by Marrs, John
But that year, eight o’clock arrived and the house was firework free. In all honesty, I’d dreaded the moment they’d wake up and not just because you weren’t there, but because I was ashamed of how pitiful the gifts waiting for them were. I knew it, and soon they would too.
It was the best I could do, as my choice was simple but bloody unfair – piles of presents or an empty dinner table for most of January. Nevertheless, I got them up one by one myself and tried to spur them into action.
“Have we been naughty?” asked James, when he saw there were only two boxes waiting for him to open.
I sighed. But without admitting Father Christmas was a big fat fib and what lay before them was all mummy could afford, there wasn’t much I could say to convince them they weren’t being punished.
“Of course not darling,” I replied, “Santa just didn’t have much room on his sleigh this year.” It fell on deaf ears.
All day I tried my hardest to encourage them to wear those flimsy, colourful Christmas cracker hats and play with the crappy plastic toys inside. I even delayed dinner so James could watch the Top Of The Pops Christmas special. Robbie said very little, and lay on his bed in his room stroking Oscar instead. Nothing I did lifted their spirits.
What should have been a day of celebration was missing its heart. Instead of the beautiful madness of six, it had withered to one drunken grown-up desperately pretending the Christmas chicken was really a small turkey. Even a second bottle of wine failed to bring me festive cheer. The third failed too.
I kept the phone in my apron pocket for most of the day in the hope that if you were still alive, by some miraculous turn of events, you’d call. But of course you didn’t.
Suddenly, there came a knock at the door and my heart jumped. Before I could say a word, the children leaped from their chairs and ran towards it.
“Daddy!” squealed Emily as her little legs buckled beneath her in the scramble. For a second, I thought they were right and chased after them, praying for the kind of miracle you see in Christmas films. But as the door opened, Roger, Steven, Caroline and Annie stood there, not you.
Their arms were full of gifts, but not even Santa could give us the only thing we all really wanted.
***
Saint-Jean-de-Luz, Twenty-Five Years Earlier
September 10, Midday
I squatted on an upturned wooden orange box on the opposite side of the Rue du Jean. I placed my plastic hard-hat on the pavement and lit my seventh Gauloise of the morning. You only ever allowed me to smoke socially or on special occasions. So with nobody to complain that my breath reeked of stale tobacco, my occasional habit had become a full-time addiction.
I stretched my legs out and winced as my knee joints cracked. Climbing up and down scaffolding twenty times a day with my hostel workforce was exhausting and took its toll on my body, but the results had been worth every second.
While the capital investment from the Routard’s owner wasn’t enough to re-establish it back to its glory days, I’d thrown myself into my work to recreate something of worth as best I could.
I allowed myself to think back to my first project; a ramshackle collection of bricks and mortar that eventually became our first home. Before we could afford a car, we traipsed past the cottage dozens of times on our way too and from the bus stop. It was in desperate need of restoration yet it always caught our eye.
Ivy had silently crept up its faded whitewashed walls, along the patchy tiled roof and clasped the chimney pot in its fingers. The wooden window frames had bowed and the garden hadn’t seen a tool in a lifetime. Weeds competed with trees to see which could grow taller.
But I liked that you could see what I saw, a shared vision of its potential. An unstable house that, with lashings of love and attention, could provide us with the foundations in which to raise a family; a perfect family.
We were living in Caroline’s parents’ spare room when we heard that a gas meter reader had discovered the body of the cottage’s elderly owner. Her withered shell had remained slumped facedown on her kitchen table for up to a month.
Her estranged son put her house up for sale for a snip, like he wanted both rid of it and her memory as quickly as possible. Money wasn’t abundant, what with me freshly qualified from college and you window-dressing at Debenhams. But we calculated we could afford the mortgage repayments if we scrimped. There’d be years of work ahead of us before it matched the image we’d painted of it in our heads. That didn’t matter, in fact nothing mattered but buying the house.
Once our solicitor had handed us the keys, not even the stench left by a decomposing carcass put us off. We simply covered our noses and mouths with tea towels and toasted our first house with a bottle of Babycham in the hallway. We had something to build on of our own that neither of us had experienced before.
But our five-year plan of long-term development was unexpectedly cut short by favour and misfortune.
“They’re offering you £20,000 for it,” an estate agent explained on an unannounced visit. “They want to build their own home on the land if you’re interested in selling it.”
For the best part of a decade, where your parents’ home had once stood on the village’s outskirts, now laid a vacant piece of land buried under a carpet of charred rubble. But somebody wanted to bring life to a place of death. Thankfully you had little sentiment for that place.
“Yes,” you replied without discussion or thought. “Tell them yes, they can have it.”
Payment arrived in our bank account enabling us to complete our renovation dreams much faster than anticipated. And by the time our blood, sweat and tears had dried, the cottage had become the first thing we’d created together. Our children would be the next.
And as I stared at the progress I’d made in restoring the Routard, those same feelings of accomplishment and excitement rushed through me - the feeling of knowing you are on your way to creating something flawless. Suddenly the voice I’d first heard in the woods the day I left you made itself known.
