Sue watched as Meadow and Forest chased Tamsyn’s and Cordelia’s twin nephews around and around the table, screeching with delight, getting ever closer to taking the beautifully laid tablecloth with them, with each circuit.
Tamsyn was a very laid-back Christmas host, probably because her mother was doing most of the cooking.
When Sue had told her that she would understand if Tamsyn didn’t want them to come round any more, Tamsyn had told her not to be so ridiculous.
‘You’re respecting your marriage, and your family, and trying to do what’s right. Only a really horrible person wouldn’t support you in that,’ she said. And Sue had cried, and Tamsyn had cracked open two more mini bottles of Baileys and made some more coffee. ‘I’ve found that at this time of year they really are a vicar’s wife’s best friend.’
Rory had been charming, sweet and delightful with the children, who were so thrilled to see him. After the pageant and the play the previous evening, they’d skipped midnight mass and gone home to eat a picnic tea of cold sausages and mince pies in the grotto, Petal telling her father in great detail about every single child who came to visit Santa, and what they wanted for Christmas.
‘And the great thing is,’ Meadow had told Rory, very seriously, ‘is that we get the real Santa come to visit us, because Mummy is friends with him.’
When the children were finally in bed, Sue and Rory had washed up and got ready for the morning in silence. When at last it came time to go to bed, Sue stopped him just outside their bedroom.
‘I made up the Blue Room for you,’ she said. ‘It feels a bit too soon to share a bed with you.’
Rory nodded. It wasn’t the first time he’d slept in the Blue Room. ‘Sue … I just …’
‘Don’t try to talk about it now,’ Sue had told him. ‘Let’s just have a lovely Christmas with our beautiful children. Let’s just do that. Set your alarm for six, and come in – I don’t want them knowing you aren’t here.’
She hadn’t thought she would sleep at all, but she must have, because when she’d opened her eyes it was gone six and the children weren’t jumping up and down on her bed and Rory was nowhere to be seen. Next to her head on her pillow though, there had been a tiny square-shaped parcel, wrapped in gold paper and tied with a deep red ribbon.
Had Rory left it? Sue had picked it up gingerly, wondering if it had originally been intended for Vivien, but when she looked at the handwriting on the tag, it wasn’t Rory’s, and the message was rather cryptic to say the least.
‘Christmas wishes only come true if you let them.’
Sue carefully untied the ribbon and opened the box. Inside, nestled on some cotton wool, was a silver Christmas pudding-shaped pendant necklace, set with tiny red gems. As soon as Sue saw it she thought of her dinner with Blake at the Pickled Egg, and she smiled. Looking again at the card, she saw that it was signed off with an ‘N’. Nick? Sue was still yet to work out how the gift got there, and how Nick could have known to choose something so … meaningful. As she’d put the pendant around her neck, she went to look out of the window, and saw the very last thing she could have expected in Poldore: fragile, beautiful, perfect flakes of snow drifting down from the sky. Nick had been right, it seemed.
The five of them had gone to church as a family in the morning, the children’s eyes shining with joy and excitement, the lack of a pony or a real gun with a Christmas bow on not seeming to dim the thrill of finding piles of presents wrapped up for them at the end of their beds. Sue had managed to buy them one real present each, and for the rest she had gone around Castle House, into attic rooms that were scarcely ever entered, and found a selection of random things she knew her children would like. For Petal that was a stuffed owl in flight under a glass dome, with a mouse in its beak. Petal named him Harry, and decided she would take him everywhere. For Forest, she had found an ancient and rusty, but huge padlock, complete with a key, and a very old box that it would serve as a lock for, which instantly reminded Forest that he really wanted to be a pirate, as he filled it with chocolate coins. And for Meadow, a china doll with real hair, that had one been her great-grandmother’s most treasured possession, but which now looked more like it was possessed, especially as one eye didn’t close, and its hair had been badly cut by Sue herself when she was a little girl. Petal didn’t see the doll’s flaws though, instead she name it Kevin and wheeled it about in her old baby buggy.
‘Mum says dinner is nearly ready, the turkey is just resting,’ Tamsyn said, flinging an arm around Jed and kissing him on the cheek. ‘I’m good at hosting Christmas, aren’t I?’
‘Where is Mum?’ Ruan asked. ‘Get her in here, will you?’
Laura Thorne emerged from the kitchen, with her new best friend and cohort, Alex’s mother, Gloria, in tow, the two of them evidently enjoying rather more sherry than was seemly.
‘We’ve got something to tell you,’ Alex said, reaching out for Ruan, who took her hand. ‘I did try to tell a few of you before today, but you were all too busy.’
