24. Emma
EMMA
After arranging my laptop on a stack of books to achieve a somewhat flattering angle, I settled into the sofa and clicked Join.
Seeing Mum and Dad pop up together on the screen always made me happy. Just two faces a little too close to the camera, with the kitchen light warm behind them. Dad had his reading glasses halfway down his nose and a mug that said KEEP CALM, READ ON. Mum turned back to the cooker.
“There she is!” Dad boomed. “Our Canadian.”
“Hello, love,” Mum added. “Wave, darling. I’m stirring.”
I waved back. “Hello. What are you having for dinner?”
“Vegetable pie,” she said. “And green beans with lemon and butter, just the way you like them.”
“Very subtle,” I said, smiling.
I picked up the laptop and turned it towards the ceiling. “Look, Mum.” I showed her the lamp, with its golden seams glowing softly in the afternoon light, exactly where I had wrestled it into place with Max’s help.
Mum gasped, putting one hand on her chest. “Oh, Emma, it looks so beautiful! I told you it would look good in the room.”
“But it wasn’t easy hanging that enormous lamp, Mum. The coffee table will never forgive me.”
She laughed. Then Dad leaned in, his eyes bright. “Right. I need to tell you something before your mother ambushes you. I did my homework.”
“On what?” I asked, amused.
“Hockey,” he said, delighted. “Proper homework. I’ve been reading up so I can support this new direction of yours. Don’t judge me; I went down a rabbit hole.”
“I would never judge a rabbit hole,” I said. “Tell me.”
Dad leaned in with a familiar twinkle in his eye, ready to share one of his trivia gems. “Did you know that the first organised indoor ice hockey game was in Montreal in 1875? A chap called James Creighton set it up. They had nine players on each side and a wooden puck so it wouldn’t fly into the crowd and break someone’s glasses. ”
I laughed. “Wooden pucks sound like weapons. How did anyone have any teeth left?”
“They didn’t,” Dad said, perfectly straight.
“Which brings me to Did You Know number two: goalies didn’t wear masks until the fifties.
A man called Jacques Plante started it because he got smacked in the face.
Wore one, took it off, got smacked again, put it back on, refused to play without it.
Sensible man. The pictures are amazing: he looks like he’s about to rob a bank. ”
“Okay, I’m not writing a true crime,” I said, grinning. “But I like the details.”
Mum turned away from the cooker to show me the pie before sliding it in the oven. “It’s all very interesting,” she said, “but we know what I’m going to ask.”
“Yes, we do,” Dad said.
I pointed at the screen. “If you ambush me, I’m hanging up.”
“You most certainly are not,” Mum said, as she ladled gravy with terrifying ease. “Are there any changes in your love life yet?”
“Mum,” I said, equal parts warning and exasperation.
“What?” She shrugged. “You mentioned a boy at Christmas.”
“A man,” Dad corrected, as if that would help. “Max, wasn’t it?”
“Yes, Max,” I confirmed, trying not to let my face do anything. “And no, no change. We’re just hanging out. He’s teaching me about Canada and hockey. And I’m learning how to shout without sounding stupid.”
Dad lit up. “Did you know that fans throw hats on the ice when someone scores three goals? It’s called a hat trick.”
“Noted,” I said, thinking about how it might work as an image in my book.
Mum stirred the gravy one last time, turned off the hob before coming to sit next to Dad, wiping her hands on a tea towel. “So you two are spending time together?”
“We are,” I said.
“Can you tell me something more about him?” Mum tried to sound casual but failed.
“He’s tall. Loud on the ice, quiet when it matters. Cocky. Thoughtful. He writes like a teenager, though, you would hate his texts.”
“Oh, so you’re texting.”
I rolled my eyes. “Everyone texts, Mum.”
She leaned forward, resting her elbows on the table, just like she always does when she’s about to pry. “Are you sure you don’t want to give it a chance? You don’t have to marry the man. You can… explore.”
I stared down at the sofa cushion, picking at a loose thread. “I know. I just… I told him I don’t want to start something when I might leave in a few months. I don’t want to have a fling either. That’s not me. He knows that.”
Mum reached for the camera as if she could touch my face through the screen. “As long as you’re taking care of your heart, darling. And his.”
“I am. He’s… good. He understands. He teases me about it, but he understands. And he’s been very helpful with the hockey, which is the point.”
Mum’s phone buzzed on the table and she glanced down. “Your aunt wants to know if the pie recipe calls for lard. No, of course not. What on earth is she thinking!” She typed a reply with decisive stabs. “Right. More nosiness. Does he make you smile?”
I took a breath, surprised by how easy the answer was. “Yes,” I said. “He does.”
“Good,” Mum said. “That’s all I wanted to hear.”
“Tell us more about the book, Em,” Dad intervened, saving me from further interrogation.
