Christmas under a Cranberry Sky

by Holly Martin

‘I’m Pip, Gabe’s friend.’

  ‘I guess we’ll be seeing you tomorrow when we open the Christmas market for you?’

  ‘Yes, I’m looking forward to seeing it.’

  Luke was still watching her and then he turned his attention to Wren. ‘Fancy coming to see the puppies with us?’

  Wren practically burst with excitement and climbed on the back of the snowmobile in between Audrey and Luke without any further hesitation. Audrey helped her on and said something to Wren that made her laugh. Pip bit her lip nervously; she looked so small on the snowmobile and none of them were wearing helmets.

  ‘Gabe asked me to come and get her,’ Luke said, casting a derisive look her way and stopping any anxious thoughts dead. ‘Clearly he doesn’t trust you to look after her.’

  Without another word Luke roared off on the snowmobile, and they all disappeared through the trees a second later.

  Gabe didn’t trust her.

  Of course he didn’t. Why would he? She had broken his heart. She didn’t know Wren or have any experience with childcare. Wren was his entire world, of course he would only want people he loved and trusted to look after her.

  She felt tears sting her eyes as she pulled her coat around her and set off down the track alone.

  * * *

  Gabe watched Pip walk off down the track. Ignoring the stab of guilt he felt at asking Luke to come and get Wren, he turned back to face Neve.

  ‘What happened?’

  Neve sighed. ‘Nothing. She was being lovely and kind and I snapped at her for no reason. I worry about you that’s all. I think getting involved with her is a mistake, but I forget sometimes that you’re not my little baby brother any more and you don’t need me to look after you.’

  Gabe sat down, rubbing his head, which had started to ache. ‘Stay out of this, please. I appreciate your concern but if it’s a mistake to try again with Pip then it’s my mistake to make. I know she’s leaving in a couple of weeks, but if we have something worth fighting for then we’ll make it work. Look at you and Oakley, you’re thousands of miles apart and…’ He trailed off as Neve’s face dissolved into tears again.

  ‘We broke up a few weeks ago,’ she sobbed.

  ‘Oh Neve, I’m so sorry.’

  ‘Well, more accurately, I broke up with him.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘I don’t know. I didn’t want to hold him back. Acting has always been his dream and I felt that seeing me would get in the way of that. I was scared I didn’t mean as much to him as he means to me. I wanted to get out before I fell completely in love with him, although it’s already too late for that. I think my fear of the past repeating itself meant I couldn’t see a future with him.’

  ‘You can’t let your past cloud your future. Don’t let what happened with Zander rule how you live the rest of your life. You deserve to be happy, don’t spoil that for yourself.’

  She stared at him and sniffed back the tears. It broke his heart to see his sister like this: she was normally so together, so calm and professional. Every conversation they’d had over the last few weeks had been about the hotel. She took her job as hotel manager so seriously, but he hadn’t realised that she’d been hiding her heartbreak by throwing herself into her work.

  ‘I want you to be happy too Gabe, and if you honestly think Pip will bring you that then I won’t stand in your way. If you really love her then don’t throw it away like I did.’

  He nodded.

  ‘Now get out of my office, I have work to do,’ Neve said, wiping the last of the tears away and straightening her shoulders. She took a deep breath and switched on her computer. He knew she would say no more about her and Oakley, at least not now.

  He stood up. ‘Are you OK?’

  ‘I’m fine. Go and talk to her.’

  He hesitated and she made shooing gestures with her hand. He smiled and walked round the desk, placing a kiss on her head.

  ‘I love you and if Oakley was crazy enough to let you walk away from him then the man’s an idiot.’

  She smiled sadly, but as she opened her mouth to speak the phone rang on her desk.

  ‘I better take this, I’ll talk to you later.’

  She picked up the call before he could argue and when he realised the call was evidently something to do with the hotel, he left her to it.

