Christmas for One: No Greater Love

by Amanda Prowse

  ‘Having second thoughts?’ Milly asked from the doorframe on which she leant.

  ‘Yes and then no and then yes again immediately after,’ Meg confessed as Lucas climbed down from the bed.

  Milly snorted. ‘Look, it’s easy. If you change your mind, just jump on a bloody plane. You’ll be with us in no time!’

  ‘You can bring your friend!’ Lucas did a little jig on the spot.

  ‘He’s right.’ Milly smiled. ‘You can. And do me a favour, Meg, go check on Juno and the new site, make sure there are no more D.E.A.D. B.O.D.I.E.S. lurking behind the counter or in the cupboards. I think that might be off-putting while people are trying to tuck into their tarte tatin.’

  ‘I will.’ Meg smiled.

  Early the next day, after a flurry of kisses and last-minute hugs, Meg waved Milly and Lucas off in the back of their luxury taxi bound for Gatwick. She sat in front of her laptop and read the latest email from Juno – who was apparently being stalked by Elene, getting daily reminders not to forget her invite to the big launch party! Meg laughed out loud. She could just imagine it.

  Edd’s email was less funny, more moving: I’m wondering how I get through the festive season without you. This separation thing doesn’t seem to be getting any easier…

  Meg closed the lid and squealed with anticipation, thinking, You don’t have to, my love. I’m on my way! She clenched her fists and closed her eyes, beyond excited.

  After retrieving the post and booking her cab for the airport, Meg was in the front hallway when she felt a wave of panic wash over her. Sitting on the step, she ran her fingers through her hair, still damp from the shower.

  ‘Oh God! What am I doing?’ she muttered at the floor, her head hanging down.

  ‘Morning, chérie. All okay?’ Guy bent down and lifted the curtain of hair that covered her face, then let it fall again once he was confident there were no tears.

  ‘Oh, Guy, am I doing the right thing? I can’t believe I’m doing this. What if I am about to make the biggest mistake of my life? I waved Lucas off earlier.’ She couldn’t help but think of the nights she had spent in care, away from her family. She had to admit that this was very different, in that he was off to stay in a lovely villa in the Caribbean where he would be doted on morning, noon and night, but still, Meg felt like she was abandoning him nonetheless.

  ‘Lucas will be spoilt rotten and have a ball. He told me he was getting an iPad!’ Guy laughed.

  Meg giggled, wondering who else he had told. ‘It’s not only that I’m worried about Lucas. I know nothing about this man really and I am about to jump on a plane and turn up, declaring my undying love and wanting to stay for Christmas! Am I mad? Is this insane?’ She glanced up for the first time with a look of panic.

  ‘Yes. You are a little bit mad and yes, it’s insane…’

  ‘Please tell me there is a “but”.’

  ‘But, you know, Meg, when you first came here, all beated up and pregnant and grubby…’

  Meg screwed her nose up; she hadn’t realised this was how he saw her.

  ‘… I would never have imagined how you would have bloomed like a flower in front of me. You are beautiful, Meg, and so young still. You have to live this life and if that means following your heart and taking a risk…’ Guy raised his palms and shrugged. ‘… then that’s what you should do. If you don’t, you will regret it forever. Anyway, one look at you and anyone can see that you have already fallen; it’s too late to reverse your heart.’

  She smiled at him and his lovely expression. He was right, it was too late to reverse her heart. ‘Thank you, Guy.’

  ‘Mon plaisir. And don’t forget, chérie, if it’s not what you think it is, you can always come home to those who love you. We’ll be here.’

  ‘Thank you,’ she said again, thinking of Christopher’s similar words of support. It was so lovely being loved.

  ‘Now!’ He clapped his hands. ‘Are you rushing off to the airport or do you have time for a warm frangipane aux framboises with thick cream and a strong cup of coffee?’ He inhaled. ‘I can smell them from here!’

  Meg stood and dusted down the back of her jeans. ‘I’m not flying until eleven and besides, I’ve always got time for warm frangipane aux framboises!’

  Guy placed his arm across her back and ushered her inside. ‘Your French accent is terrible, we need to work on that.’

  ‘I’ll try harder.’

  ‘Bon.’ He beamed.

