‘What about me? It’s a shame I haven’t seen the landscape either,’ Joanna said, pouting.
‘You’ll need proper boots, and at least one more pair of socks,’ Will instructed Lydia quite seriously, ignoring Joanna. ‘And a proper coat, gloves and that. It’s not far, but it’s cold out there. Always best to be prepared.’
‘Prepared, totally.’ Lydia nodded. ‘Like a boy scout.’
‘Well, go on, then.’ Will ushered her away with a flick of his hand, and, whirling about, Lydia found herself crashing into Jackson’s chest.
‘Oh, sorry,’ she said, rubbing her nose.
‘You okay?’ he asked her in a tone just soft enough to make Alex glare at her and Joanna come and drape a proprietorial arm over his shoulder. Lydia had run all the way upstairs and was quite out of breath when she found Stephen in her room.
‘You didn’t sleep here last night,’ he said, nodding at the perfectly plumped pillow.
‘No,’ Lydia said, guiltily. ‘I crashed out on the sofa with the dog. Did you sleep?’
Stephen nodded. ‘I was dead drunk. Look, I don’t remember much about last night, but I’m sorry if I showed you up.’
‘You didn’t.’ Lydia sat down next to him. ‘You’ve been brilliant. You could have made life hell for everyone, and no one would have blamed you. But you’re not that sort of man, are you, Stephen?’
‘I think,’ Stephen said, ‘the worst thing about breaking up with someone who doesn’t love you any more is that they aren’t sad.’
‘I am,’ Lydia insisted. ‘I am sad, really sad.’
‘No, you’re not. I mean, you are sad that you’ve hurt me, because you care about me. But you’re not sad that we aren’t together any more and, well, that’s okay. It sort of helps, actually. I feel like I’ve had the stuffing kicked out of me, but looking at you now, with your eyes all sparkling and some colour in your cheeks, makes me realise that it’s pointless pining over you for too long.’
Lydia reached out and covered his hand with hers. ‘Oh, Stephen, you just need the right woman. The woman who makes you stop long enough to realise how much you need her, the woman who is more important to you than work or a cause ever would be, one who you want to spend every spare minute with, even if you can’t. You need to be with a woman who you miss even when she’s in the next room. And if you’re honest, I was never that woman. I could never get you to stop for more than about a minute.’
Stephen nodded. ‘I know, and so I just wanted to say that I’m okay. Don’t let this spoil your Christmas. I want you to have a happy one, although I’m now a bit short of a gift …’
‘What about you? Will you be able to have a Happy Christmas?’ Lydia asked.
‘Yes.’ Stephen nodded. ‘I’m going to get very drunk and eat so much food that I’ll have to drive home with my trousers unzipped. Now, if you’ll excuse me I’m going to listen to ‘Last Christmas’ and all the other Christmas break-up songs I can think of on my iPod.’ He paused in the doorway. ‘Where are you going?’
‘Into the village, with Will, to get a camping stove,’ Lydia said, fidgeting with the hem of her sleeve as if she were somehow betraying Stephen.
Stephen nodded. ‘All you girls seems rather taken with Will. Is he really that amazing?’
Lydia laughed. ‘Amazing? No, not at all. Whatever gave you that idea?’
For some reason, Lydia had thought that Will inviting her to accompany him to fetch his camping stove and see the scenery meant that he might want to talk to her, but they had trudged through the thick drifts of snow for at least twenty minutes in total silence. For a good while, Lydia busied herself with looking around at the stunning scenery, breathing in the cool air, and trying to keep up with Will, which was difficult. She was well wrapped up, as ordered, in Jim’s outsize coat, Katy’s snow boots and a quite small, pink, glittery knitted bobble hat that sat on her head at a rather precarious angle, and which she suspected might belong to Tilly.
‘It feels like there might be no one else alive in the whole world, doesn’t it?’ Lydia said, giving in to the urge to break the silence. ‘It’s so quiet, there are no planes in the sky, no cars on the road …’
‘No people wittering on,’ Will added.
‘Sorry,’ Lydia replied, wryly. ‘I didn’t realise I had to take a vow of silence when I agreed to come with you. You’re normally quite chatty.’
‘Chatty?’ Will stopped and looked at her.
‘Yes, chatty. So why have you gone all strong and silent now?’
