Christmas at Little Beach Street Bakery

by Jenny Colgan

  “But well done for raking everything up again. Well done for reminding me of how I messed up. Ruined my life.”

  Polly jumped up and stepped toward her mother.

  “Um, we should go, maybe?” said Kerensa.

  “You should,” said Doreen.

  “Are you going to be all right?” said Polly, reaching out, but her mother turned away and wouldn’t look at her.

  “Nobody asked me that then,” she said. “I don’t know why you’re bothering to ask now.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  So,” said Kerensa, after they’d driven some way in silence. It was getting late; the air was misting up and it was turning even colder. “That went well.”

  Polly winced through her sobs.

  “Oh God,” she said. “Oh God. Tell me that wasn’t as awful as I think it was.”

  “Well, it could have gone worse.”

  “How? How could that have gone worse, Kerensa?”

  “Um, a huge monster could have burst through the front window and wreaked bloody havoc everywhere. Zombie apocalypse? Nuclear bomb?”

  There was a long silence.

  “Oh Lord.”

  Polly checked her phone. She’d texted her apologies immediately but didn’t expect to hear back, and she hadn’t.

  “Well, look on the bright side. She wasn’t coming for Christmas anyway.”

  “Kerensa! How’s that meant to cheer me up?”

  “What do you want me to do?”

  “I don’t know.”

  Polly leaned her head against the cool glass of the window pane, a tear running down her face.

  “Oh God, she really thought I’d been running around with my dad, playing happy families with Carmel.”

  They drove on in silence.

  “Can I say something?” said Kerensa.

  “Something more? More than you would usually just say?”

  “Yeah.”

  “I can’t imagine what it might be.”

  “No, listen, right. I don’t want to diss your mum, but honestly, if you wanted to see your dad, and she’d point-blank refused to talk about him but spent a lot of time being miserable about it and putting the misery kind of on to you . . . I did ask permission to say this, by the way.”

  “Yeah, right, I get that,” said Polly.

  “Well. Honestly, I kind of think it’s your business. It’s your dad. He may have been an awful one . . . he may not have told his wife he even had another kid, although she obviously knew something was going on . . .”

  “I bet it wasn’t the first time,” said Polly.

  “Or the last,” said Kerensa. “Traveling bloody salesmen! Ha! That’s probably where they get their reputation.”

  Polly sighed.

  “You see what I mean, though?” said Kerensa, as they pushed on through the harsh winter night. “You do know a little more now. But also, if you want to see him—if you want anything to do with him—well, it’s up to you. You don’t have to ask permission. Your mum . . . she needs to get over it.”

  “But she’s so upset.”

  “I’ve known you a long time,” said Kerensa. “And you know what? I don’t think I’ve ever known your mum not upset about something. I think that’s why you’re so cheery all the time.”

  Polly was barely listening. She couldn’t help thinking how happy her mother must have been when she got the job at Dinnogs; her mum, who’d left school without many qualifications; who’d been the pride of her family when she’d landed such a posh job.

  She’d lost it of course when she’d gotten pregnant; Polly knew that much. They’d said it was because of cutbacks and that people were buying fewer hats, but Doreen had known the truth: even in the eighties, being an unmarried mother carried a certain stigma. She’d slunk home, defeated before she’d even begun. And Polly had been paying the price ever since.

  “You remember Loraine Armstrong?” said Kerensa, apropos of nothing.

  Polly nodded. Loraine’s mum had been a young single mother too, and the pair had elicited snotty remarks and sidelong glances when they went clubbing together and to pubs, her mum often insisting to strangers after a couple of drinks that they looked more like sisters than mother and daughter. Doreen had always found them horrific.

  “I reckon they had a better time than you guys did.”

  Polly reflected on it.

  “I do too,” she said finally. “Oh Lord. Take me home.”

  As they approached Mount Polbearne, Kerensa fell silent. Polly, roused from her own deep thoughts, glanced across at her.

  “What’s on your mind?”

