Chapter 31

31

TWO DAYS UNTIL CHRISTMAS

Before Shelley has even opened her eyes she knows everything is different. It feels and sounds and even smells different as she lies there in bed. Everything is still and quiet, as if muffled. And she thinks: what’s happened?

Could it be that, in this short time she’s been away from home – although it’s hardly been restful – her head has cleared, and by tomorrow she’ll be ready to return to her real life? Already she feels as if she is firing on all cylinders again. That day last week, when the chilli had been scoffed and she’d glugged a bottle of sauvignon for dinner, at least one of those cylinders had felt broken.

She opens her eyes and lies there in the quiet room. Beside her, Pearl is still asleep. And over in the little fold-out bed, Lena mumbles and repositions herself.

Shelley looks up at the ceiling as she replays her conversation with Joel yesterday. Okay, he only said he’d come and meet them at the airport. He didn’t say he’d whisk them all home on a flying carpet – but still. It’s unexpectedly generous of him. Shelley realises she can’t remember the last time Joel did anything kind for her.

Her eyes prickle with unexpected tears and she quickly blinks them away. It’s probably done him good, she reflects as she slips quietly out of bed. Her coming up here means he’s had to manage the kids, their home, and the last bits of Christmas. And rather than shirking his duties he’s risen to the challenge. Okay, wrapping a few presents for his own parents is hardly heroic – but in all their years together she can’t recall him ever wrapping anything . Not even for her birthday or Christmas. It’s been vouchers in envelopes, or a bottle of perfume clearly bought in haste and handed to her unwrapped.

Once he really pushed the boat out and presented her with a family meals-type cookbook in a gift bag. Just what she’d needed. New ways to make flipping sausage and mash! She knew Martha had had a hand in the gift bag element, as she’d overheard her telling him off. ‘Are you just going to give it to her like that? For God’s sake, Dad!’ Joel doesn’t get the whole ribbons, gift tags, wrapping paper thing. But now he’s coming to meet her at the airport! And this must mean one thing.

That he loves and appreciates her after all! Because driving out to Stansted Airport for her benefit is, by Joel’s standards, akin to traversing Siberia wearing only his socks.

Shelley pads across the room, parts the curtains a little and blinks at what’s before her.

Snow! So much snow, thick and white and covering the garden and the hills beyond. So much white that land and sky have merged. Only the loch is a different hue, gleaming silvery grey. The world is monochrome and Shelley stares, transfixed.

Perhaps, she thinks, Joel is coming to the airport because he wants to make it up to her. Finally, she decides as she dresses quickly in jeans and a sweater – and then, at the front door, pulling on a pair of Michael’s green wellies – he’s realised that being in possession of a penis means you still have to pull your weight. And that his isn’t so colossally huge that it makes it impossible for him to stand at the sink and wash up. That it’s not so exhausting to drag around all day that evenings must be spent, near comatose, on the sofa.

Shelley steps outside, blinking as the dazzling whiteness tingles her eyes. That’s it, she realises. It’s taken me coming up here for Joel to remember that I am an actual person. She’s wondered sometimes, these past six months especially. Because he’s seemed different. Even more distant and blasé than usual. Preoccupied too, as if he’s had something – or someone – on his mind. There have been nights out with friends, which he’s been vague about. And when he’s come home from these nights, he’s slipped into bed and turned his back to her. She’s known he was awake, that he was lying there with his eyes open. She could just sense it.

What was he thinking about? What was going on?

‘Joel?’ she murmured one night. She touched his back and he flinched. ‘Are you okay?’

‘Just really tired.’ He exhaled slowly and then his breathing deepened and settled, as if he was asleep. But she knew he was faking it. When you’ve been with someone for twenty-five years you just know.

Snow crunches underfoot as Shelley makes her way to the edge of the garden. Trees are clotted with snow, and fence posts jut out from the thick white blanket like pencil lines. It’s a Christmas card, right here. Did Joel really remember to drop off the cards to their neighbours? She catches herself fretting about home, and mentally shakes herself out of it. Is she too controlling, wanting her grandma’s decorations brought down from the attic and a holly wreath for the front door? Is that the problem? Her thoughts break off as someone groans quietly where the cars are parked.

‘Roger!’ She smiles and tramps over towards him. More snow is falling now in soft flakes.

‘Morning, Shelley.’ He smiles, hot-faced in a brown bobble hat and a thick padded jacket. He tweaks at his beard. ‘This is something, isn’t it?’

