“We can’t find Mac.”

The words, said calmly by his assistant manager, sent his spine solid with fear. “Repeat that again because I think I misheard you.”

“We can’t find Mac.”

Zack inhaled, then exhaled. Then thought. Quickly. “I know you will have checked his room and the empty lounges. How about the new hall?” The new hall was nearly finished, just waiting for a final fix on the electrics and flooring, then the kitchen could be fitted the first week in the New Year.

“Tried there. I’ve tried every cold place I could, even the cool room in the temporary kitchen. I’ve looked in cupboards. Everywhere. Honestly Zack, I couldn’t have looked in any more places.”

“I believe you.” He checked his phone just in case Mac had wandered down to Severton and had been spotted there. It wouldn’t be ideal as it was slippery underfoot and he was a frail man. A fall could be lethal. In summer, he would sometimes walk down to the town for a brew and a paper, spending a good hour putting the world to rights with Gran in the post office, but this wasn’t summer. It was minus one and snowing, albeit lightly.

The only message he’d received was from Sorrell who had sent him a selfie of her tied up in Christmas lights, tinsel in her hair. He was meant to be going round to help her decorate the tree before they headed into town for the lights switch on, but if he had a missing resident he wouldn’t be going anywhere.

Then he saw it.

A pair of antlers walked past the window.

“What. The. Fuck?”

“Now, Zachery, you know you shouldn’t curse like that,” May Pearson said as she passed by. “It isn’t gentlemanlike.”

“May,” Zack pretended to have not seen the antlers and certainly didn’t think about what his cousin was currently up to. “Have you see Mac?”

“Of course,” May said. “He took a pair of socks I’d knitted him to go under his wellies. He was helping your cousin.”

Zack looked to the glass door, seeing an alpaca staring cheerfully at him, its thick woolly coat keeping it toasty warm. But this time, the fact that someone had clearly left the gate to the field open wasn’t the issue. The issue was the pair of glittery antlers on the creature’s head.

Zack pulled his phone out and dialed Jake, adding yet another possible way of killing him to the list.

“Yo, bro,” Jake said. “How’s it hanging?”

“You’ll be hanging from a noose in about five minutes.” Zack could picture it like a cartoon strip. “Is Mac with you?”

“Mac’s here,” Jake said. “He’s helping me get the alpacas ready for tonight.”

Zack slumped down on a nearby sofa. “My staff have just turned the home over looking for him. We thought he was missing. I had visions of him lying in the snow on the way to Severton.

Jake laughed and Zack heard him tell Mac. “He’s fine. He saw me this morning with Bruno and asked if he could help so he came over before and sorted the hens out and now we’re getting the alpacas into their outfits.”

“You’ve lost me.” Zack wondered if it was too early for a whisky. “Alpacas. Outfits. What the fuck, Jake?”

“Language!” May Pearson reprimanded. Obviously the clicking of her knitting needles wasn’t enough to block out any other noise. Surprisingly.

There was an odd noise from Jake’s side. Zack didn’t want to know.

“It’s for the lights switch-on. There’s a mini tree at Rayah’s school in the playground, so she’s having a kids only one there at five pm. I’m taking seven of the beasts down to be pretend reindeer. Mac wants to help,” Jake said.

Zack looked up to the ceiling. “I think Dasher is hanging round here then. There’s an alpaca with pink antlers watching May as she knits. Shall I bring it over?”

“Oh shit, sorry. That’s Elvira. She’s learned to open the gate. She won’t do any harm though and if she gets in alpacas are—”

“Very clean animals,” Zack finished his sentence. “I know. You’ve told me four times this week. I’ll see you at the lights at seven.”

“You taking Sorrell?” Jake said.

“Yes, I’m taking Sorrell. Can you try not to be a complete dick in front of her,” Zack said, yet again earning the wrath of May Pearson.

“You really like her,” Jake said, as if he’d just worked out the meaning of life. “I’ll need to upgrade Alex to my wingman.”

“Jesus, Jake, just… never mind. Make sure Mac is warm. I don’t need a pneumonia case on my hands over Christmas.” Zack hung up.

He looked at his assistant. “Mac’s fine. He’s with that,” he looked at May Pearson who was glaring at him from over her knitting, “lovely, delightful cousin of mine who I am not going to use as a hog roast.”

“He’d make a much better bit of steak,” May said. “Especially his ass.”

“That’s a bad word, May,” Zack said, but she just pretended to be deaf.

