“Deck the halls with—”
‘Argg! Turn it off!’ Daisy shouted. If she heard that carol one more time, she was going to explode.
‘I thought you liked it,’ her mother said, stabbing at the off button on the ancient CD player.
Daisy took the “best” cutlery out of the drawer and stated, ‘I did. Now I don’t.’
The song had played non-stop in her head for the past two weeks. It was the tune she associated with Freddie and Carl in their semi-naked glory. Even though she was on the way to forgiving Freddie, she wasn’t quite there yet and she didn’t want to be reminded of it.
Only one more day to go, and the whole sorry Christmas thing would be all over. The TV would stop showing Christmas movies, the various shows would take down the fake trees and the tinsel, and stop playing Christmas songs on a loop. Instead they would be showing adverts for summer holidays and the upcoming New Year’s sales, and at work she’d be roped into helping to ship out the vast quantities of Valentine’s Day cards.
She had one day to get through, then she could put this year behind her and concentrate on the new one.
The table looked lovely, even if she did say so herself. Determined not to rain on anyone else’s parade, she’d gone all-out to make Christmas Day an enjoyable one, starting with Bucks Fizz and parma ham with scrambled egg on seeded toast for breakfast. Elsie had grizzled a bit (she’d wanted a cup of tea and cereal) but a glass or two of the bubbly stuff had soon sorted her out.
They were holding off opening any presents until the rest of the family arrived, and David and Zoe were picking Gee-Gee up, as usual, after spending Christmas morning with Zoe’s parents. Daisy, remembering previous Christmases, thought there was most definitely a silver lining to the dark cloud hanging over her – at least she didn’t have to spend any time with Freddie’s family.
Her phone rang.
‘Hello?’
‘It’s me,’ Freddie said.
Think of the devil and he’ll appear, Daisy mused, recalling one of her nan’s old sayings.
‘I just wanted to… you know,’ he rambled.
‘Wish me a Happy Christmas?’ Daisy failed to keep the sarcasm out of her voice, even though she tried. She might have realised (too late) that she didn’t love Freddie as much as she should have, but the sting of rejection was still sharp.
‘Er… yes, I suppose.’ A pause followed, which Daisy had no intention of filling, until Freddie eventually asked, ‘How are you?’
‘How do you think?’ She certainly wasn’t going to make this easy for him, either.
‘I’m sorry I missed you when you picked up your things.’
His voice was so familiar, it hurt to hear it. If only things had been different; if only they had been different.
‘Are you really sorry?’ Daisy asked. ‘Because I’d bet my left arm that you’re glad you didn’t have to see me, in case I made a scene. I posted the key through the letterbox, by the way.’
‘I saw it, thanks. And yes, I am sorry. I still care for you, Daze.’
Daisy-Daze, that’s what he used to call her. He should have called her Dippy Daisy, because she’d been so gullible.
In time, she would come to terms with what he’d done, but not right now. It was too soon, too raw, and forgiveness of an abstract Freddie was a different kettle of fish to forgiving a contrite Freddie who was on the other end of a phone. She decided to be honest with him, even though the time for honesty should have been when they first met.
‘I care for you, too,’ she said quietly, realising that she did and probably always would.
‘I never wanted to hurt you,’ he said.
She understood that, but he had hurt her, all the same, and it would take a while for the pain to fade. She knew it would fade eventually, it was dissipating already, morphing into hurt pride and annoyance with herself for not seeing what was now so obvious. But it hadn’t completely gone yet and she knew she had to give herself time.
‘Merry Christmas, Freddie,’ she said softly, before ending the call, feeling the prick of tears in the back of her eyes.
‘Who was that?’ her mother asked, coming into the little dining room carrying a jar of cranberry sauce.
‘Just a friend,’ Daisy said, taking the jar from Sandra and putting it in the centre of the table.
Her mother gave her a shrewd look, but didn’t pursue it. ‘Everything is almost ready. David can carve the turkey when he gets here. I’ve taken it out of the oven to rest.’
The smell of roasting meat was mouth-watering. Daisy was starving, as usual. Not for her the loss of appetite due to heartbreak, but instead, she found herself eating everything and anything. Except sprouts. And cabbage. Broccoli was a bit take-it-or-leave-it too. But the sight of the mound of roast potatoes being kept warm in the oven made her almost swoon.
Her mother slapped her lightly across the back of the head when she caught Daisy trying to steal one.
‘Anyone would think you hadn’t been fed for a week,’ Sandra complained, pushing her daughter away from the open oven door and checking to see if any potatoes were missing.
Daisy nearly burned her fingers trying to hide the offending roastie behind her back. Then she really did burn her mouth when she stuffed the potato in whole as soon as her mother’s attention was diverted by a peas-boiling-over crisis.
‘Here, take the wine in, and try not to drink any of it before the others get here,’ Sandra instructed, thrusting a bottle of white into Daisy’s hand.