Will frowned, marching on once more for several paces before replying. ‘I thought I might be able to give you the stove to bring back by yourself, but you’d probably just break a nail, get lost and die in a ditch, and then I’d feel responsible.’
Lydia chuckled. ‘I’m sure that if the idea of going back to Heron’s Pike horrifies you so much, I could find my way back on my own. I mean, I just have to follow this road, right? I don’t have to track tiny otter paw prints, or navigate by the stars?’
This time it was Will’s turn to smile. ‘You’ve got a lot to say for yourself,’ he said, which in the absence of any expansion on the statement, Lydia decided to take as a compliment.
‘It’s my job. As a barrister, I sort of have to talk for a living. Argumentatively, usually.’
‘Ah.’ Will nodded. ‘Makes sense.’
‘Sense? Of what? That I don’t just agree with everything you say like a proper girl should?’
‘No.’ Will smiled. ‘Posh girl, posh job. Makes sense.’
‘Posh!’ Lydia gasped. ‘I’m not posh. Just because I don’t mispronounce vowels like the people round here, it doesn’t make me posh, you know.’
‘Whoa, touchy.’ Will held up his gloved hands.
‘I’m sorry,’ Lydia said. ‘It’s just that I don’t come from money, or anything like it. My parents never had any money when they were married, and even less after they split up. Until she remarried, my mum rented a house next door to funeral home, because it was cheap, and Dad lives in his latest wife’s house. I wasn’t supposed to do anything. I wasn’t supposed to get A levels or go to uni, and I certainly wasn’t supposed to spend so many years studying to become a barrister. I was supposed to get a job at the age of sixteen and pay my way, but I didn’t. I was stubborn. I worked my way through law school, waitressing, bar work, temping – once I even dressed up as a Mexican cow girl and followed a giant Taco round Leicester Square. I did anything to earn money, well, nearly anything. It wasn’t easy, but like I said, I’m stubborn. I wouldn’t give up my dream.’
‘So why a barrister?’ Will asked her.
Lydia stopped walking and looked thoughtfully at Will, who’d carried on a couple of steps and then turned to wait for her. Over the years she’d been asked this question time and time again, and she always came out with a trite or flippant answer: I love the stylish outfit, she’d say, or the money, or the status or the challenge. But there was something about Will that made her want to tell him the real reason she’d struggled and scraped to get where she was today; something that made her think she could trust him.
‘Do you promise not to laugh?’ she asked him.
‘Okay.’ Will nodded.
‘Or scoff?’ Lydia added. ‘Cynical scoffing is not permitted.’
‘Go on.’
‘For most of my childhood, I felt like was caught up in a whirlwind that I had absolutely no control over. Parents ripping each other to shreds, even after the divorce, shunted around from house to house, whether or not I wanted to go, whether or not I was even wanted. I didn’t have a say about anything and, most importantly of all, I didn’t have anyone on my side, to speak up for me or to defend me. No one to say this has got to stop, this isn’t right. I felt, I was, helpless.
‘Then, one Saturday afternoon when I was about fourteen, I found the film To Kill a Mockingbird on TV. You know, the one with Gregory Peck in it, as Atticus Finch. He’s noble, so strong and more importantly he won’t let anythi
ng or anyone stand in the way of doing the best for his client. He had the guts to say this is not right and this has to stop. And I decided then and there that I wanted to be Gregory Peck, well, Atticus Finch. Or at least as close to it as a little English girl in a crummy seaside town can get. I wanted to be the person that would be there, just when life seemed to be at its very worst, the person who is on your side, no matter what.’
Lydia faltered into silence, suddenly feeling very self-conscious about pouring her heart out to a near stranger in the middle of the snow, wanting him to know what she had never told another soul, for reasons that she didn’t fully understand.
‘I suppose that sounds pretty ridiculous,’ she added at last, half laughing.
Will took a step back towards her. ‘No, far from it,’ he said gently. ‘It sounds pretty amazing, as it goes.’
‘Oh, well.’ Lydia felt herself blush. ‘I can’t pretend the money isn’t good, and that I don’t enjoy the drama of it, and the wigs are fabulous …’
‘Hey, listen.’ Will stopped her with a smile. ‘You don’t have to pretend with me. I know you’re not as shallow and as flippant as you like to make out. I can see it in your eyes. You really care about what you do, it means to the world to you, and I really respect that. I’ve not known you long but you’re different from most girls.’
