Page 12 of I’ll Be Home for Christmas

Sometimes she wondered whether they were suited. She’d only had a couple of boyfriends and had never been in a long-term relationship. How compatible were they, really? Had they given it long enough to really know? She wore dungarees and old T-shirts to work, not a scrap of make-up; she hated the miniscule portions dished out in posh restaurants so preferred to go to more casual or rustic places; she’d grown up moving around because of her dad’s job in the RAF, and when they eventually settled it had been in a normal terraced house in a village. Rhys wore well-cut suits to work; he was au fait with fine dining; he could talk about wine as if he knew it intimately; he’d grown up in a huge house in the countryside and, like his parents, had a vast circle of friends. Her life was quiet, much quieter than Rhys’s. Maybe the seven-year age gap meant her mum saw what Sarah saw herself sometimes: that Rhys had a confidence she was yet to gain, a life that had moved on several steps ahead of hers already.

Rhys’s parents, Louise and Jeff, had welcomed her into their Northumberland home the first time Rhys took her there to introduce her. They were lovely, they’d been great hosts and entertained her, and embraced her into the fold. But the problem was that fold was big. Enormous. Rhys was one of five children, whereas she was an only child. All of his siblings were married so that added in partners, and three of his siblings had a couple of kids each. She hadn’t had to meet them all that first day, which was a relief, but she’d met them all a few weeks after for his sister’s thirty-fifth birthday. That was fine too, but now they were planning a wedding, somehow with everyone the Newberrys knew the guest list had exploded to some two-hundred people, because of course you couldn’t invite Aunt Penny without inviting Aunt Millie, and of course the couple three doors down who babysat Rhys and all the other siblings at one time or another would want to see the fifth and last Newberry married off.

The house the Newberrys lived in and where she and Rhys were going to have their New Year’s Eve wedding was amazing, and when they’d decided on that as their venue, Rhys had shown her photographs from the Christmas just gone. He’d said that was what the house would look like again this year. The home had looked like it was a feature in a magazine. The colour schemes were perfect. A big, old table seating ten had been dressed for the main meal, candlesticks in the centre, winter flowers and greenery, place settings with shiny cutlery and glassware. All the lights in the rooms and on the outside of the house looked fabulous, and the Newberrys didn’t have just a single tree inside, they had five dotted around the property. The pictures showed a pine tree on either side of the front door, each bedecked in white lights, another big tree in the lounge, one in the vast hallway and the fifth (and tallest of all) was in the big country kitchen where Christmas was hosted every year.

Those pictures had let Sarah envisage what their wedding would be like, and in some ways that helped. But in others, it only fuelled the feeling that this was all happening so fast.

6

CHRISSIE

Chrissie hung a beautiful wreath decorated with berries and an enormous velvet bow on the front entrance door to Chetbury House Surgery. One of their nurses had made it and it would surely give a nice, cheery welcome to patients, despite whatever circumstances brought them here.

She looked upwards as she held the door open for a harried woman pushing a buggy with a toddler in it while balancing a baby on her hip. The skies were grey; rain was surely coming soon.

She closed the door against the cold. Her mum had already sent photographs of the Christmas decorations at the chalet in Winterbruck, complete with the stunning wreath her mum had made for the front door. She’d made it at a wreath-making class in town and had described it as Nordic with its fir foliage, pinecones dusted with white to look like frost, and shiny silver yet almost blue baubles. The wreath was finished off much like the wreath here, with a gorgeous bow. Inside the chalet, her dad had put the tree up – always a beautiful, traditional and fragrant Norway spruce – and her mum had been baking to her heart’s content. Sarah was lucky; she’d be spoiled over there. But it didn’t stop Chrissie missing her or worrying about her. Tonight they should’ve been having their weekly dinner of cottage pie – Sarah’s favourite – but instead it would be dinner for one.

She pulled up outside the front of the house as the heavens opened and she made a run for it up the path to shelter.

Nolan was just coming out of his house. Their doors were so close together they often found themselves in this situation, both standing beneath their adjacent little porches. She could hear Tessa on the other side of her door, excited that she was home.

‘You’re going for a run in this?’ she asked Nolan. He was wearing sports gear – running leggings, a long-sleeved top covering another one.

