Christmas at the Beach Café: A Novella

by Diamond, Lucy

  It was the calendar, and I eagerly flipped through the pages, smiling at each image in turn. The printers had done a brilliant job – the colours were sharp and bright, the paper thick and glossy, every page a gorgeous, happy memory. Even the Miss December picture at the end had come out really well – a million times better than any fuzzy Daily Star print. Yes, I thought, breathing a sigh of relief. Christmas was now officially allowed to begin.

  That afternoon, it was the Christmas Eve bonfire on the beach, and in true stereotyped form, Ed, Jake and my dad all went to muck in with the bonfire lighting, while Amber, Mum and I dragged down a couple of folding tables and loaded them up with plates of mince pies and gallons of mulled wine.

  ‘Do you really think we’ll need all of these?’ Amber asked in surprise, eyeing the vast array of supplies we’d laid out.

  ‘Oh, we’ll need them,’ I assured her.

  It was as if the weather knew something special was happening that day. The wind dropped as flames licked up the bonfire and the sun finally emerged from the clouds for what felt like the first time in days. Then the crowds descended: hundreds of people, the children and dogs racing around together, while the adults stood in small clusters, exchanging presents and toasting each other’s health, laughing and chatting. The mince pies were all gone in under twenty minutes.

  At about three o’clock, Lindsey rang a brass bell, then everyone gathered beside the bonfire, and we sang Christmas carols together. Hearing the sound of so many voices in unison and seeing all those happy, tipsy faces gave me goosebumps of sheer joy. Ed came and found me in the crowd and we held hands.

  ‘I love this place,’ I said, squeezing his fingers in mine. ‘I can’t think of anywhere on earth I’d rather be.’

  ‘Me neither,’ he said. ‘Friends, family, the beach, a bloody great bonfire . . . and you.’

  Everyone was there: Annie, Martha and Jamie; Betty and Alec, with what must be their daughter (the spit of Alec) and a brood of tiny blonde grandchildren; Mags, Elizabeth, Nora, Jacqui, Florence . . . Oh. What was up with Florence? Her usually smiling face looked anxious and forlorn, and she stood alone, gazing out to sea, her hands clasped in front of her.

  I hurried over. ‘Florence! Are you okay? Happy Christmas Eve to you!’

  ‘Hello dear,’ she said, her blue eyes cloudy and faraway. ‘And to you too.’

  ‘What’s wrong?’ I asked, putting a hand on her arm. ‘You don’t seem your usual cheerful self. Is everything all right?’

  She wrinkled her nose and wouldn’t meet my gaze. ‘I’m fine,’ she said quietly. ‘It’s just . . . This is my first Christmas without Arthur. I’m finding it harder than I expected.’

  Of course. Her beloved husband had died soon after they’d moved down to Cornwall, leaving her alone and grieving. No wonder she looked faraway. ‘I’m so sorry,’ I said, putting my arm around her. She felt as slight as a bird, even with her winter coat. ‘But isn’t Francis here with you? I thought he and his wife were flying over for Christmas week.’

  ‘He was,’ she said, ‘but with this wretched snow, all the flights have been delayed. I’m not sure when he’s going to make it here now.’

  Poor, poor Florence. Her son, Francis, was the apple of her eye. A successful TV producer out in America, I knew how little she got to see of him, and how much she’d been looking forward to his visit.

  ‘Why don’t you spend Christmas with us instead?’ I heard myself asking. Well – who wouldn’t have? ‘We’ve got plenty of food and we’d love to have you.’

  ‘Are you sure?’ she said anxiously. ‘I don’t want to put you to any trouble.’

  ‘You wouldn’t be,’ I assured her. ‘Not at all. I’d much rather you were with us than on your own.’

  ‘Then I’d like that very much,’ she said. ‘Thank you, Evie.’ She nudged me. ‘I’m looking forward to your recipe book, by the way,’ she added. ‘Will I get my copy tomorrow?’

  ‘Ahh,’ I said, the smile slipping from my face. ‘About the recipe book. There’s been a bit of a hitch . . .’

  It was the only thing that marred the afternoon for me, having to admit to Florence, and all the other people who’d asked me the same question, that I’d failed on that particular front and didn’t actually have a great stack of beautifully wrapped recipe books all ready to distribute. Florence was quick enough to brush it aside and tell me it didn’t matter in the slightest – ‘Everyone loves a late present in the new year. There’s nothing like it to cheer up a dull January,’ she assured me – but I still felt as if I’d let her and the others down.

