The Mother of All Christmases

by Milly Johnson

  ‘Ooh, a perfect end to a perfect day,’ grinned Annie.

  ‘But first . . .’

  Joe dropped a gift bag down on the table in front of Gill as she was polishing off the last mouthful of cake. ‘This is from all of us with our love,’ he said.

  ‘It’s a little something for you to open,’ said Annie.

  ‘Oh, you shouldn’t have, you really shouldn’t.’

  ‘It was my suggestion,’ said Iris, proudly. ‘Someone had one done for our Linda and Dino’s pearl wedding anniversary and I thought what a smashing idea it was.’

  Gill carefully opened the bag as if a jack-in-the-box was about to leap out of it, then she peered inside before lifting out a box.

  ‘Go on then,’ urged Iris, when Gill took an age before she removed the lid. ‘we haven’t got all day.’

  Inside the box was a square glass block bearing an etching of all four of them, arms crossed, auld-lang-syne style, holding the ends of crackers. It was from a photo that they’d had done for the local paper a year ago. Gill’s hand flew up to her mouth to stifle the cry.

  ‘Oh, it’s something I’ll treasure forever,’ she said. ‘Look at us all. Crackers, the lot of us.’

  ‘There’s something else in the bag, Gill, don’t throw it away,’ said Annie.

  ‘Is there?’ Gill looked and brought out an envelope full of money.

  ‘We thought that you and Ted could have a nice meal out on us.’

  ‘Nay, we can’t spend all that on a meal,’ Gill protested.

  There was a thousand pounds in the envelope. They knew that money was the best thing they could give her, since their place in Spain was fully furnished. They’d seen plenty of photos of it over the last year.

  ‘At least spend some of it on that to celebrate your new life. Promise us,’ said Joe.

  ‘Oh, we will,’ said Gill, tears streaming down her face. ‘We will.’

  Chapter 19

  Palma spent most of that Friday packing after going to the local shops and cadging some empty boxes from them. Then she rang a number she’d found on the internet: ‘A Man with a Van’ as he advertised himself. Someone from out of the area because she didn’t want anyone knowing where she had moved to.

  She really could have done with not going out that night with Tommy but she had no way of getting in touch with him. Then again, maybe it would be better going out instead of sitting in this dump of a place any longer than she had to.

  Palma didn’t have a lot of clothes, but what she did have was the best quality she could afford. A capsule wardrobe, the magazines called it. Separates that could be put together to make it look as if she had loads of different outfits. She’d always been good at picking clothes that flattered her slender shape and colouring: black drained the life out of her, bold colours worked for her and made the blue of her eyes pop. She had no idea how posh the restaurant would be but she had a summer cerise-spotted dress and a jacket that looked smart but not over the top as if she were going to the races. Perfect for a warm May evening.

  Tommy turned up, exactly on time. He waved up at the window after ringing the doorbell. He was wearing jeans, white shirt and a black leather jacket and looked really smart too and so she was glad she’d dressed up rather than down.

  ‘All right,’ he greeted her, opening the passenger door of his car for her, a dark blue Fiesta ST, brand new as well. She hoped he didn’t drive it like a boy racer.

  ‘Nice car,’ she commented.

  ‘Ta,’ he said. Inside was as sparkling as the outside and smelled lovely: Jelly Belly Blueberry, she recognised it because she had the same air freshener hanging up next to her bed.

  ‘I thought we’d go to the Royal. Have you been? It’s Chinese night on Fridays.’

  ‘No, I haven’t,’ said Palma, although she’d read a complimentary review of it in the Chronicle.

  Tommy set off, smoothly pulling away from the kerb, thank goodness. He didn’t try and impress her with fast acceleration.

  ‘You got a car?’ he asked.

  ‘No, but I can drive. I’d like one. Nothing flash. Just something reliable to get me from A to B. Or work, when I eventually find something, because it hampers your chances not having one.’

  ‘No luck?’

  ‘Not yet.’ She didn’t like having to admit that she wasn’t working. She didn’t want to be lumped in with those who were content to sit on their backsides and draw benefits and she hoped he realised she was with those who were keen to earn a wage and support themselves. She felt the sudden need to tell him that she wasn’t stuck in a dead-end rut.

