Chapter Twenty
Twenty
Harriet pushed open the doors to the theater on Tuesday evening in a state of obliviousness. She had arrived on autopilot, barely noticing how the gray woolen clouds obscured the stars, or the carol singers around the giant Christmas tree handing out flyers advertising the Winter Theater’s one-night-only production of A Christmas Carol .
Her mind was so consumed with work and all the jobs she hadn’t finished today that when Ken boomed out her name, the surprise of it almost caused her knees to buckle.
“Flippin’ ’eck, lass! Didn’t you see me waving at you?”
She blinked a couple of times and reacquainted herself with her surroundings.
“Sorry, Ken, got a lot on my mind.” She rubbed her hand across her forehead as though she could wipe away her distraction.
“You can’t go on like this much longer. Something’s got to give,” he said kindly.
She laughed lightly. “My sanity, probably.”
He regarded her, frowning, and then said, “Come on, I’ve been saving the inaugural trip for you.” He ushered her toward the lift.
“It’s working!” she exclaimed.
“We’re about to find out.” Ken grinned.
He pressed the call button, and the ornate doors slid open to reveal an exquisitely Art Deco interior. Suddenly she was wide awake.
“Oh my god, Ken, I think it’s the most beautiful lift I’ve ever been in!”
He stroked his chin; one eye twitched in a half wink, which was as close to crowing as this hunk of Yorkshireman was likely to get.
“I reckon people with mobility issues ought to experience the same pizzazz as the ones who take the grand staircase.”
“They certainly will.” Her first thoughts were for Mallory and the Lonely Farts, and then she recalled Evaline painstakingly tackling each stair and was shocked by the surge of affection she felt for the old battle-ax.
“We’re putting in another one in the foyer next door that’ll reach the cocktail lounges and restaurant,” said Ken. “And one backstage—that one’ll be a no-frills affair, but it’ll get the job done.”
“Wonderful. It’ll certainly cut down Mallory’s mileage. I can’t believe the changes to this place in such a short space of time. Your teams are miracle workers.”
“Hard workers, at any rate,” said Ken. “I reckon another week or so and we’ll be close enough to done that we can finish the rest during slightly more respectable hours.”
“I bet they’ll be pleased about that.”
“Their other halves will be, that’s for sure.”
The lift doors opened, and she waved back at Ken as she stepped out into the auditorium at the bottom of the main stairs.
Yesterday’s dyspeptic atmosphere had been replaced by a can-do humor that would have made Santa’s elves proud. Several of Hesther’s group had settled into painting the backdrops with Leo. Farahnoush, who had worked in design in her former life, was in deep discussion with Billy and Harry about the sets. Down in the orchestra pit, Ava and Dhruv had already begun work on building Scrooge’s four-poster bed frame with wood castoffs from Ken. It was a recipe for bedlam but somehow both new groups seemed to fit right in, and the camaraderie levels were high. Harriet hoped their positivity might be enough to dilute the animosity brewing between the famous five and certain members of the Great Foss Players.
“Heartwarming, isn’t it?” said Josef when he saw her watching. “Everyone pitching in for a cause greater than themselves.”
“It is. It makes me feel quite emotional.”
“I feel it too.” He placed his hand over his heart. “In here. I’m inclined to think our assemblage was no accident.”
“You think we’re dealing with kismet?”
Josef smiled in a way that made him look both wise and impish.
“Something like that. Ernest has left two of his famous fruited tea loaves in the coffee room for everyone to help themselves.”
“That’s very kind of him.”
“He’s a kind man.”
From above their heads came a crackling sound, and then “I’ll Be Home for Christmas” began to play through the speakers dotted about the auditorium. Josef clapped his hands delightedly.
“That’ll be Winston, he said he could get that old sound system up and running again, and bless my soul, he’s gone and done it.”
Harriet pushed away the pang of longing for Maisy induced by the music and asked, “Have you got plans for Christmas?”
