Chapter 15
THE NEXT WEEK GOES BY in a delicious, sugary haze. There are Christmas goodies galore as I run around town with Alba and Rose to help get everything ready for their New Year’s Eve wedding.
I go through some of the boxes of things from the lake house—looking only for Christmas ornaments but finding troves of memories instead. Uncle Albie has kept it all in storage for me, and I’m grateful, but I’m not ready to go through everything that belonged to my mother just yet.
Alba and I tick nearly everything off on our Christmas Countdown.
We drag Rose to a tree lot and cut down the perfect tree, decorating it with tinsel and dozens of ornaments we made as kids, disturbing proof of our extreme lack of artistic talent.
We stare at one block of wood for ages, trying to figure out what the hell Alba had painted on the side, before finally deciding it was supposed to be a candy cane and hanging it up amongst the much prettier, store-bought ornaments.
We save the star for last, and I cheer when Alba plugs in the lights, as the tree glows to life.
Rose hides the bright green ornament shaped like a pickle somewhere in the house.
It’s supposed to be hidden on the tree itself, but my mom had to start finding more elaborate hiding spots as we got older, so we instructed Rose to hide it anywhere on the property.
It takes me a few days to finally track it down, but I find it nestled in the potted plants in the living room—much to Alba’s devastation.
Whoever finds the pickle ornament gets to add it to the tree, and Alba sulks when I get to be the one to do it. When we were young, nine times out of ten she was always the one who found it first. My smugness lasts for at least two full days.
We go sledding, but we’re only out on the hill for about twenty minutes before Alba and I are cursing about how sore we are already, lamenting how our old and weary bones can’t handle the thin material of the crazy carpets—which is basically the same as riding down the hill on a plastic sheet.
We have to spend the rest of that afternoon resting, so we use the time to tick off the second-to-last item off our list: an I Spy race.
One year, Mom gave us both the same Christmas I Spy book, where you have to find all the things in the photo listed in rhymes.
It’s a lot harder than it sounds, and Alba and I frantically skim the pages in our eagerness to finish first. She always gets stuck on one tin soldier, while I can never find the seventh star.
And in the midst of it all, I text Alistair.
It’s easy to talk to him, and the growing tension between us hums like the strings of a guitar, even through messages. He’s been working, and I haven’t seen him since the outdoor rink, although we’ve texted every day.
But I’ll get to see him tonight.
Alba told me this is the second year in a row she and Rose have hosted a community party at the main lodge of the bed and breakfast on December twenty-third.
They’re also using it as an unofficial rehearsal dinner, not wanting to jam-pack people’s calendars during the week between Christmas and New Year’s.
I carefully pull the last batch of gingerbread cupcakes I’ve been baking out of the oven. I take a picture and send it to Alistair.
Florence: They just need icing now. It’s too bad you can’t smell this photo. Soooo good!
Alistair: They look delicious. However, I don’t think I’d like to be able to smell every picture that’s sent to me, thanks.
I laugh out loud and am starting to craft a reply when another text comes through.
Alistair: Tell me about the baking. How did you get into it?
I feel my mouth twist up in hesitation. I’m trying to talk about Mom more, hoping it will help ease the pain a little bit. But the arrows still find their mark deep in my heart every time she comes up in conversation, or even in my own memories.
Florence: My mother was, no word of a lie, the best baker I’ve ever known.
I swear it was some kind of magic she was able to infuse into her cooking or something, because I could never recreate recipes and have them taste as good.
It aggravated me and, since we’re new friends and you don’t know this about me yet, I am very competitive.
So I made her show me again and again. Then when my confidence grew, I started experimenting, trying out new recipes or making up my own.
I almost set the house on fire a few times with my failed attempts.
And the pub, on one occasion. But she never made me feel like I couldn’t do it full-time, so I guess I believed I could.
I think a lot of people were surprised when I started baking, it seemed almost tame for me, I guess.
