Chapter 22
MARY
It was still snowing when Bob started whimpering at six-thirty on Sunday.
Thankfully, after a fretful day he’d only woken once in the night, and this time he settled enough to allow us another couple of hours cuddling in bed before a need for a bathroom trip and a nappy change forced us up.
Now fully light, the view out of every window was pure, sparkling white, as far as I could see.
I messaged Beckett to say there was no way a car would make it out here, and he replied confirming that he was also snowed in.
I settled upon a day of snipping, sewing and strategically adding sequins, with lots of tea and toast, soup and snacks.
After my weeks of Christmas-merriment avoidance, I now felt ready for some gentle Christmas songs in the background while I worked.
I did skip every track that reminded me of previous years, which meant expanding my repertoire to some very weird and not-so-wonderful festive tunes.
Coffee morning on Monday was also called off, so I spent a second day in solitude. This time, however, having plans that were cancelled, alongside messages asking if I was okay, still had electricity and groceries and plenty of nappies, it felt very different.
The exhaustion felt different these days, too, I realised after waking up from a late-morning nap.
For months, I’d been weighed down by a bone-deep listlessness.
Once the raw anger and loss had eased, it had been replaced with a numb apathy that would have frightened me, had I the energy to be bothered.
Now, while my body was so tired some days it felt like lugging around a bag of wet sand, it was a product of sleep deprivation, as well as, I assumed, recovery from pregnancy.
For the first time since spring, I wanted to do things.
I had purpose, and motivation, to force my jellied muscles up and about.
I’d had days during the summer when I’d wondered if I’d ever feel joy, or hope, or anything much at all, ever again.
Now, I reflected while stitching toadstools onto green felt knickerbockers, my emotions ending their hibernation meant that I had moments when I felt the pain of everything I’d lost so keenly it took my breath away.
Yet I accepted it, because I now knew this was the only way to also experience the contentment of a cosy afternoon watching a blackbird hopping through the drifts in my garden, a needle and thread in my hand, my heart-stoppingly beautiful son cooing in his bouncy chair beside me.
Allowing my brain to process another chunk of the rage and resentment also made room for the glimmer of anticipation at how perfect the angel wings I’d constructed out of layer upon layer of glittery netting would look under the spotlights.
It was hard, when the hurt reared up out of nowhere and impaled me through the chest (it wasn’t out of nowhere, it was the first three notes to ‘All I Want for Christmas Is You’ before I had time to grab my phone and click skip).
Yet it was bearable, because I could send a quick message to my friend, with a photo of the almost finished Shrek Santa waistcoat, or the massive piece of cheesecake I was about to eat, or Bob’s smile when I tickled his tummy.
Monday lunchtime, when I had suddenly begun to cry, thinking about Shay’s family, and wondering whether they’d have the Christmas Eve party without me, Sofia sent a photo of the snowmen her kids had made, ranging from a six-inch-high blob with one stick poking out of its head to a near-perfect replica of Jon Bon Jovi.
I was learning about being physically alone – devoid of adult company, at least – and yet not lonely.
I was starting to realise I would be okay.
Later that afternoon, before darkness fell, I bundled Bob into the papoose and went to investigate outside.
The sun had made steady work on the snow, the patches on the lane now interspersed with puddles.
I sent yet another photo to Beckett, with a big thumbs up, and spent the evening preparing for a day with Gramps tomorrow.
* * *
Beckett arrived at ten on Tuesday morning. He insisted upon shovelling the remaining traces of snow off my drive, clearing a neat track from my garden to the footpath leading to Hatherstone, before we headed over to his house.
‘I am capable of handling a shovel,’ I said, bringing him a coffee.
‘As I’m capable of brewing coffee and sitting with Gramps.
I thought you knew how friendship worked.
Besides,’ he grunted, heaving one last mound to the side before resting the shovel against the garden fence and accepting the drink, ‘I’m a good foot taller than you.
It’s a matter of biology that I’ll get it done faster, and more easily. ’
He didn’t need to add that he was also stronger.
Having warmed up in the December sunshine, he’d taken off his coat and jumper, working in a torso-hugging top with the sleeves pushed up.
