I’m thrown an irritated eye-roll. ‘Obviously.’
In past conversations on the topic of nights spent with a cute guy, Nari would say this with a smirk and a fist bump, but this definitely isn’t the time for celebrating getting lucky. She’s solemnly looking at her photos again and hasn’t even asked if Stellan and me used condoms, which we did, thank you very much. I shake my head at the irony of the situation. The first time in eons I have something sensational of my own to share and we’re both in a daze so deep we can’t even enjoy the novelty of it.
‘So, what about Stephen?’ I’d asked, still hoping to get Nari to open up. ‘Are you seeing him in a few days?’
She interrupted my question with a brusque, ‘No’, and her thumbs started scrolling again.
I took a surreptitious peek over at the other shots she took, all beautifully filtered and cropped to perfection: Niilo and Stellan laughing together at thelavvu, and umpteen pictures of me and Nari, our faces squashed together as we grin up at the camera held aloft for silly selfies with the huskies in the background, or at the hotel restaurant, or outside our cabins in the snow.
Looking at those pictures six miles up in the sky above Scandinavia this morning, I already felt as though the whole escapade had taken on the unreality of a dream I couldn’t faithfully recall.
As we’d checked in our luggage and watched for our departure gate on the boards, I’d felt strangely altered. Even when the elves appeared to say goodbye, handing out colourful certificates decorated with images of a smiling Santa to celebrate the fact that we had crossed the Arctic Circle, I felt my previous cynicism had dissolved, and the elf lady with the basket of sweets looked shocked then delighted as I’d offered her a hug, overcome with a strange feeling of loss and regret. She’d handed me a tissue when I started to cry on her shoulder.
She’ll forever think of me as the mad, tragic single lady who arrived in Lapland crying and left crying too, but I’d just shrugged at myself and let the tears fall, thinking that this must be who I am now, somehow changed, somehow sentimental. I’d accepted her kindness with a smile just as the gate was unlocked and I’d walked out to the plane across the treacherously frozen tarmac.
Stellan had said he’d text when he returned to the resort after the wilderness trail with the tourists. No signal all week, he’d explained. But I have the feeling our connection is already entirely lost.
What would our virtual friendship look like? A text here, a Facebook reminiscence there? (Though I notice, he still hasn’t ‘friended’ me.) Either way we’re a thousand miles apart with no signal.
It’s definitely time for a Boxing Day glass of gin, I think. If my life had a musical score this particular bit of my soundtrack, with me wandering around my flat unsure what to do with myself, would be accompanied by a morbid Morrissey wryly lamenting my choices, telling me I just haven’t suffered enough to have earned my happy ending yet. I hear him whining, and he accompanies me whatever I do as my first night back in my flat slowly drags by.
I find myself flicking through the pages of the song book that the kind priest gave me at the concert rehearsal, but the Finnish words look even more indecipherable here than they did that night in the cosy, Christmassy church, so I file it away on my bookshelf with Mum’s lucky silver sixpence marking the page of ‘Sylvia’s Christmas Song’; the carol that must mean so much to Stellan and his Finnish friends, but is, it turns out, incomprehensible to me.
I even downloaded the aurora-watching app that Stellan had mentioned at the sauna and I discover that a cloudless aurora sky is forecast for tonight. He’ll be beneath it, out on the trail in the wilderness, but here in England the heavens will simply be black.
Eventually, I settle on the sofa with a pot of tea and the big box of spiced Finnish biscuits I bought for myself in the airport’s little departure lounge. I pull my mermaid blanket over my legs and try to focus on theEastEndersChristmas episodes, crumbs falling over me.
And this is how I spend the following days, alone in my flat, staring at the screen, living off crumbs.
Chapter Thirty
‘Come in, Sylvie dear!’
Dad’s delightedly showing off an ‘I heart New York’ T-shirt with matching baseball cap, as soon as he opens the door. It looks incongruous with his Christmas robin print cardigan, beige slacks and slippers, and makes me smile instantly.
It’s the thirtieth of December. Their flight only got in last night, but they’re already in full ‘catch-up with Christmas’ mode.
‘Welcome home,’ I say, as I’m ushered inside and am met with a big hug from Mum in a jazzy mohair candy cane jumper.
‘I could say the same to you,’ Mum says. ‘Come on through. Nari not with you today?’
‘No, she’s been laying low since we got back. She texted to tell me she’s been catching up on some sleep and doing a lot of writing.’
‘What a shame, her present’s under the tree, and I’ve steamed a whopper of a Christmas pudding. Your dad’s whipped up some brandy butter and it feels like a proper Christmas with all this white stuff.’ Mum looks excitedly out the kitchen window.
It’s been snowing big fluffy flakes for an hour or so and I resist the urge to say that this is nothing compared to where I’ve been. Instead, I help Mum peel the carrots and baste the little supermarket ‘cook from frozen’ turkey that’s already turning golden in the oven and we all pretend this counterfeit Christmas is as much fun as the real, missed day would have been.
‘One of Nari’s posts is scheduled to go live on her blog at three. We can have a look at it together if you like. She took some great pictures,’ I say.
‘Did she enjoy Lapland?’
‘I think she fell in love with it.’
‘And did you?’
‘Yes,’ I say, and it comes out sounding grim and ominous.
Our belated Christmas dinner, just the three of us, is just how I knew it would be: too much food, all delicious and hearty; Dad wearing his cracker hat even on the obligatory duck pond walk and as we dried the dishes together; and lots of chatter and pleasantness. We exchange presents and Dad says his musical socks are the best he’s ever been given, and Mum appreciates the new celebrity cookbook I give her.
