Kate
Kate walked into Cocktails & Chai and any nerves she might have had about whether Emma was having a mini breakdown behind the doors disappeared instantly. Emma, dressed in her uniform of crisp white fitted blouse, black trousers and apron with the image of The Clock House printed on it, smiled warmly, looking the very picture of confident host as she insisted on showing Daniel and Kate to one of the tables.
The place looked gorgeous.
And smelled divine.
Looking around at the tables set up for two, Kate saw that Emma had placed long copper trays filled with cinnamon sticks, orange peel, pinecones and candles laced with glitter so that they sparkled under the light from the chandelier.
All Kate needed to do now was relax about sharing her evening with Gloria Pavey.
As tall orders went, socialising with Gloria was going to be the tallest, but then again, when they opened she’d be actively encouraging her patronage, so she might as well get used to seeing her on the premises.
‘What’ll you have to drink?’ Emma asked. ‘I’m doing table service tonight and I’ve done a menu with some Christmas cocktails and mocktails on.’ She passed them one to look over. ‘You can actually order whatever you like, but I thought this would be more festive.’
As Kate sat down, she shrugged out of her coat and looked at the menu. All the drinks had been given Christmas names and she was touched and impressed that Emma had gone to so much trouble. ‘I’ll have a Winter Wonderland, please.’
‘Do you have a bottle of Whispers Wrangler?’ Daniel said, passing back the menus.
‘Of course,’ Emma said with a smile. ‘I’m trying to stock as much local produce as possible. Back in a mo with your order and a feedback card for later.’
Kate gave Emma a huge grin and two thumbs-up and then turned to look at Daniel who was smiling warmly at her.
Her heart gave a happy little lurch. It had been too long since they’d sat down at a table without her bullet journal or their phones or a laptop in between them.
After delivering their drinks, Emma returned to the front of the bar and tapped a knife against a glass to get everyone’s attention.
‘Hi everyone,’ she greeted. ‘I just wanted to say a few words about this evening. Firstly, to thank you for coming along and secondly, I’m sure you’ve noticed that I’ve deliberately set up the room for couples-only tables…’
Kate looked around and saw that all the staff was sitting opposite someone with the exception of Gloira, who, thank God, wasn’t staff, but who had a strange expression on her face that Kate thought might be nervousness as she waited for her ‘date’ to show up.
‘As a thank you for Kate letting me hold this soft-opening tonight,’ Emma continued, ‘I wanted to offer something a little different and give my partners in crime here, Kate, Daniel and Juliet,’ she said, pointing to the two tables where she and Daniel and next to them, Juliet and Oscar were seated, ‘a very well-deserved night off. To that end, and because there’s only one of me on duty, I hope you’ll enter into the spririt of a small planned activity…’
‘Planned activity?’ Kate whispered to Daniel, shocked. ‘Planned activity is only one step away from, “let’s all turn to our left and tell the person sitting next to us a little about ourselves”. I started my own business so I didn’t have to go on work courses with icebreakers.’
‘Icebreakers aren’t that bad,’ Daniel whispered back. ‘It’ll be a great way for the staff to get to know each other.’
Kate shuddered. ‘I once went on a course where I got slapped on the back with a sticker that said “Fork” and I had to “find my other half and strike up a conversation”. I spent the entire allotted time racing around trying to find my “knife” only to discover afterwards that I had supposed to have been looking for a “spoon”.’ She stopped talking, acutely aware that she’d started babbling. She was babbling because she was nervous. Any moment now she thought he was going to ask her why she was nervous and she was going to respond with, ‘Moving in together … how about we do that … huh?’
And he was going to respond by…
‘I can see that you’ve been scarred for life,’ Daniel said, biting back a smile.
She breathed out. ‘So what crappy icebreakers did you have to do, then?’
‘Well being that I was in accountancy and not media, we had terribly sensible icebreaker games, like “turn to your right and tell the person next to you a bit about yourself”.’
Kate grinned and poked out her tongue at him before turning her head to listen to Emma.
‘Tonight,’ Emma declared, her voice dropping seductively, ‘is all about date-night, not work-night. I’m talking speed-dating with a difference, and the difference is that you’ll stick with your partner for the evening. No work-talk. At all.’
Kate frowned. No work talk. Like, at all? ‘But what will we talk about?’ she asked. ‘We’ve already covered icebreakers.’
‘I’m sure we’ll think of something,’ Daniel said, looking confident.
Kate swallowed. Now that she couldn’t talk about work, the only thing on her mind was the one subject she’d vowed not to introduce into conversation until she’d figured out what his response was going to be.
‘To help you,’ Emma continued, ‘on each table, you’ll notice a small wrapped present and an egg-timer. The egg-timers are going to be used when we open to help people judge the right amount of time to brew their tea, but for tonight, I think you should use them with your present. So, dive in, and have fun getting to know each other and remember, no work-talk allowed.’
Kate took a sip of her Winter Wonderland cocktail and looked around the room to see that everyone was entering into the spirit and opening the boxes on the tables. Determined not to spoil Emma’s efforts, and because it was going to save her from talking about moving in together, she tapped the lid of the box. ‘I think you should do the honours and open it.’
‘Okay, here goes.’ Reaching out he took the box and undid the Cristmas wrapping paper and bow and peered inside. ‘Ha. Cute idea.’
Kate craned her neck. ‘What is it?’
‘It’s a stack of cards with the words “Christmas Quiz” stamped on them. The label says we each get to ask a question and the other has to answer before the egg-timer runs out.’
‘Oh, that actually doesn’t sound too bad.’ She watched as Daniel took the stack of cards out and put them in the centre of the table next to the pretty hourglass encased in its wooden cage. With a quick look around she saw that others had started asking their questions.
