Blast from the Past. Cathy Hopkins

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       9

      ‘Love the tree and it smells wonderful in here, of pine forests,’ I said when I arrived at Pete and Marcia’s on Christmas Day to see a Norwegian spruce, as tall as the ceiling, in the hall. It had been decorated in red and gold and piles of presents were heaped around the base, to which I added the bag-full I had brought with me.

      ‘Ben and Ruby did the decorations yesterday,’ said Pete as he ushered me through into the kitchen diner, which was already full of family and friends.

      ‘Looks fab and I can smell cinnamon and nutmeg too. Mulled wine?’

      Pete nodded. ‘Just made. I’ll get you a glass. It’s all been a bit of a rush this year, though Marcia did some preparations before we went away.’

      ‘She ought to run the country,’ I said. Despite some of Marcia’s far-fetched ideas and predilection to be irrational at times, she was the most organized person I knew when it came to her family and work. She’d always had a gift for admin, project managing, and generally running things, though Pete often remarked it was actually just that she liked bossing people around. This season, she’d bought her Christmas cards back in October, had all the presents wrapped in November before we went away, and I’d seen her in the airport lounge in India ordering the fresh food online to be delivered on Christmas Eve. I hadn’t even bothered decorating my house because I’d missed the run-up, nor had I bothered buying any special food: there was only me at home and I didn’t plan on doing any entertaining this year.

      ‘Any news?’ asked Pete.

      ‘I have a letter waiting for me at home but have put off looking at it until after Boxing Day.’

      ‘It’s not like you to procrastinate.’

      ‘I know, but everywhere is shut over Christmas, everyone’s on holiday, so what’s the point in getting all worked up when no one’s in their office? So I’m having a bit more time off – proper time – and when everyone’s back at work, I’ll get in gear.’ Actually, part of the reason I’d been delaying the moment was that I wanted to be sure Stuart would be around to advise and, of course, he’d be busy with his wife and family over the festive period. He’d already seen me through some tough times with my business and finances, and I valued his calm approach and steadying influence.

      ‘I think that’s very sensible,’ said Pete as he handed me a steaming mug of mulled wine. ‘Good decision. Now get a drink and let’s put all thoughts of work, worry and changes out of our minds. Let’s eat, drink and be merry, for tomorrow we may diet.’

      All the family were wearing their traditional jumpers: Pete’s with a pudding that lit up on the front; Marcia’s had a Santa on it, and Ruby was in a red sweater with a snowman grinning from her chest. She offered me a canapé of gravadlax and dill on rye from a tray, and I spent the next half-hour catching up with everyone who was there – Pete’s parents, down from Scotland; Marcia’s mum from Manchester who was busy preparing vegetables; Pete’s uncle Tom in charge of drinks; Marcia’s sister Yaz laying the table with Freya. Ben was sprawled on a sofa in the sitting room watching TV with his cousins; Pete’s younger brother Ted and his wife and twin girls waved from across the room where they were playing a game which involved one person wearing inflatable antlers’ horns while the others tossed rings onto them. Neighbours Jess and Ian Ward were settled with their glasses in the conservatory off the kitchen. No single men this time, I noted with relief. One year, they’d invited Nigel, a neighbour and bachelor, in the hope that we’d hit it off. We didn’t, though he got the idea that we did. There was a reason that he was single, and that was that he was the most boring man I’d ever met with a particular passion for lawnmowers, something I knew all about by the end of the afternoon.

      ‘And where’s your jumper?’ asked Marcia. They’d bought me a blue one with a penguin on it last year, which I had dutifully worn at the time then taken to a charity shop in January.

      ‘Ah … shrank in the wash, so sorry,’ I said. I was dressed in my usual black, a small nod to Christmas being the tiny silver holly-shaped earrings I’d had made and also sold in my shop.

      ‘You were never a good liar,’ said Pete. ‘Here, have these.’ He handed me a headband of antlers’ horns instead. Nobody got away with looking cool at their house on Christmas Day. I’d spent many Christmases there over the years and, though I’d offered to host at mine, there was no point really: we’d never all fit in. It was tradition now. Marcia and Pete’s every 25 December, apart from one winter when I was living with my last long-term partner, Richard Benson. He’d come along to their house for Christmas Day for the first two years we’d been together, but wasn’t happy either time. He was threatened by the ease and familiarity I felt when I was with my two oldest friends, especially Pete, who he felt he had to compete with. After weeks of complaint, on the third year, I’d given in and agreed to have Christmas at home, just the two of us.

      It had been OK but hadn’t felt right. I missed the pandemonium that had become part of my life. After we’d split up five years ago, I’d made a new condition to my relationships, and that was ‘love me, love my friends.’ Trouble was, there hadn’t been anyone since to try the condition out on. I wondered where Richard was spending his Christmas this year. In fact, I’d been thinking a lot about all my past partners since India, reviewing who they were, who I was at the time, and asking myself if there was one who had got away. I hadn’t been thinking of them because I believed that I’d known any of them in a past life, but what Saranya Ji had said had got me thinking about the choices I’d made to get where I was today, and if there was anything I could learn from the past in order to go forward.

      *

      Richard Benson. I’d met him over ten years ago when he’d come into the shop in Hampstead, on one of the rare days when I was behind the counter and not up in my office on the floor above.

      I’d heard the door open and looked up to see a tall, well-dressed man in his fifties coming in.

      ‘I’m looking for a gift for my niece,’ he’d said in a public school voice as he perused the counters and cabinets displaying jewellery. ‘It’s her twenty-first and I don’t want to go the usual Tiffany route, I’d like to give her something more personal.’

      Hmm, a thoughtful man, I noted. ‘Any ideas so far?’ I asked.

      ‘Her name is Rose, maybe a chain with an “R” on it?’ he suggested as he pointed at a display of alphabet letter charms in gold and silver.

      ‘Oh no, they’re popular with the teenagers but maybe not for a twenty-first. Rose you say? How about something like this?’

      I drew a quick sketch showing a bracelet with slim linked leaves with one charm on it, that being a single rosebud. ‘Far more subtle and unusual than an R,’ I told him. ‘Be lovely in silver. What do you think?’

      He smiled. ‘Delightful. How clever of you just to draw it like that. It’s just the thing. Could you do it in time? The birthday’s in a few weeks.’

      ‘I’m sure we could,’ I said. I had a few contacts in the area СКАЧАТЬ