‘It’s incredible.’ She spots the shovel, propped up in a drift of snow. ‘Are you trying to dig out your car?’

‘Hmm, yes. Quite a job but we need to get back today. In fact we should have left by now. It’s the local kids’ Christmas party later and I still need to finish Theo’s costume?—’

‘You mean fancy dress?’ she asks, and Roger nods. ‘ You do that?’ she exclaims.

‘Well, yes.’ He looks bemused by her reaction. Yet for a moment, this man’s willingness to make his kid’s fancy dress outfit is more astounding to her than the vast quantity of snow that fell during the night.

‘Well, Theo and Frida come up with the idea,’ he clarifies. ‘The concept is theirs. They’re very good at that.’ He says this jovially, with no trace of bitterness. ‘But I tend to do the construction.’

‘Right.’ Momentarily, Shelley tries to picture Joel being put in charge of such a task. But it’s impossible to imagine. Switching her attention back to the snow, she looks around to where Roger has been digging. Of course, if the Sampsons’ car needs to be dug out of the snow, then Niall’s will too. All of the guests are supposed to be leaving today. What if they can’t dig their way out? And what if the snow is still lying tomorrow – on Christmas Eve! – and she and Lena and Pearl can’t get to Glasgow for their flight home? No, that can’t happen. Shelley pushes the thought aside and turns back to Roger. ‘D’you think you’ll manage this?’ she asks.

‘To dig us out?’ He grabs the spade. ‘Have to. No question about it. There’s a prize for best fancy dress and we won it last year. Theo went as a cracker! And this year he’ll be a Christmas pudding.’

‘But how—’ she starts.

‘Not as tricky it sounds actually. I built a wire frame and covered it with papier-maché. Layers upon layers of the stuff. Had to buy extra newspapers, even the trashy ones we can’t abide, haha?—’

‘No, I actually meant how?—’

‘So the basic structure’s done. A huge papier-maché sphere that’ll be suspended from his shoulders, and all I need to do is?—’

‘Roger,’ Shelley cuts in, ‘I meant, even if you can dig out your car, how are you going to get up onto the road?’ Her gaze follows the track. Or rather, where the track lies beneath a thick layer of snow. ‘We’ll all help you. Of course we will. But what will the actual road be like? Will it be possible to drive safely?’

‘Oh, the gritters will have been out,’ he says firmly as he starts digging again.

Shelley frowns. ‘D’you think gritters come all the way out here?’

‘Of course they do!’ Frida announces, stomping towards them now in a thick sweater and pyjama bottoms stuffed into wellies. And now Niall appears, followed by Lena and Pearl.

‘Oh my God,’ Lena breathes. ‘We’re snowed in!’

‘No, we’re not,’ Frida exclaims. ‘This is twenty-first century Britain and we need to get home. Theo has a party to go to?—’

‘Mummy! Snow!’ Theo hurtles out of the cottage and grabs handfuls of snow, which he flings ineffectually towards the adults.

‘The snow plough’ll be along soon,’ Frida says firmly, as if that’s the matter settled. ‘We might as well go in and have breakfast while we wait.’

Shelley bites her lip. ‘I think we should call Michael…’

‘Yes, call Michael,’ Frida commands.

Lena frowns, ruffling Stan’s head as he bounds out to join them. ‘I’m not sure he’ll be able to do much about this from London.’

‘But he’ll know when the gritters and snow ploughs are likely to arrive.’ Frida stares at her.

‘We could try digging up to the road,’ Niall offers, ‘but if that’s blocked…’ He blows out air. ‘It’s ten miles of single-track lane, Frida.’

‘Yes, but this can’t be a one-off event, can it?’ she counters. ‘Surely it happens every year, and they’re prepared for it?—’

‘Who’s prepared?’ Lena looks at her. ‘I mean, who’s going to come to a remote place like this?’

‘The council people!’ Frida turns to Roger, as if expecting him to back her up. ‘The snow team. The army …’

‘The army?’ Shelley splutters.

‘Oh, I don’t know.’ Frida glares at her husband. ‘I said you should paint the pudding before we came up here. Then we’d be all ready.’

‘But Frida?—’

‘Why didn’t you? What was the problem again?’

‘I forgot to get brown paint,’ he mutters. ‘I thought there’d be time today?—’

‘We’re not doing any good all standing around, are we?’ Shelley offers.