‘Do I need to remind you of what happens to all perfect things?’ I shook my head, and my euphoria evaporated in an instant.
‘It’s only a matter of time before they stop being perfect and destroy you.’
October 18, Midday
I lifted the sledgehammer over my head, swung it towards the door handle, and smashed through the lock.
Bets had been placed on what secrets lay behind the keyless door in the Routard’s mysterious storeroom. Skeletal remains; valuable artwork concealed from the Nazis; an extensive wine cellar or perhaps a parallel universe were all jokingly considered.
And with two well-placed whacks, the door sprang back on its hinges to reveal what not even the owner knew it contained – a six feet by eight feet pitch-black room. When Bradley shone his torch inside, the spectators behind us gave a collective deflated sigh at the sight of wooden crate after crate crammed with paperwork, receipts and invoices.
It wasn’t until later in the day when I consigned the splintered door to the rubbish skip that I caught a glimpse of a photograph poking out from a crate I’d dumped earlier. I leaned over the rim and pulled it out for closer inspection.
A family, possibly the original owners, stood dressed to the nines, beaming proudly before the camera outside the pristine looking Hotel Pres De La Cote. And I instantly recognised the chubby faced man standing by their side. It was Pierre Chareau, an art deco designer I’d studied extensively at college. I had long admired his maverick vision. Like me, he’d trained as an architect but he’d added extra strings to his bow by branching out into design and decoration. The pinnacle of his work was the Maison de Verre – the first house in France to be constructed of steel and glass.
I grabbed the crate and its contents and dragged it back into the hostel courtyard as quickly as I could. I lit up the first of many cigarettes as I ploughed through hundreds of pages of designs, photographs, blueprints and illustrations. There were sheets of hand-written notes and orde
rs – and all signed by Chareau. And they weren’t all related to the hotel. There were sketches of buildings that had never been and designs of furniture that had.
When placed in chronological order, it offered a fascinating insight into the creative mind of a genius and projects he’d never publicly acknowledged. Thirty years after his death, and I was residing in what once was just his vision. And now I’d been charged with returning it to the glory he’d been responsible for. But with these papers, I’d also found my holy grail, and my way out.
December 5, 1.15pm
I threw myself into the final stages of the Hotel’s renovation. I became obsessive, working all the hours God sent, day and night and only napped for a handful of hours at a time.
As the countdown to Christmas began, it became a challenge not to think of the family I’d shared so many of them with. But when I thought about you, I kept reminding myself I was no longer a father or a husband. We’d both agreed we wanted to be young parents, and within a year and a half of us moving into the cottage, we were overjoyed when you became pregnant.
Being a father was the greatest gift you ever gave me. Nothing you or I subsequently did to each other ever took away the feeling of utter elation in holding those tiny, hope-filled hands for the first time in the house they’d been born into. As each midwife passed each baby to me, I’d gently slip my finger between their tightly balled fists, plant a kiss on the centre of their foreheads and whisper ‘I will never let you down’ into their ears. It saddened me to think the first words they’d ever heard were lies.
“Si, you need some sleep man,” yelled Bradley, bringing me back to the present. “Look.”
He pointed to the banister I’d just sanded down to the grain - I’d only painted and varnished it a night earlier.
I yawned and closed the lid on you once again and moved on to the wooden arc of the entrance hall. It felt smooth to the touch, but it could be better. I couldn’t bring myself to stop sanding it until it was beyond compare.
Christmas Day, 8am
With only a handful of guests remaining under my re-tiled roof, the hostel had been as restful as I’d known it.
“Do you wanna call anyone?” asked Bradley when he’d finished with the phone, and handed me the receiver. I paused. “Do you want to call any of your family back in England or something? You know it’s Christmas day, right?”
For the first time since I left you, I needed to hear your voice above anything else in the world. I took the receiver and without giving myself time to debate it, I held it to my ear. I dialled the country code, then the area code and finally all but the last digit of our phone number.
*
I’d never spent the holidays in the company of strangers before, which was probably why I’d been reluctant to embrace the forthcoming festivities. But my apathy evaporated when I turned the corner into Christmas Eve.
Diminishing numbers weren’t going to prevent us from indulging in good food and all-round merriment. But it took queuing with crowds of locals outside the boulangeries and patisseries to collect orders for fine meats and cheeses to spark the kindling inside me. I fed off their gaiety until I found myself grinning without reason.
And in keeping with French tradition, the seven of us left at the Routard International enjoyed an appetising midnight meal together before we welcomed Christmas day. We covered the dining room table in a clean white bed sheet, fed our pallets with the rich textures of foie gras on sliced brioche and smoked salmon on blinis.
My bloated stomach was already close to bursting point when Henri, a chef the Routard’s owner had hired as a reward for my renovation work, brought out a platter of meats. I was completely spoiled. And after a good night’s rest, we spent much of Christmas day in the local bar chugging beer.
“What were you doing this time last Christmas?” asked Bradley suddenly, as we smoked two plump cigars by the mild seafront.