“Absolutely none.” He grinned.
“Oh, I’m so sorry…”
Josef laughed and slapped his thigh. “Why are you sorry? I’m Jewish!”
“Oh!” Harriet laughed too, mostly with relief. “Well, that’s all right, then.”
From the balcony above, Winston called for Josef’s assistance and he hurried off, still chuckling, and Harriet made her way over to Billy. She’d seen her students at registration this morning but had been holed up in her office for the rest of the day.
“Billy, can I have a word?” she asked as he hurried past her with a list in his hand.
His expression was pained, and she could tell he really wanted to crack on.
“Farahnoush has got me on a scavenger hunt to find bits and pieces for the sets. I need to track down a desk and a random door for the Marley door-knocker scene…and a bowl for ‘gruel.’?” He shrugged at the last word.
“It won’t take long. Please.”
He gave a beleaguered sigh. “All right.”
She led the way down to their makeshift coffee room backstage, having already messaged Grace to meet her in there under the pretext of organizing a baking roster.
Odette and Grace had brought along homemade shortbread and cookies to Saturday’s auditions, and Hesther’s group had arrived yesterday bearing a variety of snacks; Zahra’s tray of jalebi, sticky with honey and cardamom, had gone down a storm with the famous five. And now there were Ernest’s fruited tea loaves too. Clearly baking was a great way for people to bond, and Harriet was keen to harness that momentum, but she was also aware that if only the same few people were baking with ingredients bought out of their own pockets, resentments could quickly build. Hence, a roster and a kitty.
Technically, though, this was an ambush, as became clear when Billy walked in behind Harriet and saw Grace polishing the mirror above the dressing table top. James sat on a chair with a copy of the Financial Times held in front of his face.
“Nope!” said Billy, and he immediately made to leave.
“Not so fast!” said Harriet, hooking his hood with her finger.
“What is this?” Grace demanded, dropping her cloth into the sink.
“An intervention,” said James, smoothly folding his newspaper as he stood and moved to block the door and any further escape attempts. There was something in the way James moved his body, at once both languid and purposeful, that made Harriet think she could happily spend a day simply observing him maneuver through the spaces he inhabited.
She was happy to see him here. They had concocted this little ruse via emails sent back and forth while they both navigated their day jobs. She’d been surprised by the uptick in her heart rate every time she got an email notification, the thrill of seeing his name pop up in the header and the smiles that came to her face. It had added some much-needed pep to an otherwise relentless day.
Grace blustered while Billy locked himself inside his protective metaphorical sarcophagus.
“You two got off on the wrong foot. I don’t know why, and I’m not interested in who said what when. But it needs to end now,” said Harriet. “We have to work together whether you like it or not, so say your pieces to each other and then put them to bed and start over. And just so you know, this is not optional. I am in charge of this project, and I will have to ask you to leave the production, Grace, if this situation can’t be remedied. Okay? Who wants to go first?”
Grace’s expression was like sucking on a lime. Billy’s remained impassive. After checking her nails several times, Grace snapped, “I’ll start, then, shall I? I don’t apologize for the things I said about your boots because you were traipsing mud across the stage.”
Harriet raised her eyes to the heavens. This wasn’t sounding much like an apology yet. Billy was looking ready to have his go.
“And I don’t understand why you youngsters think it’s okay to dress like you found your clothes at the bottom of a well, there’s no effort. It doesn’t instill any kind of self-respect or make others inclined to respect you, either.” She took a breath and raised her chin. “I realize I come across as brusque. I spend a lot of time alone and I get out of the habit of being personable; I will try to be more friendly. And I’m sorry for the things I said yesterday, I didn’t know your circumstances. It was thoughtless of me.” Grace smoothed her skirt and sat down, ankles crossed, staring intently at her hands clasped in her lap.
“Thank you, Grace.” Harriet turned to Billy, whose jaw was so set his teeth must surely be aching under the pressure. “Billy, is there anything you’d like to say to Grace? Now is your chance.”