  * * *

  Pip walked through the trees, following the path down into the valley. The only light seemed to be from the green glow up ahead of her, which she guessed was the ice palace. The icy cold stung her cheeks and made her eyes water. The wind whipped through the trees with a soft moan, causing snow and ice to swirl up into her face. She shoved her hands into her pockets and with her head down against the wind, she walked on.

  It had been a weird twenty-four hours since she had landed on the island. Seeing Gabe had changed everything. He had to trust her again and so far she had given him nothing to trust. She hadn’t promised she would stay at the end of her holiday, she hadn’t told him that she thought she was falling in love with him all over again.

  The prospect of being with him again, of having a future with him, was wonderful and terrifying all at once. If she was honest with herself she couldn’t tell him any of those things because she knew she had to find it in her to trust him too.

  He had never done anything to make her doubt him, but she had spent her whole life believing that no one wanted her or loved her. When she and Gabe had fallen into a relationship she had always been waiting for it to end, for him to reject her just like everyone else. When she had found him in the arms of Jenny Maguire, in the back of her mind it hadn’t been a great surprise. If this was going to work she had to let go of those fears once and for all and she didn’t know whether she had it in her.

  The trees fell away and as she moved further down the valley the wind dropped; somehow she was protected from it in the gap between the hills. She carried on walking, the green glow getting brighter, and suddenly over the brow of the hill she saw it.

  The ice palace was huge, a great castle made of glass. It had tall elegant turrets and towers and seemed to stretch up into the sky, encompassing several floors. The glass roof was domed, probably where the auditorium was. Fibre-optic lights lit up the insides with a green and blue glow, casting an aurora into the sky, which made it look magical. It didn’t matter that it wasn’t made of ice; it was an incredible work of art.

  She pulled her camera out of her bag and took a few photos, capturing the moon as it peeped out behind the palace in the darkening sky.

  As she walked closer she could see that the glass parts she had presumed were opaque were actually engraved with hundreds of snowflakes, making the palace look like it was frozen. Wren was going to get such a big kick out of this when she saw it.

  She pushed the door open – thankfully it wasn’t locked – but if she thought she was going to get in away from the cold she was mistaken for as soon as she stepped inside a cold wind swept round her, even icier than the arctic air she had just walked through. The room was almost in darkness apart from the spotlights on the floor. Large iced snowflakes and snowmen littered the path ahead of her, lit underneath by spotlights, giving the whole room a lilac glow. It was completely silent, almost making Pip want to tiptoe. She walked through a large ice archway and into an enchanted forest made entirely from ice. It was like nothing she had seen before. Trees and bushes grew from every surface, their tiny ice leaves almost fluttering in the breeze. Fairy lights were strung from the branches, casting golden puddles of light over the snow below. Hanging from almost invisible wires were iced dragonflies and fairies flying through the air. It was incredible.

  Pip pulled off her gloves and reached out to touch one of the trees, feeling the tell-tale burn of ice though surprisingly it wasn’t wet at all. She took a few photos, hoping that she could capture the beauty of the place, though she doubted the camera would be able to do it justice.

  She moved through the trees and slowly the trees became Christmas trees, al
l decorated with baubles and stars that were trapped within the ice. Several ice reindeer were grazing or peering out through the forest of Christmas trees and she even saw a couple of Shetland ponies, which made her smile.

  ‘It’s beautiful, isn’t it,’ came Gabe’s voice, though she had no idea where he was. His voice seemed to echo round the room.

  ‘It’s amazing.’

  She carried on through the forest, passing candy canes that were lit up from below with red spotlights to give them their distinctive striped colouring. She saw movement through the trees, but when she quickly looked in that direction there was only her reflection staring back at her from a wall of icicles.

  ‘We flew an ice carver up from White Cliff Bay, which is somewhere on the borders of Devon and Cornwall. Penny Meadows won some ice-carving competition last year, so we put her in charge of creating this. She didn’t do it alone though; she hand-picked a team of carvers to do the job with her.’

  Pip came to a large iced bridge that even had tall Victorian-style lanterns with golden lights casting their glow over the icy river below. The path led up the stairs and over the bridge, although there was a white rubber mat on the parts she was supposed to walk on.

