Chapter 28 Jenny
Jenny
I f someone had asked her what her favourite part of Christmas was, she would have said all of it. The chaos, the joy, the unexpected moments, the surprises, the moments of laughter and even the moments when the whole thing was so exhausting she thought when are they all leaving?
But really it was Christmas Day. Because somehow the present and the past came together and it became more than this one day.
It was this Christmas, and all the Christmases that had ever gone before, and the children were partly responsible for that because they always wanted to do what they’d always done, in the exact order they’d always done it.
With one exception. Getting up before it was light.
She remembered years when she’d hear excited giggles in the hallway, the sound of bare feet making the stairs creak as three children tried to creep downstairs without waking their parents, subdued squeals when they saw the stockings and Martin grumbling that it was just too early, and couldn’t they at least stay in bed until it was light.
And now, here they were, lying in bed with weak winter sunlight poking through the blinds, and she was pretty sure that no one else in the house was awake yet.
“Do you miss the days when they used to try and creep downstairs without waking us?”
“No.” Martin’s eyes were still closed. “This was one of the few days of the year I could actually have a lie-in.”
“But now you can lie in every day.” She kissed him. “Happy Christmas. I need to put the turkey in the oven.”
“Now?”
“If you want to eat at lunchtime, yes, now.”
“Can’t we just eat when it’s ready?”
“We could, yes, but my parents like lunch to be at lunchtime and not at some indeterminate point mid-afternoon. Dad will start snacking and saying things like ‘my stomach doesn’t know what time of day it is.’ Last year I made him scrambled eggs and he stared at it and said ‘I don’t know what meal this is supposed to be. ’”
“Eggs can be any meal. That’s the point. We should have trained them better.”
“They’re too old to change now, and I don’t mind. I love them the way they are. I love the fact my dad won’t move in the mornings until he’s done his crossword, and that my mother uses her age as an excuse for saying things that make me want to hide.”
“You hate the fact that she says things that make you want to hide. That’s why you hide.”
“True.” She smiled and tugged at the covers. “But I wouldn’t change her. It’s all part of the chaos.”
“Let’s hope the kids feel the same way when she buys them all pregnancy tests for Christmas.
” He yawned and levered himself upright.
“Okay, I’m officially awake. I’ll make coffee and take Percy out.
Where are you getting your energy from? It was a late night.
Yet another late night. Why couldn’t our children have made their announcements on the same day so that we could just have one late night celebrating and then get back to normal? What will it be tonight I wonder?”
“It’s such great news about Will and Becky.” She’d barely slept, smiling to herself in the darkness. “I keep seeing her face. She was glowing.”
“That was windchill. The two of them were standing outside in the cold for hours.”
“You’re so unromantic. I was thinking that next year we should invite Audrey and Paul to stay for Christmas.
That way we can guarantee that Will and Becky will be here.
And if they’re here, the chances are Rosie and Declan will be too.
And providing Hayley enjoys herself this Christmas, hopefully she and Jamie will come. ”
“Where are all these people going to sleep? At this rate I’m going to need to build an extension.” He stood up and stretched. “And why are you planning next Christmas when we haven’t finished this one yet?”
“Because I don’t want to think this will be the last Christmas we’ll all be together. I want to know it will happen again.”
He sighed and sat down next to her. “You’re the one always telling me I have to adapt.”
“I never said it was easy.”
He pulled her to her feet. “Come on. We’re going to stand on the creaky stair and wake the children. It’s time the day started. Remind me, when do we do presents?”
“The same time we have always done presents. Stockings before breakfast, main presents afterwards.”
They used the bathroom and pulled on clothes, Jenny wearing the festive red dress she wore every year.
They headed down to the kitchen, treading hard on the creaky stair several times until Jamie yelled, “why are you treading on the creaky stair?” to which his father replied “it’s revenge,” and then they sprinted to the kitchen giggling like children.
Half an hour later when the turkey was in the oven and the smell of fresh coffee filled the kitchen, people started to emerge.