Billy’s eyes were laser beams trained on the linoleum as though he wanted to melt through it.
“I don’t like being judged and I don’t like Sid being judged, either. People like you just decide whatever you want about people like me, and you don’t care if it’s true or not. Being old doesn’t automatically give you the right to be respected, it just means you’ve lived a long time, not that you’re a good person. I’m sorry that you’re lonely, but that’s not an excuse to give everyone else a hard time.”
Oh boy! At this point, Harriet wasn’t sure if this intervention was making things better or worse. James’s expression was one of trained professional blankness.
“You’re sorry that I’m lonely?” Grace’s voice was small. Her clasped hands had tightened, whitening the papery skin across her knuckles. “Do you understand what it is to be an aging woman? To be all alone in the world and be a woman that society has deemed past her prime?” She faced Billy, her expression a challenge. “Of course you don’t. How could you? I am invisible. I am the invisible woman. When I walk down the street, people look right through me as though I’m not even there. When I’m in the supermarket, nobody pays me the slightest bit of attention. Age has stolen my identity. I am powerless. I live with the knowledge that if I disappeared tomorrow no one would notice. I don’t want respect because I’m old, I want to be acknowledged as a member of the human race.”
Harriet’s heart grew heavy. It was hard to believe that someone as prim and upright as Grace could feel invisible. Silence choked up the small room.
“Billy?” Harriet touched his arm in encouragement. “Is there anything you would like to add?”
His brow furrowed even deeper than usual.
“Yeah, all right,” he muttered as he cleared his throat, daring a look at Grace. “Me and Sid have been through some stuff, but we have each other. I feel lonely sometimes, but I’m not actually alone, if that makes sense. But I do understand about being powerless. I’ve had no control over my life, still don’t really, not till I’m eighteen. Till we went to live with Tess and Arthur, I never knew where we’d be sent next or how long we’d get to stay there, or if it would be better or worse than the place we were at before; a lot of times it was worse. I’ve felt invisible for most of my life.”
Harriet swallowed hard to push down the lump in her throat. She turned to James and saw that he was struggling to keep his face neutral.
Grace looked up at Billy and nodded. “You and Sid don’t deserve to feel invisible,” she said.
“Yeah, well, nor do you,” he mumbled in reply.
Grace cleared her throat tentatively. “Perhaps we could begin again, you and I, with a little more understanding on both sides. I’ll try if you will.”
It seemed to Harriet that for the first time since she’d met her, Grace was actually acting her age.
“Sure,” Billy agreed. He turned to Harriet. “Can I go now?”
“Yes, of course.” She smiled at him. “Thank you for talking with us and for your honesty.”
“Didn’t really have much choice, did I?”
“No, I suppose not.”
He made to leave, and James stepped to one side to let him pass. In the doorway he looked back, glancing between the floor and Grace, teenage awkwardness leaching from his every pore.
“I’ll see you around, Grace, yeah?” In the absence of a smile—Billy didn’t dish out smiles often—he squinted his eyes at her in a kind of friendly way, and she nodded back in acknowledgment.
“Yes, I’ll see you around, Billy.” She gave him a diminutive smile, and then he was gone like a rabbit at a dog race.
Back in the auditorium, rehearsals were in full swing despite the hammering, sawing, and drilling and half of the stage being taken up with people on all fours painting backdrops. Gideon, cape flung back over his shoulders to reveal a blue velvet waistcoat with embroidered fish motif, was in his element as he readied the actors for a read-through of Act 1, Scene 2.
“Now then, Isabel, you will be farthest away from Ahmed on the stage because you are shivering beside your one measly lump of coal, warming your hands against a candle as you work.”
Isabel took her chair and placed it as far away from Ahmed as the painters on the floor would allow.
