Christmas for One: No Greater Love

by Amanda Prowse

  Her heart leapt with both relief and disappointment. ‘Sometimes I’m not sure that I am on the other side, not yet.’

  ‘I know how that feels.’ He nodded into the distance, looking out across the clusters of trees and the winding path.

  ‘You’d think I’d be used to disappointment, but I’m not.’ She hesitated. ‘I always believe things are going to get better, but then something comes along and pulls the rug from under me. Admittedly it’s different worries now. When I was little, I used to worry about becoming homeless. I used to wonder what would happen if agencies and charities stopped gathering up my clean pyjamas and Neville, my ratty teddy bear, and giving us both shelter.’ She glanced at him, it was rare for her to make admissions like this. ‘It was only ever me that left, being that much younger than the others. I was the one that was whisked away when things started to crack, always being told that being taken away from my family was only temporary, just until my mum got her act together and I could go home again. It was temporary for a week and then it was temporary for a month and, once, it was temporary for four years…’ Meg sniffed, imagining Lucas being bundled out in the middle of the night. ‘Oh God, look at me!’ She swiped her tears, embarrassed. ‘I think it’s the shock of finding Mr Redlitch like that. It’s made me sad.’

  ‘Of course. It was horrible.’ Edd shook his head. ‘Look, it’s getting colder.’ He shivered. ‘We could go and get something to drink if you like?’

  Meg nodded; she liked the idea very much. ‘I know, we could go to the coffee shop that they use in Friends. That’s near Central Park, isn’t it?’ She smiled.

  ‘I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but there is no such coffee shop. It’s a studio set.’

  ‘Oh.’ Meg looked at the floor, feeling a little stupid.

  ‘And I was thinking of a drink drink – something a little stronger than coffee?’ He narrowed his eyes.

  ‘Drink up.’ Edd filled her glass with red wine. Her second or third, she had lost count.

  Meg looked around the dark interior of the dimly lit wine bar a couple of blocks from the Grand Army Plaza entrance to Central Park. It was half past five and the place was practically empty apart from her and Edd, two men in suits on another table, their ties slackened and faces flushed, and the three waitresses that hovered by the bar, enjoying the lull between the late lunchers and the dinner crowds.

  ‘I feel terrible.’ Meg propped her head on her palm. ‘Poor Mr Redlitch.’ She sipped at the warm vino, which was making things better and worse at the same time. ‘I was making out that I knew him and all the time he was dead. Poor man.’

  Edd lifted the bottle and let the remains of the house red glug into his glass. ‘You weren’t to know.’

  Meg shrugged. It made little difference, she still felt bad. ‘And the way Victor looked at me when I had to confess I didn’t know him at all – that was just as bad. He looked so disappointed. I’m sorry, Victor.’ Meg leant on the table with her arms folded inwards, cradling her glass of plonk against her chest.

  ‘Look at it this way, if you hadn’t lied to Victor, Mr Redlitch would have lain there a lot longer and that would have been worse for everyone.’

  ‘How long do you think he’d been dead?’ she asked, biting her nails.

  ‘They said about a fortnight, which coincides with when we first tried to contact him.’

  ‘Did they say how he died?’

  Edd sighed. ‘It looks like he had a heart attack and just keeled over. It would have been very quick and painless.’

  Meg looked at him, suspecting he offered the last detail by way of comfort and based on no particular knowledge. ‘I wish I knew what his first name was.’ She felt her tears pool.

  ‘It began with G, I know that, but that’s all. It doesn’t really matter now.’

  ‘It matters to me. I want to say a little prayer for him, and “Mr Redlitch” sounds so formal.’

  ‘Do you believe in God?’

  ‘Sometimes,’ Meg confessed, ‘and sometimes not. You?’

  ‘Same, I guess. I think it’s hard to believe, when you’ve been tested…’ He let this trail and waved his hand in the air for the waitress – they required another bottle.

  Meg once again rested her head against her upturned palm. ‘I saw him.’

  ‘You saw who?’

  ‘Mr G. Redlitch. Well, I saw part of him.’

  ‘Oh.’

  Meg nodded. ‘I saw his hand and arm as I looked back into his flat. It was dark and seemed a bit deflated.’

