A Winter in Wonderland, page 22
‘Actually, Josh had to leave Lapland early because of a family emergency.’
‘Oh no. He’s gone?’
‘He’s gone.’
‘Are his family OK?’
‘I hope so, I’ve not heard from him since he arrived back.’
Dad paused. ‘Sorry, love.’
‘It’s fine.’ I picked at a loose thread on the duvet cover. ‘Actually, I’m a bit gutted. And I know that sounds really selfish because I don’t wish he was here with me instead of there, where he needs to be, it’s just sad losing someone, isn’t it? Even if they were just a friend.’
‘It is,’ Dad agreed, his voice soft.
Memories of Mum leaving drifted past my mind again like falling snow and though I didn’t want to, I found myself trying to catch them.
‘Dad?’
‘Yep?’
‘Are you still sad about Mum leaving?’
I heard him take in a big breath. ‘Yes … and no.’
‘All right then … ’
‘Yes, because it was a sad thing that happened and I can’t change that because it’s in the past. It’s out of my hands. But no because, well, your mum is happier now – actually we both are – than when we were together. Your mum loved you girls to the moon, but in the end her life wasn’t meant to be in our house with us, and I don’t begrudge her finding happiness.’
‘Why?’ I asked.
‘Because what good would that do me? Apart from stop me moving forward and being happy myself?’
‘You are happy … right?’ I asked with trepidation.
But my dad surprised me, and without hesitation let out a laugh. ‘Bloody right I am. I have two daughters I’m intensely proud of – one who’s working in Lapland which is pretty amazing, the other who’s about to have my first grandchild. I have a house that’s all mine now you two have skedaddled, and sometimes I spend whole weekends watching crime dramas with endless popcorn.’
‘Dad, that can’t be good for you—’
‘Hush. I’m healthy … ish. I’ve still got a fair amount of hair. I’m doing well. I’m happy.’
That was nice to hear, and for now, I let those thoughts melt away.
‘Good.’ Changing the subject, I added, ‘My other development, which I’m sure Shay will find hilarious, is that Love Adventuring Lapland have me working as an elf since Josh left.’
‘Oh dear, I can’t imagine you like that much,’ Dad chortled.
‘I don’t,’ I sighed. ‘Dad … can I come home?’
‘Why do you want to come home?’
‘I’m just feeling … over it. This was never a good fit for me and I don’t think I can take it any more.’
‘I thought you were enjoying it though, love? Surely there are more pros to cons?’
‘There are, but it’s been two months now and I’m tired of pretending to be Holly-Jolly-Christmas every second of the day. I want to come home.’
A movement caught my eye. I turned my head. And there was Esteri standing in the doorway, looking furious.
Esteri stepped in the room and closed the door, and I said a goodbye to Dad for now.
‘Hi,’ I said to her, dragging myself to the ladder and stumbling down from the top bunk, wondering what she’d heard.
She stared at me, her arms crossed, and I didn’t think I had to wonder any more.
‘Look,’ I started, ‘I was just letting off steam after a difficult day—’
‘Do you want to quit?’ she interrupted me.
‘No. Well … maybe.’ My heart thudded. Esteri and I were close, but she’d been with Love Adventuring Lapland for four years. Was she going to tell on me to Daan, and would my sister get in trouble?
‘You would give up this experience because a guy left?’
‘No, it’s really not that. It’s Christmas, I just don’t … I’m not … Christmas isn’t … ’
‘I know, I know, you don’t like Christmas.’
‘Of course I— Wait, pardon?’
‘I said, I know you don’t like Christmas.’
We locked eyes for a moment. She knew? ‘You knew?’
Esteri waved her hand in the air, her eyebrows still furrowed together. ‘I could tell right from the start, but you know why it didn’t bother me? Because you were trying. You were making the most of the opportunity. I may not have understood what exactly brought you here, but I could tell the longer you stayed the more comfortable you were becoming. Now, you don’t seem to be trying any more. You’re giving up, because a boy you liked has left? What happened to all that progress?’
I stepped back. ‘I can’t believe you knew. And you still made me do all those Christmassy things with you.’
‘Oh, for God’s sake, they were your job. They still are. Unless you’re planning to quit and run away?’
‘You don’t understand,’ I said. ‘Christmas is a really hard time for me and coming here has been tough. It’s hard to let go of bad memories.’
‘You don’t think I know that? You think you’re the only one who’s done hard things?’
‘No, I’m not saying that.’