  ‘I wasn’t grubby, Guy,’ she whispered as they stepped into the café.

  ‘Oui, chérie, you were grubby,’ Guy murmured.

  ‘Is that because your English isn’t too good? You don’t mean “grubby”, do you?’ She looked up at him.

  ‘My English is perfect and you were grubby.’

  *

  Meg checked in and took a seat in the departure lounge. Nerves and excitement swirled around inside her stomach. She pulled out her phone and devoured the latest text from Edd.

  6 a.m. and already been for my morning run. Impressive, huh?! Gotta keep in shape, I have a hot British girlfriend who I have to impress. Kinda wish she was closer right now…

  Sames, was Meg’s succinct reply.

  She held the phone to her chest and blinked slowly. She will be closer, and sooner than you think!

  As she watched the planes coming and going at the various gates, her head was with Lucas, way up above the clouds. He was probably playing with his new iPad, if everything had gone according to plan. Lucky boy! She smiled at the thought of him.

  She patted the small square package that sat snugly in the front pocket of her handbag. She hadn’t considered buying a Christmas gift for Edd. Ironically, even though she was in love with him, she didn’t know him well enough to buy for. What was his taste in socks, music, books? She decided on no present, but maybe a spontaneous gift if they spotted something on their wanderings. Her stomach clenched in excited anticipation at the prospect. She pictured the two of them perusing a flea market before stopping for coffee and a cake at the Doughnut Plant, where she would happily demolish their famous crème brûlée doughnut, one of the finest things she had ever tasted. Fate, however, had had another idea. As she’d made her way along Curzon Street a couple of days before, with an armful of fresh vegetables and an apricot-stuffed loin of lamb, she’d felt drawn to the window of Amy Bauer the jeweller. There, sitting proudly on a little raised glass plinth, was a pair of silver cufflinks. Not just any cufflinks, but cufflinks with seahorses engraved onto them. The flat silver discs, displayed side by side, each carried one of the creatures and they were facing each other, as if they were about to link tails, snout to snout. Perfect.

  13

  The taxi queue at JFK Airport was long and snaked back into the terminal. Meg bounded towards it and took her place; as this was the second time in as many weeks that she had been here, the routine now seemed quite familiar. She heard the beep of a horn and the bark of a cabbie and grinned: she was back in New York and within the hour, assuming her man wasn’t at the Yankees stadium or visiting his favourite deli, she would be in his arms. A jolt of happiness fired through her body and ricocheted along her limbs. She twitched with impatience. Edward, Edward… Isabel was right; it was a fine name.

  ‘Move it along now! Move it along!’ The guard rolled his hand, keen to get this line of passengers off the rank, ready for the next wave of arrivals.

  It was busier than it had been last time. Everyone was trying to get home for the holidays, weighed down by luggage, gifts and an extra carrier bag or two of airport-shop booty. The wind had dropped in the six days since she had left and it felt all the warmer for it. Six days, was that all? This was a crazy life she was living, nipping back and forth across the Atlantic like she was a film star. Truth was, she felt like a film star, with the world at her feet.

  Meg looked out of the taxi window and narrowed her eyes to better glimpse the Statue of Liberty.

  ‘Your first time in New York?’ The cabbie leant into the mi
ddle of the car to speak through the gap in the grille.

  ‘No! I’ve been once before. I love it here…’ I do now. ‘And my boyfriend lives here, so I’ve come for Christmas!’ She giggled, still feeling a swell of joy at the idea of her boyfriend, the most perfect man on the planet.

  ‘You got much planned?’ he asked as he navigated the three lanes of traffic leading towards the city.

  Meg shook her head. ‘Not really.’ She pictured them on the sofa, her wearing his Yankees shirt and him in his red and yellow plaid pyjama bottoms. ‘We are just going to eat takeout in front of the television; he has a lot of work to catch up on.’

  She smiled out of the window as she mentally formalised the plan for the holidays. Edd could work and she would drag him out to the Greenwich Avenue Deli for a treat. Truth was, she would be happy never to leave the apartment. As long as they were together, that was all that mattered. Uninterrupted time with no alarm set – bliss!