  Kerensa swallowed.

  “Do you think that’s what Reuben would be like? If . . . you know. If he found out.”

  “You still don’t know for sure,” said Polly. Kerensa stroked her huge bump, a sad look on her face. She could barely reach the steering wheel. She looked at Polly.

  “Seriously. You don’t know how badly I was ovulating that night. It was one of those times of the month where you’d fancy a tramp.”

  Polly nodded. They sat in silence.

  “Because if he found out . . . I mean, I don’t know what he’d do.”

  “You mean—God forbid—the baby would have to grow up like me?” said Polly.

  “No!” said Kerensa. “That’s not what I meant at all. And anyway,” she added, “that would be a good thing.”

  Polly sighed crossly.

  “It wouldn’t be a good thing,” she said eventually. “You’re going to have to tough it out. You absolutely are.”

  Kerensa looked at her.

  “What if it’s born with a thick black moustache?”

  “Like we said before, invent an Italian grandfather or something. I mean it. Sort it out. Do it.”

  “You can’t tell Huckle. You can’t.”

  Polly was still in two minds about it. It felt such a horrible dilemma. She wanted to tell him everything. But he was Reuben’s best friend. His best man. The only reason Kerensa had met Reuben in the first place. Yet he was also Polly’s other half, her fiancé. It was horrible. She didn’t know how he’d react—she didn’t know if he would even know himself. Could she risk it? Sometimes she thought that of course she could, it would be fine, but there was always a chance that it might not be. And then where would they all be?

  Deep down she suspected it might be something only another woman would understand. A mistake on this level, something that would affect your whole life.

  Huckle understood things. He was amazing. But could anybody understand this happening to their best friend?

  “I haven’t,” she said.

  “You can’t, Pol. You can’t. If I’m to have a shot at this, you absolutely can’t.”

  Polly bit her lip and thought of her mother’s hollow life. She agreed with Kerensa, but she felt entirely conflicted; entirely awful about it. About everything.

  They rumbled across the causeway. The harbor lampposts were festooned with strings of plain white lights. Mount Polbearne didn’t have much of a budget to compete with the fancier displays in the bigger towns, but the lights suited the cobbled streets, forming long dips and chains between the old-fashioned lampposts built to withstand the spray and wind. There were red bows on the lampposts too, and twinkling trees and candles in every window. The town looked extraordinarily lovely, filled with a deep peace; a lovely passing into the quietest season, of night and cozy beds and bright sharp stars glimmering overhead.

  Kerensa drew up at the lighthouse door. The place was in darkness; Huckle must be sleeping. Polly kissed Kerensa gently on the cheek, then jumped down, wincing at the freezing air, as the Range Rover roared away.

  The lighthouse was bitterly cold. She checked in on Neil underneath the kitchen table but didn’t even stop to make a cup of tea. Huckle grunted, rather sleepily, as she moved her frozen feet toward his lovely warm body, so she rolled over, staring out of the window, where they still hadn’t gotten around to putting curtains up. The stars looked whit
e and pale against the freezing air; she was blowing out steam when she breathed out, the house was so cold. She couldn’t warm up at all; couldn’t even take warmth from Huckle. Instead she just lay there, desperately wiggling her toes, trying to see a way through.

  She could only think of one: carry on as normal. Sometimes, if you pretended everything was normal, you had a chance of making it so. Keep buggering on, as the saying went. She couldn’t think of anything else. Her mum would come around. They’d make it up. After all, she thought glumly, who else did they have but each other?

  Work. Work would solve everything.

  Chapter Eighteen

  The next morning, Huckle was surprised and pleased to see Polly up and bustling about quite merrily, apart from a slight headache.

  “Hey?” he said cautiously.

  Polly turned round with her normal smile on her face.

  “Hey,” she said.

  “You okay?”

  “I’m fine,” she said. “Cheese scone?”

  “YES! God, I like living with you.”

  Polly popped a warm slice, covered in salty butter, into his mouth.

