Emma
‘Sheila, these are so good, they should be illegal.’ Emma bit into another of the bite-sized mince pies with the little star and little Christmas tree sweet-pastry toppers and told herself this would absolutely be the last thing she ate seconds of during Sheila’s visit.
Kate’s mother’s face lit up at the compliment. ‘Bootleg mince pies. I like the sound of that. Perhaps I should deliver them under the cover of night.’
‘We’ll set up a code and a secret handshake,’ Emma joked alongside her, delighted to discover where Kate got some of her sense of humour from. ‘Honestly, I can’t remember the last time I ate a mince pie this good.’
To be honest, she wasn’t sure she’d had one since she’d left the UK, and as the rich fruit flavours burst on her tongue and the sweet buttery pastry melted in her mouth, the vault containing Christmases past burst wide open.
Suddenly she was six years old again. Valiantly trying to stay awake on Christmas Eve and waking in the early hours with the feel of a pillow case filled with treats, against her feet, signalling that Father Christmas had been. With excitement she’d feel her way past the small wrapped toys, and the dreadfully squishy Satsuma, hunting for her favourite present, a book. Tearing off the wrapping she’d clamber out of bed, read the title by the dull hallway light and rush into her parents’ bedroom to climb in between them and fall asleep, happily clutching it to her chest.
As the carousel of Christmas memories sped up there were more books but it was harder to steep herself in the stories with her parents hurling recriminations at each other until her father would inevitably decide to go for a drive.
Feeling a little sick, Emma quickly tugged on the reindeer reins, jumped off the carousel and fled the vault, slamming the door shut behind her. Picking up her clipboard she concentrated on putting another tick in a column.
‘Well,’ she said, forcing a smile for Sheila. ‘These are definitely going on the menu. As is the triple layer chocolate-fudge cake. Also, the Tiffin brownies and, oh, I don’t suppose you could do mini Yule-logs with white frosting to look like snow?’
‘I think I could do that.’ Sheila jotted the request in the notebook beside her. ‘What if I dust them with a pistachio crumb in the shape of a holly leaf and add a couple of cranberries for the berries?’
‘That sounds yummy. They’d need to be small enough to fit on these cake stands,’ Emma said, pointing to the pretty mismatched ones she’d laid out, so that Sheila could get an idea of what would go into each festive afternoon tea. ‘Is that going to be possible? I don’t want to make your life too fiddly.’
‘Oh, I can handle a little fiddly.’
Emma heard the determination in Kate’s mother’s voice and looked up from where she’d been adding notes to her order sheet. ‘Do you not get busy at the B&B at Christmas?’ she asked.
‘Not during the lead-up. That’s why I’m so happy to be doing this.’ Sheila fussed with the napkin she’d laid across her lap. ‘It’s a strange time of year,’ she confessed.
‘Because of Bea?’ Emma couldn’t believe she’d come right out and said that and reached a hand out in automatic apology. ‘I’m so sorry, Mrs Somersby. I shouldn’t have mentioned anything.’
‘Actually it’s fine. Everyone always tiptoes around it, not wanting to make it harder on me, I know.’
‘I remember Kate only ever made flying visits back to you at this time of year. I guess that made it even harder?’
‘I’m ashamed to say at the time I hardly even noticed. After Bea died I could never really get myself into a place to celebrate. This year, I’m feeling so much better and so thankful and well, Oscar and Melody should be allowed to celebrate with Juliet and Kate will want to celebrate with Daniel of course,’ she rushed out. ‘Their relationships are so new and I don’t want to intrude.’
‘Of course,’ Emma said, feeling awkward. She wasn’t sure it was her place to reassure Kate’s mother that Kate and Daniel, and Oscar, Juliet and Melody were bound to include her in their Christmas plans. She hated thinking the first year she was ready to celebrate since her daughter’s death, Sheila was worried about intruding on her other daughter’s or her son-in-law’s plans. Was Sheila subtly asking Emma to get involved? If she could help then perhaps she should mention something to Kate? It wasn’t like she couldn’t speak to the feeling of being on your own at Christmas.
‘I get the odd guest at Christmas but between you and me,’ Sheila said leaning forward in her chair conspiratorially, ‘there’s this phenomenon in Whispers Wood where even the largest of houses tend to magically shrink at this time of year.’