  Edd exhaled. ‘You need to put that out of your head. It wasn’t him. Just the shell of him.’

  ‘That doesn’t sound like the words of someone who doesn’t believe in God.’

  Edd flicked the edge of the cardboard drinks coaster with his thumb. ‘Well, as I said, sometimes I do.’

  The middle-aged waitress popped the cork and leant forward, placing the bottle on the table. ‘To young lovers!’ She smiled as she sauntered back to the bar.

  Edd gave her the smile that had been absent for the last hour or two. Meg blushed, awkward and yet excited as she thought about the previous evening and their inauspicious, flirtatious meeting in the deli. She felt comfortable in his company, despite only having known him for such a short time, but couldn’t say if the glow she felt was down to the wine or something else entirely.

  ‘I think we should finish this and go and get some fresh air.’ Edd reached for the bottle and refilled both their glasses.

  ‘That’s a good idea. Where shall we go?’ Meg sat forward, enjoying the wine-soaked euphoria that flooded through her body.

  ‘Central Park again?’

  ‘No! Let’s go to the top of the Empire State Building!’ She clapped.

  ‘Okay!’ He laughed. ‘If that’s what you want to do.’

  ‘It is! Have you done it before?’

  Edd considered this. ‘Yes, years ago. I went on a trip with my school.’

  Meg laughed loudly, then instantly felt guilty as she remembered someone had died. ‘You went on a school trip to the Empire State Building? I went on a school trip to Ealing Bus Station to learn about transport and you went to the top of the Empire State Building!’

  ‘Only because Ealing Bus Station was already booked.’ He smiled, wondering where Ealing Bus Station was.

  Meg nipped to the loo and met Edd outside, where he had managed to hail a cab. She wobbled on the pavement before sliding into the back and sitting close to him, happy to feel his form next to hers.

  She leant across him as they drove southwards, peering into the windows of Macy’s. Santa Claus sat in a huge red leather chair with a giant Christmas tree lit up behind him. Presents were stacked high all around and he waved to children as they stopped to stare at the festive scene. Meg’s head was fuzzy with wine and excitement. ‘Look, it’s Santa and it’s nearly Christmas!’ She cheered, bouncing up and down on the seat.

  ‘Don’t remind me, I have a deadline to make, remember?’ he quipped.

  ‘It’ll all be okay, Edd. And you know what? Seeing Mr G. Redlitch like that earlier has made me think. You’re right, it does put things into perspective. We can’t worry too much about opening dates, we just need to live a little and count our blessings!’ She flung her arms wide.

  ‘That’s a good motto. And I shall remind you of it tomorrow.’ Edd laughed; she was clearly more inebriated than him.

  The cab pulled up at 350 Fifth Avenue and the two rushed inside. They joined the throng of tourists waiting for the elevator to the top, then squashed into it like beans in a can. Meg lost sight of Edd as she was squeezed into the corner, surrounded by people taller than her.

  They made their way to the glass double doors and on to the balcony of the 86th Floor. It was a lot narrower than Meg had imagined, quite different from what she’d come to expect from countless movie shots. The chill wind whipped her face, but it was a minor discomfort and worth it for the view, which was breathtaking.

  ‘Wow!’ Her ey
es scanned the New York landmarks lit up against the crisp dark sky. It was the perfect time of day to appreciate the sights.

  Edd stood close behind her and pointed over her shoulder into the distance. ‘There’s the Brooklyn Bridge and you can just make out Central Park.’ They walked around a bit further. ‘And the Chrysler Building!’

  Meg smiled and held her scarf close around her neck. ‘This has a much, much better view than Ealing Bus Station.’ She stood back, teetering slightly as she peered at the spire. ‘Poor old King Kong.’ She frowned.

  ‘I know, right?’ Edd shook his head. ‘I don’t tell many people this, but I cried when they shot him at the end. I cried like a baby.’

  ‘Oh, Edd! How old were you?’

  ‘Twenty-three,’ Edd replied.

