Winter solstice and the Cold Moon. In the last few days before Christmas, El hurries between the bookshop and the Pig Pen, and all the while she’s thinking about Will, unnerved by the total silence, unable to contact him. Each time she thinks about texting him she loses her nerve. She still feels ashamed that he might think she was coming on to him but she wishes that she hadn’t reacted so violently. She just longs to see him but doesn’t know how to phrase a message that is appropriate. She believes now that Elton John is absolutely right about sorry being the hardest word, especially when she has no idea what Will is feeling. There has been no response to her call and she has no idea if Christian passed on her message. Somehow this has added to the difficulty of making a second call. Perhaps, after all, Will was simply responding to an impulse and, when she reacted so strongly, he just shrugged and went back to his own life. At last she scraped up enough courage to send him a Christmas card. It was a simple watercolour of Dartmoor in the snow and inside she wrote:
I’m really sorry about the way I reacted, Will. Just put it down to all the weird stuff I’m going through at the moment. I hate it that we’ve parted like this after all the good times we had and all your kindness. I think I told you about Angus’s party and Midnight Mass. You’re still invited and I’d love to see you.
She hesitated, wondering how to sign it, what she should put, and in the end just wrote her name. There has been no response and now, on Christmas Eve, as she moves amongst Angus’s guests, she is certain that she’s ruined any chance of a relationship with Will and she feels miserable and lonely, even amongst all these friends. She talks to Plum’s elder daughter, Alice, and as they chat about what it’s like to work at a literary agency in London, El wonders if, after all, her decision to try this life here was a good one. Perhaps she should have accepted Angus’s offer to stay the night rather than return to the Pig Pen alone, but it’s difficult keeping up this pretence of jollity when her heart is aching as she thinks about Will.
Even as she thinks about him, she remembers the difficulty in introducing him to her friends, the complications of his being her stepbrother. She’s mentioned it to Angus, in a casual kind of way, saying that it felt odd, that she didn’t know quite how to deal with it. He thought about it for a few moments.
‘There’s no legal tie, of course,’ he said. ‘And you haven’t grown up together, so there’s no difficulty, really, but I can see it’s an odd one. I shouldn’t worry about it, too much. All your friends know the situation, other people will just assume that he’s a friend. Keep it simple is my motto.’
El sighs. It’s been a long day in the bookshop and she’s finding it hard to keep awake. It’s a relief when the time comes for them to set out for church. They all go in together, Father Steven greets her warmly, and they file into a pew near the front. She sits between Plum and Cass, and Cass smiles at her encouragingly as if she is able to imagine what this must be like for El, this first Christmas without her father.
The church is festive with holly and candles and the scent of pine needles, the choir and clergy are grouping at the back, the organ playing. El glances behind her to watch the procession forming up, and takes a little gasping breath. Will is here, standing at the end of a pew where the occupants are squeezing up to make room for him. He’s in uniform, and she guesses that he must have driven straight from the airport. As she watches, he looks around, his face anxious, hopeful, and then he sees her. El is filled with relief, joy; she wants to weep and laugh all at the same time. She beams at Will and he smiles back, gives her a little nod. Then the organ plays the chords of the first hymn, the congregation stands, and she turns back, picks up her service sheet and begins to sing.