And in the process, I’ve made absolutely damn sure that I do not. Christmas has suddenly lost all its magic for me.
I hear Stacey lock the door behind him, and within seconds, her head pops round the back room door. ‘You okay?’
I can’t manage anything more involved than a shrug.
‘If it helps, he looked distraught.’
I know he did. I could hear it in his voice even without seeing him. ‘Good,’ I say, although I can’t hide the wobble in my voice and Stacey hears it too.
She comes over and gives me a hug. ‘Come on, let’s finish tidying and then you’re coming home with me. Simon’s taking Lily ice skating tonight so you and me are going to put on a Christmas movie and eat three times our bodyweight in ice cream.’
I appreciate her efforts, but I think it’s going to take more than festive romantic comedies and ice cream to fix this. I don’t remember being this upset after Brad cheated on me and I’d been dating him for years. I’ve known James for three weeks and my heart feels more broken than it ever has before, and I don’t know if it’s because of him, or because I’m absolutely certain that whoever he is and whatever he’s playing at, this will be my last year on Nutcracker Lane.
There is no more hope of saving it. Both the man I was falling for and the Christmas village I’ve loved since childhood are gone.
Chapter 17
Yesterday, I was shocked and numb, but today I’ve barely stopped crying. It’s December 23rd, the penultimate shopping day before Christmas, and Nutcracker Lane is bustling with festive cheer. These few days before Christmas when most things are done – cards are posted and presents have been delivered to people you aren’t spending the day with, visitors have visited and office Christmas parties are hazy memories – these are my favourite days. There’s a certain satisfaction once last posting dates have passed and you’re officially too late to buy any more gifts or add any more food to your Christmas grocery delivery. A sense of “that’s it, if it’s missing now, we’ll just have to go without it”, absolving yourself of your festive to-do list and looking forward to a few days of eating too much and not getting up from the sofa unless it’s absolutely necessary.
Everything Christmassy has lost its appeal now. I forced myself into a Christmas jumper and holly-leaf headband this morning solely because I knew Stacey would march me across the lane to the jumper shop to buy another one if I turned up in ordinary clothes. She’s already held me down and inserted a pair of flashing Christmas bulb earrings into my ears. I couldn’t risk anything that would make me leave the safety of the back room.
Going across the lane is out of the question because James could pop out at any moment. His car wasn’t there when Stacey and I got in this morning – early, to avoid any risk of running into him – but Hubert has reliably informed us that it’s now in its regular space, although his shop is shut so he must be over in the factory.
Lily’s dressed up as Rapunzel from Tangled and is dancing around the shop, belting out “I See The Light” like some sort of summoning ritual, but she’s too adorable for me to ask her to stop.
‘Auntie Nia, why won’t you let an actual Disney prince into your shop?’ she asks me for the eleventh time this morning.
‘Because Disney princes only exist in Disney films. They never, ever step into real life. I should’ve known that.’
Despite her love of Flynn Rider, she promises to hit James with her fairy wand if she spots him lurking nearby. Stacey has taught her well.
I spend most of the morning in the back room. Well, all of the morning because Stacey shooed me away when I did go onto the shop floor and was so obsessed with watching for James that I knocked over an earring stand and sent forty pairs of bauble earrings flailing across the floor. I spend most of the morning painting sets of gingerbread man bunting sprinkled with iridescent glitter, even though it’s a bit late for Christmas decorations now, and if I was thinking clearly, I’d have made good use of the time and started on Valentine’s Day stock instead.
The afternoon brings with it a slew of last-minute custom orders that customers buy for collection tomorrow, and to give the paint and varnish ample drying time, they need to be done as quickly as possible.
Usually I get annoyed at last-minute orders, but it’s like Nutcracker Lane knew I needed the distraction today, and I appreciate the ability to lose myself in the work and not think about anything else.
Except for every voice in the shop and every hint of a footstep near the open doorway to the back room. Except every 0.02 of a second when my mind drifts to him and where he is and if he’s going to come in and try to talk to me again.
When I finish the last custom order for a set of standing reindeer pulling a 3D sleigh and screw the cap back on my red acrylic paint bottle after doing Rudolph’s nose, the last of the cup of tea Stacey made me before she and Lily left for the day has gone cold and the clock shows it’s past seven. Stacey asked me to go home with them, but I didn’t want to impose again, and now I’m going to have to run the gauntlet of avoiding James alone.
He’ll have gone by now, I tell myself.
I had a desk lamp on my work, but the main light in the back room is off because it
