“Oh, thank you. It’s lovely.” Like Barbara Cartland had decorated it for her granddaughter.
Mrs Browning beamed at her and Chloe found herself smiling back. She realised that she hadn’t remembered the Brownings very well. The last time she’d seen them, she was deeply ensconced in her new friendship with the other two MLs and adults were “boring”. Yet, there they were, opening their home to a virtual stranger—at Christmas.
She felt a surge of affection for them both.
There was also a tiny but loud part of her that was dying to give Mrs Browning a makeover. Chloe couldn’t remember exactly how old she was—she rarely noted such details about other people’s parents, even those of her closest friends—but the kind, broad face of the woman now fussing with the throw pillows couldn’t have been any older than sixty. Yet she dressed like she had one foot in the grave.
“Now,” said Mrs Browning, turning back to Chloe. “I expect you will want a bath, a hot meal, and bed, in that order. Have I got that right?”
Chloe glanced at the clock on the bedside table. 6:03pm. It didn’t matter what time it was in Melbourne. She needed to acclimate as soon as possible to UK time, so Mrs Browning’s suggestions seemed perfect. Except the bit about the bath.
“That sounds divine, thank you. But …” A pair of eyebrows shot up to a hairline inquisitively. “Can I just have a shower instead?”
“Oh, of course, love.”
The weight of the journey hit her with full force and all Chloe wanted was that shower. “We have a handheld nozzle for that business.” A handheld what? “We tend to take baths here, but last time she visited, Max bought the nozzle for Lucy.”
“Er, right.”
Chloe got undressed in the frigid bathroom and stepped tentatively into the massive bathtub, her flesh covered in tiny bumps. After fiddling with the taps and waiting for what felt like forever, she discovered that tepid was as warm as the water got and that the handheld nozzle put out little more than a trickle. She rinsed as quickly as she could, bracing herself against the cold water and even colder air, then got out and wrapped the towel tightly around her, attempting to get warm.
“Maybe I’ll just use a wet washcloth ’til I go home,” she muttered to herself as she dried off. The thought made her giggle. What on earth had she signed up for? Maybe this was part of the traditional English Christmas.
Dinner was a plate piled high with sausages, mashed potatoes, and peas—all of which, Mrs Browning mentioned, came from a local farm. Chloe cleaned her plate and enjoyed every mouthful—the fresh bursts of the peas, the creamy, buttery potatoes that were an indulgence she would never allow herself back home, and the spiciness of the pork sausages.
Regardless of whether it was Mrs Browning’s cooking or the farm-fresh produce that made everything so delicious, Chloe was going to have to watch herself. If she ate like this the entire time, she’d go up a dress size.
Seated in the front room, as the Brownings called it, Chloe sipped a tiny glass of after-dinner sherry while admiring the traditional charm of their Christmas decorations. They’d strung a piece of red wool from one end of the longest wall to the other, with Christmas cards of all sizes and colours hanging from their spines. Placed along the mantle above the fireplace was a faux fir-tree garland and six small brass candlesticks, each holding a red candle. None were lit. Perhaps that only happened on Christmas.
There were four stockings hanging from the mantle, three of them much-loved and one new one with her name embroidered across it in gold thread. Chloe was surprised to feel the sting of tears in her eyes. Would her parents have done the same for Lucy? They would have, she decided—not stockings, because her family didn’t do those—but had they not been cruising around the South Pacific, she was sure they’d be spoiling Lucy, or Jules, or whomever she’d swapped Christmases with.
Actually, if her parents weren’t on a cruise, she wouldn’t be here.
The Christmas tree was only as tall as she was, but it was real, and the heady scent of pine filled the room. Chloe stood to admire it, taking her sherry with her. She was not particularly into sherry—it was far too sweet for her—but apparently it was Mrs Browning’s after-dinner ritual. When in a tiny village in Oxfordshire, right?
“Oh, Mr and Mrs Browning, your collection of ornaments is beautiful.” Amongst the dense assortment of nutcrackers and angels, all very traditional in design and colour, were the handmade ornaments of a child. Chloe carefully held the bottom of an angel made from cardboard and painted gold.
She sensed Mrs Browning next to her. “Oh, thank you, love. You see that we’ve kept all our Lucy’s ornaments from school days. And many of the others are from her travels with you girls. She’s always finding the loveliest things. I think this one is my favourite.” She pointed to a Murano glass angel that Chloe recognised immediately, as she’d been there when Lucy had bought it.
“Beautiful,” said Chloe softly. She hoped they would like the ornaments she’d brought them from Australia. Nestled back in her chair, she went to take a sip of her sherry only to find the glass empty. “Oh.” She looked at it in shock, a little embarrassed that she’d drunk it all already.
“Oh, never mind about that, love. Happens to me all the time.” Mrs Browning laughed and got up to refill Chloe’s glass. “They’re tiny glasses, aren’t they? Quite silly really.” She threw in a wink and Chloe grinned up at her.
“Thank you, Mrs Browning.”
“Love, you really must stop calling us ‘Mr’ and ‘Mrs’. Please, it’s Max and Susan.”
“Right, Max and Susan.” For some reason, it didn’t seem right to her to call them by their first names, which was ridiculous, because she called the CEO of the company she