  Maybe I needed to make a new year’s resolution about not biting off more than I could chew, I thought to myself.

  Yeah, right. Like that would ever happen.

  Chapter Eight

  And then it was Christmas. I woke up early, just like I always did with that instant, wide-awake It’s Christmaaaaaaas! feeling, as if my inner Noddy Holder had been unleashed. I smiled to myself in the dark room, tingling with lovely quiet Christmassy joy. After what had been a fairly testing few weeks, the special day was here at last. We’d made it.

  I lay there thinking about all the times I’d woken up in this flat on Christmas mornings, and a flood of childhood memories came rushing back. How Ruth, Louise and I had shared Jo’s spare room, the three of us whispering excitedly in the darkness. How we’d discovered the ‘reindeer’ hoof prints on the beach one Christmas morning and stared saucer-eyed with the thrill. How we’d always be dragged out, rain or shine, on the post-lunch seaside walk to ‘blow away the cobwebs’ as Jo liked to say. How we hung up the red felt stockings she’d once made for us, which became stuffed with goodies overnight . . .

  Hey, talking of stockings . . .

  I moved my feet and felt a strange weight at the bottom of the bed, and in the next moment could almost hear the high-pitched girlish shrieks of Christmas mornings gone by, back when I still believed in magic. He’s been! Father Christmas has BEEN!

  I grinned across at Ed even though he was still sleeping. Christmas was all about magical moments, even when you were a grown-up. I was glad I lived with, and loved, a man who was still a kid at heart, just like me. I had wrapped up Ed’s stocking presents the night before and hidden them in my biggest cable knit slippersock under my side of the bed. Very slowly and carefully, so as not to wake him, I rolled over and reached down a hand, patting around on the floor until I found it. Then, every bit as slowly and carefully, I lifted up the slippersock and placed it at the bottom of the bed, near the bulge of his feet.

  I was just congratulating myself on how stealthy and sneaky I’d been, and how maybe I was wasted in a café and should be a professional jewel thief, when I noticed that his eyes were open now and he’d witnessed the whole thing. Ahh. Okay. Maybe I was best suited to working in a café after all.

  ‘Merry Christmas, gorgeous,’ he said, his voice husky, and pulled me in for a long, slow smooch. For a delicious few moments, I forgot about everything that had been bothering me lately – parents, Jake, Melissa, bare bums in the national press, the lot – and lost myself in those kisses. Christmas kisses. This was more like it.

  ‘Guess what?’ he murmured, sliding a hand up my pyjama top in a way that made me shiver. ‘I’ve just thought of another new tradition.’

  Later on, we cuddled up in bed and opened our stocking presents together: chocolate truffles, soap, a pair of silver star earrings, new lacy knickers (all for me, if you were in any doubt) plus a satsuma, an apple and a bag of gold-wrapped chocolate coins. It was perfect.

  And then the phone started to ring.

  Annie was first. Her boiler had broken down and they had no heating, hot water or means to cook their turkey. Was there any chance she and Martha could join us for lunch? ‘Of course you can,’ I said, full of Christmas Day bonhomie and goodwill to all men. ‘Two more won’t make any difference. Come along whenever you want.’

  Then it was Ruth, calling to wish us all a merry Christmas and could
she have a word with Mum, please, because she wanted to finalize arrangements for her Boxing Day get-together?

  Next were Ed’s parents phoning to say Happy Christmas, then Louise rang too.

  ‘Unplug that phone for goodness’ sake,’ Amber said at last. ‘We need to give you something, Evie.’

  And suddenly, everyone was there in the kitchen together – Ed, my parents, Amber and Jake – with secretive smiles on their faces. Ed held out a parcel wrapped in blue and silver paper. ‘This is from all of us, really,’ he said.

  I stared around in surprise. All of them? What? When had this been decided?

  ‘Open it, then!’ Amber laughed.

  Intrigued, I ripped open the paper to see . . . Oh. My laptop. My laptop?

  ‘Open it,’ Ed urged. ‘Try pressing the ‘On’ button.’

  I did as I was told and it sprang into life with the familiar little tune. ‘You got it fixed!’ I cried. ‘Oh guys, thanks so much.’

