Chapter 21
Chapter Twenty-One
EVIE
Alicia bounced over to me the next morning as I was having breakfast with Mrs Evans and Monty.
‘Morning, Alicia,’ said the older woman as she pulled out the chair opposite me.
‘Morning, Mrs E, how are you doing?’
‘I’m having a wonderful time. It’s always fascinating to see what Evie will get up to next. The Dyker Heights lights were extraordinary. Quite hideous in most cases. I’m a great believer in less is more.’
I turned, surprised that she had seen them.
‘What? You think I’m too old for Instagram. Darling, Monty has his own account with thousands of followers.’
‘Of course he does,’ I said, looking at the dog. ‘He’s a cutie.’
‘Don’t let him hear you say that,’ she slapped my hand. ‘It will go to his head and there’s nothing worse than an insufferable dog.’
Alicia sniggered while I tried not to laugh.
‘So, Alicia, what news. You look as if you’re about to burst,’ said Mrs Evans. ‘You young people ought to practise restraint sometimes, it doesn’t do any harm to cultivate an air of mystery, you know.’
Alicia laughed. ‘Sorry, but holy shit, Evie.’ Her eyes shone. ‘You’ll never believe it. Everyone loved the bath pictures and the latest reels from last night. FAO Schwarz, the toy store, have invited you guys on an official visit. It will be so sweet. Excellent work, Evie.’
Mrs Evans rose to her feet. ‘Please excuse me, ladies, but Monty has a date this morning and I need to get him to the dog groomers.’ With that she sailed off with the little dog in tow.
Alicia and I waited till she was out of sight and then burst out laughing.
‘She’s quite a character,’ said Alicia.
‘Yeah, but she’s adorable and always very kind to me. It’s nice to have breakfast with her.’
‘You never quite know what she’s going to say next.’
‘That’s part of her charm.’
‘Well, I’ll head off. Looking forward to today’s pictures. You’ve got a full-on schedule and I’d better let you get on.’
* * *
I met Noah in the lobby at eleven o’clock. A black beanie hat framed his chiselled face, reminding me once again just how handsome he was and he wore a dark grey wool pea coat along with black jeans and tan lace-up boots. He exuded man-about-town, laid-back elegance.
I was glad that I’d put on the Burberry trench coat that Debbie had rightly insisted would take me anywhere.
‘Ready to go?’ he asked.
‘Where are we going?’ I asked.
‘I thought we’d do a detour – we’ve got all day. There’s a place I’d like to take you to and then we can go via Times Square because, as a tourist, you have to see it. Then we can cut across to Bryant Park. There’s a place there that does the best Christmas cocktails.’
‘Okay,’ I said. ‘So, what’s with the bossiness today?’
‘I’m not being bossy. I’m being assertive.’
I nodded, rather liking assertive Noah.
Even though we were off the main drag, it was still busy, but it didn’t take us long to reach our first destination, a small shop on Seventh Avenue.
‘Christmas Cottage.’ I read the shop sign.
‘Yeah, they do Christmas all year.’
‘Fun,’ I said with a sigh, not meaning it at all.
Noah gave me a quick sidelong glance. ‘Whenever we came into the city, we would always come here to get a new decoration for the tree. A family tradition. I want to get a couple for my mom and sister.’
I followed him into the store, which, as its name suggested, was crammed with every Christmas decoration and ornament you could possibly imagine.
It was difficult to know where to look first but being a magpie, who couldn’t resist any sort of trinket, I was drawn to a display full of New York-themed ornaments.
‘Oh, look at this,’ I said picking up a little yellow cab driven by Santa with an elf in the back.
‘This is cute.’ There were tree ornaments of every possible design from pizza slices, hot dogs, Christmas-themed Big Apples and festive crystal Statues of Liberty sporting halos through to skyscraper cityscapes and Santas on skates.
My eyes kept darting this way and that trying to take it all in. Maybe some bits of Christmas were fun.
On another display were more fairy lights than I’d ever seen before, old-fashioned candles, little LEDs, fancy gingerbread men, tiny angels. I was rather taken with some pretty, warm gold lights, which were so tiny they looked like fireflies winking in and out and would be nice all year round.