  Meg couldn’t tell if he was joking. She stared at him, her expression solemn. ‘Well, as we are confessing, I’m embarrassed to admit that until very recently I didn’t know that seahorses were real. I always believed them to be mythical creatures like unicorns and yetis. I had of course seen pictures and I remember the famous scene in Bedknobs and Broomsticks when they dance around on the bottom of the sea, but I never for a moment imagined they existed, not in real life. I mean c’mon! A little horse-faced creature with a curly tail that lives in water, with the males carrying all the babies – who were they trying to kid?’

  ‘What, you thought they were invented? Like Donald Duck or the Little Mermaid?’ Edd smirked.

  ‘Yes! Exactly like that! Can you imagine my shock when I saw one, in fact not one but a whole bunch of them in a tank at the London Aquarium? I screamed and pointed. People laughed at me, three tourists took my picture! I just stood there, shaking my head in confusion. I tried to explain that for me it was the equivalent of coming face to face with a centaur clip-clopping down the high street while a griffin circled overhead. I still get shuddery if I think about it, a real live seahorse! I thought they were beautiful as imaginary beings, but in real life they were even more stunning. They fascinate me.’

  ‘Are you for real?’

  Meg nodded.

  ‘That is possibly the cutest thing I have ever heard.’ He laughed.

  For some reason Meg felt very close to tears. How could she explain to someone like Edd that she had never gone anywhere and hadn’t seen enough to challenge her imagination? She gazed up at him, happier to look at him than the view of New York State that stretched for miles behind her.

  Edd took a step towards her. ‘And just for the record, I don’t really think you are ugly, Mary Poppins.’

  Meg smiled. ‘But you were right. I am single.’

  ‘Well, that makes me very happy to hear.’ He grinned and reached for her hands, which he held inside his own. Then he bent down, hesitated and kissed her very gently on the mouth. As he did so, the gentlest flutter of snowflakes landed on her upturned face.

  Meg closed her eyes and spoke quietly. ‘It’s snowing and you just kissed me on top of the Empire State Building.’

  ‘Yes I did.’

  ‘I think you knocked my socks off…’ She decided not to mention her spinning knickers.

  ‘Is that a good thing?’ he asked, a little self-consciously.

  Meg opened her eyes. ‘It’s a very good thing.’

  ‘What should we do now?’ Edd whispered into her hair.

  ‘I’d quite like another one of those kisses,’ she whispered back as she threw her arms around his neck.

  6

  Meg woke with a start. Her mouth was dry and her eyes heavy. She sat up in the bed and gasped, clutching at the unfamiliar white sheets in the unfamiliar room. Some walls were exposed brick, the others were painted white; all were picture-free. The contemporary chandelier that hung low over the bed was fashioned from green glass bottles with the bottoms cut out to reveal retro-looking light bulbs with quirky-shaped filaments. Wherever she was, it definitely wasn’t her chintzy room at the Inn on 11th. She opened and closed her mouth. Her tongue felt thick and she clearly hadn’t cleaned her teeth before falling asleep – a big no-no.

  ‘Morning.’

  She turned her head. Edd’s broad, naked back was stretched out in the space next to her.

  ‘Oh my God!’ She tucked her hair behind her ears and ran the pad of her index finger over her eyelashes, confirming she still had yesterday’s make-up on – a double no-no. She could only guess at how bad she looked.

  ‘Headache?’ he asked.

  ‘Yes, but that’s not what’s bothering me!’ She placed her hand over her mouth.

  ‘What’s wrong?’

  ‘I’m a tart!’ she wailed.

  ‘What?’ He turned his head towards her and opened his eyes.

  ‘I’m such a tart! I’ve only known you five minutes and I’m waking up in your bed!’ She shook her head. ‘Oh my God! I can’t believe it. I never do anything like this. I mean never, ever!’

  Edd laughed. ‘Don’t worry, you didn’t “do anything like this”! We got back here late and you kind of collapsed. I didn’t know where you were staying and so it just seemed logical.’ He let his palms fall against the mattress.

  ‘Oh.’ She exhaled. ‘So nothing happened?’ She looked away from him – easier to hear the details without looking at his face.

  ‘Well, not nothing… just a little making out. But no more than second base, I swear!’ He raised his hands as if taking an oath.

  ‘What’s second base?’ She turned back to face him.