Zack dropped Elvira the alpaca off with Jake and made sure for himself that Mac was alive and warm before driving back over to the hotel. He’d managed to have a quick shower after felling a lot of trees and distributing them to the families and businesses that had ordered them. Next weekend was the Christmas Tree Festival, which usually included a parade round the town for the kids and adults to take photos of the trees and garden decorations. Then there was a vote on the best, most unusual and the wackiest and it wasn’t competitive at all, no one treated it as if it was an Olympic event. No one. And Jake didn’t have seven alpacas dressed as reindeer

The large fir tree outside needed its lights up, something he and his brothers would do during the week. The tree tour didn’t come this far up out of town, but they’d always had decorations outside for the residents and their visitors. It was a job he loved, as he knew that each Christmas was likely to be someone’s last and that had always been the motivator: to make sure Christmas Day was as happy as it could be, so memories could be made.

There was Christmas music piping out of the room just off the hallway, the one that had been the residents’ lounge and was now a stylish sitting area for guests. Zack paused outside the door and listened: the music was accompanied by a voice that was completely out of tune but the owner was clearly enjoying belting out the words.

He pushed open the door as slowly as he could, desperate to catch her in the act. Except in bed she held back—observing, controlled, a touch timid—so to hear her sing and see her dance about the room made him feel happy. How could one person being relaxed and smiling make him feel this way? Even when he hadn’t been instrumental in it?

“I didn’t realise you were there?” Sorrell said, stopping dead as soon as she saw him. “I know I can’t sing…”

“You sang like you were enjoying yourself.” He walked straight to her and pulled her into him carefully. She was covered in glitter and had a strand of tinsel in her hair.

“I was,” she said. “I am. I’ve sorted everything into sections and I've got the stepladders out. I started to try to put the lights on, but it was too high and I don’t have the best balance in the world…”

He kissed her because it had been too long since he’d felt her lips against his and he wanted to stop her from explaining herself to him.

She relaxed in his arms and by the time he moved back, wanting to see her, she was smiling again. “How was your afternoon?” he said, picking up the strand of Christmas tree lights which had been neatly wound to make it easier to put them on the tree.

“Good,” she said. “What do you know about Lena who works here?”

He opened the stepladders and climbed up to the top, starting to unwind the lights. “She was part of the religious group that lives at Felley Manor in Underwood,” he said. “I think she went to university early to try to get away…”

“Slow down,” Sorrell said. “By religious organisation do you mean a cult?”

“Something like that. It’s called Church of the Seven Saints or something like that and it’s been here since the sixties. My dad can tell you more about it,” he said, wrapping the lights round quickly. It was a big tree and Sorrell had ordered a lot of ornaments, all in whites and golds.

“So where’s Lena living now?” Sorrell said. “She doesn’t travel from Underwood each day—she said she only lives in the town.”

Zack balanced on one leg to try and hook the lights round the tree. It was a practiced move, and one made easier by the fact that his brothers weren’t there to rock the stepladders. There had been one Christmas when he’d had his arm in a cast after Scott had been a little too overenthusiastic in pretending he was Spiderman when putting the tree topper on. Their mum had not been impressed.

“I think she lives with her aunt. Not all the members live at Felley Manor. Some live in town, most live in Astley. It’s harmless enough, but I think it’s quite strict and the kids aren’t allowed to mix with outsiders,” he said, bringing both feet onto the ladder. The fiddliest bit was now done.

“That explains a lot. Do you want me to pass you the angel for the top while you’re there?” she said, holding a carefully made tree topper with large feathered wings.

Zack stepped down. “I’m not sure I want to leave you on top of the tree for all of Christmas.”

He knew it was the corniest line and if she ever repeated it, it would probably end up being engraved on his tombstone.

She blushed, her eyes crinkling in embarrassment and then she laughed. He reached for her waist and pulled her close for another kiss. “Let’s put the angel up there when it’s all done,” he said. “Leave that till last.”

It was a good two hours later when the tree was finished. Lena had arrived to help any guests during the evening while Sorrell was out and Abby had come to work the bar and keep an eye on Lena. Their reactions to the tree had made Sorrell smile even more which seemed to be the aim of his day: keep her smiling, making her happy.

He drove down into town. Usually, he would’ve walked the mile and a bit, but the pavements were treacherous even with the grit that had been laid. The snow had ceased temporarily, although more was predicted overnight, which meant another early morning to sort out animals and clear the roads with the tractor and the plough. They parked on a side street at the start of the town near the river, Zack racing round to open Sorrell’s door and help her out.

“I can manage,” she said, gripping his arm anyway.

“I know you could if you had to,” he said. “But you don’t have to. And maybe I want to.”

“Why are you so… caring? When we first met I thought you were the biggest idiot I’d ever come across. In fact, I wished upon you the pox and penile dysfunction. Now I’m not sure you’re the same man whose builders I stole,” she said. “And I definitely don’t want the penile dysfunction to happen.”

