Chapter 11
Alex arrived back at her house after the lunchtime rush ready to have some more fun in the snow with Zara.
Quinn had been dealing with a customer when she left the Wonky Tree Studios so she’d waved and left him to it.
She wasn’t expecting him to give up his whole day to play with her daughter.
This time of year was the busiest for all the artists.
Violet had happily taken Zara for a few hours and they were going to make some Christmas cookies and, by the smell of it as she opened the kitchen door, they’d done exactly that.
The kitchen was spotless, probably more so than when Alex had left, apart from a small area on the kitchen table where they were decorating… heart-shaped cookies.
Zara looked up with a big smile on her face and icing on her fingers.
‘We’ve made Christmas heart cookies, to give as gifts to the ones we love.’
That sounded like they might be confusing their holidays, although to be fair Christmas was about giving gifts to the ones you love too, as well as Valentine’s Day.
‘That sounds lovely.’ Alex glanced at Violet.
‘Oh, I couldn’t find the Christmas cookie cutters, so this seemed like the best option,’ Violet shrugged. ‘And they are decorated with Christmas accessories.’
The heart cookies were beautifully decorated with sparkly snowflakes, holly leaves, berries, baubles and little iced snowmen, plus lashings of sparkly sprinkles.
‘They look beautiful,’ Alex said, picking up a tiny sugar snowflake and popping it in her mouth. ‘You’ve worked so hard.’
‘We made loads,’ Zara told her. ‘I’m going to give one to you, Immy, Quinn and Nanny because I love you all. I wanted to give one to Jacob but Nanny said that was probably not a good idea.’
Alex looked down at the dog and Jacob licked his lips in anticipation.
‘No, probably not. Sorry Jacob.’
‘I made you a special one to give to Quinn.’
‘Oh, I…’ Alex found herself blushing and floundering for words. In Zara’s innocent view of the world, of course Alex loved Quinn in the same way that Zara did. She clearly didn’t mean the head-over-heels kind which was closer to the truth.
‘When we were discussing who we were giving them to, I was trying to explain that there are different kinds of love,’ Violet explained, looking flustered herself.
‘That’s true,’ Alex said, not sure if she was ready for this kind of conversation with her daughter.
Just then Quinn arrived in the kitchen.
‘I know that,’ Zara said, as if trying to explain to the uneducated.
‘Mum and Quinn love me because we’re family, but Mum and Quinn love each other with heart eyes like the heart eye emoji.
I can see it. So I made you a heart biscuit with extra hearts on to give to Quinn and I made the same for him to give to you because you love each other. ’
There was silence in the room as Zara opened the tin and brought out two heart-shaped biscuits covered in tiny red hearts. She offered them out to Alex and Quinn.
‘What’s going on?’ Quinn asked, in confusion.
‘Zara made heart biscuits to give as gifts to the ones we love. She thinks we love each with heart eyes not just because we’re family so she made us special heart biscuits to give to each other,’ Alex quickly surmised.
‘You have to give it to each other and tell them you love them,’ Zara said.
Alex expected more of an awkward silence but Quinn simply shrugged, took the biscuit and handed it to Alex.
‘I love you.’
Alex found herself smiling from ear to ear. It was silly. It didn’t mean anything but she couldn’t stop the big silly grin on her face at hearing those words.
She took the cookie from him and then took the second heart cookie from Zara and handed it to him. ‘I love you.’
He now had the same soppy grin on his face.
‘See, that wasn’t that hard, was it,’ Zara said, before returning her attention back to the cookie she was busily decorating.
Alex and Quinn continued to stare at each other with matching grins on their faces before she remembered that her otherwise distracted daughter was not the only person in the room with them.
She took a step back and looked at Violet for her reaction to all this only to find she had a big grin on her face too.
Dear Alex,
My other half doesn’t know I’m St Nick, well not yet anyway.
We don’t actually live together so I can paint when I’m at my house, but a lot of the baubles were painted prior to December and that’s why there are so many baubles being delivered every day, otherwise I’d never have time to paint them all.
I’m looking forward to seeing you tonight at Santa’s cottage. I will try to say a few words to you, if it seems appropriate.