‘Different?’ Lydia asked him, not sure if it was a compliment or not. ‘How?’ she asked him tentatively as his black eyes looked intently into hers.
‘Don’t ask me,’ Will said, a deep furrow between his eyes. ‘Right now, I don’t know whether I’m coming or going. Yes I do, I’m going – we’re going – to the village to get the gas stove. We’d better get a move on, else we’ll get frozen to the spot.’
‘So why did you ask me to come with you?’ she asked him, a little confused. ‘Why not one of the boys?’
‘Because they are all idiots,’ Will said. ‘Nice blokes, and all. But idiots.’
‘Oh, and I’m not an idiot?’ Lydia brightened.
‘I just thought you’d rather have a bit of time out of the house,’ Will said. ‘You’ve been stuck in there for days.’
‘Nice of you to care,’ Lydia said. ‘You make me sound like a dog that needs walking.’
‘I don’t care, I …’ Will stopped himself. ‘I just know what it’s like. Breaking up with someone. I was engaged for a bit.’ Will marched on with even more determination, leaving Lydia standing for a moment in the snow.
‘Wait!’ she called after him breathlessly. ‘Will, hold on. Look, you can’t just drop a bombshell like that and then run off.’
‘I wouldn’t call it a bombshell,’ Will said, stopping to wait for her until she caught up. ‘I was engaged and then I wasn’t. So I know that you probably could do with a bit of space to sort you head out. Which doesn’t normally require chatting.’
‘But, what happened? Who was she?’ What did she look like? Lydia thought but didn’t ask. ‘Did she dump you?’
Will’s brows knitted together in a deep frown. ‘Why do women always need to know everything?’
‘I don’t know. I don’t, I suppose. I’ve shared with you; I thought maybe you’d like to share with me. After all, you brought it up,’ Lydia said. ‘I’m sorry. It’s just I don’t know how I’m supposed to be feeling right now. I mean, this was the most serious relationship I’ve ever had, so I’m pretty sure I’m not supposed to be feeling the way I do.’
‘Which is?’ Will asked her.
‘Relieved,’ Lydia said. ‘And right now … happy. Happy to be out here, in the snow, with these amazing surroundings. I feel exhilarated. Which makes me sound very callous, doesn’t it?’
‘Or it shows that you made the right decision.’ Will shrugged. ‘Her name was, is, Rachel,’ Will said as he walked on, holding out a hand to help her through a particularly deep drift. ‘She was pretty, nice. Read a lot of books but still, you know, funny.’ Lydia reluctantly let go of his hand as she privately seethed about this beautiful, literate comedienne called Rachel. Boring name anyway, Lydia thought. ‘We’d known each other a long while. She had a gift shop in the town. I’d see her on her bike, riding into work every morning. We’d stop and chat.’
Lydia wondered when they were going to get to the breaking up part.
‘I’m not the sort of bloke who goes in all guns blazing. I suppose I don’t give much away,’ Will said. ‘It’s hard for me to let a lass know I like her. I was building up to asking her for a drink when one day she just asked me right out if I fancied her, just like that. I said yes. That was that, we were going out.’
‘And then what happened?’ Lydia asked him, almost sorry to see, some way ahead among the trees, the tip of the village church spire come into view.
‘We went out,’ Will said. ‘For two years.’
‘But you must have loved her if you asked her to marry you?’ Lydia persisted.
‘Not sure I actually asked her,’ Will said, looking genuinely perplexed. ‘We were out in the town, I’d just sold on this place I’d done up in Keswick, made quite a bit on it. Rachel said we should do something really mad, really spontaneous. We were standing outside this jewellery shop when she said it. So I bought her a ring, caught up in the moment, you know. And then we were engaged. I’m not sure I knew about it until afterwards, and then I sort of just went with it.’
‘Wow,’ Lydia said. ‘This Rachel had moves even Joanna would be proud of. What happened?’
‘I liked her a lot,’ Will said. ‘Like I said, she was the prettiest girl around for miles, funny, smart. Had it all.’
‘Obviously not all,’ Lydia said, a touch snippily. ‘Otherwise you would have married her.’