  ‘Well, we didn’t do that bit,’ Ed said cryptically. ‘It was Seb who sorted that out for you.’

  Good old Seb! He was the teenage whizzkid who’d once been the most hopeless assistant ever to work in the café, bless him. ‘And is the recipe book still okay?’ I asked breathlessly. ‘Did he manage to retrieve the document?’

  ‘Why don’t you have a look?’ my mum said, her mouth twitching in a smile.

  What had they done? I clicked to open the document, my fingers shaking a little. Then I gasped as an image came up, one that I didn’t recognize. A photo of the Beach Café I’d taken back in the summer, with the words ‘Recipes From The Beach Café’ laid out across it. It was the front cover for my book.

  ‘But who . . . How . . . ?’ I stammered.

  ‘Keep looking,’ Jake said with a grin.

  I flicked through to find a Contents page and let out a shriek of excitement. No longer were there a paltry nine recipes. Someone had added new ones – a whole raft of new ones.

  Decadent Chocolate Log

  Best Ever Christmas Cake

  Boeuf Bourguignon

  Pad Thai

  Amber’s Christmas Cocktails

  Apple Spice Muffins

  Christmas Pudding Cupcakes

  Annie’s Famous Millionaire’s Shortbread . . .

  Tears pricked my eyes and the rest of the page blurred. Wow. Just wow. I couldn’t believe they’d pulled all of this together. I flicked through the pages to see that they’d taken photographs of the dishes wherever possible and that the recipes – from Jake, Mum, Louise, gosh, so many people – had been typed up perfectly.

  ‘This is the best present ever,’ I managed to say, taken aback by how hard they must have worked on it together. No wonder there had been so much secretive whispering and vanishing lately.

  ‘We thought you could email it around to everyone this morning,’ Ed said. ‘Florence collected lots of email addresses at the bonfire yesterday; she said she’d bring a list with her when she comes over. That recipe for Apple Spice Muffins is hers, by the way.’

  ‘And you did all this in secret,’ I marvelled. ‘I had absolutely no idea. Thank you.’ I hugged them each in turn.

  ‘I felt so bad when I thought I’d wrecked it,’ Jake said. ‘I’m really glad we could make it all right again.’

  ‘All right again? Are you kidding me? This is a way better recipe book than I could ever have made on my own,’ I said. ‘You’re all amazing. The best. Cheers!’

  ‘Talking of “Cheers”,’ my dad said, glancing up at the clock on the wall. ‘Is it too early for champagne, do you think?’

  There’s only ever one answer to that, needless to say.

  Christmas lunch was a million miles away from the quiet, romantic meal for two I’d originally planned. No smooching or hand-holding or gazing into each other’s eyes with the gentle strains of carols in the background. Instead we had Christmas hits blasting out, a whirlwind of activity in the kitchen, three turkeys at once as well as enough roast potatoes to sink a ship. My Dad was teaching Amber the moves to ‘Rocking Around the Christmas Tree’, Monty was barking dementedly and running round in circles, Annie, Martha and Florence arrived to another round of champagne and the volume levels rose even higher. In short, it was a madhouse. But do you know what? It was absolutely brilliant too.

  When it came to serving up lunch, we dragged two long tables together in the café, spread out the beautiful holly-green tablecloth that Annie had brought along, and lit the candles in silver candlesticks lent by Florence. We pulled the crackers, put on our gaudy paper hats and laughed like drains at the dreadful jokes.

  Once everyone had a plate full of food and a glass full of bubbly, my mum got to her feet, a little pink in the cheeks. ‘I would just like to say a few words before we begin,’ she said.

  ‘Here we go,’ murmured my dad, pulling a funny face at me across the table.

  ‘Before we start on this amazing feast – thank you Ed, Amber, Annie – well, everyone really, it looks wonderful – I’d like to raise a toast to my sister, Jo. I wish with all my heart that she could be with us right now.’ Her voice shook and I felt a lump in my throat. Oh, me too, Mum. ‘However,’ Mum went on, gathering herself, ‘what gives me comfort is thinking how proud and happy she would be to see us all here today, knowing that the café was in such good hands with Evie and Ed.’ A tear rolled down her cheek and she brushed it away impatiently, and gave me a watery smile. ‘I can’t think of a nicer tribute to her than that. To Jo!’