But I get the same sort of high from trying to get a recipe to taste exactly the way I imagine it tasting in my head. It’s its own kind of adrenaline rush.
He writes back immediately.
Alistair: You? Competitive??? I’m shocked. It’s just a coincidence I’ve been calling you Miss Anne Shirley in my head all week—fighting tooth and nail to outdo poor Gilbert Blythe. And all this time he’s only been trying to be her friend! Remind you of anyone? ;)
While his nicknames for me aren’t new, I’ve learned this week that he has a rolodex of pop-culture references at the ready.
He loves to read, has seen about a million movies, and often teases me about his comparisons that go over my head.
But this one makes my heart sing. I love Anne of Green Gables and always felt a connection to Anne as a kid, probably because of her red hair.
My phone buzzes again.
Alistair:
But that’s lovely, Florence. You should count yourself lucky to have so many people in your corner. And I like that there’s a safe way for you to feed the thrill-seeking beast—well, not including the fires I suppose.
Something about this doesn’t sit right, the nearly wistful tone of having people in my corner.
It makes me wonder if he doesn’t have that.
I feel a wave of gratitude for Alba, Rose, Uncle Albie and Violet, even though I haven’t seen her in ages.
I type out a question I’ve been wanting to ask about his brother.
Florence: I am very lucky in that department, you’re right. But you say it a bit like you don’t feel the same way. Are you and Finn not super close?
He doesn’t reply right away, so I force myself to put my phone down and get to work preparing the vanilla bourbon icing. I let myself check my phone again before I start icing each cupcake: no new messages.
I ice all forty cupcakes by hand. I clean up all the dishes, trying not to strain at every little sound with the hope it’s the buzz of my phone. When I can’t take it anymore, I peek at my screen. There’s one new message, and it’s long.
Alistair: We are. But it’s complicated, I suppose.
He took it a lot harder when our dad left, I think because I shielded so much of it from him for so long.
And that anger came out eventually. He went through a really dark couple of years.
I think he resents me a bit for moving to Canada.
He’s actually never been to visit, although I’m certain he’d fit right in here.
We either meet up elsewhere, like our hiking trip through Snowdonia last year, or I see him when I’m back in Scotland.
I would do anything for Finn and he knows that, which is all that really matters to me.
Luckily, I’ve made a lot of good mates since moving here.
There are a few guys on the force that I spend a fair amount of time with outside of work.
They understand the strain and the frustrations of the job, and I know they’d have my back if I needed it.
Plus, everyone in Christmas Island has taken a particular liking to me, I think because I offered to help out with so many things when I first got here.
I mull all of this over for a few minutes.
I think back to that first night I saw him at the pub, drinking a beer with a man I didn’t recognize.
Was that one of his coworkers? I’m glad he has friends he can talk to about his job though.
But I’m not quite ready to delve into that particular subject tonight.
I notice he doesn’t say that Finn would have his back too, and wonder why he might resent Alistair for moving. Maybe because he felt left behind?
I think about how much Alistair does for other people.
I remember something he said to me at the beach the day of the polar bear dip—that he got into policing because he liked making people feel safe.
My chest feels like it’s been run over by a cement truck.
It’s like all these pieces of who he is are finally slotting together, and I wonder how Uncle Albie saw who he was so early on.
I feel a surge of protectiveness for Alistair and I’m selective with what I say in my response.
Florence: I get it, I really do. The family stuff can be a lot sometimes.
I don’t have any siblings, but Alba and I have had our fair share of complicated phases over the years.
But hey, you’ve got another friend in Christmas Island who’s in your corner now, too—even if she does have a lead foot.
The Cape Bretoners are really lucky, Alistair, that you ended up here to keep us safe.
Us? Since when did I think about myself as fully us with the Cape Bretoners again?
Alistair: Thank you, Florence. I’ll see you tonight?
I think there’s something almost hopeful there, but maybe I’m imagining it. I send him another picture of the finished cupcakes and three words: See you tonight.