  ‘She did a brilliant job. How long will these things last?’ Pip called through the trees.

  ‘As long as we want them to. We have the snow and ice-carving competition in January, so I imagine we’ll keep them here then. We have a large walk-in freezer out the back so we can put some of the things into storage and bring them back out as necessary. Most of the larger pieces are on wheeled crates so we can manoeuvre them quite easily.’

  ‘You know you’re spoiling the magic for me.’

  Gabe laughed and she instantly knew he was somewhere up ahead of her.

  She followed the route off the bridge and through the trees and smiled at the ice husky dogs that were running along the side of the trail. Large iced presents and oversized baubles also punctuated the path either side, as well as a few elves with large pointy hats and shoes too.

  She rounded the corner and saw a large igloo up ahead. The opening was big too, and she barely had to duck to get in. Inside was a large spectacular golden throne made of ice, a big sack of iced presents and a couple of reindeer were grazing. The room was lit by lights strewn about the domed interior, but she had eyes only for the man sitting on the throne watching her with fondness as she stopped. In the light his ice-blue eyes seemed to sparkle and dance as he stood up and stepped down the few stairs towards her.

  ‘This is Santa’s Grotto. When the guests arrive, we’ll have a Santa in here for a few hours a day for the children to visit,’ Gabe explained, resting his hands on her shoulders.

  ‘What will you be asking Santa for?’ Pip asked.

  He smiled at her, then kissed her forehead softly.

  ‘There’s only one thing I want,’ Gabe said, as he stared into her eyes.

  Pip looked down, suddenly scared by the intensity of his gaze. She didn’t want to hurt him again, but what if she was incapable of trusting him?

  ‘I’m sorry about Neve…’ he said.

  ‘Don’t be. She’s looking out for you. I wish I had someone to look out for me.’

  He put a finger under her chin and brought her face back up to look at him.

  ‘You do. You have me.’

  She smiled, sadly, and looked over his shoulder at the throne. ‘Do you remember when your mum took us to see Santa when we were kids? It was the year that my mum had died and your mum obviously knew that my dad was never going to take me. We sat on Santa’s lap, obviously in the days before political correctness made that impossible, and told him the things we wished for most in the world.’

  ‘I remember. The guy was the best Santa I ever saw, his beard was real and his suit was perfect. All you wanted was a rocking horse. A grey one with silvery hair and a red saddle.’

  Pip stared at him in shock. ‘How do you remember that?’

  ‘Because that’s what I asked Santa for. I knew your dad would never get it for you, so I asked Santa for it so I could give it to you.’

  She had no words at all to convey about that beautiful gesture. She swallowed the emotion that was clogging in her throat and wrapped her arms round his neck.

  ‘Do you know what I asked for that year?’

  ‘You didn’t ask for the rocking horse? Jeez, I thought if we both asked for it we stood more of a chance.’

  ‘No, I wanted something more. I asked that you would be my best friend forever.’

  Gabe’s eyes softened as he slid his hands down to her waist and then wrapped them round her back, hugging her tight.

  ‘I think we will be. Whatever happens between us in the next couple of weeks, I always want to be your friend. Let’s make a pact now. Whether this thing that’s bubbling between us develops into something more or not, whether we shag each other’s brains out on Neve’s desk every day for the next few weeks and you still walk away at the end of your holiday back to your glamorous life of travelling the world, let’s promise each other now, we will always be friends.’

  ‘I promise,’ Pip said, smiling at his use of her words.

  ‘Good. Now can I kiss you again before certain bits of me freeze and snap off completely?’

  Pip laughed and nodded and under the golden light of a grotto made from ice, Gabe kissed her softly and sweetly just like a best friend should.

  * * *

  Gabe was woken again by screams later that night, but this time Pip was screaming for him. He ran as fast as he could to Pip’s room and just like before she was thrashing around in the bed.

  Learning from his mistake the previous night, this time he hit the light before gently shaking her awake.

