The Christmas Café

by Amanda Prowse

  ‘I’ll go grab our drinks. Make yourself comfy.’ Bea smiled at Flora.

  ‘Thanks, Gran.’

  Bea hesitated in the doorway. ‘Flora, one thing: do you have to call me Gran? It makes me sound ancient, can’t you just call me Bea?’

  ‘Sure.’ Flora nodded. ‘If you want me to.’

  ‘I do.’

  ‘Why have you never mentioned that before?’

  ‘I haven’t had the chance, not with your dad standing feet away, ready to shout down the suggestion, brand it one of my crazy, hippy ideas.’

  Flora smiled, knowing this was true and liking the fact that they shared a confidence. It made her feel quite grown-up.

  Bea disappeared briefly into the small kitchen and returned with a white laminate tray bearing two white mugs and a plate of pale gold shortbread shot through with scarlet globes; their cherry scent was impossible to ignore. She set the tray on the coffee table.

  ‘Come and sit down.’ She patted the sofa next to her.

  Flora sank down and exhaled. ‘I like this room.’

  ‘My little haven.’ Bea smiled, holding the mug between her palms. ‘Are you going to try Kim’s shortbread?’

  ‘No. I’m good.’

  Bea noted the way Flora placed her hand on the flat of her stomach as if reminding herself why cakes were not a good idea. She couldn’t remember when her own stomach had last been flat, taut. Not that she was fat, far from it, but her skin seemed to sag and crease with the creep of age, no longer clinging sharply to her muscles; it was more in league with gravity now than it ever had been. ‘Maybe later then.’ She smiled.

  Flora rolled her eyes, as if this comment was reminiscent of her mother’s nagging. ‘Maybe.’

  Bea sipped her drink. ‘You can stay as long as you like, darling. You know that. As long as Mum and Dad are okay with it.’

  Flora nodded. ‘Thanks.’ Her sweet, open smile was familiar to Bea. This was how she pictured her, not the scowling ball of angst she had encountered earlier.

  ‘I’ll open the skylight in the study, roll out the futon and pop the lamp on. You’ll be snug as a bug in there.’

  ‘It feels nice here, Gr— Bea. Cosy.’ Flora kicked off her thongs and curled her feet under her on the sofa.

  ‘Thank you. I like it very much too. Even after twenty years, there’s nothing much I’d want to change.’ Bea smiled as she stared across at the open window onto Reservoir Street. ‘And to think it might never have happened – Pappy and I might have ended up in Mollymook, instead. Miles away.’

  ‘When Pappy retired, you mean?’

  ‘That’s right. When your dad was a teenager, Pappy took early retirement and we sold the business, moved down the coast to Mollymook. You’ve not been there, have you?’

  Flora shook her head. She hadn’t been told much at all about her dad’s youth.

  ‘You’d like it, I think – there are whales and dolphins, and a lovely natural rock pool for swimming in called Bogey Hole. We were so excited. It was what we’d been working towards all those years. We couldn’t wait to start living the beach life, playing lots of golf, eating fresh fish every night.’ Bea’s eyes twinkled as the memories flashed through her head. ‘But after about a month, Pappy started getting antsy, couldn’t relax, got bored of all that golf. Truth was, he was a city boy and he needed to get back to the bustle.’

  ‘But what about you? Didn’t you just want to stay on the beach?’ Flora was curious, having only overheard her parents’ version of events, retold at dinner parties of how her grandparents had retired to the beach and only lasted a few weeks. ‘Threw the towel in,’ her dad had smirked with a shake of his head, as though it was in some way a failure.

  ‘I just wanted Peter to be happy. The day he gave up the lease on our Mollymook house, he had a spring in his step that I hadn’t seen for a long time. But I remember worrying about where on earth we were going to live. We’d got rid of the house on Melville Terrace by then, so going back to Manly wasn’t an option. But Pappy had it all worked out. He’d never sold this building.’ Bea looked up at the high apex ceiling with its exposed steel beams. ‘It seemed fitting to end up here, where we started, where we met.’

  ‘That’s so cool!’ Flora stared at her gran with new respect. ‘Making your own home almost from scratch. How would you even know where to start?’