  ‘I’m moving from my flat.’

  ‘Are you? To go where?’

  ‘I’ve found a house to rent in Dodley Bottom.’

  She saw the grin spread across his lips. ‘I’m at Dodley Top.’

  ‘You live in Dodley? So what were you doing running round Edgefoot park the other night?’

  ‘I run up the rocks at the back. Good stamina training. We’ll be neighbours more or less. I don’t know, one date and you’re moving to live near me.’

  He was obviously joking, or at least she hoped he was. And ‘one date’? Is that what she was on now? She wouldn’t have said yes if she’d known that. She’d have to make it very clear that she didn’t see this as a date at all. She didn’t want to lead him on.

  She ignored the date reference when she carried on talking. ‘It’s a really nice house. Small, but a million times better than the bedsit.’

  ‘Even by Ketherwood standards those . . .’ Tommy stopped in mid-sentence and made an embarrassed face. ‘I mean . . . well . . .’

  ‘You’re right what you were going to say,’ said Palma. He wasn’t telling her anything she didn’t already realise. ‘Even by Ketherwood standards that block of bedsits are shitholes. But it was all I could afford at nineteen and the area wasn’t as bad three years ago as it is now. It’s gone right downhill in a short time.’

  She’d managed to put away some money every month; her cash-in-hand overtime payments from the takeaway had mounted up. She’d hated having to break into her savings when she’d lost her job. That five grand she’d taken from Christian might not have been a fortune, but it felt like one to her.

  ‘I’m sorry. It must have been hard on you not having any family to back you up.’

  ‘Well, you just get on with it, don’t you?’ said Palma. ‘Living in a crappy bedsit and having a job dishing up chicken and chips wasn’t exactly what I had in mind when the career officer asked me in year eleven where I saw myself in five years’ time; but you have to start somewhere.’

  ‘Where did you see yourself, Palma?’ Tommy asked.

  ‘No idea, but doing something I could get my teeth into and build up. I’ve never been scared of hard work and I hate being unemployed and having to sign on. I do have some pride. I want to earn my own money.’

  Or get it by blackmail, said a voice in her head that she didn’t like.

  ‘I can tell that,’ said Tommy. ‘The way you dress.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘You having pride. You take care of yourself. You’ve got style.’

  Palma half-wanted to laugh. Style was a word that had never been applied to her before, that she knew of anyway. But it was a sweet compliment and she accepted it and gave him a bashful, ‘Thanks.’

  He’d booked a table because it was a popular place, especially at the weekends, he said. He opened the front door for her and the smell of Chinese food rushed at them and her stomach responded with a discreet growl. She hadn’t eaten all day, hadn’t even felt peckish really, but suddenly she was hungry.

  ‘What do you want to drink?’ he asked.

  ‘A Britvic 55, please.’

  ‘Don’t you want a wine or a gin and tonic? They do nice cocktails here.’

  ‘No, I’m happy with a softie.’

  He ordered a diet cola for himself. He didn’t drink anything when he was driving, he said. He didn’t drink much anyway these day
s. His body was a temple, he said, with his trademark grin.

  ‘TNT. All right, mate?’ someone across the bar shouted and gave him the thumbs up and Tommy responded with a modest ‘Cheers.’

  ‘Friend of yours?’ asked Palma.

  ‘Never seen him before in my life. It happens a lot though, it’s nice, I like it.’

  ‘Why TNT?’ asked Palma when they were shown to their table.

  ‘Tommy Neil Tanner,’ he explained. ‘Neil isn’t my real name, it’s my brother’s. But I adopted it. Tommy “TNT” Tanner. That’s how they announce me in the ring.’

  He pronounced it ‘bruvver’. On anyone else it might have been annoying, on him it was totally endearing.

  Palma tilted her head and studied him, seeing him through the awestruck eyes of the man at the bar for a second. ‘Done well for yourself, haven’t you, if you’re the British champion?’

  ‘Not bad,’ he smiled and tapped the menu that she’d been given. ‘Stop talking and pick. I’m starving. Let’s get loads of dishes.’

  Palma picked three, Tommy picked nine. He couldn’t decide, he told the waitress who took their order, so he was having plenty for choice.