“I mean, if you want to wake us up, Mum, just set an alarm,” Rosie said sleepily.
“All that creaking made me think I was in a haunted house.” She was wearing red pyjamas covered in smiling white snowmen and her hair was tousled from sleep.
The innocent effect was slightly ruined by the fact that the top fastened with a single button that was challenged by Rosie’s curves.
The back door opened and Percy shot into the kitchen, bringing with him snow and cold air. Martin followed, stamping snow off his boots. “Chilly out there. I hope Santa was wearing his thermals.”
“Martin, wipe the dog’s paws!” Jenny caught Percy and took him back to the door before he could leave snowy prints through the house.
“Dad, close the door!” Rosie shuddered and moved closer to the oven. “It’s freezing. I’m going to get inside the oven with the turkey.”
“Why is everyone yelling at me?” Martin closed the door. “Merry Christmas to you too. And you’re only freezing because you have flesh showing.”
Jenny grabbed the towel and dried Percy. She looked at Rosie, trying to remember the time when she’d had perfect smooth skin. “You’re not wearing enough clothing.”
“I’m not six, Mum. I can decide what I need to wear. And I was wearing plenty of clothing until Dad decided to open the door.”
“Why didn’t you get dressed before coming down?”
“Because of all the creaking. You obviously wanted us to get up, so I got up. Like a dutiful daughter. Here I am. Also, I have a special dress and I don’t want to drop my breakfast on it.”
“Who was going up and down the stairs?” Becky walked in next, wearing jeans and a hoodie that had this is a Christmas jumper emblazoned on the front of it. “It was torture.”
Martin removed his boots. “Now you know what you put us through for all those years.”
Jamie walked in next, with Hayley. “I just bumped into Granny. She wants to know what the creaking sound was.”
“If Granny is up, then you really should get dressed, Rosie.” Jenny started laying the table.
“Why? It was Granny who gave me these pyjamas. It will be nice for her to see them.”
“You’re showing too much boobage,” Becky said. “Grandad is too old for that much flesh on display. Why are you laying the table for breakfast? We have to open our stockings first.”
Grumbling, Rosie left the room to dress in something more suitable and then they all convened in the living room.
Hayley opened the contents of her stocking and for some reason this was an emotional moment because she and Jamie exchanged looks and Jenny thought to herself that even when you thought you knew your family really well, you could never really know everything and perhaps that was good.
Later, after they’d all consumed breakfast (and her father had commented that it was good to have an actual meal at the right time of day), they went back to the living room to open the gifts piled under the Christmas tree.
And Jenny watched them, her amazing, complicated, surprising, wonderful family, and decided that this was her best gift. Being all together for Christmas. That was what she wanted.
“Why are you gazing at us in that weird way, Mum?” Rosie folded a ribbon. “Like you’re going to cry?”
“I’m not going to cry,” Jenny said. “It’s Christmas. Why would I cry?”
“Because you often cry at Christmas. You say things like ‘when you were little’ and then you come out with some hideously embarrassing story about something we did when we were little and didn’t know better, something that is very probably still being held against us, and then you cry.”
“It’s true,” Jamie said. “You do that, Mum. So maybe this is a good time to give her our present.”
Rosie rummaged under the Christmas tree and pulled out a box. “Here,” she said. “Happy Christmas. From the three of us. This really will make you cry. Sorry not sorry.”
Jenny removed the paper carefully (so that she didn’t incur the wrath of her mother) and opened the box. Inside was a large photo album.
“Oh, it’s an actual physical album. What a great idea. I’ll be able to print some photos instead of having them all living on my phone where I never see them. In the sky, as Granny would say.”
“Not just an album,” Becky said. “Open it.”
She opened it, and there was Jamie aged around five, holding both his sisters on his lap.
She turned the page, and there was Rosie at her first ballet class.
She kept turning the pages, moving through the years and the memories.
Child to adult. All the stages. So much of her life, right there in front of her.
And at the end was a family photo, the three of them, with Declan, Hayley and Will.
Standing on the beach laughing, wind blowing their hair and their smiles so big it made her smile to look at it.