  ‘It was a great adventure, you’re right, turning this place from offices and warehousing into the apartment. And then setting up the Kitchen...’ Bea took another mouthful of cocoa, enjoying the feeling of the soft, melted marshmallows against the roof of her mouth. ‘You know, a lot of people thought we were mad. Instead of sitting by the water or strolling around a golf course, taking it easy, we were donning bib ’n’ brace overalls and picking up sledgehammers! Maybe we were a bit mad.’ Bea laughed. ‘In fact, there’s no maybe about it!’

  ‘Why did you guys open the café?’ Flora asked.

  There was the smallest flicker to Bea’s eyelids. Because I wanted to feed people around a table. Cooking for them with love and feeling their gratitude. I thought it might make up for the big, close family I craved. ‘Who doesn’t want to run a café? It’s great fun!’

  ‘I guess. But it’s hard work...’ Flora blinked, giving Bea the impression that this too had been overhead on one of Wyatt’s rants about the foolish ambitions of his mother, the only woman he knew who chose to slog her guts out every day.

  ‘I think, Flora, that it’s one of life’s great privileges to do something because you want to and not because you have to. Don’t you agree?’

  ‘I suppose so.’ Flora nodded, not entirely sure she understood. ‘This apartment is awesome, even if it is a bit noisy with the doors open. It’s cool.’

  ‘Thank you, that’s nice to hear. It’s funny, my gran always seemed so old, even though I knew her when she was much younger than I am now!’ She smiled, picturing her late grandmother back when they all lived in England. ‘She had a little Edwardian house in Surrey, not far from the Epsom Downs—’

  ‘So you came all the way from Surrey, England to Surry Hills, Australia – neat!’

  Bea smiled at her funny, perceptive granddaughter. ‘You couldn’t imagine two more different places, darling!’ She chuckled. ‘Where my gran lived, on the Epsom Downs, was famous for horse-racing. They used to train the horses in the early morning and I used to love watching them galloping through the mist, heads down, steam rising from their bodies. Quite a sight. But I didn’t like my gran’s house so much: it was so old-fashioned, full of tasselled lamps, brass ornaments, chintzy cushions and embroidered pictures of dogs, if you can imagine that! And the whole place smelt of mothballs. I always wanted to fling open the windows, it was stifling.’

  ‘Sounds gross.’ Flora grinned.

  Bea laughed; she liked the girl’s honesty. The two sipped their drinks in amiable silence.

  ‘It was just different and I believe it came into fashion a while back, all that vintage floral on just about everything, but personally I can think of nothing worse than being one of those women who wear frocks and mackintoshes that coordinate with their bread bins.’

  Flora laughed; this sounded like her mother’s friends for a start. ‘Why did your parents leave Surrey and come out here in the first place? I mean, I’m glad you did, but I was just wondering why.’

  ‘Well, I don’t know how much Dad has told you, but my father was a minister. A man of God, at least that’s what he told everyone.’ ‘You will leave and take your shame with you. You are not my daughter...’ His words were still crisp in her mind. ‘He and my mum came to take over the running of a church in Byron Bay, up in northern New South Wales.’

  ‘But you didn’t stay with them?’

  ‘No. I didn’t.’ Bea took a deep breath, not able to discuss this today; she needed to change the topic. ‘I’m a bit worried about you, Flora. It is lovely to see you, but I’m worried about you. I hated seeing you so upset earlier. Dad said you were having a spot of b
other at school. You don’t have to talk to me, of course, but if you want to, then you can. Okay?’

  Flora cupped her mug between her palms. ‘Okay. I just didn’t want to be at home...’ She sipped at her drink, using it as a prop to avoid further explanation.

  ‘Well, I’m glad you thought of coming to me. You look lovely, a bit skinny, but lovely.’

  Flora looked up at her gran through her thick lashes. ‘Do you ever wish, Gr— Bea, that you could rewind or fast-forward time?’