‘Go on then,’ Gloria said. ‘Don’t keep us in suspenders!’
‘Well.’ Alex took a breath. ‘Skipper, NO!’
They turned around to see a small scruffy dog hauling a bird that was almost the same size of him up the hallway.
‘Oh my God!’ Tamsyn cried. ‘Skipper!’
Sue couldn’t help laughing as the next five minutes were spent in watching her friends and children chase the young dog, round the rectory, as he ducked in and out of room, determined to keep hold of his prize, dribbling turkey in his wake, which in turned caused his pursuers to slip and slide and swear rather more than was appropriate in front of children. Catriona Merryweather, Jed’s verger, and baby Mo’s mother, sat down next to Sue, with her baby on her knee, and rolled her eyes.
‘My mother would have loved this,’ she said. ‘Still I’m glad I’ve gone vegetarian.’
Mid-commotion Alex’s other dog Buoy arrived with a mouth full of sausages, and, casting a baleful glance at Sue and Catriona, settled down under the table to enjoy them, as the chaotic turkey hunt went past the dining room door once again. At last the turkey was caught and dumped on the table for forensic examination.
‘Well.’ Tamsyn prodded the turkey with a fork. ‘I think he mainly only mauled a leg, the rest of it is a bit dusty, but not chewed. Who’s game?’
‘I think I’ll pass,’ Alex said.
‘That’s not like you to wimp out, Alex!’ Tamsyn laughed.
‘And normally dog-chewed turkey is my favourite thing, but as I was about to tell you before Skipper stole my thunder, Ruan and I are expecting a baby!’
Laughter, turned to cheers, which turned to kisses and jokes, and bottles of wine were opened. Backs were slapped, people were hugged and Petal asked Ruan did that mean that he and Alex and done it. Those who were brave enough had turkey, and those who weren’t had ham, and the afternoon rolled on, a perfect combination of friends and family, joy and laughter, a day that was just as every Christmas Day ought to be – full of love.
‘Suuuuuuuuue!’ Tamsyn sat down next to her on the sofa, a little on the squiffy side. ‘How are you holding up?’
‘I’m having a lovely day,’ Sue said. ‘I don’t want it to end.’
Which was true, because after this day was over all of the problems that she had been resolutely avoiding would come crashing in around her. She closed her fingers around her pendant, and wondered what Christmas wishes she would make, if she were only brave enough to let herself think about them.
‘Well, listen, I’ve been trying to talk an idea through with you for ages now, and you kept ignoring me and then it didn’t seem like the right time. But I hope you don’t mind, Cordelia told me about your money worries, and I couldn’t wait any longer so …’
‘What are you babbling on about?’ Sue asked her.
‘Tamsyn Edwards Designs,’ Tamsyn said. ‘I’ve looked and looked for premises in the town where I can design, make and fit my frocks, but there isn’t anywhere that has the drama and theatre that I am looking for. And then I had this idea – Castle House. I never really wanted to move out, I just thought you must be fed up of me taking your home for granted. But now, well, I want to move back in. Not to all of it, just one wing, the one that you have currently filled with an assortment of chairs. I’d pay you rent, of course, and, best of all, once you make part of Castle House a business that is employing local people it makes you eligible for all sorts of grants and help with keeping up the building.’
‘So there would be people coming and going all day?’ Sue asked her.
‘We could make a separate entrance, use one of the side doors, but actually I don’t think it would be a lot of people. I’d make the dresses there, but I can travel to see and fit clients. And there is another thing, Sue. I want you to work for me, for a wage. I want you to be my logistics manager. You are so brilliant at organising things, so why not be paid for it, and best of all you wouldn’t even have to leave home!’
‘Oh,’ Sue said. ‘Really?’
‘I know it’s a lot to think about. But you have no idea how much money that building can make if you let it, and you wouldn’t have to stop letting it be your home. I mean, you could rent it out to film and TV companies, for magazine shoots – it’s so beautiful, it’s got so much potential. I just don’t think anyone with half a business head has ever sat down with you and talked you through the possibilities. Imagine if you put half the effort into making Castle House pay as you did in organising the people of Poldore, you’d never have any money worries again.’
Sue smiled tentatively. ‘Do you really think so?’
‘I do,’ Tamsyn said.
‘But while I am working for you, and turning Castle House into a going concern, who is going to organise the pageant or the Easter passion play, or the May fete, or the summer solstice festival …’
‘All of us,’ Tamsyn said. ‘Everyone in Poldore. We’re a great community, and a large part of why we are is you, always keeping us together, always keeping us going. Now it’s time to let us take over, Sue, and look after yourself a little bit.’
