‘Your secret’s safe with me,’ I murmur against his hair.
I feel his face shift into a smile again, and he doesn’t let go of my hand.
What the heck am I doing? Sitting in the storeroom holding hands with a guy I barely know. I don’t do this sort of thing.
‘What would yours be?’
This proximity and his cologne are making me feel fuzzy too. ‘What?’
‘Your Christmas wish. What would it be?’
I’m not telling him about the whole Prince Charming thing the other night. I might’ve let my guard down a bit, but not that much. ‘For someone to care about Nutcracker Lane.’
‘No one cares about it?’ He sounds confused.
‘No one who matters. No one in management. No one who can actually help. It feels like everyone’s waiting for it to die forever. It used to be special, and now it’s just a shell, consigned to the memories of the people who loved it. I wish there was someone who cared about it as much as the shopkeepers do, someone who’d realise it’s worth saving and with a bit of time and investment, could be restored to its former glory. It doesn’t matter to anyone anymore. No one will listen.’
‘I’ll listen.’ His fingers tighten around mine. ‘I mean, I don’t think I can do anything to help, but you’re clearly passionate about this place and passion is inspiring. Tell me about it.’
I didn’t expect him to say that. I’m sure he’s not even vaguely interested in our little outlet village dedicated to the thing he hates most, but it’s sweet of him to offer.
‘Our Santa used to be the jolliest for miles. Not the bum-scratching grumpy thin bloke we’ve got now, and there used to be such an emphasis on helping others. Nowadays, all the advertising is about sales and deals in the shops, but it used to be about donating toys for children who wouldn’t have any on Christmas morning and the free Christmas dinner that Nutcracker Lane used to host for the homeless, and how they used to drive out and collect elderly people who would be alone for Christmas and bring them here and put on bingo games and raffles and then take them home where they’d all totter tipsily off the bus with new friends and hampers under their arms.
‘The wish-granters would only ever grant the wishes that meant something to people. It was never about material things – the children who asked Santa for a long list of expensive toys were rarely given even one. The wishes granted were for those who wished for something that would help the people around them or make their lives better in some way …’
‘An iPad could make many people’s lives exponentially better …’
‘This was the Nineties – thankfully we didn’t have iPads then.’
‘Exactly. Don’t you think it’s failing because it’s old-fashioned in this day and age? Walking into this place is like stepping back in time.’
‘Exactly,’ I repeat. ‘People need that now more than ever given the state of the world. Is there anyone who doesn’t love a bit of nostalgia and would love to step back into the past for a little while?’
‘Yes!’ He sounds so incredulous that it makes me laugh. ‘I can’t think of anything worse.’
‘This is exactly the kind of place everyone needs. Modern Christmases are all about stress and expensive presents that none of us can really afford, but what Christmas is really about is time with family and friends and appreciating what you have rather than making lists of stuff you want. Nutcracker Lane is a remnant of times gone by, with the paving slabs and the Victorian lampposts and the old-fashioned carollers singing traditional Christmas songs rather than, I don’t know, that bloke from The Royle Family singing “Christmas, My Arse”.’
‘There’s not seriously a Christmas song called that, is there?’
I nod.
‘If I could move enough to get my phone out of my pocket, I’d look that up right now. I think we both know what the soundtrack in my shop is going to be tomorrow. Forget Tchaikovsky, “Christmas, My Arse” is my new favourite song and I haven’t even heard it yet.’
I know he’s deliberately winding me up again, but there’s something so good-natured about it that I don’t mind.
‘Did you know they used to do free-of-charge day trips here for people with terminal illnesses? People spent their last ever Christmas on Nutcracker Lane. That’s something special – something that shouldn’t be forgotten.’
He shakes his head. ‘Yeah, but … I’m not so heartless that I can find an argument against that, but people stopped coming. If Nutcracker Lane was as important as you say it was, why isn’t it still?’
‘People stopped coming because the budget keeps being cut. The more stuff that’s taken away, the fewer reasons there are for people to visit.’
‘If it was earning enough money, the budget wouldn’t have been cut in the first place.’
I hate that he’s got a point there. Am I putting more value on it than there actually was? Just because it was special to me, was it really so special to other people too? Or did they just come here for whatever free stuff they could get out of the magical nutcracker’s wish-granting abilities, and when the wish-granters left, so did the visitors?
‘It was an escape for me. My dad died when I was young, and my granddad died not long after, and my grandma and I kind of connected through our grief. We used to come here almost every day during the Christmas season and it was a little haven. Inside these doors, you could forget about everything outside for a while and lose yourself in festive magic.’
‘That sounds nice,’ he murmurs.
‘After my granddad died,
