A Merry Little Christmas

Chapter One

Marianne was simmering a lamb stew on the Aga, in the homely country kitchen she and Gabriel had recently renovated in oak, while the twins sat in their high chairs banging spoons on the table, giggling away at each other. It was a deep and abiding relief to her that they were so happy in each other’s company; they kept themselves usefully occupied when she was busy. It was a wintry Monday afternoon and Gabriel had taken Steven over to have a look around Middleminster. Marianne had thought of coming with them as she wasn’t working, but decided that the twins would probably be too distracting, and it might be better for Gabriel to do this with Steven on his own. She also hoped that it might persuade Gabriel that this was really a good idea.

She was just serving the twins’ portions into two identical plastic bowls when an animated Steven burst through the door, followed by Gabriel, looking slightly less than thrilled. Marianne was caught afresh with the realisation of how similar father and son were getting. Steven had grown a lot recently and his hair had darkened, and his eyes, though blue, retained something of his father’s look about them.

‘So what’s it like?’

‘It was fab, Marianne!’ Steven was jumping about with glee. ‘They’ve got a brilliant football pitch and I could get to play cricket too!’

Steven had started playing cricket the previous summer, and been disappointed to learn that the local secondary school hadn’t got cricket on the curriculum.

‘What about the choir?’ laughed Marianne, caught up with his infectious enthusiasm. ‘I mean, that’s the main reason for going.’

‘It was cool, wasn’t it, Dad?’ Steven’s eyes lit up. Unusually for a boy, he loved singing – and had a talent for it too.

‘Very cool,’ agreed Gabriel, ‘but you have to get in first.’

‘We’d better get started on those practice tests, hadn’t we?’ said Marianne, giving Steven a hug. Since the idea of Middleminster had first been mooted in the autumn, she had occasionally run through a past paper with Steven. He was a bright boy, and she saw no reason why he couldn’t get in, but he needed more experience of the entrance tests if he were to stand a chance. Marianne looked at Gabe and gave him an encouraging smile. She knew how hard this was for him. On the one hand, he wanted to give his son the best chance he could have, of course he did. But on the other, Gabe had no desire to lose Steven to a choir school fifty miles away, despite Marianne’s pointing out it was a good opportunity if Steven wanted to take it.

‘Mum says Darren knows someone at the school who might be able to help,’ said Steven.

‘I gathered that,’ said Gabe. ‘If you’re going to get in, I’d rather you did it on your own merits.’

‘So you did like it then?’ Marianne said as Steven disappeared upstairs to play on his Xbox.

‘It’s a great school,’ admitted Gabe. ‘And I could see Steven loved it. Hell, I loved it. You should have seen the facilities they have. I think Steven could do well there.’

‘That’s good isn’t it?’

‘Yes …’ Gabriel had a slightly forlorn look on his face. One she hadn’t seen in a long time.

‘I sense a but here,’ said Marianne.

‘Eleven is very young to be away from us,’ said Gabriel. ‘I hate the thought of him going away. And if Eve does move up here, we won’t even have him every weekend.’

‘I know,’ said Marianne, ‘and I do understand, but if Steven really likes it …’

‘And he does,’ said Gabriel with a rueful smile. ‘I’m being selfish.’

‘No you’re not,’ said Marianne giving him a hug. ‘You love your son. Which is perfectly natural, and is one of many reasons that I love you. And here’s another.’

She handed Gabe Daisy’s bowl, and she took Harry’s, and together they fed the twins. It was one of the most fun parts of a hectically busy domestic routine, and one which always made her happy and grateful that she’d found Gabriel four years ago, when she’d nearly left Hope Christmas after Luke Nicholas had broken her heart. As she’d hoped, five minutes of making aeroplane noises for the twins cheered Gabriel up no end, and his mood was much lighter by the time they were clearing up.

‘Try not to worry about Steven,’ Marianne said, lifting Daisy out of her high chair and popping her into the playpen that sat in the corner of the kitchen. ‘I know it’s hard, but even with a nod from Darren’s mate, he’s not certain to get in.’

‘True,’ said Gabe, carrying Harry to join his sister. ‘And even Eve admitted we can’t afford it if he doesn’t get a scholarship.’

‘There, you see,’ said Marianne, kissing him. ‘No need to waste your energy on ifs and buts. It might never happen. Why don’t we just enjoy what we have?’