‘No,’ Frida agrees. ‘There must be something we can do to clear this snow…’

‘I’ll fetch my hairdryer,’ Pearl murmurs, and Nail’s mouth twitches into a smile. ‘Oh, but we can’t call Michael,’ she adds. ‘He’s lost his phone.’

‘I’ll try him at the hotel,’ Shelley announces, and as the others head indoors she plods through the thick white covering to the end of the garden. Here the whiteness is punctuated by the hen house and a glimpse of dry-stone wall. She stops and googles the airport hotel, calls the number and is put through to his room. ‘Thank God you’re there,’ she exclaims when he answers.

‘Shelley? I was just about to call the house. How is it up there?’

‘You know already?’ She steps carefully over a snow-covered log.

‘Yeah. I had the news on just now. Caught the weather report. So, it’s really bad, is it?’

‘It’s actually beautiful,’ she replies. ‘But yes, I guess it’s not exactly ideal?—’

‘No, it’s not. I’m sorry.’ He exhales. ‘This is going to be difficult for you, isn’t it? If the guests can’t leave today?’

‘We can look after them,’ she assures him. ‘And hopefully it’ll all be cleared tomorrow, so we can still catch our flight?—’

‘Shelley, I hate to say it but?—’

‘We’ll just get through today,’ she says briskly, unwilling to even consider that they might not be able to fly home, as planned, on Christmas Eve. ‘Frida’s not happy,’ she adds. ‘She’s had Roger digging for hours already, but their car’s stuck…’

‘Right,’ Michael murmurs. ‘Like that, is she?’

‘Yes, she’s used to things happening the way she wants them to.’ She breaks off. ‘But what about you? I’m sorry, I’ve been so caught up with things here, I’ve just realised. You’re flying home today, aren’t you? I’m so sorry. This is my fault…’

‘Your fault?’ He sounds bemused now. ‘How are you to blame for this?’

She watches as a small feathered head appears at the door of the hen house, and quickly pops back indoors. ‘You wanted to change your flight and come yesterday. And if you had, you’d be here now and everything would be okay?—’

‘Hey,’ he says, ‘it’s happened. As long as you’re all okay, then it’s fine.’

She pauses, still trying to quell her guilt. ‘So will you still fly to Glasgow and stay there until the weather clears?’

‘Actually,’ he starts, ‘I thought I might as well stay in London…’

‘What, forever?’ she teases. ‘Come back, Michael! We need you here?—’

‘I mean until the thaw comes.’ He chuckles. ‘I think I can amuse myself here.’

Shelley smiles, despite everything. ‘I should’ve asked. How did yesterday turn out?’

‘I had a great day actually. Walked for miles, taking it all in. All along the South Bank and then through Covent Garden and Soho, and there was this amazing place with a huge courtyard, Somerset House, and I sat there and had a coffee and got chatting to all these tourists on a Christmas shopping trip. Then I found a little bar on the Strand…’

‘Oh, that’s great. I was worried about you mooching around, all on your own.’

‘No, quite the opposite. I must’ve talked to more people than I’ve talked to all month, probably.’ A pause. ‘I haven’t been ice skating though.’

‘There’s still time.’ She smiles. ‘But I’m glad you’ve been out and about. Sorry, that makes it sound as if you’re about ninety?—’

‘I feel it sometimes.’ He laughs. ‘But actually, not so much right now. It really has been pretty good. And that’s why I thought I’d stay here a little bit longer. I don’t care about the flight. I did buy a cheap phone though, in case you need me…’

‘Great. So have fun, won’t you? Sounds like you’re loving it down there…’

‘I am. It’s…’ She senses him smiling too. ‘It’s… well, it’s different .’

‘You can say that again.’ She laughs. Then Lena calls out that breakfast is nearly ready, and over at the cars Frida snaps at Roger, ‘Don’t be so defeatist. The party’s happening at four and that pudding’s not going to paint itself!’

‘What was that ?’ Michael asks.

‘Just your guests,’ Shelley says, ‘having a mini crisis. But we’re all fine here. Honestly, there’s nothing to worry about.’

‘But what about you and your family?’ he asks. ‘How will they feel if you can’t get back home tomorrow?’

Shelley forms deep footprints in the snow as she heads back to the cottage. ‘Oh, I’m sure the snow will be gone by then,’ she says firmly. ‘It’s got to be, hasn’t it? It’ll be Christmas Eve.’