“Things worked out okay,” he said. She was dressed for the cold, a woolly hat on her head and Gran’s knitted scarf draped over the top half of her body. Skinny jeans were hidden to the knee with tall brown boots, flat for walking in and her cheeks and nose were pinked with the cold. “More than okay. For me anyway.”

“For me too,” she said. “You’ve been amazing. Getting me the tree, helping this afternoon when I know you haven’t had a minute to yourself in days. I feel really bad for taking up your time.”

He shook his head and smiled, pausing in the snow on the bridge above the river. “You don’t get it, do you, Ells?” he said.

“Get what?” she said, frowning. “I know I’m a therapist but I’m not a mind reader.”

“I really like you,” he said, realising he was going to have to spell it out for her. “And I feel like I’m a dorky seventeen-year-old telling you this, but I think you’re great and I’d do anything to spend more time with you.” He wanted to tell her that he thought her ex was a complete fuckwit for ending things with her, but right now he didn’t want her thinking anything about her ex, just him.

“You do?” she said. “Even though…”

“Even though what, Sorrell?” he said gently.

Carols flew through the air, sung by a choir across the bridge. A child laughed. A seemingly single snowflake danced down between them.

“Even though I…” She couldn’t finish the sentence because he knew she was finally seeing what he saw. “But you’re this Adonis round here. You could have any woman who came through…”

“Please don’t let Jake ever hear you say those words,” Zack said. “You’d have to spend the rest of the evening therapizing him.”

She laughed, a sound that was becoming his favourite. “I’m not even sure that’s actually a word.”

“It possibly isn’t. We need to head towards the clock tower; it’s almost time.”

Pretty much every resident in Severton was there, surrounding the clock tower where the Christmas tree that had first been felled then planted nearly fifty years ago stood proudly. Its lights were haphazardly placed, mixtures of white and colours when they were switched on having been added by well-meaning donators across the years. The rest of the high street always had white lights which zig-zagged from one side to the other, pictures of Santa, reindeer, trees and snowflakes outlined in a thousand lights.

The streets around them fell dark. Children gasped and the town slipped into a sweet apprehensive silence. Then, as if they really had been rehearsing for the last two months, the Severton band started to chime, softly at first, a simple, gentle ringing of bells and then the choir began, voices singing the Carol of the Bells.

No one spoke. The soprano voices were answered by the lower tones of the men filling the air along with the bells. As they sang the lights furthest away from the clock tower began to slowly brighten, then the next line and the next, until the three streets that led to the clock tower and the square were fully lit and then the tree and the clock tower both began to brighten from the ground upwards, the sounds of children exclaiming and Sadie Grace’s little voice just about audible over the still singing choir. “Santa’s coming! It’s magic!”

Then the music changed, the carol changing to Santa Claus is Coming to Town and the crowd became noisier.

“Wow,” said Sorrell. “That was like no other lights switch on.”

“We don’t have a celebrity press a button or have a countdown. We keep it simple. We’re lucky here, we don’t need the extra tourism, just the tradition. Speaking of which.” He pointed in the direction of an ice cream van that wasn’t selling ice-cream. “Mulled wine?”

“Is that Scott?” she said, squinting.

“No, it’s my uncle, Jake’s dad,” Zack said. “He’s been selling mulled wine at the lights switch-on since he was eighteen—his first business venture. Let’s get some.”

They queued for about ten minutes, most of the adults of Severton wanting to keep warm with the large mugs of the cinnamon-spiced hot wine. They were joined in the queue by Keren and Rayah. Alex was on duty with the dogs, Scott was back in his bar as it was going to be a busy night and Jake had apparently bumped into an old flame.

“We’re going to go to the Northern Whisperer for a few Christmas cocktails if you want to join us,” Rayah said.

Zack looked at Sorrell. He was more than happy to go with her or if she wanted to go without him, he’d go and perch at his brother’s bar. Tonight had never been an official date anyway, although he wanted to end the night with her.

“I think we’ll grab something to eat and head back to the hotel,” she said, surprising him a little. “Maybe I can catch up with you girls during the week?”

Rayah’s lips pursed into a very knowing smile. “We understand and forgive you. Neither of us have penises.”

Zack wondered what gene Jake and Rayah had that he and his brothers had missed out on and if there was any way of retrospectively deactivating it.

“Penis?” said Keren. “What’s a penis?”

“It’s that thing that a man has between his legs. Or sometimes on his head. We usually see the ones on the head, that’s why we don’t bother with the other one…”

They thankfully walked off, leaving her biting her lips together so she didn’t laugh.

“I’m not related to her really,” he said. “I’m pretty sure a stork dropped her on my uncle and aunt’s doorstep one afternoon and they took pity on her.”

She took his free hand with hers. “You wouldn’t swap her,” Sorrell said.

“Trust me, I would.”