Daisy seriously debated whether to have a quick swig straight from the bottle to cool her burning mouth, but a glare from her mother changed her mind.
‘Merry Christmas!’ David called, as the front door banged open and her brother wheeled Gwenda into the hall. Zoe, as usual, followed silently behind, an inane smile on her face.
Daisy vowed to play nice. It wasn’t Zoe’s fault the girl was a bit silly and vacant, though Daisy was surprised David chose to marry someone like her in the first place. She thought he would have gone for someone a bit more intellectual. Or at least, someone who did more than giggle.
‘Daisy, help your great-gran. David, come and carve the turkey. Zoe, take Elsie another glass of sherry – she’s in the living room, hoping all the work will get done by magic – then pour one for yourself.’ Sandra barked orders, and everyone jumped to do her bidding.
Once the food had been brought to the table and they were all seated, Daisy noticed her mother relax a little, Christmas lunch successfully accomplished, and she glanced around at the smiling faces of the rest of her family, and realised that all of them, except one, were female. Last year Freddie had been with them, and Daisy felt a little sorry for her brother, who was now the only man in a room full of women – four generations of blood relatives along with his wife. God help him!
Gee-Gee sat at one end of the table, her wheelchair pushed as close as was practical, and David as the honorary (read only) male head of the family, sat at the other. Zoe sat next to him, with Zoe, her nan and her mother opposite. This week, Elsie had the job of feeding Gee-Gee, with Daisy chipping in to help.
With the crackers pulled and the wine poured, the family settled down to enjoy their meal. Enough food was on the table to feed a small army. Daisy dug in with enthusiasm. As she shovelled a forkful of turkey and stuffing into her mouth, she noticed how David kept putting his knife down and squeezing Zoe’s knee under the table. Daisy was tempted to tell him to leave the woman alone for five minutes, but she held her tongue when she saw Zoe’s face.
Something was definitely amiss with her brother’s wife, Daisy thought. The younger woman was paler than usual; she was normally all long golden hair and translucent skin, but today she looked positively wan. Plus, Zoe was only picking at her food. The dark circles under her eyes made her look rather unwell. Daisy wondered if the girl had had too much of a good time last night and now had a humungous hangover. Zoe seemed the type to do a party justice, being blond and giggly, and Sandra had mentioned that Zoe’s parents were having a few friends, as well as Zoe and David, over for a couple of drinks. It looked like Zoe had downed more than a couple.
Without realising, Daisy saw she had cleared her plate. Groaning, she pushed her chair away from the table slightly, surreptitiously undoing the button on her trousers, and almost crying with relief as the pressure on her over-full stomach eased.
Two helpings of roast potatoes, another of veg, and a whole turkey leg plus what she’d piled on her plate at the start of the meal, had left her with an aching belly. She estimated she must have eaten her own share plus Zoe’s, and there was still plenty of food left over. She suspected they’d be eating turkey in some form or another for the next week, and guessed that by day three she’d be pleading for beans on toast, or a pizza – anything but turkey!
Her glass was empty, and she reached for the bottle of wine and refilled it, then offered to top up Zoe’s barely touched drink. For once Zoe didn’t giggle, placing a hand over the top of the glass instead.
All the more for me, Daisy crowed, though she did think it rather mean of her sister-in-law not to take a turn with the driving, and let David have a drink or two, considering the woman was so hungover she clearly couldn’t face alcohol today.
David didn’t appear to be any the worse for wear – he’d eaten as much as Daisy – and even Gee-Gee, with her sparrow-like appetite, had managed to polish off a decent portion.
Daisy helped her mother clear the table, glad for a chance to stand up. She really shouldn’t have eaten so much, and when Gee-Gee said, ‘Bring on the Christmas pudding and I hope you remembered to make brandy sauce,’ Daisy wanted to disappear off to her room for a lie down and never think about food again. There was no way she’d be able to force another morsel down her throat.
‘And there are mince pies, and cheese and crackers if anyone wants them,’ her mother announced.
Daisy caught Zoe’s eye, thinking Zoe looked as green as Daisy felt. She really shouldn’t have had that last “pig-in-the-blanket”, but she simply hadn’t been able to resist the sausagey-baconess of it, and when it was covered in rich gravy it was heaven on a fork.
Zoe gave Daisy a pallid smile, but before Daisy could think of anything to say to her sister-in-law, David cried, ‘Look,’ and pointed to the window.
Snowflakes were falling thick and fast from a heavily laden sky.
Sandra clapped her hands. ‘Oh, how wonderful. Now I really do feel like it’s Christmas.’
‘They didn’t forecast snow,’ Elsie pointed out, ‘and let’s hope we don’t get too much because our David has still got to take my mother back, and get home himself. I bloody hate snow. Nasty slippery stuff.’
‘I need a wee,’ Gee-Gee said, and all thought of snow was banished by the complexity of getting a very old, wheelchair-bound lady safely into the small downstairs loo and back out again.