Pippa was baking; her kitchen smelling warm, comforting, and safe. It was her default position when stressed. Plus she was part of the volunteer group who kept the local shop open, stocked and supplied with local produce and home baking. The rate she was going today, the shop was going to be well stocked for weeks. She’d spent all morning making chocolate brownies, blueberry muffins, and scones – all to put off facing up to the unpalatable news that Lucy’s social worker, Claire King had given her that morning.

‘I’m sorry,’ had been Claire’s opening gambit, ‘but we’re all having to cut our budgets for the next financial year, and one of my more unpleasant jobs has been working out which services have to be cut. One of the options we’re looking at is reducing our respite care packages. It has to go on level of need, I’m afraid …’

The pause spoke volumes.

‘And ours isn’t great enough,’ Pippa said flatly.

‘I wouldn’t go as far as to say that,’ Claire was clearly floundering a bit, ‘and I’m not saying this is a definite, or that you’ll lose the respite altogether …’

‘But it’s a possibility?’ said Pippa.

‘I think it’s more likely that Lucy will be receiving respite care once a month in the foreseeable future, rather than once a fortnight,’ said Claire, ‘and rest assured we will be working hard to sort out an alternative for you, but …’

But that was no guarantee of help in the long term. Reading between the lines, and given the level of cuts being imposed on social services, it was highly unlikely that Lucy would be having any respite care in a year’s time. Pippa was desperately looking round for alternatives, but as far as she could see there were none. She’d written a letter to her MP, Tom Brooker – without much hope of success, given that it was his party implementing the cuts – and was now trying to drum up support from other parents similarly affected. The trouble was, most of them, like her, were worn down by the years and years of fighting a system that at its best could be brilliant, but at its worst was cold, indifferent and cared little for individual sob stories.

Her next port of call was going to be Cat Tinsall. With her media contacts, Cat might be able to help, not just Lucy, but the other kids who got help from the Sunshine Trust. And Cat, Pippa knew, would understand. When Cat had first moved to Hope Christmas just under four years ago, they had instantly bonded over children, cooking and how hard it was being a carer. Cat’s mother, Louise, suffered from dementia, and Pippa knew how tough she found it. She empathised with the guilt, the feeling that maybe you could do more, be better, be less selfish.

‘Mmm, something smells good. Bad day?’ Dan’s six-foot frame filled the kitchen. He had a way of dominating a room. He’d come fresh from the outhouse where he scrubbed down after milking the cows, before entering the house. He’d been out since dawn and had come back now to have breakfast. Pippa’s heart swelled. However hard life was, she had and always would have Dan. A sudden memory snuck its way into her brain, of her and Dan, lying together in their field at the bottom of the hill on a sunny day, Dan saying quite seriously, ‘Love you forever,’ when Pippa had only just got round to thinking the ‘L’ word. Everything was manageable with Dan by her side.

‘How did you guess?’ asked Pippa, lifting her last batch of scones out of the Aga and putting them on the pine kitchen island in the middle of the kitchen, replacing them with muffins. She took a broom out and swept away the mud Dan had brought in with him.

‘You always bake when you’re in a bad mood,’ said Dan.

‘And you always bring mud in from the farm,’ she said.

‘I did wash up,’ protested Dan.

‘But you forgot to take your boots off, as usual,’ Pippa rolled her eyes at him.

Dan responded by picking up a scone and taking a bite. ‘Delicious.’

‘Oi, they’re not for you,’ said Pippa. ‘But why don’t you sit down and I’ll make you a cuppa and a fry-up.’

‘No, you sit down,’ said Dan, ‘and tell me all about it. What’s that bloody woman done now?’

‘Nothing more than usual,’ said Pippa, loving him for so perfectly tuning into her mood. ‘She’s wrung her hands as much as she can, but the upshot is we still have respite care for the short term, but monthly not fortnightly.’

‘Well, that’s something at least,’ said Dan.

‘I know,’ said Pippa. ‘But it’s the long term I’m worried about. What happens if we lose it altogether?’

‘We cross that bridge when we come to it,’ said Dan, handing his wife a cup of tea.

‘Why are you always so positive?’ said Pippa. ‘Here I am finding problems, and you go round making out it will all be okay.’ That was Dan all over, her rock, her strength. He always managed to help her see a way through, when she felt overwhelmed.

‘One of us has to be,’ said Dan, ‘and you do enough worrying for the pair of us. Something will turn up, you’ll see.’

‘Oh Dan,’ said Pippa, suddenly feeling a bit teary. ‘Whatever did I do to deserve you?’