“Splendid!” His compliments were aggressive, like a sergeant major yelling out orders. “Let us have the narrators for this scene gathered in a loose semicircle between Scrooge and Roberta Cratchit as though you were a group of carol singers. Mallory, darling, could you arrange them, please, they look like they’re waiting for a bus. Yes, you too, Leo, if you could leave your canvas for a short while, that’s it, and Ricco be ready to enter stage left. Odette, you will begin. Annnnnnnd action!”
“Once upon a time—of all the good days in the year, on Christmas Eve…”
Harriet stood a little way up one of the side aisles, hidden in the shadows, surveying the action across the auditorium as she sipped a well-earned decaffeinated tea. James came to stand beside her.
“I think that went as well as could be expected,” he said.
“Let’s hope they each keep their end of the bargain.”
James nodded and then observed, “Gideon is a man of great passions.”
“He is indeed.” Harriet smiled into her mug.
“Would we describe him as eccentric, I wonder?”
At that moment Gideon took to the stage bellowing, “My dear people, you must let the theater take you over! Feel its passion! Give in to its siren song!” He threw off his cape and flung it at Mallory—who caught it with practiced ease—and broke into a spirited rendition of Eminem’s “Lose Yourself.” The incongruity of a sexagenarian man wearing plaid trousers while rapping in a perfect Queen’s English accent startled the entire theater into silence.
“Yes,” Harriet said, failing to stifle her giggles. “I believe we would.”
Harriet tried to cap rehearsals so that they finished no later than seven thirty each evening; any longer than that and people were simply too tired after a full day at school and work that tempers became likely to fray. It also gave her an outside chance of keeping on top of her day job.
Since she’d begun at the theater her evenings had followed a pattern: get home, peruse the fridge for a microwave meal, set up laptop on the sofa, TV on low for background noise, work and eat, hope Maisy might call, fall into bed exhausted and not be able to sleep. It wasn’t exciting, but there was comfort in its predictability.
On Wednesday evening, she’d just finished a very satisfactory microwave lasagna when her doorbell buzzed. It was James. Suddenly she was very awake. The thrills zipping up from her toes to her head made her light-headed; this was a lot for a Wednesday. She buzzed him in and quickly gargled some mouthwash and applied a swish of lip balm before he knocked.
She took a breath and opened the door—and realized she was still wearing her fluffy slipper socks with smiling sloth faces on the toes. James smiled sheepishly at her and then looked down at her feet.
“They look cozy,” he said.
She felt her cheeks redden. “I don’t like drafts on my ankles.”
“They work well with the apron.”
Oh, for god’s sake! She’d forgotten about the Wonder Woman apron.
“I didn’t want to get lasagna down my dress, tomato is a trial to get out. I’m a very practical woman.”
“You made lasagna?”
“The good people at Aldi made it. But I microwaved it.”
He smiled like a crocodile.
“Can I help you with something?” she asked.
“Actually, yes, you can. May I come in?”
She noticed for the first time the large paper bags at his feet. She opened the door wider and stepped aside for him to enter.
“These are for you,” he said, laying the bags down on the table in the hall.
She gave him a dubious side-eye.
“Take a look.” He gestured that she should open the bags. “And try not to look like I’ve asked you to dismantle a bomb.”
Cautiously she opened the bags. The first contained two wooden nutcracker dolls, one in a green uniform, the other in red. The second bag held a large snow globe on an ornate base. She pulled it out of the bag. Inside the globe was a perfect village scene surrounded by fir trees, with thatched cottages and a bridge over a frozen lake where a boy and a girl in bobble hats and scarves skated. Protruding from the base was a key, which Harriet turned, releasing a tinny musical-box version of “Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy.”
“Do you like them?” he asked, a hint of nerves in his voice.
“They’re beautiful!” Harriet whispered; her voice came out hoarse and she cleared her throat. She looked up at him. “But why?”
“I thought some decorations not associated with your Christmases with Maisy might ease you into enjoying the season for yourself. And if it’s not too presumptuous, I thought perhaps I could help you put your Christmas decorations up.” He smiled at her.