  “Oh, heaven. So . . .”

  She shook her head to indicate she didn’t really want to talk about it.

  “My family’s bananas,” she said. “And it’s the village fair on Saturday. So . . .”

  “All families are bananas,” said Huckle.

  “Exactly. They’re all nuts. Nuts and bananas.”

  “An ice cream sundae.”

  “Precisely. So I’ve decided. There’s no point in dwelling on it for years and years and years. They’re screwed up, but it’s not my fault, so I’m just going to get on with things and stop beating myself up about it. They did all the mad stuff, not me. I don’t want anything to do with it. We are going to make a tremendous Christmas for Reuben, then pay off the puffin shelter so the puffins are safe, which will be more of a contribution to this earthly existence than I ever expected to make, then we are going to take the remainder of the money and go somewhere on holiday where they serve cocktails larger than my head—there’s nothing larger than your head . . .”

  “Thanks,” said Huckle.

  “And we’re going to lie on the sand and make love and go swimming and get drunk and think about absolutely nothing at all. How does that sound to you?”

  “That sounds awesome.”

  He came closer.

  “Are you sure?”

  “I am totally and utterly sure. Being unselfish is going to get me absolutely nowhere with Mum or with . . . with Tony. So I might as well be completely selfish.”

  “Is saving a puffin sanctuary and cooking for someone else’s Christmas and running the town fair your definition of selfish?”

  “Yes,” said Polly. “Because it will make me feel good. Whereas none of the other stuff does. So I may as well stick to what I know will work.”

  “Okay,” said Huckle. “Well, that sounds fine by me. I am going out to sell honey to lots of stupid beauticians to pay for this holiday of ours. You’ve inspired me.”

  “Good!” said Polly. “Take some of these mini cheese scones as bribes.”

  “I shall,” said Huckle.

  “Are you going to eat them all before you get to your first client?”

  But whatever Huckle’s answer was, it was lost in a sea of crumbs.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Polly put out the tray.

  “Free samples!” she said cheerily, and the old ladies gathered around, cooing happily. She was trying pigs in blankets with honey—she had a good supplier for the honey, which helped—and more of the mini scones.

  “Not you, Jayden,” she said firmly to her second-in-command, who looked wounded and stroked the side of his moustache.

  “But I need to test what I’m selling,” he said.

  “I thought you wanted to get in shape for You Know What.”

  Jayden colored instantly.

  “Go on then. One.”

  Jayden grimaced. “That barely touches the sides. I think you’re getting mean in your old age.”

  “Do you?” said Polly. Jayden was twenty-three, so of course he thought she was ancient for being over thirty.

  “You’ll be turning into Mrs. Manse . . .”

  “Any more cheek from you,” said Polly, whipping him lightly with a tea towel, “and you’ll be scrubbing under the bread ovens for the next two weeks. Anyway, how are things going with Flora?”

  “I’m just gearing up to it,” said Jayden solemnly. “It’s important to get these things right.”

  “It is,” said Polly.

  Patrick the vet came in, looking slightly harassed as usual. He liked Polly, although he disapproved mightily of her keeping a seabird as a pet. He’d long realized, though, that as in many other parts of his life, there wasn’t actually that much he could do about it, so had learned to keep quiet.

  “How’s Neil?”

  “He’s good!” said Polly quickly. “Perfect BMI for a puffin, probably. Free sample?”

  “Thank you. That wasn’t why I came in, though.”

  “No?” said Polly.

  Outside, it was absolutely freezing. The wind was blowing a gale sideways into the houses, whistling down the little alleyways that made up the bottom of Mount Polbearne; the houses became less frequent and the road steeper as you wound your way to the top, to the ruined church that stood there, ancient but magnificent.

  No, today was a day for staying indoors with the fire on, watching the white-crested waves; or huddling somewhere cozy and warm, whatever the weather. Hence the excellent trade at the bakery.

  Polly thought about Neil.