I told them what I could: that I was still working on the middle and wasn’t sure about the ending I had in mind; that I wanted to capture how people move around each other, both on a rink and in real life.
“As I told you at Christmas, this book has a little more romance in it than I’m used to.
Not a pure romance novel. Just a stronger thread. ”
“We like romance,” Mum said right away. “We met at a bus stop. He offered me a mint.”
Dad held up his mug, solemn. “An excellent mint. Did you know…”
“No,” we both said, and he laughed.
“Jokes aside, darling, are you all right? You sound happier. Different.”
I shrugged because my face was clearly betraying me. “I am, actually. Teaching helps. I didn’t realise I would like it so much. I get to talk about books for a living, and the students aren’t afraid to argue with me. It’s a nice balance with the writing.”
“Even the marking?” Dad asked, sympathetic, because he knows exactly how much I complain about marking.
“Even the marking,” I lied. “Some of it.”
“And the students?” Mum asked. “Anyone driving you crazy?”
“Only one,” I said, unable not to smile. “He turned in an essay that was so full of grammatical errors I felt like I had aged five years in twenty minutes. But he’s trying. I’ll get him there.”
“Of course you will,” Dad said.
Mum tilted her head. “And Toronto is still… good?”
“It is,” I said. “Although it’s a big city, it doesn’t feel like it.
It feels cosy, despite the freezing temperatures.
And the people are nice, like my friend Grace who works at the library and my colleague Simon, who has also become a good friend.
We’ve been salsa dancing a couple of times.
He gets me out of my comfort zone, which I didn’t know I needed.
It feels… I don’t know. Like I might be building a little life here. ”
Mum’s face softened, but she didn’t say anything.
We started talking about other things, like their neighbour’s fence again, the cat’s ongoing war with the postman, and how Dad’s book club inexplicably chose a thriller that none of them liked but all managed to read in two days.
At some point Dad wandered off to go and fetch a bottle of wine, leaving me alone with Mum. She leaned closer to the camera, conspiratorially. “He’s been reading Canadian novels,” she whispered. “He leaves them all over the house like breadcrumbs. He misses you, even though he won’t admit it.”
“I miss you too,” I said, my throat tightening.
“We know. It’s a good thing we can stay in touch like this. We like seeing your face, even if it’s only through a screen. You look… I don’t know. Alive.”
“I feel it,” I said. Dad appeared back on the screen, holding a bottle of red wine. “I’ll leave you to your dinner. Enjoy the pie!”
“One last thing, Em,” Dad said.
“Hmm?”
He cleared his throat. “Write the book you want. Not the one you think people will like.”
“I know.”
Mum blew me a kiss, then made Dad do the same. “And if this Max teaches you anything useful, pass it along. Your father is going through a phase.”
“It’s not a phase,” Dad protested. “It’s research.”
“Research,” Mum repeated, rolling her eyes. “Go on, darling. We love you.”
“I love you too,” I said. They waved, I waved, and the screen blinked back to my reflection. I closed the laptop and sat in the quiet for a minute. Then I picked up my notebook and wrote: Hat trick. Wooden puck. Masks. I smiled, because I realised I could make these images work in my book.
* * *
My editor Denise waved me into the café booth with that brisk efficiency of hers, already taking her laptop out of her bag. “You look less pale than the last time I saw you,” she said. “Toronto is treating you well, then?”
“Surprisingly well,” I said, as I pulled off my coat. “I’m still not used to how bright the sky is here, even when it’s freezing.”
“Good writing weather,” she said, before putting her glasses on. “Right. I’ve gone through the chapters you sent me.”
I held my breath as she tapped her screen.
“They’re solid, Emma. Sharp. The voice feels alive, but there’s a softness creeping in too. It works. And the hockey angle… is better than I thought it would be. You’ve managed to make the chaos readable. And relevant.”
“So you think it’s working? The balance?”
“Yes. Especially if you stick to what you told me you wanted: using the games’ speed, hits and pauses as a mirror for the characters. That part’s clever. Readers won’t even notice it at first, but they’ll feel it.”
I smiled, very relieved. “That’s exactly what I want. The rhythm. The unpredictability. And how you can’t win without trust.”
Denise sat back, studying me in that way she always did. “It’s all there. You only have to keep going. And, Emma, stop second-guessing yourself so much. You’ve got this.”
I ducked my head, embarrassed but comforted by the certainty in her voice. “Thank you.”
We drifted into talking about timelines and markets, about which arcs to tighten and which threads to let breathe. She made me promise to send her another set of chapters by the end of the month.
Then, through mugs clinking and chairs scraping, I leaned forward. “Denise… I think I know how I want it to end.”
She stopped typing, her gaze sharp and interested. “You do?”
I nodded, feeling a mix of nerves and certainty. “Yes, I think I do.”
Her smile widened, ready to push me for details.