in confusion. “I thought there was just one book? The one you’re working on now?”
“Umm. About that,” I begin, feeling guilty, but not really knowing why. It’s not like I owe him an explanation of my life, after all. “I’ve been doing a bit of ghostwriting on the side. Quitea lot, actually. So I’ve written quite a few books. Just none you’d ever have heard of.”
“Really?” He looks surprisingly interested in this. “What kind of books?”
“Non-fiction ones,” I admit, not wanting to tell him any of the titles. “Except this current one. It’s a novel. It’s my first novel.”
I feel absurdly proud saying this, even though I know it’s not strictly true, because it’ll technically be Vivienne’s twenty-third novel — or whatever number she’s up to now.
It’s stillmyfirst, though; and I’m going to allow myself a brief moment of pride in it.