  She shot up, her eyes flying open. He could immediately see she had been crying. He quickly knelt on the bed, pulling her into his arms, and she clung to him, sobbing with relief.

  ‘It’s OK, Pip, I’m here. It’s OK.’

  ‘God, Gabe, this dream was different. This time it was you that was trapped in the car with me and I couldn’t get you out. I swam up to the surface and when I went back down to look for you I couldn’t find the car. I could hear you screaming for help and I couldn’t find you. I’ve never been so scared before.’

  ‘It’s OK. It was just a dream.’

  He sat on the bed and she cuddled into his chest, holding him tight. As he stroked her to calm her down, after a while the sobs subsided and her breathing returned to normal.

  ‘I’m so sorry to wake you again. I bet you’ll be glad when the power comes back on and you can get rid of me.’

  ‘I never want to get rid of you. I love having you here. Nothing you could do could push me away.’

  ‘What about Wren, did I wake her too?’

  ‘No, nothing can wake her once she goes to sleep. Once, when we were living in California, a car blew up right outside our house, the emergency services came, all their sirens blaring, and she slept through the whole thing. She’ll wake up sometimes to go to the toilet, but she never gets woken by noise. You could scream all night and it wouldn’t disturb her.’ He paused and noticed she was more settled. ‘Are you OK now?’

  She didn’t answer straight away, then she looked up at him. ‘Would you stay with me for a little while?’

  ‘Of course.’

  He shuffled around so he was lying down and she lay next to him, with her head still on his chest. He wrapped his arms round her and stroked her hair just like he used to.

  It wasn’t long before she was fast asleep again, but he had no intention of leaving her for the rest of the night.

  * * *

  Pip woke up in the very early hours of the morning, when the sky was just turning grey. At some point the lamp had been turned off and she had rolled the other way, but Gabe hadn’t left her. He was curled round her back with one arm tight around her stomach; it made her heart soar. If this was what could happen if she stayed, if she could spend every night like this, she would b
e happy for the rest of her life.

  Suddenly she was aware of movement in the room and her eyes shot open. Wren was standing next to her, sniffling a little.

  ‘Hey sweetheart,’ Pip whispered, instinctively pulling back the duvet for her. Wren immediately crawled into the bed and wrapped her arms round Pip’s neck, crying a little but not properly.

  Gabe carried on sleeping behind Pip, obviously exhausted at being woken two nights in a row.

  ‘Are you OK?’ Pip whispered, holding her tight. Wren’s tiny body was warm next to hers and Pip felt something unfurl inside her.

  ‘I had a bad dream and Daddy wasn’t in his room.’

  ‘Well, it’s OK now. I’ve got you and I won’t let anything hurt you, I promise.’

  Wren made little huffs against her neck, but Pip knew she wasn’t really crying any more.

  ‘Did you have a bad dream too, is that why Daddy is cuddling you?’

  Pip hadn’t even thought about what Wren would make of finding her dad in bed with a woman, or whether Gabe’s lifestyle of dating lots of women meant that Wren had seen this sort of thing many times before. For Wren’s sake, she hoped Gabe had been a little more discreet than that.

  ‘Yeah I did,’ Pip said, honestly.

  Wren nodded, wisely. ‘Hugging Daddy always makes me feel better when I’ve had a bad dream.’

  ‘He gives the best hugs, doesn’t he?’ Pip said.

  ‘Yes, but you smell nicer than Daddy.’

  Pip laughed. ‘I do?’

  ‘You smell of flowers and cherries.’

  ‘Oh. What does Daddy smell like?’

  ‘Like a stinky boy.’

  Pip had to hold a hand over her mouth so she didn’t laugh out loud at that. Wren let out a little giggle, clearly seeing that Pip was laughing at her comment.

  ‘I like the way your daddy smells.’

  Wren became all serious again. ‘Do you love him?’

  Oh God, what a question.

  ‘Do you love Chester?’

  Wren nodded. ‘He’s my best friend.’