Men with amnesia: 0 (Bad)
Gorgeous men with gorgeous personalities: 1
Gorgeous men who are son of Santa Claus: 1
Gorgeous men who I can ever look in eye again: 0
“Amnesia.”
“What?”
“Amnesia,” the nurse repeats when I get to the hospital the next night. “He’s got amnesia. He doesn’t remember who he is or where he comes from.”
A spark of hope lights up in me. Maybe the amnesia kicked in after I left. Maybe he doesn’t remember everything now. Maybe he temporarily remembered some things I’d said and then forgot them again. The brain is a strange thing; it must do odd things when you’ve been in a coma. Amnesia is brilliant. It’s exactly what I needed him to have.
I knock gently on the door, suddenly feeling more optimistic than I have all day. He’s sitting up in bed and I’m positively fizzing as I go into his room, and it’s not just because of the energy drink I pinched from Nick’s fridge earlier when I was at the cottage to feed Rudolph and clean some soot off.
He looks up and gives me a dazzling smile, the smile I remember from every night in the park. “So, you melted my vacuum cleaner?”
I stare at him in horror. “What? How do you know that? You’re meant to have amnesia!”
“What was I supposed to do? Tell them I’m the son of Santa Claus and that I come from the North Pole?”
The sight of his smile and the deep rumble of his voice sends shivers down my spine but I try not to show it. “So it’s true?”
“Didn’t you think it was?”
“I don’t know. I suppose part of me expected you to wake up and say it was all a big hoax, you’re just a normal guy, Santa’s not real, and you’ve just got a friend with a penchant for dressing as an elf and sliding down chimneys.”
He shrugs then winces when the movement pulls at his ribs. “I can’t deny it now. You know everything already. I’m not usually so open about it. Sorry, I kind of thrust you into the deep end.”
“Yep.”
“Are you going to lurk by the door all day or will you come in and talk to me? I owe you a massive apology.”
“I think I’ve talked to you enough lately.”
“Is that why you ran off yesterday?”
I shuffle my feet together and look down at the floor.
“I was really upset when you left. All I wanted was to talk to you in person. I could hear you all the while and my whole body fought so I’d be able to wake up, to actually be here with you, and then you weren’t here.”
“I’m sorry,” I say automatically. “I didn’t expect you to hear everything. It was just rambling, nonsensical rabbiting to fill up the silence. I didn’t mean you to actually remember it.”
He laughs. “You’re embarrassed.”
I blush but I can’t believe this is actually happening. I’m standing here having a proper conversation with Gorgeous Dog Walker. I never thought I’d manage to say more than a pathetic ‘lovely weather’ to him.
“Emma, you have nothing to be embarrassed about. Please, come and sit down and talk to me. I owe you my life.”
I scoff. “Hardly.”
“The police came this morning. They told me exactly what happened. You saved my life.”
“I pushed you under a bus!”
“And out of the way of a car. I’d have fared a lot worse if you hadn’t. Hah! Bus fare, get it?”
“What?”
“Sorry, I used to write Christmas cracker jokes for a living.”
“I thought you were Santa’s son?”
“Well, being Santa’s son isn’t an occupation as such. I’ve had a go at lots of different things, but it’s a long story. Please come and sit down.” He pats the bed beside him, but I drag my usual chair over and sit in that instead. I’m not sure I trust myself to sit next to him. Despite the bruises and the injuries, he’s still Gorgeous Dog Walker, and the desire to kiss him is still bubbling under the surface, even harder to ignore now we’re face-to-face than it is when walking past him with our dogs. If I sat next to him, I’d probably end up hurting him somehow. He’s got an arm and a leg in plaster, broken ribs, and God knows how many other bruised bits.
He leans forward slowly and takes my hand. His thumb runs over the back of it, like I’ve been doing to him lately and goosebumps break out across my entire body. I’m glad I’m sitting down.
“I don’t know where to start,” he says. “You’ve disrupted your entire life for me. I never meant for this to happen. I panicked after the accident. I knew Dad would see it as an excuse, but I honestly never expected them to actually make you go out and sweep the chimneys, I just thought you could explain what had happened and they’d believe you. I knew my body was going to shut down while it recovered and then you were there like a light in the dark. I didn’t mean to put all my responsibilities onto you, but I knew I could trust you.”
“I’m sorry about the vacuum cleaner,” I say, because I don’t really know how to reply to all that.
He grins. “I melted seven in my first month. Vacuum cleaners are surprisingly fussy when it comes to heat.”
I can’t help but laugh too. “I doubt you’ve ruined as many carpets as I have this week.”
“Oh, you’d be surprised. I don’t understand why people put white carpets in the room with all the coal and soot, do you? And I spent my first few weeks on the job looking like a soot ball from My Neighbour Totoro too.”
“You really did hear everything, didn’t you?”
“I loved it. You, you’re amazing. I always thought we had a connection. You wouldn’t believe the amount of times I nearly turned back and asked if you wanted to get a coffee with me, but I didn’t want to lose the nightly smiles. I looked forward to seeing you too, you know. I would never have been able to explain my life to you; I’d never have been able to tell you the truth. Eventually it would have ruined us. I decided it was better to just smile and say hello and occasionally mention the weather.”
He smiles that gorgeous smile, the one that’s filled my head throughout many empty hours on the tills, but I find it difficult to comprehend what he’s saying. He’s GDW, and I’m me. He’s way too good for me. He couldn’t really like me back, could he?
“And I’m not dating anyone, by the way. Not even a penguin or a really tall elf.”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean that.”
“You made me laugh,” he says. “I looked forward to you coming in.”