  Bea stared at her granddaughter who was about to dive into life. An image filled her head from her own youth, when she was just a few years older than Flora: a narrow bed in a locked room, a plastic bowl in which to pee and a cold fear that hovered in her chest at what would happen when her time came. I’d go back to then, I’d find him. I’d be stronger! I’d run as fast as I could around the world and I would cling to him and we would grow old side by side. Bea sighed, knowing she would have done no such thing. She had had to let him go, and she did.

  ‘I guess we all do,’ she said quietly. ‘When would you go back to?’

  Flora looked up at the photos on the wall and swished her long hair over her shoulder. ‘I wouldn’t go backwards. I’d fast-forward.’

  ‘To when?’

  ‘To when I’m older and I have my own money in the bank and I can get my own apartment and do what I want.’ She jutted her chin.

  ‘Oh! And what is it you’d want to do in your own apartment?’ Bea asked nervously.

  Flora considered this. ‘I’d stay up late and go to bed whenever I wanted. I’d never eat any vegetables. I’d have a hot tub in my bedroom and put 5 Seconds of Summer posters over all the walls instead of wallpaper! Oh, and I’d get a dog.’

  ‘Really? A dog?’ Bea was touched by the innocence of her response. ‘What kind of dog?’

  ‘A French bulldog – they are so cute! And you can take them for walks or they just sit on your lap and watch TV with you. They’re perfect.’

  Bea watched as Flora’s face lit up. ‘They sound it.’

  ‘And I think if you have a good dog, it’s like having a best friend, isn’t it?’ The smile slipped from Flora’s face.

  ‘I guess it is.’ Bea wondered if they were getting closer to the heart of the problem.

  Flora picked at a thread on her cut-offs. ‘I sometimes feel like I’m the only person in the world that feels like me, like there’s this huge club of people that all know what’s going on and I’m the only one that doesn’t. Like I’m on my own.’ And just like that her tears threatened again.

  Bea squeezed her granddaughter’s hand. ‘You are not on your own, Flora. You are loved and if I can help fix things in any way, you know I will.’ It was as close as she could come to prying.

  ‘Thanks. I don’t think anyone can fix things.’ Flora blinked away her tears.

  There was a second or two of awkward silence. ‘Are you any good with computers?’ Bea eventually asked.

  ‘I guess.’ She shrugged. ‘Not bad.’

  Bea stared at her. ‘Do you know how to send an email and things?’

  Flora threw her head back against the sofa and giggled loudly, reminding Bea of the thirteen-year-old girl she was. ‘Gr— Bea! Who doesn’t know how to send an email?’

  ‘Well, me for starters! It’s not that funny! I hardly even saw a computer until I was in my forties and Pappy used to look after everything electronic. I’ve been muddling through trying to teach myself, but I don’t really know how to close anything down. I’m worried that if I press the wrong button, I’ll delete everything.’

  ‘It’s quite hard to delete everything. Where’s your laptop?’ Flora sat forward on the sofa, flicked her hair over her shoulder and cracked her knuckles.

  Bea retrieved the laptop from the kitchen and handed it to her granddaughter, who flipped the screen up and let her fingers dance competently over the keyboard before howling again. ‘You’ve got like a million things open!’ Flora shook her head, and looked skyward, reminding Bea very much of Wyatt, who often made the same gesture.

  ‘I told you I was hopeless with technology.’ Bea watched as Flora tutted and simultaneously clicked on the little flat square that made things happen.

  ‘Okay – so that’s closed a few screens down. It’s easy, Gran – Bea. You just need to know where to click!’ She nodded. ‘The Christmas Café – you have a lot of their pages open. Not that they tell you much, it’s a pretty basic website.’

  ‘Ah, yes.’ Bea gave a small cough to mask her embarrassment. ‘The lady that owns it runs this club thing and asked me to join. I just kept clicking on different pictures and things.’

  ‘Ooh, look at this!’ Flora sounded excited as she pointed at a picture. ‘It’s the street in front of the café and it’s covered in snow! I’d love to run up it and leave my footprints. It looks so pretty!’

  Bea peered at the screen. ‘Oh, it does! There’s something about snow that makes everything look so Christmassy.’

  ‘Oh, Gran! Look at the decorations in the window!’ Flora pointed at the tartan swags that were strung from one side to the other, with tiny pine cones and sprigs of heather clustered in the upward loops.

