I will be there in 10. DxThere’s a text from Daniel on my phone. It’s Christmas Eve.
Shall I pick you up later and we can buy a Christmas tree?
I text back:
What, a real one?
Of course a real one! I will be there in 10. Dx
I shout up to Tyler that I’m going out. Silence. He must have his headphones on, so I wander up the stairs to his room.
‘Tyler?’ He’s deep in thought on his bed, his face buried in his laptop. ‘Tyler, I’m going out, to get a tree!’ I can’t help the smile spreading across my face.
He looks up and squints at me and pulls his earbuds out. ‘What?’
‘A tree, it is Christmas soon! And Santa won’t come unless there’s a tree!’
‘Sure, Mum, you feeling all right? I’m just finishing off these photo edits. Hey, but haven’t we got that tree under the stairs, the white one?’
Every year I’ve dragged our little white plastic tree out from under the stairs. We’ve only ever had a fake one; I dust it off every Christmas and put the same decorations on it. Some of them are Tyler’s he made at nursery: a bell with cotton wool across the bottom for snow, a ‘stained-glass window’ of card and coloured cellophane, and a very battered, glittery star for the top. The tree is white; each branch is like a stick of tinsel. It was on special at Asda one year – it was Christmas Eve and we didn’t have a tree yet; Tyler was five – it had been half price, £5.99. It was all I could afford. Tyler loved it. I loved it for what it represented: our family-of-two Christmas.
‘This year we’ll have another one, OK?’
‘Sure, Mum.’
‘I won’t be long. Can you feed the cat by the way?’ I start to walk towards the door.
‘Mum?’
I turn around. ‘What?’
‘You’re happy, aren’t you?’ He cocks his head to one side. ‘I don’t normally see you like this.’
I smile and shrug, not wanting to give too much away, and head towards the door. I almost run down the stairs I’m so excited, but I steady myself, grab my thickest coat from the rack. It was second-hand last year, and it won’t fit for much longer, but it will do today. I put on a sparkly woolly hat I picked up when Gloria and I were at the markets last week and pop it over my head and smile to myself. Happy? Yes, I suppose I am. I jump as there’s a beep on the horn outside. He’s here.
I grab my bag from the floor, open the front door and head towards his car. As I clamber inside the warm fuzzy space that I have come to love, I settle myself down with a grin.
‘All right?’ He glances at me then starts to tune the radio. We listen to ‘Time after Time’ by Cyndi Lauper as Daniel turns out of our road.
Not far outside Chesterbrook, we turn down a bumpy track leading on one side to a farm, and on the other there’s an old rickety barn. I’ve seen the signs for this place before, every year it goes up, but I’ve never been down the lane.
Real Christmas Trees / Bring the kids!
There’s frost along the drive and clinging to the wooden fence on the edges.
We park next to a blue van and Daniel hops out. As I open the car door, I’m hit with the wonderful aroma of fresh pines. The perfume in the air is intoxicating, mixing with the farmyard smells.
‘C’mon,’ he says, ‘time for a real tree – no fake plastic this year, Ms Moore!’
I laugh. He’s taken to calling me Ms Moore as I am ‘his client’ he says with a wink. My heart gallops a few beats too fast and I swing my legs round and get out of the car.
Circular holly wreaths with bright blood-red berries are piled up in boxes. There’s a stall parked outside selling hot dogs, hot chocolate, coffee and candyfloss. Fairy lights have been strung up along the tins of coffee, bags of sweets and ornaments at the back of the stall; it looks like little fireflies dancing across the table. My stomach grumbles. I’m absolutely starving.
Further on, there’s row after row of trees neatly laid out in the yard and there’s a couple of small pens enclosing piglets in one, and an exhausted-looking sheep in another with a gaggle of children standing around, kicking the hay and squealing.
‘Charlie, what shall we get?’
We. ‘A small one for me. I haven’t got much to decorate it with!’
‘Don’t worry about that. I got two big tubs of “Family Christmas decorations” earlier – buy one get one free.’ He laughs. ‘They’re in the back of the car.’ He marches off purposefully and I can’t help but admire him from behind. He’s wearing his leather jacket, a thin-knit cream jumper and a navy scarf wrapped around his neck.
‘Hey, come and look at this one!’ Daniel has come up to me and places a hand on my shoulder. ‘Over here.’
I follow him to where the trees have been perched in rows like a miniature forest on the courtyard. I’m drawn towards a fluffy little tree, no higher than my shoulder, and pull on the branches. ‘This one, Charlie?’ He’s standing next to me.
I nod. ‘Yes, it’s perfect.’ Daniel chats to the owner and pulls at branches. He’s smiling and laughing as the man explains something about the pine needles and central heating.
‘Right,’ says Daniel, ‘we’ll have two of those! The man pops them in the contraption that wraps them in plastic netting and they come out the other end like tree-sausages. I wander around and look at the wooden ornaments, inhale the cinnamon smell of the scented candles burning on a nearby table and pick up some of the decorations laid out there. There are silver filigree angels, a tiny polystyrene snowman with an orange scarf and a nativity scene made out of wire figurines. They’re all adorable.
Daniel comes up behind me as I’m holding the snowman in my hand. He gives me a nudge in the ribs and nods to the car.
I carry one of the trees and he carries the other back to the car and we sling them in the boot.
He stands with his hands on his hips before closing the boot. ‘There, that’s Christmas, right there.’ He turns to me and nods towards the boot.
‘You love Christmas, don’t you?’
‘Yeah. Lots of memories of growing up with real tress; the excitement of Christmas Eve. Being back in the UK – I guess it’s all coming back to me. I want to enjoy it with—’ He stops mid-sentence and I wonder what he was about to say. ‘Coffee?’
‘Sure,’ I nod. ‘And I’m buying it this time.’
When I get back to the car, I hand him a coffee. He takes it from me and has a sip. Then he places it on the dashboard.
‘Close your eyes and hold out your hand,’ he says.
I do as I’m told.
‘Open up your palm.’ I can feel him place something light and delicate in it.
‘Now open your eyes.’
I look down to see the snowman with the orange scarf sitting in my hand. The snowman has a painted orange carrot nose and tiny black beads for eyes. I smile. ‘Thank you.’
‘Your first Christmas present from me.’
Will there be more? We sit in silence, looking out over the farm in the dusky light. Steam has built up on the windscreen from the hot drinks. The air in the car is warm and musty: coffee mixed with his aftershave. There’s a small lake next to the farm, the moon reflected in its dark, inky water, casting an eerie white glow across the surface.
I think about what Tyler said. You’re happy, Mum, aren’t you? I look over at Daniel staring out over the lake, at the steam from the coffee gathering around his face and I tentatively reach out and put my hand on his knee. He seems lost in thought. Without saying anything, he places his hand over mine, curls his fingers gently around my fingertips and squeezes it tight. Happy? Yes, I am.