I recalled sitting in the corner of our lounge watching all six of you caught up in the moment. Our relationship, no longer valuable to me, was distorted. I didn’t belong there. He had made sure of that. I was like a coiled spring that longed to unravel but didn’t know to or when.
“Not much,” I replied ambiguously.
“Thought you’d say that,” said Bradley before we puffed away and watched a trail of shooting stars blast their way across the sky.
*
My finger hovered over the last number, unable to press it. Even hearing you just say the word hello as you picked up the phone, or the voices of the children playing with toys in the background would do me no good. The time of year for family and togetherness was weakening my resolve, but I had to come to my senses or undo all my good work.
“No, it’s okay,” I told Bradley, passing the phone back to him. I had to remain in the present, not the past.
***
Today, 11.10am
He’d spent years holding himself back from allowing her sympathy. But even he couldn’t ignore how traumatic it must have been to lose a baby and face it alone.
He tried to contemplate its awfulness but came nowhere near. As sorry as he felt for her, ultimately, she had brought it on herself. All of it. And she’d been right; the baby had had a narrow escape.
He was surprised by her tenacity when it came to working three jobs, but he didn’t mention it so as not to appear patronising. He’d expected her to have quickly found a replacement for him, if only to provide financial stability for the children. But he’d seen to it one man in particular could never have been an option for her.
So far, she’d not mentioned anyone else; instead, she’d muddled along alone. He admired that, as he did her return to dressmaking. He recalled how she’d believed that hobby had destroyed their family. But secretly he knew it wasn’t to blame. Not at all. He understood how financially destitute she must have been to have picked up a needle and thread again.
For every story he’d recounted of his adventures without his boring wife and children, she was torn between bringing him back to the brutal reality he left behind, and the achievements she’d accomplished.
No one could ever really appreciate her lows unless they’d lived through them with her. She knew he understood grief, as they’d walked that path together. But he couldn’t ever comprehend the pain of losing someone without ever knowing if they were truly lost.
She wanted him to feel the same misery as he’d inflicted upon them, but she didn’t need his pity. Besides, he hardly resembled a man wracked with remorse or who had faced hard times, well, not based on that golden tan or tailor-made suit.
She just desperately needed to witness some human emotion in his steely exterior or proof that she’d not been completely guileless throughout their relationship. That inside him, some compassion remained.
She thought she’d spotted it briefly when she told him about their Christmas without him. She noticed the uncomfortable twitch of his middle finger against the print of his thumb. It meant he didn’t like what he was hearing and she would use that to her advantage, she decided.
If he was going to play games by making her wait before he told his truth, then she’d use that time to make him feel as awkward as possible. And her children would be her weapons.
But most importantly, she would try her hardest to show him she was not the same naïve fool he’d left behind.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Northampton, Twenty-Four Years Earlier
New Year’s Eve, 5pm
“You’re drunk Mummy,” whined James.
“Don’t be silly,” I snapped, and yanked the hem of his costume down further still. “And for God’s sake, stop fidgeting.”
“Ouch! You’re hurting me!”
I’d been trying to finish his Red Indian outfit for the New Year’s Eve fancy dress party at the village hall. I accidentally jabbed a pin into his ankle and I wasn’t in the mood for his whinging.
It’d been a relentless week. I had all our costumes to make from scratch for an event
I couldn’t have given two hoots about. I’d worked an extra fifteen hours of overtime at the supermarket over two days and had a list of sewing requests as long as my arm. And I hadn’t even begun to tackle the baskets of un-ironed clothes stacked up in the hallway. There just weren’t enough hours in my day. So who could blame me for having a glass of wine here and there to help me through it? Well, James for starters.
Habitually, I’d uncorked the first by breakfast and by early evening two more empty bottles lay on their sides by the kitchen bin. But I certainly wasn’t drunk, I told myself, and it annoyed me my son had the nerve to presume I was.
“Shut up, it’s only a little prick,” I barked as James’ eyes filled up. That irritated me even more because he was only going to slow me down. I raised my voice and dug my fingernails into his wrists until he squirmed.
“Right, you can either stop your sniffling and let me get on with this, or you can go to the party looking like a fool and have your friends laugh at you. Which one are you going to choose?”
Even as the words tripped off my tongue, I knew I was sounding like my mother. I heard a lot of her in myself these days and I didn’t like it. But the colder I became, the more frequently she reared her head.
It wasn’t James’ fault I’d been in such a foul mood. I’d missed you more than ever that first Christmas. The New Year was about to begin and I couldn’t see how things were going to get any easier.
It hadn’t helped that it was also my thirty-fourth birthday, and my first without you for two decades. I wanted to throw myself under the quilt in an alcohol-induced coma and wake up six months earlier. Then I’d never have let you out of my sight for the rest of our lives. Instead, I was going to a party filled with couples who’d remind me of what I was missing.
I also resented the kids for not remembering my birthday, even while I was trying to forget it. Four unopened cards and gifts from friends lay on the kitchen table, but there’d been no special kisses or cuddles from my own family - just relentless demands for food, costumes and attention. I longed to be the centre of someone’s attention again.