I had no idea how Beckett maintained muscles like that, considering he had no time for a proper walk, let alone to go to the gym.
Maybe he did workouts in his bedroom, or using a DVD, like Shay’s mum bopping along to Davina McCall.
‘Are things any better with Gramps?’ I asked, taking a sip of my own coffee. I’d felt reassured enough by Marvin’s demeanour to leave him in the living room with Bob, but there was a lingering frostiness between the grandfather and grandson that the sun would do nothing to dissipate.
‘He’s acting the same as normal.’
‘And by normal, you mean grumpy and infuriating?’
Beckett nodded. ‘Also, still worrying. He was up at four, making feeble attempts to sweep the last bits of snow off the patio with a dustpan and brush.’
‘I’m glad I can give you a break today. Even if it is so you can work.’
Beckett smiled. ‘I am going to do some work. Otherwise we’ll be cancelling Christmas. But I’m also taking an hour to myself.’
‘Doing what?’
His smile grew, lighting up his whole face. ‘I’m taking Moses rowing.’
I felt so proud, I could have kissed him.
* * *
It took three ‘I really need to get going’s and me eventually leaving Beckett in his kitchen where we’d been chatting after lunch, shutting myself with Gramps in the living room, before he finally headed out in the taxi.
I’d never had a friend who I could chat with seemingly endlessly and effortlessly.
For a long time after Shay and Kieran decided I was one of them, they had taken the lead, the quick-fire words crowding in on top of each other, like popcorn in a pan.
The kind of conversation that only kids who’d grown up together could have, when they already knew all the references and the subplots, the characters and locations.
I often found it impossible to chip in until they asked me, or coincidentally both happened to pause to draw breath or take a synchronised swig of vanilla Coke.
As the years went by, I never quite lost that sense of being allowed to eavesdrop in their conversation, and even when with only one of them, it had been easier to stick to my role as the ‘quiet one’.
That was part of why I’d found Leo so impossible to resist. Our ‘getting to know you’ phase had been impassioned, fervent, as if we were being swept along in a fast-moving river, always slightly out of control, heads scrambling to catch up with the intensity of the emotions. We were consumed by each other.
With Beckett, it was more like a hike through the forest, where we varied the pace yet consistently came across something interesting, unexpected or beautiful where we needed to stop and take our time investigating, or merely allow our minds to boggle a little.
Our backgrounds were different in so many practical ways.
However, they had both led us to far more ‘same here!’ moments than I’d have thought possible.
Perhaps it helped that all the awkwardness had been got out of the way in that sweaty, groany, bloody first meeting, or that I’d left my old identity behind in Sheffield.
Maybe it was inevitable after my months of isolation that the words would flow, but something about Beckett made it easy to open up to him.
I couldn’t think of a better way to feel safe and seen than being genuinely interested in the details of each other’s lives.
I ruminated on all this as I completed my secret task of the day.
While Gramps explained sudoku to Bob, I hung up the decorations I’d cobbled together in between sewing sessions over the past two days.
Beckett had told me Gramps waited until the twenty-first before putting up a tree, but he’d not said anything about a string of bunting, featuring random offcuts of fabric.
He’d also not objected to the bin-bag of greenery I’d sneaked in Beckett’s boot, pretending it was full of costumes awaiting construction.
I hung swathes of holly, pine branches and ivy across the mantel, around the ceiling and in artistic arrangements on the other recently cleared surfaces, adding sprigs of red berries from a bush in the garden, and the odd ribbon or candle.
I wound more ivy up the stairs, and hung a giant paper star from the light fixture in the kitchen.
I then turned off the main lights, lit the candles, breathed in the scrumptious foresty smells and fed Bob while Gramps snoozed. By the time Beckett arrived home, I’d completed one seam of Original Santa’s tunic.
‘This is incredible.’ Beckett took three slow steps into the living room. ‘You’re an artistic genius. I’m now utterly embarrassed by the hash job I made of your cottage.’
‘Pah. I love what you did to my cottage. Especially once I’d rearranged a few things after you’d left.’
‘Before you stepped foot through our front door, we were living in a dingy mess. I’d never even considered that how a place looked can change the whole way it feels.’
‘And you’re supposed to be the smart one.’