‘You’re welcome.’ His little finger reaches towards mine like he’s going to touch my hand but he pulls back and pushes himself upright instead, his hand trailing along the fence tops as he puts a bit of space between us.
‘So community spirit saved the nutcracker once,’ I say as cogs start turning in my mind. ‘That’s magic in itself. It’s a shame we can’t get people to care that much again.’
‘Well, it is Christmas. A certain someone keeps telling me anything can happen at this time of year.’
His maple-coloured eyes are twinkling, showing up flecks of green in them that I’d never noticed before, and I know he’s only humouring me, but he’s got a point. Anything can happen at Christmas, even the impossible.
Chapter 6
‘You cannot seriously be getting me an advent calendar,’ James says when I meet him in the middle of the lane between our shops the next morning.
‘Yep. No arguments. And I peeked into the chocolate shop this morning. They’re all half price now we’re four days into December. Come on.’
‘Nee …’ he starts as he follows me up the lane. It’s not even half past nine yet and it’s still quiet. There’s a bit of chatter filtering down from around the nutcracker but not a single customer has wandered down this far yet. ‘I enjoyed last night. I can’t believe you made me sit through the whole of It’s a Wonderful Life without falling asleep … or that I didn’t completely hate it.’
‘I’ve got a pie ready to go in the oven when I get home tonight,’ I say before I have a chance to second-guess it.
‘You seriously want me there again?’
‘We’ve got a ton of Christmas movies to get through. We’ve come this far, we can’t give up now. It’s non-negotiable that you still have to watch at least The Muppet Christmas Carol, Christmas Vacation, The Santa Clause, and the Jim Carrey version of The Grinch. And that pie is massive – I can’t eat it all myself. And I promise tonight we’ll watch something with an ending that won’t make you cry.’
When I look at him, his mouth is twitching as he tries not to smile. ‘I wasn’t crying. There was something in my eye.’
I giggle because I teased him mercilessly last night too. He deserved it after his disparaging comments about one of the best-loved Christmas films of all time.
Mrs Thwaite in the candle shop is rearranging her window and she looks up and gives us a dirty look. I slip my hand around his wrist and tug him onwards, wondering why it feels so natural to touch him. His fingers start to curl around mine and I let go quickly, because it would be so easy to intertwine our fingers and walk up to the chocolate shop hand-in-hand, but it’s not right. I barely know him.
I woke up early this morning because I couldn’t stop thinking about him, and I occupied the hours between getting up and leaving for work with making a butternut squash and baked camembert pie that I was hoping he’d like because I want nothing more than for him to come over again tonight. Five days ago, I’d sworn off men forever, and now he’s appeared and smashed through my defences with one smile, I can’t hold his hand as well. The other night in the storage room was different. He needed it then. Now I just want to hold it because his hands are elegant and long-fingered and he’s surprisingly adept with just one functioning.
The window of the chocolate shop log cabin is almost always surrounded by children pressing their noses against it and cupping their hands around their eyes to stare in without reflections. It’s empty today, and James is the one who stops to stare in longingly. ‘Do I walk around with my eyes shut or something?’ he murmurs. ‘Why have I never looked in here before? Have you seen that sleigh? How can anyone do that with chocolate? This woman is insanely talented.’
‘This woman is going to lose her shop like the rest of us,’ I mutter. Carmen the chocolate maker has been a staple of Nutcracker Lane for more years than I can remember. My granddad used to buy us all a selection box of her chocolates when I was young, and it was one of my grandma’s favourite shops on the lane. Carmen changes her display every week and it gets more magical each time, from families of chocolate snowmen, to a North Pole workshop manned by chocolate elves with moving piles of presents, to today’s creation of white chocolate reindeers pulling a ruby chocolate sleigh on an actual track that judderingly transports them from one side of the window to the other.
I’m standing in the doorway waiting and I touch James’s left shoulder with the gentlest touch I’ve ever used because I have no idea how far his bruising extends. He looks up, blinking like he was lost in his own little world.
‘Magical, right?’
He swallows hard and gives me a tight nod, and his Flynn Rider hair falls forward to frame his face.
‘Come to survey the competition?’ Carmen sounds angry and unwelcoming when we step inside the shop.
‘Of course not.’ I’m taken aback by the venom in her voice. ‘Come to buy my chocolateless friend here an advent calendar.’
‘Back wall. Half price. Don’t touch anything. If you ruin it, you pay for it.’ Carmen is barely tall enough to see over her own counter, but she folds her arms across her chest, her strawberry-blonde hair pulled up into a high ponytail that