Your clue for today is that I’ll also be wearing an elf hat tonight.
Snowy hugs,
St Nick
The decorating of Santa’s house was probably the biggest night of the year in the Lovegrove Bay calendar and also the most secret.
Which of course meant most of the town would know.
Only the elves were supposed to know the date, well that was the theory.
As most of the elves were parents of young children, those children needed babysitting while their parents sneaked out to do elf duties.
The elves’ plans had to be cancelled or rearranged to fit in with being an elf so, by the time the big night rolled around, almost everyone knew.
Apart from the children. The magic of the house being decorated overnight was such a special thing for the kids of the town that the adults at least took that part very seriously.
There were never any pictures thrown up on social media of the decorating process just in case it was seen by innocent eyes.
Any children who lived near or around Christmas Gardens were often squirrelled away to relatives’ houses for the night so they wouldn’t inadvertently look out of their windows and ruin the magic.
Alex loved doing it, she always looked forward to this night but with the limited sleep she’d got the night before lying in bed thinking about Quinn, and the busy day today playing in the snow, she was exhausted.
Still, she did have an extra reason to look forward to tonight as she’d be spending it with Quinn again, or at least she would after all the elves had gone home. She couldn’t wait to be with him again.
She was also looking forward to seeing St Nick, even if she still didn’t know who it was. She would be on high alert when any of the male elves spoke to her and especially any wearing an elf hat. She knew a few of the elves liked to dress up in character, although most people didn’t.
She saw Quinn ahead chatting to someone but stopped dead when she saw he was wearing an elf hat.
Her heart leapt. Was Quinn really St Nick?
She thought back to her messages with St Nick.
Quinn loved Midsomer Murders and all the cosy mysteries, just like St Nick did, and they would often watch them together.
Quinn wasn’t a painter and he worked in a place with a lot of footfall.
Even Flick had thought it was Quinn a few days before.
Why had Alex dismissed that when she started getting the messages?
But as she glanced around she realised that pretty much every person there was also wearing an elf hat.
She couldn’t help smiling. St Nick had tricked her.
Although now the idea had been planted, she would be looking at Quinn a little bit more closely.
She tried to be practical about it. She’d never seen Quinn painting but he was always very good whenever they played Pictionary with Zara and Immy, although his drawings were never as detailed as the baubles were.
St Nick had called his wife or girlfriend – probably his girlfriend as they didn’t live together – his other half.
But when St Nick sent that message, she and Quinn weren’t together.
They weren’t technically together now, but they had certainly been less together then than they were now.
The term ‘other half’ was normally reserved for someone you’d been dating a while or were married to, not just a friend.
A lot of things pointed to him being St Nick but there wasn’t anything conclusive right now.
She walked closer. He was talking to someone about the fake glittery snowy roof they were going to attach to his roof.
It went on in large custom-made panels but overlapped in such a way that it looked like one big snowy roof.
They would have to clear the real snow off to put the fake stuff on, which felt counterintuitive but the real snow probably wouldn’t last long.
In fact the whole of Christmas Gardens was supposed to be covered in fake snow as part of the decorating.
Alex wondered if they still intended to do that or maybe come back later considering how beautiful the real stuff looked right now.
It was as if Quinn sensed she was there as he suddenly turned round and a big smile spread across his face, probably matching the one on her own.
Someone came up to him to talk to him, gesturing at the roof and he turned to face them which was probably a good thing. People would start to notice, just like Chloe had when they were stupidly staring at each other while they were sledging earlier that day.
She noticed there was a group of women excitedly talking about something and as she stepped closer she realised that one of them had one of St Nick’s coveted baubles.
‘I just found it over there, under the tree,’ Suzie said, as the other ladies admired it.
Alex stepped a bit closer, not wanting to appear nosy but desperate to see what was painted on this one. She could see it was a little potting shed, surrounded by flowers, a pair of wellies and a spade. It was lovely.
‘What will you do with it?’ Frankie said.
‘I’ll give it to my hubby, he loves his little allotment, probably more than he loves me.’
The women laughed.
‘Don’t you mind that he spends all his time there?’ Aggie asked.
‘Mind? When he’s there I get some peace and quiet.’