Emma leaned forward too. ‘Between you and me it’s not only in Whispers Wood where there’s suddenly “No Room at the Inn”. Perhaps the greatest gift family can give each other at Christmas is space. Everything seems to work better when no one is under each other’s feet.’
‘You’re probably right,’ Sheila said but Emma could see the tinge of sadness in her posture and decided it wasn’t meddling if she could help her not to feel alone. ‘How about you? What’s Christmas usually like for you?’
Emma sat back in her chair. ‘Usually my mother and I spend Christmas Eve at a spa and then we open our gifts to each other.’
‘So she spends Christmas day on her own – I mean – you both spend the day apart?’
‘No. My mother never spends the day alone. She always spends it,’ Emma held her hands together to form a heart and added in a thick French accent because somehow, to her, it sounded less judgey, ‘avec l’amour du jour.’
‘Oh.’
‘It’s perfect really. She gets to do what makes her happy and so do I.’
‘And what makes you happy?’
‘Being in my apartment where it’s usually quiet because my flatmates have gone home to their families,’ Emma confided, bringing up the memory she’d created and filed under “How Not to Feel Alone at Christmas”. She’d spent a good few Christmases honing her skills so that now she always associated spending that particular day of the year on her own with happy thoughts. ‘I’ve usually stuffed myself silly at Thanksgiving, so I lay off a huge lunch and enjoy a few little treats. Nothing as nice as these though,’ she added, looking again at the finger sandwiches and baked goods Sheila had brought along to the afternoon tea tasting session. ‘Then I sit in my favourite chair and read. It’s bliss. Truly the best Christmas present I could give myself.’ Infinitely better than being invited to spend the day with people who were all coupled-up, or get herself a Tinder date and discover the guy didn’t want to be out with her, so much as he didn’t want to spend the holiday alone.
Sheila looked as if that was the saddest thing she’d ever heard. ‘It sounds lonely. Do you and your mother not get along?’
‘We do,’ Emma laughed a little self-consciously. There was absolutely no need to mention the bitter disappointment followed by the endless links to auditions for panto season, when Lydia Danes had discovered her daughter was coming back to the UK. Or the strange relief Emma had felt in ignoring them. ‘But I guess the pressure on Christmas being perfect can bring out the worst in everyone, so we switched to going big on Thanksgiving when we moved to the States.’
Now Emma realised with a start that Thanksgiving wasn’t far away. A pang of home-sickness hit and she felt caught. Her loyalty divided between two different celebrations. Maybe if she asked everyone over for a meal on Thanksgiving? It might be a nice way of fitting in. Not that she should really be let loose cooking and only if she could get the cottage to warm up, that was. As the hurdles started mounting up, she lost her confidence. Who’d want to have a Thanksgiving celebration so close to The Clock House opening up? Everyone would surely have their own plans.
To prove to Sheila she didn’t have some weird penchant for being on her own at Christmas, she found herself admitting, ‘Anyway, this year is all change. I expect to be at my Dad’s on Christmas Day, spending it with him and his family.’ Nervous as she was about that, and worried she’d be crying out for down-time and solitude after having worked so many hours at The Clock House by the time the big day came around, she was also looking forward to breaking with tradition.
It was all part of her new adventure. And, anyway, she and her Dad would get better at chatting on the phone with each other so that by the time they actually met up it would be less stilted.
She was nearly sure of it.
Eager not to let her mood flatten she changed the subject. ‘I also have another favour to ask.’ Standing up, she pulled a piece of paper out of her pocket, unfolded it and slid it across the table to Sheila Somersby. In a careful whisper, she asked, ‘Is there any way you could make these out of gingerbread?’
Sheila took the piece of paper and unfolded it. ‘Oh, how lovely,’ she said, looking up at Emma with a soft expression on her face.
‘And could you not tell anyone about it? I want to create little scenes and put them under the glass domes so that they look like giant—’
‘Snow globes,’ Sheila said on a delighted sigh.
‘Exactly. Do you think you’d have time to get them done by opening night?’
‘Yes. I think I could do that.’
‘Wonderful. I thought it would help Christmasify the theme, I’m glad you like the idea.’
‘I do and Kate will love it.’
‘Love what?’ Kate said wandering into the room.
‘It’s a surprise,’ Emma and Sheila answered together and Emma was pleased to see how happy Kate looked that her mother might willingly be in on a surprise for her daughter.