I drifted through the store, unexpectedly entranced by the sheer choice available. At some point, I lost Noah. He’d probably got bored, but I couldn’t get enough of the place.
There were the sweetest felt stockings, pretty snow globes and wooden nutcrackers with startled soldier faces in every size, from a few inches tall through to five feet.
At the sight of the familiar traditional wreaths bursting with holly berries and fir boughs in every size and the ornate garlands festooned with everything from velvet bows to dried orange slices through to plastic snowballs, I could hear my mum’s voice cooing and sighing in childlike pleasure.
‘Evie, look at this one.’ ‘How cute is that?’ ‘What about that one?’ ‘Isn’t this the sweetest?’
I almost laughed out loud. She’d had terrible taste.
The tackier the better when it came to …
well just about everything. She would have loved it in here, and I held it together until I came to stand in front of one of Santa and Mrs Claus kissing with the words, ‘I love you to the South Pole and back’, when my eyes blurred.
To the moon and back and back again, Mum had always said to me.
I blinked hard, trying to remind myself that she’d be happy for me.
That I should be enjoying myself for her.
I turned away. Mum wouldn’t have left this place without at least a dozen ornaments, but I couldn’t bring myself to choose one.
There was no point. I wasn’t suddenly going to start getting a tree each year.
‘How are we doing?’ asked Noah. ‘I’m getting hungry. Do you fancy a coffee? There’s a great coffee bar down the street and they do amazing donuts.’ His eyes shone with sudden enthusiasm.
‘Have I just found your kryptonite?’ I asked.
His boyish shrug was endearing. ‘What can I say? I love donuts, and this place does really great snowman donuts.’
‘You’ve been shopping,’ I said noticing his bulging carrier bag.
‘Just picked up a few gifts,’ he said. ‘Come on, I’m starving.’
When we stepped out of the store, the sky was filled with swirling snowflakes.
‘It’s snowing!’ I squealed and, laughing, held out my hand to catch a flake, tipping my face up to feel the cold kisses of snow. I stood for a minute, closing my eyes to feel it flutter against my eyelashes like the gentle touch of an angel. At least that’s what my mum believed it felt like.
When I opened my eyes, Noah, with snow settling on his eyebrows, was watching me, a tender smile curving his lips.
His expression hit me straight between the ribs and I caught my breath.
Running scared, I brushed the flakes from my cheeks, even though I wanted to smooth them away from his brow and touch his face. ‘Come on, you promised to feed me.’
The donut shop was everything he promised and more. Donut heaven. And the snowman ones were to die for, each covered in thick white frosting with a little carrot nose, chocolate-button eyes and a red M&M as a mouth. And of course, they oozed with jam.
‘Do you know what? I’m going to take one of these for Danny, the doorman. He can have it with his coffee when he’s warming up on his break.’
‘That’s a real nice idea.’
‘In fact, they’re doing boxes of four. I can get one for Carol and the other lady on the desk, and for Angel – and one for Alicia – although she might not thank me, she’s so slim. Oh, and then there’s Cora, her assistant.’
In the end I bought two boxes.
‘You’re going to have to carry them around all day,’ said Noah being very sensible, eyeing the paper bag I was handed.
‘Oh, well,’ I said, having not considered that. Hopefully they wouldn’t get too battered.
From there we walked to Times Square, the snow swirling around us but not really settling.
Like us, lots of people were looking up and children were excitedly trying to catch flakes with their wool mittens.
People milled around us, taking pictures and stopping to gawp at the sights.
Brightly coloured billboards promoting all the popular shows, like Wicked, The Lion King, Frozen, Stranger Things and Chicago festooned every building, while digital screens flickered with adverts for internationally familiar brands like Coca-Cola, Nike and Sony.
It was both familiar and alien at the same time.
Many of the images were commonplace but seeing them altogether was an assault on the senses, heightening my feeling of being out of place.
Noah was an excellent guide, explaining that although long gone, The New York Times offices had been based here in the early 1900s, and that was when it became a tradition to gather there on New Year’s Eve. Now, of course, it was famous for the huge predominance of theatres in the area.