‘I don’t know,’ said Dan with a grin, ‘but if I’m allowed another one of those scones, you never know, I might even stick around a while.’

Cat was on the set of Cat’s Country Kitchen, her new TV show which was due to air in the autumn, when her phone buzzed. She’d been busy talking to Len Franklin the director about setting up a shot of her chopping onions for her Shropshire hotpot, which she was meant to be doing without crying. The phone buzzed insistently again. Damn. She thought she’d turned it off. Cat took it out of her pocket and saw, to her dismay, the school phone number. Her heart sank. Now what had Mel done?

‘I’m terribly sorry,’ she said to Len. She hadn’t worked with him before, and found him a little taciturn and unfriendly, so she wasn’t quite sure how he’d take the interruption. ‘Would you mind if I take this?’

‘If you must,’ said Len in long-suffering tones. ‘But please be quick, we’ve got a busy schedule and a lot to get through.’

‘Thanks,’ said Cat, smiling apologetically at the film crew, and wandered to the back of the studio.

‘Hullo, Catherine Tinsall here,’ she said. ‘Sorry to keep you waiting. How may I help?’

She dreaded phone calls from school, which seemed to be happening with monotonous regularity of late.

‘Mrs Tinsall?’ The crisp tones of Mrs Reynolds, the school secretary, always made her turn to jelly. ‘It appears that Melanie is absent from school, and we haven’t heard from you. I take it she is ill?’

‘Ill? No of course not,’ said Cat in bewilderment. ‘I saw her off to school myself. Did you send me a text message?’

‘Of course,’ said Mrs Reynolds.

‘Oh,’ Cat checked her messages. She’d missed one. ‘Yes I did get it. I’m at work, and didn’t pick it up. Didn’t Mel come in at all?’

‘Apparently not,’ said Mrs Reynolds frostily. Cat knew it was paranoid, but she always got the impression Mrs Reynolds thought all mothers should stay at home till their children had left school.

‘I am so sorry,’ said Cat. ‘I’ll try and find out what’s happened and where she is.’

She put the phone down, her heart thumping. Bloody hell. She’d had far too many conversations this year with Mel’s form teacher about her bad behaviour, but usually it was about cheeking the teachers, or not working hard enough. She’d even been suspended for a day for being caught smoking. Why on earth would she have skipped school? It was probably because she was due to get her mock results. Mel had been grumpy as hell for the last few days, and judging by how little work she’d done over the Christmas holidays, Cat wasn’t expecting miracles. It was the first time Mel had ever bunked off. That is, if she was bunking off, and not dead in a ditch somewhere. Oh God, Cat thought, what if something had happened to her?

‘Don’t even go there, Cat,’ she muttered to herself, and rang Mel’s mobile. Switched off, of course. She sent a text instead. You’ve been rumbled. RING ME, Mum.

She texted both James and Paige at school, though she knew, technically, they weren’t supposed to have their phones on them.

Do you know where Mel is?

No idea. James’ response was swift and to the point.

Paige took longer to reply.

Saw her talking to Andy outside school.

Andy who?

Dunno was the helpful response.

Great. Thanks for nothing, Paige.

‘Ahem, if we could get on?’ Len was tapping his watch, the film crew were looking bored, and Cat was conscious everyone was looking at her.

‘Yes, of course, nearly done.’ Cat made one last phone call.

‘Noel, I’m really sorry to do this, but Mel’s bunked off. I’ve no idea where she is and I was due on camera five minutes ago. Can you deal with it? I assume she’s in town somewhere. Possibly with a boy named Andy.’

‘Cat–’ began Noel.

‘I know, I’m sorry,’ said Cat, ‘I’ll get away as soon as I can, I promise.’

‘Okay, leave it with me,’ said Noel, ‘I’ll go out on a recce.’

‘Thanks,’ said Cat. ‘I owe you.’

‘Again,’ said Noel, who had, she realised guiltily, been picking up more of the domestic slack than her of late. ‘I’ll bloody kill her when I find her.’

‘Not before I do,’ said Cat.

‘When we’re ready,’ interrupted the director, sharply.

‘Ready,’ said Cat, turning her phone off.

She allowed the make-up girl to touch up her face, and stood in front of the shiny hot plates on which she was about to demonstrate making her twist on a traditional Shropshire stew.

‘Hello and welcome to Cat’s Country Kitchen, where I’ll be showing you recipes old and new from Shropshire, the food capital of Great Britain,’ she said, trying with all her might to forget about errant daughters and concentrate instead on cooking. After all, that’s what she got paid for.

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