  Edd chuckled. ‘It’s a baseball metaphor. Nothing you wouldn’t do as a tenth grader, particularly if you were Jennifer Molowski.’

  ‘What’s tenth grade? Is that a baseball term too?’

  ‘No, jheesh! It’s a school grade, aged about sixteen, seventeen.’

  Meg peeled back the sheets and looked down at her body. Thankfully she wasn’t naked; she had her pants on and an oversized sports top of some description. ‘What am I wearing?’ She plucked at the white fabric run through with a navy pinstripe.

  ‘You have the honour of wearing my third most treasured possession in the world.’ He grinned. ‘And I had the honour of helping you into it.’

  ‘Well thank you.’ She blushed. ‘What is it?’ She ran her hand over the appliquéd logo on the front.

  Edd turned over and sat up against the padded black headboard, seemingly less awkward in his near-naked state than Meg. ‘It’s my Yankees shirt.’

  ‘Are they a football team?’ she asked, glancing surreptitiously at his hard chest and muscular arms, all dappled with dark freckles that matched the ones on his nose. She was delighted to see that he was wearing red and yellow plaid pyjama bottoms.

  ‘Football?’ He tutted. ‘You see, if they didn’t spend all their time in British schools teaching you witchcraft and wizardry, you might know that there are very important sports in the world other than football and Quidditch.’

  ‘You got me! I’m a Hogwarts graduate!’ She smiled, thinking of her own inner-city school, where the cosmopolitan mix meant that much of the lesson time was taken up with trying to make instructions understood in five different languages and where if you made it to the fifth form without leaving to have a baby or being sent to a youth detention centre, you were considered a high achiever.

  ‘The Yankees are the greatest team on earth and they play baseball.’ He looked serious.

  ‘Are you baseball obsessed? You’ve mentioned it a lot.’

  ‘In a word, yes.’

  ‘Don’t think we have much baseball in England.’ Meg pondered this.

  ‘Then it’s nowhere I could ever live,’ he said, quite matter-of-factly.

  ‘What are your other two?’

  ‘My other two what?’

  ‘Treasured possessions?’

  ‘The second is this.’ He reached for the black leather-bound notebook on the bedside table and flipped it open in the middle, pulling from it a fabric badge shaped like a shield. It had the words ‘New York’s Bravest’ on it. Blocks of blue and red sat behind the
city skyline and the whole thing was edged with a thick gold embroidered border. ‘It’s my dad’s old one.’

  Meg ran her fingers over it. ‘It’s nice. Was your dad a policeman?’ She handed the badge back to him and watched as he ran his fingers over it before placing it back between the pages of his notebook.

  ‘No, a firefighter. You know it’s the only way I can picture him, in his uniform, either coming in from or heading out to work.’

  ‘That’s a nice memory to have.’ She considered what she knew about his death. ‘Was he caught in a fire?’

  Edd stared at her, letting his eyes travel over her face and form. ‘He was killed in 9/11.’ He paused, letting this sink in. ‘After the first plane hit, they got the call and had just arrived when the second plane hit the South Tower. We know he was making his way into the South Tower when it collapsed.’

  ‘Oh my God.’ Megan stared at the book with the badge lying between its pages. ‘Edd…’ She shook her head, searching for the right words.

  ‘I don’t talk about it to most people.’

  She smiled, acknowledging the compliment as he continued,

  ‘It’s strange for me. That’s the day that the whole of New York mourns and so my grief isn’t special.’

  ‘Does that make it harder or easier?’ she wondered.

  ‘Easier at first, I didn’t feel alone because there was so much support, I could feel the love and thoughts of everyone in the city, the country all pulling together. We got messages from all over the world. It was incredible.’

  ‘But now?’ she asked.

  ‘Now, I sometimes feel like shouting that I know it’s everyone’s tragedy, but he was my dad! My dad and I lost him and only I know what that feels like. Does that make sense?’

  She nodded.

  ‘Like I said, it’s not something we talk about often, but every New Yorker carries it around in a little pocket just below their heart and once in a while we let it out, release the pain and sadness and then we tuck it away again, so we can get on with everyday life.’ He looked up at her. ‘I think that’s why I can talk to you about it because you weren’t here, you don’t have your own version of the day. It makes it easier somehow.’