  As they got closer, Meg pulled her make-up bag from her holdall and removed the faintest smudge of mascara from beneath one eye. She applied her nude lipstick and then kissed the excess into a tissue. A quick spritz of her favourite fragrance, Calvin Klein’s Eternity, and she was all set.

  The taxi driver was delighted with his generous tip, a direct result of her buoyant, heady mood. ‘Happy holidays!’ he boomed.

  After straightening her hemline and taking a deep breath, Meg flicked her hair from her collar and walked to the front door of the block on East 12th, pushing the button for apartment 18. She swallowed her nerves, her mouth dry, wondering what her first words should be. She decided to go with ‘Delivery for Mr Kelly!’ and then stand quietly, allowing the penny to drop. She would then place the cufflink box on the flat of her palm and simply stand with her hand out. She almost squealed with excitement.

  ‘Hello?’ The voice was slightly muffled over the intercom.

  ‘Oh, sorry! I think I’ve buzzed the wrong apartment!’ Meg released the button and gave a small laugh with her hand over her mouth. The woman didn’t sound too happy at having been disturbed. Meg checked her watch; it was early afternoon, surely not too early.

  She ran her fingers over the panel and this time determinedly pressed the circle numbered 18.

  ‘Hello?’ It was the same voice; this time her tone was more questioning.

  ‘Oh God, I’m really sorry. I’ve done it again!’ Meg racked her brain, trying to remember Edd’s apartment number; she had clearly got the wrong one.

  ‘Who is it you are trying to reach?’ The woman’s manner was a little clipped, impatient.

  ‘Oh, no one, I’m sorry. Well, I mean, yes, someone, obviously! But not you. I was after Edd, Edward Kelly.’ Meg cringed as she hopped on the spot. This was no way to endear herself to his neighbours.

  ‘Oh, right. Well, you have the right apartment, but he’s not here right now.’

  ‘Oh?’ Meg stood still; the wind blew her hair across her face. Her voice was small. Who was this? A cleaner? Friend? Cousin? She mentally ran through the possibilities.

  The woman continued in a brisk New York accent. ‘He’s shopping right now, but should be back any time. Was he expecting you?’ She sounded puzzled and was far too informed and asking too many questions for a cleaner.

  ‘Not really, no.’ Meg heard her heart beating loudly in her ears. ‘Sorry, but who am I talking to?’

  ‘Flavia, Edd’s girlfriend. And you are…?’

  Flavia. Carb- and protein-free, organic Flavia. Meg placed her hand on her chest. Ssssshhh. Her head swam and her legs felt like lead. Her chest heaved with dry sobs, her tears yet to catch up with the tsunami of sadness that engulfed her. I should have known. I should have known. She replayed Christopher’s words of advice: ‘Make sure everything is as he says it is. In my experience, young men when faced with a pretty girl will say and do just about anything to win them over.’

  ‘Won’t they just,’ Meg muttered.

  ‘Excuse me?’ Flavia strained to hear.

  ‘Oh, nothing. I was just…’ Meg swallowed the sob that was building in her throat. She pictured herself at nine years of age, walking into the sitting room of yet another foster family on Christmas Day. It was a house that smelled of dog. The mum had a purple paper crown on her head that was ripped and clashed with her bright red hair and she was talking to a fat aunt that had appeared. She remembered the way they all stopped talking, staring at her as though expecting a performance. She had stuck out her chest, clenched her palms, slick with sweat, and twisted her foot inside her black elasticated plimsolls. ‘I’m Megan,’ she had announced and they gazed at her in silence as if to say, so what? And she had realised in that second that she was nothing special.

  ‘I… I’m Meg. I work for Plum Patisserie.’ She cursed herself for having given too much information. It was an automatic response, given as she tried to control the wobble to her voice and attempted to steady her legs, which swayed beneath her. ‘I’m sorry, I…’ Meg tried, but there were no words for how she was feeling.

  ‘Hello? Are you okay?’ Flavia’s voice brought her firmly to the present and she realised that nothing had changed, she was still Megan, arriving unannounced, unwanted and surplus to requirements. Nothing special.

