A New Year

The peal of bells and the explosion of fireworks echoed from the television.

Ian raised a toast. ‘Happy New Year!’

Maggie slid from the leather settee. ‘And to you!’ They clinked glasses.

‘Hope it’s a good one!’ Wilma added her champagne flute to the mix.

‘Yes, well…’ Maggie broke off.

They were in Wilma’s front room. Lowered window blinds and a hissing gas fire kept the space snug against the wintry weather outside. On the giant wall-mounted television, STV’s Hogmanay party was in full swing.

‘You’ll be pleased to see the back of the aul year,’ Ian said, cheerily. ‘Everything that’s happened, like.’

Wilma threw him a warning look.

Maggie buried her nose in her glass, affecting not to notice. She let the effervescent bubbles prick her nostrils, savoured the honeyed aroma. Ian was right, though. She was thankful to draw a line under the year past: a year in which George, her devoted husband of more than twenty years had died, her children been in crisis and she, Maggie Laird, rudely plucked from her cocoon of domesticity to embark on a career as a private detective.

She thought back to their first New Year together, she and George, in that poky rented flat in Ferryhill: top floor, two rooms, kitchen and bathroom. How, when the ships’ hooters sounded, they’d rushed to the window and thrown up the sash. They’d rested their elbows on the sill and watched, transfixed, as crimson flares lit up the sky, all thoughts of toasts and TV abandoned. It was only when the harbour fell silent, and chill air nibbled at their elbows, that they’d lowered the window and crept through to their sagging three-quarter bed to spoon in the dark.

Tears welled in her eyes.

‘Come for a bosie.’ Wilma threw her arms wide.

Grateful, Maggie allowed herself to be enfolded in her friend’s embrace. Changed days, she reflected, since Wilma had first moved into the douce West End suburb of Mannofield. It seemed no time since she’d first appeared on Maggie’s doorstep, all Ten Ton Tessie in her sprayed-on leggings and fake tan. Then, Maggie had been a bit sniffy, she had to admit. But now look at the pair of them: so attuned to one another they could almost read each other’s thoughts.

‘You okay?’ Wilma relaxed her hold.

‘Yes.’ Maggie wiped the tears away. ‘Thanks for that.’

‘No worries.’ Wilma grinned. She turned to her husband. ‘Top us up, will you? My pal here’s needing a bittie cheering up.’

‘I’m fine. Really,’ Maggie protested, as Ian trickled fizz into her glass. ‘Thanks! It’s great just to have company.’ She toasted them both. ‘Cheery company,’ she added, smiling.

She looked around. Wilma’s house was ablaze – candles lit, chandelier twinkling, silver baubles glittering on a huge, fake tree. And that was just the inside. Maggie shuddered as she recalled her reaction to the curtain of LED lights dripping from the front of the adjacent bungalow, the giant illuminated reindeer standing by the front door. Made her own, dark house look like an old folks’ home. Time was, her family would have driven out to Tyrebagger, the four of them, and picked a real tree from the Forestry Commission’s site. Maggie hadn’t had the heart, not this year. Instead, she’d unearthed the small fake tree that usually sat on the dining-room sideboard. A forlorn sight it looked, too, marooned as it was now in the sitting room bay window alongside George’s empty chair.

‘Where are they, your kids?’ Wilma’s voice brought Maggie back to the present.

‘Colin’s at a sleepover out at Cults. Kirsty’s on the razzle with her pals. So I’m glad to be here with you guys, especially after the Christmas I’ve had.’

‘That bad?’ Wilma had been embroiled with her own extended family over the festive season, so there hadn’t been time for small talk.

Maggie made a face. ‘Nightmare! My folks meant well, inviting us out for Christmas lunch, but it was hard going, I can tell you. My dad sat slumped in his chair, hardly said a word. As for Mum, I scarcely saw her. She spent half the time in the kitchen, wouldn’t let me do a thing. I don’t doubt she was fretting over me the whole darned time, whilst I sat next door with dad and the kids worrying about her.’

Wilma chortled. ‘I can just see it.’

‘We had to sit all the way through the Queen. The kids were bored witless: Kirsty making eye signals at me, Colin thumbing his phone. Then, by the time we finally made it to the table, Col was so famished he stuck his head in his plate and wolfed every last thing that was put in front of him. If my mum wasn’t biting her tongue at his total absence of table manners, she was sneaking horrified looks at Kirsty’s navy-blue nail varnish. My dad, God bless him, was totally oblivious. It’s sad, really, the way he’s retreated into himself. Mum’s the exact opposite. Once she’d had her annual ration of sweet sherry, she couldn’t hold back from giving me the third degree.’

‘Like?’

‘The usual: didn’t I think running a detective agency was an unsuitable occupation for a woman?’

Wilma rolled her eyes. ‘Sounds familiar.’

‘How was I getting along with my “friend”? That’s you.’ She gave Wilma a gentle nudge. ‘Weren’t there any “proper” jobs I could get? It was all I could do not to run screaming into the snow.’

‘Ah, weel,’ Wilma assumed a grave expression. ‘That’s a big hurdle over, Maggie – your first Christmas on your own. And your ma will come around. Just like Ian,’ she joked, unable to stay serious for long.

‘What about me?’ Her husband turned his head from the television.

‘I was just saying,’ Wilma teased. ‘You’re okay now. With the agency, I mean.’ End of. She could still recall how dogmatic he’d been, way back, when it was just a notion in her head.

His face darkened. ‘“Okay” just about covers it.’

‘Oh, don’t be like that,’ Wilma pouted. ‘We’re celebrating.’

He drew his brows together, pursed his lips in a thin line. ‘If you say so.’

She cosied up. Smiling, she tickled him under the arms.

‘Steady on.’ He backed off, balancing his drink so it didn’t spill. His face bore a troubled expression, Maggie saw. Still and all, his eyes were twinkling.

In that moment, she envied her neighbours their moment of intimacy, wondered if she’d ever have that again.