“That’s a lovely offer, but I’m not doing decorations this year.”
“I thought you’d say that, and I’d really like it if you would reconsider.”
“Why?”
“Because I get the feeling that you do a lot of things for other people, but you don’t pay yourself the same courtesy. Your daughter is lucky to have the kind of mum who spins the magic of Christmas up around her. I wonder if in her absence you might need a friend to help you spin some of that magic for yourself.”
She was trying very hard to keep herself from unraveling into a sad heap of discarded ribbons on the floor.
“That’s really thoughtful,” she managed.
“Think of me like festive methadone; I’m not Maisy but I’d like to try, in some small way, to fill the gap in your Christmas, if you’ll let me.”
She hiccupped out a strange sob-laugh and felt mortified that she was coming apart like this in front of him.
When he spoke again his voice was a gentle hum that unfastened her final knots. “It’s okay to be sad that you won’t be with your daughter this Christmas. But it’s okay to enjoy yourself too.”
A blizzard of emotions twisted and swirled inside her chest: an aching sadness at reaching the end of this chapter, and the cavernous uncertainty as she stood poised to turn to the next page. She had made Maisy her home, and now she was suffering from the worst homesickness of her life.
Her tears were sudden and profuse, and she didn’t protest when James folded her into his arms. He held her while she cried herself out; the steady rise and fall of his chest and the weight of his arms around her were a lighthouse leading her back to shore.
“I’m not usually a crier,” she sniffled into his nice smart coat.
“You’re lucky,” he spoke into her hair. “I cry all the time.”
“Do you?” she sniffed.
“I realize that must be hard to imagine beneath my cool exterior, but I am known for bawling my eyes out at the John Lewis Christmas adverts, and those videos of dads coming home from the army to surprise their kids for the holidays; man, they get me every time.”
She chuckled wetly into his chest and when she pulled back, in dire need of a tissue, he had one ready. She blew her nose too loudly to be attractive, but after the sloth socks and the Wonder Woman apron and the ugly crying all over his coat, she figured that ship had sailed. It came as a surprise, then, when she looked up at him and he swiped away the last of her tears with his thumbs, his hands cradling her face, before he pulled her back into his arms and kissed her so fervently that her toes went tingly.
Kissing James Knight was every bit as good as she remembered, and she would have been more than happy to let things progress to their natural conclusion, but after far too short a time, he pulled away and smiled at her.
“Where do you store your Christmas decorations?” he asked.
James helped her to fit together her very expensive, very tall fake Norwegian spruce, which—while beautiful—was a total ball-ache to assemble. She had dispensed with her apron and made them each a mug of hot chocolate with marshmallows and candy cane stirrers; if she was doing this, she was going all in.
“These look rather fancy—are they part of your festive embellishments?” James asked, picking up one of the orange-and-cinnamon candle boxes.
“Oh, no,” she said, setting their mugs down on coasters on the coffee table. “I bought them to make the place smell Christmassy, but now that Maisy won’t be here I’ll not bother. Just leave them boxed.”
He frowned but didn’t argue, replacing the box where he’d found it.
“Your decorations are very you,” said James as he helped her to tie an assortment of festive ornaments into the thick garland of faux evergreen foliage that they had laid over the mantelpiece. The two nutcrackers stood sentinel on either end; ivy and fir tree branches twisted around their shiny black boots. “I mean that as a compliment. They seem curated somehow…loved,” he said, turning a ceramic Father Christmas ornament in his fingers. “They suit your home. They suit you.”
He looked up at her and smiled and she felt like he really saw her. That didn’t happen very often.
“Thank you. They are loved. I suppose they’re kind of an anthology; my and Maisy’s Christmases are all wrapped up in the tissue paper with them.” She could stop there and it would be enough, but something about the way James listened made her want to keep talking. “I was afraid that if I got them out, all the happiness trapped in their fabric would become polluted with my melancholy. That probably sounds stupid to you.”