Daisy let her mother and nan sort that one out. She rolled up the sleeves of her rather itchy and very silly Christmas jumper (it had a flashing Rudolf nose on the front and strategically placed grey-brown antlers over her boobs, which looked suspiciously like hands) and tackled the washing up.
By the time everyone returned to the dining room, Daisy’s lunch had gone down enough for her to consider some Christmas pudding. Just a little bit, not too much, but enough to keep her great-gran happy.
Sandra made the brandy sauce and Daisy took centre stage as she carefully carried the flaming pudding into the dining room, images of accidentally setting the curtains alight popping into her head. What idiot had started the stupid tradition of pouring neat brandy onto a pile of cooked fruit and setting it on fire anyway? Someone who sold sprinklers or smoke alarms for a living, probably.
‘Ooh,’ Gee-Gee exclaimed. ‘It looks lovely. Did you make a wish?’
‘Yes, Gee-Gee, when I put the sixpence in, remember?’ Daisy replied.
‘What did you wish for?’
Elsie said, ‘Don’t tell, Daisy, otherwise it won’t come true.’
‘Since when did you believe in sixpences?’ Gwenda demanded. ‘You’re too miserable to believe in anything! You’ve never been the same since that man of yours did a runner.’
‘Pudding anyone?’ Daisy asked, seeing the very real possibility of the once-civilised meal deteriorating into a verbal mud-slinging match. Exactly the same thing had happened last year, except Elsie had started it first. This year it appeared to be Gee-Gee’s turn.
‘I’ll have some,’ David replied, gamely, as he held out his hand for a bowl.
Zoe shook her head, and Daisy thought the girl didn’t look at all well.
‘Gee-Gee?’ Daisy asked, praying she’d managed to head things off at the pass.
‘And whose fault was that?’ Elsie demanded.
‘Gee-Gee? Pudding?’ Daisy tried again, hearing the slight sound of desperation in her own voice.
‘Yours, that’s who!’ Elsie continued. ‘You frightened him off.’
‘If your daughter had come home at eighteen and told you she was up the duff, you’d frighten off the bloke who’d got her that way, too,’ Gee-Gee said.
‘Nan? Pudding?’ Daisy pleaded, looking at David for help when Elsie failed to respond. David had his head down and his gaze on his own bowl, and was pretending he was deaf.
Daisy saw her sister-in-law kick him on the shin, and he looked up at his wife in confusion. Zoe waggled her eyebrows at him, and jerked her head at the combatants.
‘Oh, er, right. Now?’ David asked.
Zoe nodded.
‘We was going to get married, before you went and interfered,’ Elsie stated.
Daisy decided she’d done all she could, and it was best to keep out of it and let the two old biddies have their slanging match, so she turned her attention to her own dessert and spooned some of the pudding into her mouth. Her eyes widened in surprise. It was actually quite good, and the brandy sauce set it off nicely. Why hadn’t she eaten Christmas pudding before now? Why hadn’t she made it before now?
David clinked his spoon against the side of his glass. Everyone ignored him.
‘Bah!’ Gwenda fired back. ‘He got what he wanted from you, then he took off like a rat up a drainpipe when he saw the size of your belly. And who ended up looking after you and your baby, eh? Me, that’s who!’ Gwenda tried to poke herself in the chest with a distorted finger.
‘I didn’t ask you to!’ Elsie cried, snatching up an empty bowl and angrily dolloping a generous helping of Christmas pudding into it.
‘We’re pregnant,’ David said.
‘Yes, that’s right, David,’ Gwenda said. ‘Your grandmother got herself pregnant.’
‘It takes two, you know,’ Elsie retorted. ‘I didn’t do it all by myself.’
‘No, but you had to raise the baby all by yourself, didn’t you?’ Gee-Gee’s face creased into a smirk.
‘I thought you just said you raised the baby,’ Elsie countered.
‘Pregnant?’ Sandra repeated.
‘Keep up,’ Gwenda grumbled. ‘Of course, your mother was pregnant. How do you think you got here?’
Daisy shot a swift glance at Zoe, who was staring down at her hands as they twisted in her lap. No wonder her sister-in-law was upset. Daisy’s family was enough to upset a gang of football hooligans on the way to a match. This sort of squabble tended to happen quite often between the three women, which was possibly one of the reasons why Freddie always found some excuse or another to avoid Sunday lunch at Sandra’s house.
‘I’m not talking about Mum,’ Sandra said.
‘Who are you talking about, then?’ Elsie asked, and Daisy, sensing she’d missed something important, hurriedly shoved the last spoonful of pudding into her mouth.
‘Zoe, my lovely wife,’ David said, ‘is expecting a baby.’
Daisy tried to swallow the mouthful of pudding and speak at the same time. She took a breath, felt something hard hit the back of her throat and swallowed convulsively. It was stuck. She tried to swallow again, but it didn’t budge. When she tried to take another breath, she realised what had happened.
That bloody sixpence!