“How did you take that last one? When?”
“Yesterday. Will took it. And we printed it off.”
“I should scold you for making your mother cry,” Martin said, “but I assume they’re happy tears. Good choice.”
“Yes, thank you.” Jenny was choked, but she managed to hold herself together and join in as everyone took it in turns to open presents. Not that they all made sense to her.
Hayley was opening presents from Jamie and the two of them were laughing.
“Days-of-the-week knickers?”
“Yes. You can wear Monday for a change.”
Jenny watched them, mystified as they shared a joke clearly only the two of them understood.
But that wasn’t as strange as the moment Declan gave Rosie a box of pink paperclips that for some reason reduced her to tears ( I’d cry too if someone gave me pink paperclips , Jamie was heard to mutter), and Jenny decided that a gift that was adored by the recipient and not understood by anyone else was probably the perfect present because it was obviously personal and meant something.
She looked up as Martin handed her a box.
“What’s this?”
“It’s my gift to you.”
She opened it and found an old shoe box adorned with a homemade sticker saying Worry Box .
“You wanted somewhere to put your worries, so from now on you can write them down, put them in here, and I’ll take them. So that you don’t have to carry them on your own.”
Her throat stung. “You won’t look after them properly.”
“Yes, I will. I will give them my full attention. In between bins and gutters. If you don’t believe me, look inside.”
She opened the box and there was a piece of paper with his name on it, but it was crossed out.
She looked at him and he shrugged.
“I know you’ve been worried, but you don’t need to be. Not anymore. You can cross that one off your list. I’ve had some ideas. We’ll talk about them when it’s just us again.”
And she realised that he did seem like Martin again. Ever since the night of Jamie’s party, he’d slowly been regaining energy and interest.
“Worries? Can we help?” Jamie spoke up. “What are you worried about, Mum?”
“Everything,” Becky said. “She’s Mum. And no, you can’t help. You’re probably the reason she’s worried.”
“Well, thanks!”
“If all Dad has given her is an empty cardboard box then we should all be worried,” Rosie said. “Next year I’m in charge of your gift buying, Dad. I thought I’d trained you better than this. No kitchen equipment. Nothing that’s secretly a gift for you. You know the rules.”
Jenny clutched the box. “I like my gift.”
“When I’m old,” Rosie muttered to Declan, “don’t even think of giving me a cardboard box.”
“Enough!” Martin lifted his hands. “Is nothing private around here? I do have another gift for your mother, so maybe this is a good time to give it.” He handed her an envelope and they all waited while she opened it.
“I hope you’re not giving her money,” Rosie said, “because buying your own gift is seriously overrated. Why are you laughing, Jamie?”
“I’m not laughing. I’m just grateful not to be Declan. The thought of having to choose exactly the right gift for you for the next fifty years would put me in therapy.”
“That’s because you’re not as clever as Declan.”
“I always think there’s no point in worrying,” Phyllis said. “If something is going to happen it will happen.”
Ignoring them all, Jenny pulled out a small, stylish brochure. “What’s this?”
“It’s where we’re going for three nights in January. You always say the house feels empty after Christmas when everyone has left, so we’re going away. You won’t be in an empty house. Someone else will put food in front of you, which will be a nice change after all the cooking and entertaining.”
“That’s a good idea,” Jamie said. “Nice.”
“I take it all back, Dad,” Rosie said. “That’s a great gift.”
It was a great gift, because she knew that what he was really giving her was a sign that he was moving forward.
That they were moving forward together. That they’d handle this change the way they handled everything else that came their way, by adjusting, however long that took.
And her children would come and go and maybe have children of their own or maybe not, but whatever shape her family took, she knew she was lucky to have them.
But that was the future, and for now she intended to stay in the present and enjoy this one day when everyone was together and, for a moment at least, everything was perfect.
She gazed at the Christmas tree and then heard her father clear his throat.
“I don’t want to worry anyone,” he said, “but is everything fine in the kitchen? I think I can smell burning.”