James’s expression was contemplative as he tied two glittering turtledoves onto a fir branch. When he’d knotted the golden thread, he stood back.
“It doesn’t sound stupid at all. Although I don’t think you need to worry in that regard. Your home and the life that you’ve built here with your daughter is full of warmth, I felt it the first time I was here. I feel it now. And I think your happy memories are so deeply embedded here that they won’t be destroyed by a bit of wistfulness.” He raised an eyebrow at her teasingly, and she gave him a playful shove. “But I have to ask you, what inspired you to purchase this?” He held up a hand-painted Beetlejuice bauble and she laughed.
“Each year my foster parents would buy me two tree baubles from places we’d been or ones that I liked in a shop, so that by the time I left home I would have a box full of my own decorations, each with their own memories. I went through a big Lydia Deetz phase.”
“You grew up in the care system?”
“I did.”
“That explains a lot.”
“Does it?”
She could see in his face that he wanted to ask more questions, but instead he said, “That was very thoughtful of your foster parents.” He picked up a Windsor Castle bauble and turned it in his fingers.
“It was. It was their way of helping me to build my own personal history because I didn’t know my parents. Every one of them holds a piece of me at a moment in time. And then I carried it on with Pete and Maisy, and Emma and the kids. I know it seems ridiculous to have so much of myself invested in Christmas baubles…”
“No, it’s not ridiculous. I get it.”
“What about your decorations?” she asked, picturing his sleek apartment.
“Mine?” He rubbed the back of his neck.
“Yeah. Do you have any favorites?”
“Truth be told, I’ve always paid someone to come in and decorate my apartment for me. I tell them the esthetic I want, and they create it.”
“Seriously?”
He looked embarrassed.
“I guess I don’t have as much history wrapped up in my Christmases as you do. I mean, I’ve enjoyed the holidays as much as anyone, but I don’t have those kinds of memories associated with them. I’ve attended a lot of Christmas parties, eaten at a lot of fine restaurants, I’ve had skiing Christmases and sunbathing Christmases…”
“That sounds pretty memorable, if you ask me. If you want me to feel sorry for you, you’re going to have to try harder.”
“And,” he said, cutting her off. “Though I appreciate that these are privileges not available to everyone, none of them are the kind of remembrances that I could summon up to keep me warm on a cold night. You have sentimental history; I have party anecdotes. It’s not the same. Up until recently I was more than content with my lot. And now I find myself in my late forties, wondering what I may have missed. My situation in life has been enviable, but perhaps the grass on my side is not as green as I once thought.”
She hadn’t thought about it like that. She had a vast stash of happy memories and though they smarted right now, she was glad she had them.
“If it’s any consolation, my ‘sentimental history’ is only highlighting how empty my nest is going to be and how lost I am with no one to fuss over.”
“But would you change it? Would you trade your family Christmases for ones that didn’t leave a mark?”
“No,” she said honestly. “I wouldn’t change a thing.”
“Well, there you are. Your Christmas decorations are not your enemy. Maybe this is the year you lean into some new traditions, just for you.”
She had imagined it would be painful to revisit all those cherished moments without the prospect of making new ones this year. In fact, the opposite was true; it was cathartic, and she felt comforted having them swirling around her. With so many wonderful memories with her daughter in the bank, perhaps she could afford to invest in some just for herself.
“Maybe you’re right,” she said. “What about you? It’s not too late for you to make Christmases that you’d care to remember.”
His answering smile was so sad that her heart squeezed. She had that feeling again that he was holding something back. What could be so big or so bad that he couldn’t find his way to confiding in her, even after she had laid herself bare to him?
“Maybe,” he said quietly. “I hope so.”
James stayed until every surface glittered, and when at last he flicked the switch, the tree lit up with hundreds of golden fairy lights wound round and round it, making the baubles of her life twinkle on the laden branches.
