Chapter Twenty-Nine
Christopher
Christopher doesn’t get out of bed for two days.
At the end of the second day, Shaz breaks into the flat and finds him and the cat curled up in their misery pit. She joins them, holding him while he cries through this terrible heartbreak.
He knew Nash would leave. He knew they could only be temporary.
The trouble was that he had dared to imagine that it could be a fairy tale ending, where somehow they’d find a way to exist together. Either way, he deserved a proper goodbye, an ending that resolved some of their feelings and gave him somewhere to put all this hurt.
On the bedside table, he finds one of Nash’s cards, the very same kind he gave to Myffy. His number. Nash might see it as an olive branch, but it’s one that Christopher is not ready to take. He throws it into the rubbish.
On the third day, he finally notices the snow has gone. Completely, utterly gone. The whole world has gone back to normal while he’s been crying in the dark. He takes Nash’s card out of the bin and goes back to bed with the cat.
On the fourth day, he finds Tegan downstairs in the bakery and he does start to wonder whether, between Tegan and Shaz, there is some kind of familial ability to break into places they’re not supposed to be.
‘Life goes on,’ she announces with the kind of deep solemnity only teenagers can manage. Apparently, things with her and Danny from the shop had not been going well either.
But she was right. It was time to get back to work, and even if he didn’t feel able to open to the public just yet, he decided instead to throw himself into work as a distraction.
He could get his orders to the suppliers, plan for the next couple of months, and, finally, teach Tegan how to bake some things.
She wanted to know this stuff, and if he was going to be a good boss, and a good member of this community, growing her skills and talent had to be part of that, right?
He had to keep giving back; things couldn’t just go back to the way they were before the snow. Before Nash.
* * *
The fifth day, New Year’s Eve, starts with Shaz informing him that he is taking the afternoon off.
‘I’m busy,’ he mumbles, not looking up from the open spreadsheet on his laptop.
He’d never normally work at the bakery counter like this but Tegan wanted another afternoon practising her breadmaking with his supervision, so he sits perched on a counter stool, hunched over his computer, trying to avoid the occasional plume of flour or splodge of dough.
‘It’s a national holiday, Christopher.’ At this point, he assumes Shaz must have cut herself a key, by the ease with which she keeps appearing without anyone having to let her in.
‘Not for lots of businesses. Pubs do a roaring trade, I hear.’
‘Yes, and you’re a bakery. What are you going to do? Offer buns at midnight? Hardly the same.’
‘You say that, but you’d be into it.’
‘I would. But also look at Teegs, she’s desperate for some time off.’
He raises his head finally. ‘Are you, Tegan?’
She has finished kneading the loaves, which sit in their baskets proving on the counter, but she hesitates before answering. ‘No. I mean, yes. I mean! This has been really nice today and thank you for teaching me all the new things, but I’d like to go to the . . . thing later.’
Shaz shoots her a wide-eyed look, and groans exasperatedly. ‘Tegan!’
‘Thing?’ Christopher asks. ‘What thing?’
‘Well, he was going to find out anyway. That’s why you’re here to bully him into closing the shop up, isn’t it?’ Tegan huffs, arms folded.
‘I do not bully,’ she hisses.
Christopher is not entirely sure that’s true.
‘It’s just a light cajoling.’ She fixes him with a soft look that he’d almost call maternal if she wouldn’t absolutely hate that.
‘Fine. I’ll stop working so you can tell me whatever this thing is.’ He shuts the laptop and looks up to find Tegan already pulling her coat on.
‘See you later!’ she yells.
‘Bye then,’ Christopher says to the back of Tegan’s head as she flies out of the door. ‘So,’ he turns to Shaz. ‘The Thing? Hopefully not the film, it’s not really snowy enough for that to be thematic anymore.’
‘You’re rambling.’
‘Yeah, because you’re being all mysterious and unnerving.’
She sits down next to him. ‘The thing tonight is a party Tammy has organised as a thank you to everyone who helped out.’
‘Oh. That’s so nice. Do you need some help?’
‘Please, no. We wanted to surprise you as you’d done such a big job with Christmas Day and knew you’d try to get involved.’
‘Oh. All right then. So why do I need the afternoon off if it’s tonight?’
‘Because I arranged an extra surprise. For you, specifically.’
‘A surprise? Do I like surprises?’
‘I think you’ll like this one.’
There’s a strange grumbling sound from the café. Did the cat somehow get downstairs? They seem happy enough upstairs and obviously he can’t have the cat wandering round the bakery, but perhaps he didn’t lock them in?