  ‘That’s beautiful, isn’t it? I think Miss McKay is far more creative than me. I thought Pappy’s Christmas lights were a grand gesture, but look at that!’

  Flora clicked on another page entitled ‘The Perfect Christmas Cupcake’.

  ‘Oh, wow! I could eat them all!’

  The two oohed and aahed at the elegant display of Christmas-themed cupcakes, each one iced with a smooth puddle of white and adorned with either tiny green holly leaves and berries or miniature Santas fashioned out of sugar paste. Along the rim of the vast silver cake stand were little sugar-paste reindeer linked by gossamer strands of sugarwork that connected them to a sleigh bulging with gifts and parcels. The iced detail was breathtaking. It was the work of a Mr Guy Baudin, who was head of design at the café of the week, Plum Patisserie in Mayfair. ‘Ooh, Mayfair, that’s very posh!’ Bea said. ‘We’re in good company.’

  ‘You could be café of the week!’ Flora enthused. ‘What would you put on your page?’

  Bea considered this. ‘Mmm, not sure. Maybe my world-famous chocolate mousse?’

  Flora wrinkled her nose and paused. ‘I think we should get Kim to think about it.’

  Bea laughed. ‘Well, that told me!’

  Flora scrolled through some of the featured cafés.

  ‘Ooh, look at that one!’ Bea pointed. ‘Kaffeehaus Lohmann in Osnabrück, wherever that is! Look at that strawberry torte! I can smell it from here.’

  ‘How long have you known about this club?’ Flora asked.

  ‘I didn’t know anything about it until I received a letter from the lady that runs it. I was clicking on pages trying to find out about the forum she mentioned, but I couldn’t figure out how to go backwards once I’d opened something. I’ve got her letter here somewhere.’

  Bea popped on her glasses and reached into her soft leather rucksack. She pulled out the correspondence and passed it to Flora, who balanced the laptop on her knees and drew it from the envelope after scrutinising the postmark and stamp.

  ‘Ooh, Scotland! That’s a good stamp.’

  ‘Yes it is; that’s what I thought. Kim said the lady who wrote the letter sounded fat, and with a fondness for cats.’

  Flora glanced up. ‘That’s funny. My teacher is a cat person, but I told her I like dogs—’

  ‘French bulldogs, to be precise,’ Bea interrupted.

  ‘Exactly!’ Flora beamed, happy that her gran had been paying attention. ‘Maybe that’s why she hates me.’

  ‘Your teacher? Oh, I’m sure she doesn’t hate you!’

  ‘Is Edinburgh near London?’ Flora changed the subject.

  ‘No!’ Bea chuckled. ‘It’s about six hundred and fifty kilometres away.’

  ‘Not that far then.’

  Bea smiled at her granddaughter: Aussie born and bred, wi
th none of the small-island attitudes that she had grown up with. When your country was so big you could fit the UK into it more than thirty-one times, what was a seven-hour car journey up the motorway?

  ‘Why do you think it’s called the Christmas Café? D’you reckon they change the name when Christmas is over? Maybe it becomes the Easter Café?’ Flora’s eyes lit up; she clearly liked this idea.

  ‘Ooh, Easter Café would be good. Nothing but chocolate – can you imagine?’ Bea drained the last of her mug. ‘Could you send her an email from me?’

  ‘Sure, do you have the address?’

  ‘Yes, I’ve got her letter.’ Bea pointed at the sheet.

  ‘No!’ Flora giggled. ‘The email address? Don’t worry, I’ll get it from the website.’

  Bea gathered the soft grey woollen wrap around her shoulders and watched as Flora tip-tapped her way dexterously across the keyboard. She found it amazing how tech-savvy this young girl was. She thought back to when she was thirteen, when she and her sister, Diane, would invent games that involved hiding objects in the garden for the other one to find, or writing plays they would then perform for their parents. Their favourite pastime had been singing along to the Top Forty every Sunday night and recording it on their radio-cassette player, trying to master the skill of hitting and releasing the pause button when the DJ was speaking between songs. That tape would then be played to death all week long, before the process was repeated the following Sunday. It was another world entirely.