‘You’re right,’ Will said simply, stopping at the crest of a hill that fell away to reveal the village, nestling in the crook of the hill, rooftops covered in snow, smoke rising from chimney stacks and snaking into the air.
‘Oh,’ Lydia breathed, as she took in the view. ‘It’s so beautiful, it’s lovely.’
Will looked sideways at her. ‘You think so? I’ve lived here all my life, and I never get tired of walking to the top of this hill and seeing that. It’s home, you know? Whatever else is going on in the world, to know you’ve got a home to come back to, like that. It lifts the heart.’
Lydia looked at him. ‘You can be quite poetic when you want to be,’ she said.
Will smiled faintly, taking hold of her gloved hand and not letting go as he led her down the hill towards the village, even though this time there didn’t appear to be any obstacles that she needed guiding over.
‘I realised I didn’t love her,’ Will said as they walked on. ‘She didn’t make my heart race every time I looked at her, or even thought about her. I didn’t miss being with her, even though I hardly knew her, and I didn’t feel the instant urge to build her a house, exactly the way she liked it, even if I suspected it might have turrets, and live in it with her for ever. And I thought she deserved someone who did feel that way about her, so I broke it off. It was bad, she was very upset, but that was a year or so ago now. She’s with someone new, she doesn’t hold a grudge any more.’
‘I think it’s amazing,’ Lydia said. ‘Not that you broke up with her. I mean, that you have such a clear idea about love, about what it’s supposed feels like. I broke it off with Stephen because I know that I don’t love him. But I don’t think I know what it really feels like to be in love.’
‘Don’t ask me,’ Will said, noticing her hand was still in his and dropping it rather suddenly. ‘Romantic stuff, not my strong point. I’m not the sort of bloke who does the wining and dining business. I haven’t got all the chat. If I’m honest, most of the women I’ve been out with have chased me, and I’ve let them. But your gut, maybe I should say your heart, knows what it knows, right? I mean, you know inside how a person makes you feel; even if it doesn’t make the most sense, you know.’ Will seemed as perplexed by his own thought process as Lydia was.
‘So are you in lov
e now?’ she asked, just as the snow began to fall again.
Will reached out, capturing a flake in the palm of his hand and watching it melt away. ‘We should stop for a pint and a pie before we head back,’ he said, which, by way of response, was frustrating. ‘Come on, I’ll introduce you around.’
* * *
The Royal Oak was full, of heat, light and above all people. It really did feel to Lydia as if the whole village was crammed into the tiny ancient building, which was packed from its flagstone floor to its ancient ceiling beams.
Children chased each other through the throng of legs, older people sat at the tables, laughing and reminiscing, families shared meals and raucous jokes, mothers swayed with babies of varying ages slung over their shoulders, or balanced on their hips as they compared sleepless nights, and teenagers buried their faces in their hair, their thumbs glued permanently to their phones. The old oak beams of the interior had been garlanded with mistletoe and holly, and strung with flashing coloured lights, and a roaring fire crackled in the grate. It didn’t escape anyone’s notice that Will had come in with a strange woman, and while the pub didn’t exactly fall silent while the locals stared at her, Lydia could feel many sets of eyes give her the once over as Will led her to the bar.
‘Now, then,’ the bar man greeted Will with a nod. ‘We thought you’d gone off somewhere, Will. Where you been?’
‘Up at the Pike, helping the new folk settle in,’ Will said.
‘And where did you find this young lady?’ Lydia smiled and waved, remembering her pink bobble hat a little too late.
‘This is a friend of theirs, Lydia. She’s from London but she seems okay. Lydia, this is Mal, the landlord. He’s best mates with Jim.’
‘Oh yeah, Jim from the Pike, he’s a good bloke, he is, likes his ale.’ Mal nodded. ‘What’ll it be?’
‘Pint,’ Will said, looking at Lydia. ‘Lydia?’
‘Um, do you have a wine list?’ Lydia asked, finding herself inexplicably speaking exactly like Celia Johnson in Brief Encounter, her averagely middle-class south coast accent suddenly accelerating, against her will, through the roof to the height of poshness. ‘Oh, no, I mean. I’ll have a pint too. As long as it’s wine.’
The Night Before Christmas Page 18