  ‘So,’ began Tommy. ‘Fill me in on what’s been happening to you since we were at school.’

  Palma chuckled. ‘I already did that. Bugger all.’

  ‘Add some detail. Or make something up,’ he pressed, and she thought what twinkly eyes he had. Laughter was dancing in those eyes and she hoped it wasn’t because he fancied her. His timing was off if he did.

  Palma shrugged her shoulders. ‘Really, there’s nothing.’

  ‘I seem to remember your mum wasn’t well,’ he said. A memory came swimming back to him. ‘Didn’t she turn up at school . . .’ Then that memory tuned into sharp focus and he waved it away. ‘No, it wasn’t you. Forget that.’ But he hadn’t got it wrong, they both knew.

  ‘Yes she did, you remembered it perfectly,’ said Palma. ‘She turned up pissed as a fart. She’d decided to have a shot at being a proper mother and pick me up from school, two hours early and eight years too late.’ Palma’s cheeks began to heat as the old shame revisited her. ‘She had a fight with the supply teacher and ended up scratching her face, you’ll have remembered that as well.’

  ‘I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to drag all that back for you.’

  ‘It’s okay.’

  ‘I feel really bad.’

  ‘It doesn’t matter.’ Palma never cried, but she had that day, completely overwhelmed with humiliation. ‘She did me a favour really, because it led to social services being called in again and started the ball rolling to get me away from her. I went into care after that.’

  ‘What was it like?’ Tommy was interested, leaning forward to hear more.

  ‘It was okay, actually. I got fed proper meals and they were really good people who ran the home, then I got shifted to live with a foster mother. I think you’d . . . you’d left by then,’ she said.

  The food arrived and took up all of the table. It both looked and smelled fantastic.

  ‘Dig in,’ said Tommy. ‘Anything you want. Anyway, you were saying . . . foster mother. And yes, I’d probably been sent away. I went just before Christmas.’

  ‘I went into care in January and moved in with her in March,’ said Palma. She had a sudden vision of herself being driven to Grace’s. The snow was settling on the road and the car was skidding everywhere. It was dark and freezing and as they drew up in front of the house, there was a warm, golden light shining out of the front window. ‘I was okay in the kids’ home, I didn’t really want to go and live with anyone, but five minutes after I walked across her threshold, I was sitting at a table with a big plate of homemade spaghetti Bolognese. I don’t think I’ve ever tasted anything as wonderful in my life. Somehow I fitted into that house as if I’d been specially made for it.’

  ‘That’s nice,’ said Tommy, after he had cleared his mouth of a prawn cracker. ‘How long did you stay there? Four years, did you say?’

  He’d remembered. She was impressed. ‘More or less. Grace had a massive heart attack the fortnight before my A-levels. No wonder I failed them all.’ Palma’s voice cracked and she changed the subject quickly. ‘Anyway, what about you?’

  Tommy gesticulated at her to wait because he had just chomped down on a spring roll. He loved his food, that was clear. ‘Sorry about that. You know, I felt for you that day your mum came to school because I couldn’t ever remember seeing my mum sober before she left us. Dad was useless and I ran riot. I got sent to Forestgate, Dad died whilst I was in there and at the funeral I met this Neil bloke who introduced himself to me as my older brother. I didn’t even know my dad had been married before. He kept in touch with me and, when I came out, he took me in, him and his missus, Jackie; they’ve been great.’

  ‘And did you say he was your trainer?’

  She’d remembered. He was impressed. ‘I still had a lot of anger issues when I left Forestgate,’ Tommy admitted sheepishly. ‘He dragged me off to his gym and told me to take it out on a punchbag, make my aggression work for me. Channel it, he said.’

  ‘And so you did?’

  ‘I did. I love boxing. It’s all I was ever interested in, it’s the only thing I really understand, Palma. And it’s the only thing I’m good at.’

  ‘I bet that’s not true,’ she said.