“You were in a coma.”
“I could still hear and feel everything. It was just like swimming through treacle to try responding to it.”
Feel everything? My mind instantly goes back to kissing him the other night and I feel myself blush furiously. Okay, so it wasn’t like I did anything obscene, but I still lingered for too long and rubbed my face against his stubble when he couldn’t defend himself. I’m pretty sure that counts as taking advantage of his coma.
“I’ve never been more desperate to do anything in my life than I was to kiss you back the other night.”
“Don’t tell me you’re a mind reader too?”
“Nope, just good at putting two and two together.” He winks at me. “That ‘feel everything’ comment and the colour of your cheeks made me think of it too.”
“Comas must be good for honesty,” I say.
He actually blushes at that. “I’m sorry. God, I don’t know what’s got into me today. I’m never this forward.”
“Good pain relief?”
He grins. “Probably.”
He possibly expects me to lean over and kiss him then, but I don’t. It’s all a bit much to take in. Gorgeous Dog Walker, who I’ve been fawning over for months, couldn’t really like me too. Could he?
“Well, it’s good to see you awake,” I say quickly.
“It’s good to be awake. I’m so sorry for what I’ve put you through. I honestly can’t apologise enough.”
“It’s my fault you’re here in the first place.”
“It was an accident, Em. Let’s forget it, okay? I’ll be up and about and back on the job in no time now.”
“You aren’t seriously going to be able to sweep chimneys again, not for months. You’ve got loads of broken bones.”
“I can’t leave it up to you any more.”
“Look, it’s fine. I’m getting the hang of it now. Okay, I admit I’m finding it hard working in the day and in the night, but it’s just a matter of sorting the schedule out better. And now you’re awake, you can tell me how you do things. That’ll make life easier because Twinkle is about as helpful as a bucket with no bottom.”
“I reckon they’ll let me go home in a few days.”
“You’re not supposed to know where you live.”
“Oh. Yeah. I hadn’t thought of that. We’ll figure something out. Between you and me, I hate hospitals.” He whispers the last line like it’s a swear word with his granny in earshot.
“Me too,” I say.
“And you’ve been coming to visit me every day.”
“I couldn’t just leave you on your own, could I? No one else was coming. I didn’t want you to think nobody cared.”
“Yeah, my family aren’t big on sentimentality.”
“Aren’t they the Clauses?”
He goes to shrug but stops himself before it hurts more. “My dad is, I don’t know…to you, he’s probably exactly as you expect. He’d do anything for a child without a present on Christmas morning, but when it comes to me, he’s got more of a ‘you got yourself into this mess, you can get yourself out of it’ attitude.” He says the last line with a deep, gruff voice, imitating his father. “Never mind,” he continues in a voice that’s far too bright and does nothing to hide his disappointment with the situation. “How’s Rudolph?”
“He’s okay. He’s missing you, I think.” That’s a complete lie. Even Rudolph doesn’t seem bothered by everything that’s happened. He jumps at me and wags his tail when I go in to feed him and he likes it when I walk him around the park, but he doesn’t seem to have even noticed the lack of Nick in his life. I would like to think that if I was in hospital for any amount of time that Button would at least miss me.
“I miss him too,” Nick says. “I can’t thank you enough for looking after him. It’s overwhelming to think of all you’ve done for me.”
“It’s nothing,” I say. “Just helping out a friend.”
“For someone who’s my friend, I just realised I never even introduced myself. I’m Nick, by the way.”
I laugh. “Yeah, I’d kind of figured that one out by myself.”
“And I know you’re Emma. I heard you calling yourself Em. I hope you didn’t think I was being overfriendly.”
“I think we’re way past overfriendly by now, don’t you?”
“I know.” He smiles and the warmth in his blue eyes floors me. “No one has ever done anything like this for me before. Seriously, I can’t believe it. I never expected…” He actually wells up as he says it.
I feel a lump in my throat too. I never thought of it as doing something nice for him. I just got on with it. I rub my thumb over his hand where he’s still holding mine. A little thrill goes through me. I am holding GDW’s hand! “Don’t worry about it,” I say. “I’ll carry on until you’re back on your feet. It won’t be long, I’m sure.”
“You’re exhausted. I can tell from here.”
“I’m fine,” I say. “Like I said, I just need to get into a routine. If I catch a few hours’ sleep before the night shift and then another couple of hours after it, I’ll be sorted.”
“How long before tonight’s shift starts?”
I check my watch. “About an hour.”
“And you’re still here, wasting time with me.”
“It’s not wasting time.”
He grins at that, a big, wide beam that lights up his whole face. “You should go. I don’t want you to, but I don’t want you getting even more tired because of me.”
I nod. I’m enjoying his company so much that I don’t want to go. It makes a real change to actually have someone responding after so many days of talking to myself. But he does have a point – I’m already cutting it fine for getting to the supermarket on time. “I’ll come back tomorrow.”
“I’ll work on getting back on my feet.”
“You need to take it easy for a while. You’ve just come out of a coma. I don’t think your body needs any more stress.”
I already know he’s going to push himself more than he should.
“Okay then, um…” I say awkwardly as I stand up.
“C’mere.” Nick cocks his head to the side and I lean down to meet him. It was only intended to be a quick peck, but sparks shoot through me when our mouths touch. Nick’s uninjured hand comes up to the back of my head and the kiss gets deeper. I can’t believe this is happening! He’s an incredible kisser, even better than he was in the many, many times I imagined this moment. We’re both out of breath when we pull back, but he has a dazed smile on his face. “See you tomorrow, then?”
I can’t help the matching one on mine. “Tomorrow.”