She cannot sleep. She’s been tossing and turning and hitting her pillow in sheer frustration. Then she remembers Charlotte is in the bedroom next door and feels foolish.
She finally drops off around two but dreams she’s on fire and awakes soaked with sweat and regrets. She has to get up and change her nightdress. Beatrice is sure the stress of Henry’s death has precipitated these awful symptoms.
She goes downstairs to make a cup of tea and ponder her overwhelming sense of sadness. Her son has refused to spend Christmas Day with her!
‘I am not leaving my girlfriend to sit and pull crackers with you and bloody Charlotte. We have plans.’
We!
‘But this is the first year since your father—’
‘I am very well aware of that,’ he snapped. ‘Which is why I want to be with Hannah.’ More quietly, he added, ‘I need to be with her.’ 162
It stung. But not so much that she’d actually invite the barmaid.
The compromise was that he would pop round to drop off his mother’s present on Christmas morning. She suggested he come for drinks after lunch, but he refused.
‘We’ll be going for a walk then.’
She almost suggested she could join them but guessed she wouldn’t be welcome.
Since he moved into his father’s pied-à-terre in central London and started practically commuting to the island every few weeks, Beatrice has hardly seen Kit. She misses him.
And then all her chums had bailed for various reasons, so she now faces the prospect of dealing with Charlotte by herself. The poor girl is not coping well with her mother and father’s divorce. Rather than pick a side for the festive season she was keen to escape. Beatrice felt she had done a kind thing to invite her here. But she guesses how Christmas Day will go. The girl will stuff her face and then spend half an hour in the toilet throwing it all up again. As bad as Princess Diana!
Beatrice intends to spend as much time as humanly possible in the Old Ship. She might sing carols; she might read alone in her room; or she might howl at the bloody moon!