  ‘To Jo,’ we all chorused.

  I looked around the table as everyone clinked their wine glasses and I felt a tingle go through me. It might have taken me a long time to realize it, but at last I knew that this was what Christmas at the Beach Café was really about: community, friends and family, everyone mucking in together and cracking jokes, everyone toasting Jo and bringing her back in our memories. ‘Tuck in!’ I ordered – and we were off.

  Later, while Mum was organizing a team of washer-uppers and my dad was making umpteen teas and coffees, Ed and I slipped away to the beach to give each other our presents. It was a mild, bright day and the snow had almost vanished from the sand by now. We found a dry place to sit up on the rocks together, enjoying being alone again.

  I couldn’t wait another second. ‘Happy Christmas,’ I said, handing him the wrapped calendar.

  My heart thumped in anticipation as he ripped open the paper, and I suddenly panicked again that he wouldn’t want a home-made present – but I needn’t have worried. He exclaimed over every single photo in the calendar, spending long moments gazing at each one and reminiscing about the time when it had been taken. And then he reached the December page . . . and burst out laughing.

  ‘You might have seen this look before,’ I said, self-consciously. ‘Like in a Lesbian Strip Drama photo shoot on page 7 of the Daily Star?’

  ‘I knew it was familiar,’ he said, hugging me. ‘And it’s great. I love it. Especially now I understand what you were up to that day.’ He laughed again. ‘Brilliant.’

  ‘I thought it might remind you of . . .’ I began.

  ‘Oh, it does,’ he said. ‘You bet it does.’ He turned and kissed me, a laugh still rumbling in his throat. ‘Thank you, Evie. Fantastic present. Perfect. And now . . .’ He rummaged in his coat pocket. ‘Yours.’

  He pulled out an envelope but didn’t give it to me immediately. ‘I should tell you, I’ve got some good news and some bad news about this present,’ he said. ‘The bad news is that I tried and tried but couldn’t get my hands on a glass angel just like the one Jo bought you back in the day. I spent hours online on Ebay and all sorts of other sites searching for an exact match. No joy.’

  ‘Oh, Ed,’ I said, touched that he’d gone to so much trouble. ‘Thanks for trying anyway.’

  ‘No joy in the UK anyway,’ he said meaningfully. ‘But the good news is that I’ve tracked down an antiques dealer who . . .’ He passed me the envelope. ‘Well, open it and you’ll see.’

  I opene
d the envelope . . . and a colour photograph fell out of two glass angels very similar to the ones Jo had given us all those years before. ‘You found some!’ I cried, delighted – then realized there was something else in the envelope. Return plane tickets to Marseille?!

  ‘That’s the thing,’ he said, with a grin. ‘The antiques dealer is in Provence. She said the angels are so delicate they might not survive being posted, but that she’d hold them for a few weeks if we wanted to pick them up. She also said to apologize for hanging up on you a couple of times when you answered the phone – I’d told her not to speak to you, and it sounds as if she took that literally. I should have given her my mobile number from the start.’

  I was still trying to process all of this. So the mystery silent phone calls weren’t from Melissa after all. And – wait. Had he just said what I thought he’d said? ‘If we wanted . . . We’re going to Provence?’ I cried.

  ‘We’re going to Provence,’ he repeated. ‘On New Year’s Eve, for five days. We’ve had such a busy few weeks, I thought we could see in the new year just the two of us, have a proper break, explore the south of France . . . and collect a couple of angels, ready to put on the tree next Christmas. What do you think?’

  ‘I think – ’ I couldn’t speak for a moment because my breath caught in my throat. ‘I think that sounds absolutely perfect,’ I managed to say. ‘And I think you’re the loveliest person I’ve ever met. Thank you. Oh, thank you, Ed.’

  ‘Happy Christmas,’ he said, smiling.

  And as I threw my arms around him and kissed him again, I couldn’t stop smiling either. My beach café Christmas may not have been the one I’d expected but despite everything, it had turned out to be pretty magical after all. ‘Happy Christmas,’ I replied. ‘Here’s to many, many more.’

  Christmas Recipes

  Back in the summer, when I was first thinking about this story, I mentioned on my Facebook page that I was looking for fabulous Christmas recipes to feature in the back of the book. Did any of my readers have a favourite that they’d like to share?