Sue buried her head in her hands and wept, as Tamsyn wound an arm around her shoulders.
‘Mummy!’ Meadow came across at once, wriggling her way into Sue’s arms. ‘Why are you crying?’
‘They aren’t sad tears.’ Sue revealed a huge smile. ‘They are happy tears, very happy tears. I’m crying because I never really knew that I had such wonderful friends.’
‘Oh.’ Meadow rolled her eyes. ‘That is really very silly of you, Mummy.’
‘I know,’ Sue said and she couldn’t stop laughing.
Later that night, back at home, Sue tucked her exhausted children into bed – one of them with her arms wrapped around a stuffed owl under a glass dome – and went back to the kitchen to talk to her husband.
Rory was sitting at the table; he’d made her a mug of tea.
‘Sounds like Tamsyn’s idea might really come through!’ he said, brightly.
‘Yes.’ Sue sat down opposite him, and studied his face. It was strange, she’d lived with him for so long, but she didn’t really ever look at him any more, and even now, he somehow didn’t seem familiar.
‘I had no idea that things were so bad, Sue,’ he said. ‘Why didn’t you talk to me?’
‘I don’t suppose I ever talk to you any more,’ Sue said. ‘And I don’t suppose that you ever talk to me, do you? We have conversations, we bicker and argue, but we never really talk.’
‘Well, that’s going to change,’ Rory said. ‘I promise.’
‘Yes,’ Sue said it is. ‘We have to do better, Rory. We have to make more of an effort to support and understand each other, so we can be the parents that the children need.’
‘Exactly.’ Rory nodded.
‘But we don’t have to be married to do it,’ Sue said.
There was a moment of silence as Rory took in exactly what she was saying, and Duchess, sensing something was amiss, nosed her muzzle under Sue’s hand.
‘Rory, we make each other so unhappy. We love our family, but we don’t love each other. And I’m not prepared to go on feeling so unhappy every single day to the extent where it becomes just … normal. Both of us deserve better, but especially me.’
‘But what about the children? Sue, what are you saying?’
‘That we tell the children we are going to live apart. That you find a job that pays, and rent a cottage in the town. That we remain good, close friends. We see each other and the children see us both every day, but that we don’t continue to torture each other any more. I thought being married was more important than anything else, but now I see that I was wrong. Our family is more important, and the best way to make it a happy one is for us not to be together. Rory, let’s not hurt each other any more, please.’
Rory dropped his head, pinching the bridge of his nose as he closed his eyes. ‘This is all my fault,’ he said.
‘It is a bit,’ Sue had to concede. ‘But not entirely. We haven’t been as kind to each other as we could have been.’
He looked up at her. ‘I heard, about your dinner with Blake Fletcher. And I noticed the pendant you are wearing. Sue, is there anyone else?’
Sue wanted to laugh at the idea that Rory of all people felt he had the right to ask this question, but she didn’t.
‘No,’ she told him. ‘There isn’t. But you know what, Rory, I really hope that one day, there might be.’
A little later, Sue took herself off along the corridors and hallways of her family home to open some of the closed doors of the disused wing that Tamsyn wanted to occupy. She thought of what it would be like, filled with local people learning a new trade, brides-to-be and their mothers, maybe even some celebrities, and she smiled. It was a really wonderful idea, she couldn’t have wished for more. Which gave her a shiver as she thought of the note that had come with the Christmas pudding necklace. She took her phone out of her pocket and found Nick’s number and dialled it. She had no idea how the gift had made its way onto her pillow, and the idea that he might have somehow placed it there should have had her taking out a restraining order by rights, but somehow, when it was Nick, she didn’t feel that way.
‘This is Nick,’ a recorded message came on the line. ‘I am now on holiday, see you next December! Ho! Ho! Ho!’
Sue looked at the phone and laughed out loud.
There was no way …
I mean he was just some eccentric old crazy guy …
He couldn’t possibly be … Could he?
Of course he couldn’t be, Sue decided. That was just ridiculous. And yet, she found that she was quite content to leave the mystery there – she didn’t want to know what the logical explanation was.
Silently, she sent Nick a thank you into the ether, and supposed that maybe if one of her Christmas wishes came true, that perhaps she should try making another one, before the clock struck midnight. Just in case.
Looking up at the moon, she let herself dream, just for a moment – a secret wish, that was just between her, the moon and maybe … just maybe, a certain secret Santa.