“What’s the verdict?” he asked, coming to stand beside her.
“It’s beautiful.”
It was.
“No regrets?” he asked cautiously.
“None. Thank you for making me do it, I wouldn’t have done it myself.”
“I figured as much.”
“I feel like I owe you a dinner or something. You’ve brought me gifts.” She gestured to the nutcrackers. She’d positioned the musical snow globe on the hall table, so that she could wind it up each time she came in out of the cold. “And you’ve helped decorate my home and forced me out of my slump, and you have very graciously listened while I rambled on about my daughter for the last two hours.”
He chuckled, and she liked the low vibration of it.
“Microwave lasagna for two?” he suggested.
“Contrary to the contents of my fridge, I can actually cook.”
He smiled. “You don’t owe me anything. I’ve had a lovely evening.”
And just like that the mood changed. The air was suddenly charged with an end-of-date energy, only this hadn’t been a date and James was already standing in her sitting room. What were the rules here? Were they casual smoochers? Should she kiss him on his way out? Shake hands? What? She settled for complete avoidance by trying to delay his departure.
“Would you like a decaf tea for the road?”
James looked at his watch. “I’d better not, it’s late.”
He made his way out to the hall and unhooked his coat from the coat stand and she followed.
“I guess I’ll see you tomorrow night at the theater,” she said, for want of anything to fill the quiet tension in the air.
“You will indeed.”
James opened the front door and stepped out onto the welcome mat in the communal hall. “Well,” he said.
“Hmm,” she replied. Her heart was hammering in her chest.
James opened his mouth as though he was going to say something and then changed his mind.
“Thank you again.” Harriet smiled.
“Don’t mention it.”
If this went on too much longer, she was going to have full-on palpitations. Ten more seconds passed. Did he want to kiss her? If she leaned in, would he reject her?
“I want to kiss you.” James kept his voice low, a deep frown upon his brow. “But I don’t want to complicate things.”
Don’t worry about all that, just kiss me already!
“I shouldn’t have kissed you earlier…”
Oh!
“Oh.”
“I mean, I wanted to, but I shouldn’t have let myself get swept up in the moment. You just looked so sad and I…”
Embarrassment dropped over her like a bucket of ice water.
“Are you saying that you kissed me because you felt sorry for me?” Her voice was rising. “Was that a sympathy snog?”
She thought she might turn inside out with the force of her humiliation.
“No,” he replied firmly. “It’s like I said before, I’m trying to do better, and part of that is not acting on my every impulse. You were vulnerable, and I kissed you—”
“I kissed you back, James, I’m not some breakable damsel—”
“That isn’t the point.”
“Then what is?” She was exasperated now.
“My life is complicated at the moment, and I don’t know how much of myself I can give over to a relationship.”
“I’m not asking you for a relationship. If you recall, I was not the one who got their knickers in a twist after we spent the night together. I was perfectly happy with a one-night stand, thank you very much, but you felt like you had some sort of civic responsibility to my vagina.”
“Don’t be ridiculous.”
“Don’t you be ridiculous.”
“You are infuriating.”
“And you are confounding.”
“Are you still sad?”
“No. Now I’m livid. Want to have sex?”
“Abso-fucking-lutely.”
They collided in an explosion of hungry kisses. Harriet pulled James back in through the front door, and he kicked it shut. Fast hands pulled and pawed at clothes, tearing them off as though they were on fire.
“Jesus! How many cardigans are you wearing?” he mumbled, tugging at layer after knitted layer.
“I’m not sure Jesus is wearing any,” she gasped as he kissed her throat. “But I’ve got three on.”
“Smarty pants,” he breathed, nipping at her shoulder.
She scooted the snow globe to one side as James lifted her onto the table and she wrapped her legs around his waist, their breaths coming hard, bodies pressing and arching, their need to be joined a vital emergency.
They never made it as far as the bedroom. But that night she slept better than she had in a long time.