Even they don’t look appetising, but Stacey assures me fresh cream has medicinal properties and we both huddle behind the counter while Lily answers customer queries with more adeptness than I ever have.
‘All the times his car’s been in but he’s been nowhere to be found,’ I say with my mouth full. ‘Where did I think he was? The North Pole?’
‘Where was he?’ she asks, struggling to keep up.
‘I don’t know. Over in the factory, I suppose. Being an acting manager. Poring over his expansion plans and which shops he can bulldoze first.’ I take a sip of hot chocolate, which does nothing but remind me of James and the way he bought us one on the morning after he came home with me for the first time. ‘Oh God, Stace, the keys. Last night, he had the keys to the outlet shop and I thought he must’ve gone to so much trouble to get them and do this incredibly special thing for me when they were his all along.’
She scoops cream out of her cake with her finger. ‘I hate to be the voice of reason, but don’t you think he’s gone to a lot of trouble here? The decorations, the nutcrackers, talking the shopkeepers into getting involved in banding together against … himself? Nia, it doesn’t make any sense.’
‘Nothing Scrooge has ever done makes sense. We knew he wasn’t using his real name, but even in that, he was … what, taking the mickey out of us? Laughing over his own Scrooge-like tendencies?’ I lick my fingers as I finish my cake and sip my hot chocolate again even though it’s still too hot.
His notebook is on the floor under my knee and I pick it up. ‘I’m going to, I don’t know, go and paint something. I should have been putting in more hours with my crafting, not spending every waking moment with him …’
‘You were trying to save Nutcracker Lane. That’s a good thing.’
‘The only thing I’ve been trying to do is not fall in love. And I failed.’
‘Nee …’ she calls after me as I get up.
‘It’s okay. I should’ve known. From day one, I’ve said men like him don’t exist in real life – turns out, they don’t.’
I go through to the back room and put my hot chocolate cup and his notebook down on the workbench. I’m sure he only gave it to me because he had nowhere else to put it, but I can’t resist the temptation to flick through. It doesn’t say much, other than proving he was at least honest about what he was doing this morning because the first few pages really are full of customer comments, although why or what he intends to do with them is anyone’s guess. Clues to the most popular shops he can bring back next year, I suppose. I shut the book in frustration. I don’t know what I expected to find in there. An explanation that made sense, maybe?
I had a custom order for a snowman family with the names of each family member on yesterday that is being picked up tomorrow, so I sit down at the table and pull out my paint box. One of the things I’ve always loved most about making things is the escape and the ability to let your mind go and forget about everything other than the brushstrokes.
As I sit there dabbing white paint onto MDF snowmen, I can almost hear the gossip spreading down the lane like the leaves on trees leaning across to whisper to each other on a windy day, and it isn’t long before Carmen, Mrs Brissett, and Hubert bustle into the back room to find me.
Hubert puts a bag of peppermint bark down on the desk in front of me and I thank him and put a huge piece of the jagged chocolate into my mouth so I can avoid answering their questions for a while.
‘We had no idea, pet,’ Mrs Brissett says.
‘What a shock,’ Hubert says.
‘And he seemed so nice,’ Carmen adds.
The shop’s obviously quiet because Stacey pokes her head round the door and gives me a wink of solidarity.
‘But what about the good things he’s done? It was James’s idea to put the decorations back, and he’s done so much of it himself, even with the arm,’ Carmen says.
‘And I’ve lost track of how many jumpers he’s bought now,’ Mrs Brissett says. ‘That first day when we met him, I thought he was way too uptight to wear a Christmas jumper, but you had such a positive influence on him.’
‘All those wishes he’s granted. Why would he do that if he was going to shut us down?’ Hubert holds up a finger to halt us. ‘And look at how happy it’s made him. He’s been genuinely touched by some of the people he’s helped.’
‘He practically ran to that supermarket the other day to get that voucher even though he was obviously in agony,’ Mrs Brissett adds.
I think about standing in the car park with him as we watched that woman drive away. He was genuinely touched. He talked about Nutcracker Lane’s legacy … because that’s all it will ever be to him – history.
‘The rivalry between shopkeepers,’ I say, because I can’t combine the James I’ve got to know with the Scrooge who’s been sending us condescending letters for months. ‘That was his idea. Every budget cut. Every little thing that’s gradually been siphoned from the lane. That was all him.’
‘What about all he’s done this year?’
‘All I can think is that he wanted to get hands-on with his factory expansion plans. As well as the sales figures for each shop, he wanted to see for himself which ones are performing best. We all said straightaway that it would be impossible to judge from figures alone because of item value, and he obviously knew that too and inserted himself smack bang into