  ‘It is,’ he came back at her with gusto. ‘My life was a mess but somehow everything made sense as soon as I stepped in a ring. I’m not one of those natural fighters, I’ve had to work hard at it, but I do. I study my opponents beforehand so I know their patterns. I used to do it as a kid, play videos over and over again, study and study and study fighters so much that I could almost get into their heads and if I could do that, then I knew what their next moves would be. Take Frank Harsh, for instance –’ he shuffled forwards slightly in his seat and Palma stifled the smile that bloomed in response to the passion in his voice – ‘He’s a brilliant fighter, heavy puncher, fast, slick, longer reach than me but I’ll pulverise him because he’s not an inside boxer. Close up, tight to him, I know I can beat him, and that’s where I’ll be in December, closer than his wife gets. I can’t wai—’ He stopped abruptly. ‘Sorry. I get carried away talking about it. Boring you to death, aren’t I?’

  ‘You aren’t at all,’ replied Palma, smiling freely at him now to show that she was being genuine and not merely polite. ‘I love your appetite for it.’

  ‘Talking of appetite, have you tried that chicken and mushroom yet? It’s fabulous.’ Tommy scooped half the dish onto his plate and offered the other half to Palma. ‘So where’s your mum now?’

  ‘No idea,’ said Palma. ‘I’m not bothered.’

  ‘Same as me,’ said Tommy. ‘I’ve got all the family I want. At least for now. I’d love kids. I’d do it properly an’ all. I’d look after ’em. They’d never see me drunk and I’d never hit ’em. I’d tell ’em I was proud of ’em. I always wanted someone to say to me that they were proud of me, so I’ll make sure they hear it a lot.’

  He said that so tenderly that Palma had a sudden vision of him play-boxing with a little boy. Totally ridiculous, she knew.

  ‘Some people just churn kids out, don’t they?’ Tommy went on.

  ‘Yep,’ she said, spearing a mushroom and putting it into her mouth, whilst breaking eye contact.

  ‘My life is a straight line at the moment, no complications, nothing in the way of my boxing because it’s a young man’s game, you can’t overstay your welcome in that ring, but I definitely want them in the future. Do you think you’ll have kids one day?’ he asked.

  Oh, that was too close. She could wreck this evening by saying, Well, funny you should say that . . .

  ‘Not sure,’ she said instead. ‘I’m not very maternal.’ She didn’t want to think about her present situation until after the weekend. Top of the list was moving house, then what to do about her pregnancy, then she needed a job to allow her to continue living in the
house. She changed the subject. ‘So when’s your next fight?’

  ‘December the twenty-third.’

  ‘Your first defence.’

  ‘Yep. Can’t wait. Here, try this, Palma. Duck. I don’t usually like duck but that sauce . . . oh . . . mmm.’ He kissed the circle that a finger and his thumb made and Palma smiled, delighting in his delight.

  Talk flowed easily between them and yet later, when Palma would try and recall what they could have filled two and a half hours with, she couldn’t remember it all. News about what some of the kids whom they both knew were doing now. The O’Gowans were mentioned. Tommy had heard that Leslie, son of the notorious Bull O’Gowan, was doing a long stretch for attempted murder. He told her that he’d come up against Leslie’s cousin Clint last year for trying to deal ’roids outside the gym. He’d have killed the druggie scrote if Neil hadn’t held him back from chasing after him. He took scum to a new level, he said. Palma didn’t comment on that, but asked him if he’d heard about Bull’s youngest Ryan, because he’d bucked the O’Gowan fate and was at university doing English. He’d been taken in by the woman who employed him in her café at weekends. Tommy already knew that because Ryan had done an inspirational talk for some of the kids he worked with – kids having troubles in the mainstream education environment – about how your past shouldn’t nobble your future. Tommy was proof of that, too. There were lots of anecdotes from his time in Forestgate; not so many from Palma, but she did fill him in on the list of the jobs she’d done, beginning at Sheila’s sandwich shop and ending with Ketherwood Fried Chicken. Next stop, head of ICI, she joked.

  When Tommy dropped her off later, she thanked him for a lovely evening. And she meant it. He thanked her for her company but he didn’t ask to see her again, which was probably just as well; though she thought that if he’d given her the option, she would have said yes. Instead he leaned over and gave her a friendly peck on the cheek. He said he’d wait until he saw a light going on in her bedsit so he could be sure she was safely inside. She switched the light on, then waved at him from the window and he drove off. That, as far as Palma was aware, was that.