Nolan pulled on a beanie with a small light built into the front. His smile had endeared him to her the first time they met, and it still did. ‘I don’t mind the rain. And the thought of a hot shower when I get home will keep me going.’

As he left with a wave, the thought of him in a hot shower kept her going too, and despite the dismal weather and the dark, she was smiling as she stepped inside. Her beagle didn’t much like being picked up, but she liked a fuss, especially when she’d been on her own for a while. Chrissie’s work was close enough that she could nip home to let Tessa out part-way through the day, and Nolan had always been good at stepping in when she couldn’t do that.

She wondered what it would be like if she did go to Nolan’s for Christmas. It might be better than being on her own, and every time she saw him, she was tempted that little bit more.

She put the tree lights on and caught sight of the white and silver fairy decoration Sarah had made at primary school. Sarah had vetoed some of the decorations she’d made as a kid going anywhere near the tree, but this one had made it.

It felt odd not knowing what this Christmas was going to look like. Every Christmas Eve she and Sarah usually made Astrid’s cheese and cider soup together before enjoying a big, hearty bowl with enormous chunks of fresh white bread, lightly toasted, thickly buttered. But that, as well as other things they usually did, wouldn’t be happening this year.

She was about to go and put the oven on to warm up when the home phone rang. She answered it with a ‘Hello, Mum.’ She sat on the sofa and Tessa jumped up beside her, ready for a fuss. Her mother was the only one who called on her landline. She didn’t like to catch her daughter ‘on the hop’ as she put it, she wanted to get her undivided attention. Sarah tended to call Chrissie when she was rushing somewhere and although Chrissie never complained, she kind of wished – much like Astrid did – that she could get her daughter’s full focus. When had people stopped pausing for a proper talk and instead added it in, multitasking like with everything else in their lives? She was definitely guilty of it too – ordering something online when she was in the car park because she’d forgotten to do it earlier, returning a call as she rushed into work, sending a text as she went into the bank so that the person who had messaged didn’t think they were being ignored.

‘How did you know it was me?’ Astrid asked.

‘Lucky guess.’ Her mum asked the same question almost every time. Chrissie had got it wrong a few times recently, answering to cold callers, and she’d started to pretend she was hard of hearing. When they began their spiel she would repeat, ‘Mum, Mum, are you there?’ and then, ‘Oh, you’re not. I’ll call you later then. Bye!’ and hang up.

‘The wreath you made is gorgeous,’ Chrissie praised, remembering the photograph her mum had sent her among the many others of the chalet in the Swiss Alps. ‘You’re very talented.’

‘You need to send me a picture of your tree, Chrissie.’

Chrissie smiled. ‘I will do it as soon as we finish this call.’ She was desperate to ask how Sarah was, whether she’d said much at all about her or Rhys since she arrived in Winterbruck. But instead of asking directly, she said, ‘I’ll bet you two are loving having Sarah there.’

‘It’s a real joy, I can’t deny it. She’s been helping me in the kitchen. We delivered the cinnamon rolls and she’s met some of the neighbours. It’s a real treat that she came here to see us because we won’t be able to make the wedding.’ She paused. ‘Don’t worry about her, Chrissie.’ The volume of her voice suggested she was making sure Sarah didn’t hear their conversation.

‘Has she said anything? About Rhys?’ Chrissie had liked Rhys when he and Sarah first got together, she’d told her parents as much, but the engagement had knocked her off-kilter and she hadn’t shared her doubts about the rush at all because she didn’t want them worrying. After all, Chrissie could worry enough for the whole family.

‘No, she hasn’t. Why?’

‘I just thought she might miss him, that’s all.’

‘Young love. I can just about remember it at my age.’ Her mum laughed.

‘Thank you for being there for her.’ Chrissie felt like a young girl all over again, unable to understand why something was happening. Except she wouldn’t and couldn’t fall apart on her mother, not now, not when her mum had her own things going on. The heart problems had scared Chrissie, but she seemed to have a good medical team and was receiving the care she needed. It was times like this that Chrissie hated being so far away.

They chatted a while longer, but Chrissie’s mind was on Sarah. Going away for Christmas and to see her grandparents was one thing, but so close to the wedding baffled her, and it was taking all her willpower not to call her daughter for more of an explanation. She wondered if Rhys was worried. Were his family worried?