  Looking up and down the street, she was struck by the appalling thought that she might bump into Edd as he returned home to his girlfriend, laden down with goodies for the festive period, which they would spend on the sofa in his apartment. Even the idea of that was more than she could stand. Meg picked up her small suitcase and ran. At the first turning she came to, she found herself on First Avenue. Placing her luggage on the pavement by her feet, she leant against the wall and clutched her stomach as if in pain. Picturing Lucas, she felt a very, very long way from home.

  A howl escaped from her and she bent forward, trying to contain the noise. Great gulps of distress rippled through her body. She didn’t care that people stared, she didn’t care that a couple laughed. She didn’t care about much. Her heart ached in her chest and the thud of a headache throbbed behind her temples. Wiping her tears as fast as they fell, she smeared make-up onto the sleeve of her coat and sniffed, loudly.

  ‘Oh God! You stupid, stupid cow,’ she muttered, running her hands through her hair and trying to catch her breath between sobs.

  Eventually her crying slowed and her breath found an almost natural rhythm.

  ‘Are you okay?’

  Meg recognised the voice from the intercom. She looked up at the woman standing on the pavement. She was holding her silky, patterned, kimono-style top closed over a tight, pale blue vest, her long legs were encased in skinny jeans and cowboy boots, and she had short dark hair, wide, almond eyes and a large, fabulous chest. She reminded Meg of a vintage-styled doll; she was perfect.

  ‘Is it Meg?’ The woman approached, bending slightly to get a better look at the crumpled mess in front of her.

  Meg nodded as she stared at beautiful, beautiful Flavia. Not a badge of protest or a hemp shoe in sight. No wonder Edd wasn’t seriously interested in her – how could he be? Meg knew she could never measure up. She placed her arms across her flat chest, feeling stupid for thinking she might have been able to.

  ‘I was talking to you via the intercom but getting no response.’ Flavia pointed back towards her home. ‘I came to find you to say if it’s a work thing then come on up to the apartment and wait. I could make you a coffee?’

  I’ve already had a coffee in your apartment, made in that flashy coffee maker. I drank it from your plain white mug and I sat on the sofa before falling into your bed. Oh God!

  ‘You seem really upset – what’s wrong?’

  Flavia’s concern made Meg cry even harder. It would have been easier if she’d been a cow.

  ‘Oh!’ Meg swiped at her tears. ‘It’s just because we are so pushed at work and I need to get a few things sorted. I think I’m just very tired.’

  Flavia let her eyes widen and her mouth twist in irritation at any woman that co
uld get in such a state over something so seemingly trivial.

  ‘Do you want to come up and wait for Edd? The offer’s there.’ She splayed her fingers, which Meg checked for an engagement ring. There wasn’t one, although this was scant consolation in the grand scheme of things.

  Meg shook her head. ‘No. No, it can wait. I think I’ll get back to the office and get a grip!’ She tried to laugh. ‘But thanks.’

  She straightened her back and gathered up her bag as Flavia sauntered back along the pavement to the apartment she shared with Edward Odhran Kelly.

  Meg looked up and down the street and tried to think what to do next. She needed a base from which to make calls, use her computer and wash her face. Thankfully, she knew just the place.

  As the taxi headed west, Meg ducked down to avoid any last views of East 12th and Edd’s apartment block, pretending to fumble in her handbag on the floor, until it was nothing more than an upscale pile of bricks in the rearview mirror.

  The cab bumped the kerb on Bleecker Street outside Plum Patisserie. Despite her broken heart, she felt warmed by the logo that always made her feel at home.

  The outside of the café looked beautiful. The windows were sparklingly clean and well lit, bursting with panniers of baguettes and crusty golden boules de campagne. Ornate glass stands displayed a sumptuous array of baked goods that shone like pastel-tinted jewels. They had done it! In just six days since she had last visited, Juno and the team had pulled it off. Meg was glad of this for two reasons. Firstly, all their hard work had been worth it. Secondly, she was confident that Juno would make a great success of the place; and if things at Bleecker Street ran like clockwork, there would be no need for her to come here again – ever. That thought brought a small amount of calm to the rising tide of panic inside her.

  Meg hovered outside and used a wet wipe, normally reserved for Lucas’s sticky mitts, to remove the residual mascara that clung to a lash or two. She pinched her cheeks in lieu of blusher and blew her nose. Smiling, she pushed on the door. What she found wasn’t quite what she expected.