‘Ladies, first,’ Daniel said, indicating she should ask the first question.
She took the first card off the stack, turned it over, read the question, and smiled. ‘How many milk-maids are a-milking in the song The Twelve Days of Christmas?’
‘Easy,’ Daniel said, bringing his bottle of beer to his lips and taking a chug. ‘Five.’
Kate made the sound of the X-factor buzzer. ‘Nope, that’s gold rings.’
‘That’s silly – why would you want five gold rings? Surely you’d only want one?’
Kate felt her drink go down the wrong way. ‘One?’ she spluttered.
Daniel looked at her like she’d lost the plot. ‘Of course, one. One wedding ring.’
‘Partridge,’ she squeaked out. Here she was vacillating between asking him to move in with her and not asking him to move in with her. And here he was, calmly talking about wedding rings!
‘Partridge?’ Daniel repeated like a parrot. ‘I thought that was two. In a pair of trees.’
‘Oh my God,’ Kate shook her head at him, feeling on much more solid ground talking partridges and trees. ‘It’s a pear tree.’
‘Oh, yeah, partridge in a pear tree.’ Daniel grinned at her like he might have known that all along and she felt herself grin back.
This was fun and Emma was a genius for setting up the evening like this.
Kate made a promise to herself that she and Daniel would introduce date night once a week, regardless of how busy both their schedules were.
Everything was going to be fine if she just allowed herself to be in the moment with him and stop worrying. It really had been way too long since they’d kicked back and enjoyed each other’s company. She wasn’t about to spoil it with deep and meaningful questions that once asked, couldn’t be taken back.
Daniel picked up the second question. ‘Name all thirty-six reindeers.’
‘Call yourself an accountant, there were only eight. Or maybe nine if you count Rudolph, but he was a bit of a late entry because he only appeared in the twentieth century.’
Daniel leaned forward and stared into her eyes. ‘Given that Melody is the one in your family with the voracious reading habit, I know you haven’t swallowed a Christmas lexicon. There’s only one other possible explanation … You’re secretly Mrs Claus.’
‘You can find out when you unwrap me, later,’ she replied with a coy smile.
He grinned. ‘Yes! All my Christmases have come at once!’ Signalling to Emma to bring them both another round, he asked Kate, ‘So can you name them all?’
‘Sure. Rudolph.’ To play for time she took the last sip of her cocktail.
‘Time’s running out,’ Daniel laughed indicating the egg-timer.
‘Rudolph,’ she said.
‘You already said that one.’
‘Okay, you want a name?’
‘I want all eight/nine.’
Kate smiled and leaned forward so that Daniel’s attention was drawn to her neckline. ‘Rudolph, Donner, Kebab, Blitzen, Shmitzen, Dobby, Bobbly, Twilight Sparkle, and Pikachu.’
Daniel threw back his head and laughed. ‘Erm, I’m pretty sure Pikachu was not a reindeer.’
‘So I got one wrong? Do I have to do a forfeit?’
‘Maybe later.’
‘I’m going to hold you to that.’
Reaching forward, Daniel took hold of her hand and linked their fingers together. ‘This is really great, isn’t it? Want to do it again next week?’
You see, she thought. They were so on the same page. The little devil on her shoulder whispered in her ear that if they were on the same page as this, then maybe … To cut off any more whispering, she said, ‘What? Harden our Christmas trivia skills and take on the pub quiz teams of the world?’
‘You make it sound so romantic,’ he said, ‘so yes! And as well as that, do you want to do this again next week, as in, you and me, no work talk, just date talk?’
Her fingers tightened around his. ‘How about we do this all the weeks?’
‘You had me at “Fork”,’ he said, his voice curling around her insides.
‘If Emma hadn’t gone to so much trouble, I’d have been asking you to get your coat because you’d pulled,’ Kate said.
‘And even though I usually play coy on a first date,’ Daniel grinned, ‘I might have got my coat and followed you all the way home.’
Home.
Together…
It had such a comforting sound to it.
But since when had comfort become the new adventure?
She glanced at the man sitting opposite her and had her answer.
Kate put her hand under the table and pressed it down hard on top of her knee to stop her foot from tapping away and the action helped strengthen her resolve.
She didn’t ever want him to think she was rushing life – rushing him and what they had now.
‘So how long do you think we have to stay for?’ she asked.
‘I think we have to stay until the last of the staff depart.’
Kate pouted. ‘It’s so hard being the responsible one.’
Daniel winced. ‘Hard is not the right word to be using right now.’
‘Oops. Let’s cool this down then and go back to playing by the rules.’ Reaching out she picked up the next card. ‘Favourite place to spend Christmas?’
‘That’s easy. Anywhere with you.’
Kate’s heart got too big for her chest. ‘How do you know? We haven’t spent a Christmas together, yet?’
‘Don’t you feel it?’ he asked, his blue eyes piercing hers. ‘Don’t you feel what we’re building here?’
Slowly, she nodded her head.
‘You know I’m not talking just about this place, right?’
Slowly, she nodded again.
Maybe the shock of Bea’s death – the shock of losing half her identity had finally passed. Juliet had allowed her a way of finding her way back to Bea, but it was Daniel who had led her to find herself.
She didn’t need to know how he was going to respond to asking him to move in together.
She already knew the answer in her heart.
Ever since she’d come back to Whispers Wood, she’d been trying very hard not to depend on Bea sending her signs of what to do and she thought that she’d found a better balance. She was learning to find her own way and make her own decisions. Daniel showed her that she could be that brave every day.
So she would ask him to move in with her.
But not here in The Clock House.
She’d ask him on Christmas Day.
In the place they’d first started sharing secrets all those months ago.
Over the garden wall between Mistletoe Cottage and Myrtle Cottage.