  “He really is fine,” she said. “I was quite cross with him, actually, taking losing the egg so well.”

  Patrick smiled. “Male chauvinist puff, huh?”

  “I like to think, when he’s staring out to sea, that he’s feeling bad for his little egg,” said Polly.

  Patrick gave her a look.

  “Instead of thinking about tasty fish?”

  “Instead of thinking about tasty fish.”

  “You really shouldn’t anthropomorphize animals,” said Patrick. “Seriously, it doesn’t do them any good. Neil won’t remember that egg. Neither will Celeste. They’re instinct-driven creatures.”

  As he said this, he helped himself to another sausage without even realizing he was doing it, but Polly didn’t mention it.

  “Do you think he might . . . find another girlfriend one day?”

  “I don’t know,” said Patrick. “Puffins mate for life. They were just unlucky. Of course if you took him to the sanctuary . . .”

  Polly gave him a look.

  “I think we already know that’s not happening.”

  “Well, quite. No, I think you’re stuck with a bachelor puffin.”

  “Good,” said Polly.

  “You know they can live for twenty years?”

  “Also good,” said Polly.

  Patrick shook his head. “Well then.”

  “Did you hear they might be shutting the sanctuary?”

  “Really?” said Patrick. “Now that is a shame.”

  He looked at her closely.

  “You can’t adopt them all,” he said.

  “No,” said Polly. “But I can do something.”

  He looked at the spread in front of him.

  “What’s all this in aid of, then?”

  “Well, it’s partly getting ready for the Christmas fair . . . and partly to welcome Reuben’s parents.”

  “Oh,” said Patrick. “Oh goodness. I wonder what they’re like.”

  “Exactly how you’d think,” said Polly. “And then some.”

  Chapter Twenty

  The day of the Christmas fair dawned crisp and crackling. The village hall was absolutely heaving. People had come from miles around. Polly had been up for days on end making delicious gift baskets of gingerbread and clotted cream fudge and half a dozen small Christmas cakes that had bee
n soaking in brandy for weeks now. Her stall was absolutely groaning, and, from the second the doors opened, totally mobbed. Selina was on her left-hand side with her lovely filigree jewelry that had taken hours upon hours of careful work.

  “It’s brilliant,” said Samantha, bustling around the many little stalls. “This is going to raise so much money!”

  “I’m getting all my Christmas shopping done!” said Mrs. Corning. “This is going to wrap it right up.” Polly and Selina tried not to think about how much money they would have made if people had done their Christmas shopping directly from them.

  Flora was helping on the bakery stall, having brought a huge tray of her fabulous religieuses. Polly was paying her for being there. Well. At least Flora was a student. And it was Christmas. She should get into the spirit more.

  “How’s Jayden?” she said cheerfully. Flora as usual simply shrugged.

  “He’s all right,” she said.

  “Polly, show this guy your ring,” called Selina from the next table, and she leaned over obediently and showed off her beautiful seaweed engagement ring.

  “Oh yes,” said the man. “Something like that would be lovely.”

  Selina beamed. “Ooh, maybe this exposure thing works after all,” she said, and Polly gave her a cross look.

  “It is pretty,” ventured Flora, and Polly let her examine it, feeling proud.

  “It’ll be you next,” she said, remembering the conversation she had had with Jayden.

  “Ha, no way,” said Flora. “Don’t think so.”

  Polly winced and pulled her hand back. Maybe she would have to have another word with Jayden.

  “Have you seen Kerensa?” said Selina. “Only she’s gone really weird on me. I haven’t seen her for months.”

  “Hmm,” said Polly, not quite trusting herself. “She’s just been really exhausted with the pregnancy and everything, I think. I’ve hardly seen her either.”

  Selina gave her a penetrating look.

  “When’s the baby due again?”

  Polly looked at Selina and decided that the best thing under the circumstances was to tell her a big fat lie.

  “End of February,” she said.

  Mid-January was more like it. She could actually see Selina counting backward in her head.