Except the sound seems bigger than the cat could make. There’s a knocking of crockery and a hiss and . . . he’s pretty sure he heard someone say fuck.
‘Guys, you missed the cue to jump out,’ Shaz shouts.
‘Oh. Shit!’ Up jumps Haf, his Haf, wearing the world’s puffiest winter coat.
Her hair is enormous, but it’s really her.
She’s here in the bakery, and so is Kit, who she helps up, all the while muttering a series of foul curse words.
From the other side of the counter appear Ambrose and Laurel in a much more dignified fashion.
There’s something so disjointed about it all that he can’t quite believe it’s really happening.
‘Surprise!’ cries Shaz.
He can’t believe it. They’re here?! His friend-family and also actual family are here.
Christopher rushes through the bakery to the counter and soon he’s wrapped in all their arms. ‘You came? You came all the way here?’
‘Shaz told us to,’ Haf says. ‘We’ve been scheming.’
‘And we wanted to,’ adds Kit.
‘Because we were worried about you,’ says Ambrose, which is so out of character for them that everyone in the hug steps back to look at them askance. ‘We were!’
‘Yes, darling, but the way this works usually is that you say something rather rude and then I follow it up with something wholesome,’ Laurel explains, threading her arm through their elbow crook.
They both look so elegant, dressed in contrasting tailored coats – Laurel in an ecru woollen wrap coat, Ambrose in a belted bright red coat with oversized lapels and a matching belt. God, he’d missed them all.
Ambrose sniffs. ‘I was trying something new.’
‘Horrifying,’ Christopher says, and they all burst into giggles.
‘But yeah, Shaz is the mastermind,’ Haf says.
‘Haf’s parents made it onto their cruise so we’re staying at theirs instead of squeezing in upstairs with you,’ Kit explains.
‘Unless you want us to.’ Haf waggles her eyebrows. ‘We can all get snuggly.’
‘I think he’s had enough only-one-bed this year,’ says Ambrose, and everyone but Christopher shushes, hushes and even hisses at them. ‘What?’
‘Ixnay on the Ash-Nay,’ growls Haf.
‘What??’ Ambrose repeats, looking around at the others. ‘So what, we’re going to just avoid talking about it?’
‘Yes because his feelings are hurt and we’re trying to be sensitive about it,’ she urges.
Kit groans, her face in her hands. ‘I think that ship has sailed.’
His heart aches with how much he loves his friends. ‘Guys, it’s fine. We can talk about it.’ He’s not ready to say his name out loud just yet.
Shaz takes his arm in hers. ‘Are you sure? I only just got you out of your sadness pit.’
‘I prefer misery pit. But yes. It happened. He left. It sucks and I’m sad and no I haven’t heard anything from him and, yes, I . . . technically have his number but I’m not going to be the first one to reach out either. That’s pretty much it. Now, let’s have a nice time together, shall we?’
There’s a pause as the others seem to digest this list of non-news, and he gets it.
It is a weird end-of-a-situation to walk into while trying to be happy and excited and united.
And he knows that’s why they’ve come – they want to cheer him up.
But there’s nothing they can do except be here, which they are.
‘Can we see the cat?’ blurts Haf.
‘Have you been waiting to ask that this whole time?’
‘God yes. We just, you know, had to do all the polite, normal-people bits first.’
They all file upstairs and find the cat curled up on the bed. On Nash’s side. Since he left, the cat has taken up residence there. Christopher wonders if the cat feels the lack of him too.
‘Oh, you’re so cute,’ babbles Haf, tickling the cat under the chin. ‘Aren’t you the sweetest little creature?’
‘What’s their name?’ Kit asks.
‘Karma/Felix/Paddington.’
‘Bit of a mouthful isn’t it, darling?’ Laurel sniffs.
Shaz fills the kettle and flicks it on. ‘Did you hear about his escapades with the puppies? He’s going to be a daddy twice over in two months’ time.’
‘Christ, please do not call me Daddy. Why do I always have to end up with a horrible nickname?’
Naturally, this leads to everyone calling him Daddy at every opportunity for the next few hours.
They all squeeze into the living room, balancing cups of tea and gingerbread reindeer on armrests and tables and laps, as the cat weaves itself around them all.
It feels so easy being together that time slips away, moving a little too fast if anything.
The flat doesn’t feel quite so empty with all the people he loves packed in tightly.
Well. Almost all of them.
‘Right, I’m going to go get my glad rags on. See youse all in a bit?’ says Shaz, and before she can get away from him, Christopher wraps her up in a huge hug.
‘Thank you, for everything,’ he whispers.