‘Well guess what? You’re not the only one. And I know everyone is different, but I choose not to define myself by the things in my past. They have happened, they are a part of me, but so are a million other things.’ She shook her head and went to sit on her bunk. ‘I don’t know what you’ve been through, but you can talk to me about it if you want to. Or I guess you can just leave. Since you’re so tired of pretending.’
Esteri lay back and rolled over, facing away from me, and I stood in the centre of the room feeling pretty crap about myself. I’d never meant her to think I didn’t like being around her. It wasn’t her, it wasn’t Lapland, it wasn’t even the holidays, it was me.
I’m the problem.
Chapter 41
I’d really messed everything up. Not only had I come to winter wonderland when I had a huge Christmas aversion, but thanks to my shoddy husky-sledding skills I now couldn’t do my job, even though I was just getting the hang of it, just starting to actually let myself like it.
And now I’d let myself open up to heartbreak.
I was filling in as an elf and I just knew I was doing the worst job in the world, my best friend here was pissed off at me, and Shay was going to be so mad when I told her I was leaving early.
Well. If I was going to piss off my sister by leaving early, I’d better not waste her Christmas present to me too.
With Esteri not talking to me, and a long, dark evening until bedtime, I needed to get out of there. Grabbing my coat, my wallet and my phone, and before I could think too much about my decision, I left the staff chalet and marched to the activities’ lodge, where I called for a taxi to come from Luosto to pick me up. Within the hour I was standing outside the ice bar, which rose from the thick compacted snow as if it were carved straight out of the scenery. Soft glacier-blue lighting guided me to the doorway where I stood in a warm zone with other patrons awaiting their timeslot. I blended in as a tourist and after being kitted out with some extra layers was told I, and the other visitors during this time slot, had thirty minutes in the frozen bar to enjoy an array of icy alcoholic drinks.
Perfect. Thirty minutes was all I needed.
It doesn’t take much to get me tipsy. So when I entered the minus five degrees bar, which felt like stepping into a giant, crystal blue ice cube complete with ice sculptures lit from below with vibrant pink and purple bulbs, I went straight for an ice-cold vodka shot. Served in an ice shot glass. And I sat on a stool made of ice while I knocked it back.
As the cold liquid slithered down my throat, burning and scratching as it went, in seeped the first memory I’d been trying to hold back …
CHRISTMAS 1999 ~ AGED EIGHT
I glared at Shay from the other side of the living room. We were like two wrestlers in our corners, panting, red-faced, lips curled into snarls. Outside, rain beat against the windows. Inside, Home Alone 2: Lost in New York played on the TV, though neither of us were paying attention.
Tinsel framed the picture frames. Cards from friends and family lined the mantelpiece. A solitary bauble dropped from the tree, falling with a tinkle on the floor, like a bell ringing for the next round to start.
Shay picked up a cushion from the sofa and gave it an intimidating punch, so I let out a guttural screech and, wielding the tube of wrapping paper, advanced towards her ready to strike.
Thwack, scratch, bite, pull, rip.
‘What is going on in here?’ My mum’s horrified voice cut through our anger, and I turned, leaving my guard down just as Shay whipped a length of tinsel across my cheeks.
She scratched my cornea with that tinsel, and my, how I wailed. Especially after falling back and bumping my head. And so that year I spent Christmas in hospital.
My mum was still furious, even while I sat up in the hospital bed happily munching on fistfuls of grapes, wearing an eye patch. ‘What on earth were you arguing about?’
‘Father Christmas,’ I replied, spitting grape juice down my chin.
‘What about him?’ Mum side-eyed Shay.
‘Shay said he wasn’t real.’ Shay looked close to tears, and I added, ‘She didn’t mean to be horrible, it doesn’t matter, Shay, it is what it is.’
‘It is what it is’ was a phrase I’d heard Dad say a few months back and now I used it all the time, though I didn’t really get what it meant.
‘I shouldn’t have said anything,’ Shay said, shame etched all over her little face.
‘You shouldn’t have got into a fight,’ Mum scolded both of us.
‘Sorry, Mum,’ we chorused.
I wasn’t angry at Shay for telling me about Santa, I’d had suspicions anyway and she clearly felt terrible. I was more upset about spending Christmas Eve in hospital, and when I was told I’d need to stay through until Boxing Day, that’s when I started crying again. Big, gulping sobs at not being allowed to be at home for Christmas.
Dad stayed in the hospital with me that night, and Mum and Shay returned first thing in the morning along with a pile of presents for me and some for them all to open too.
Late on Christmas Day, when Mum and Shay had gone home again, Dad took my hand and helped me out of the hospital bed, and we went on a little walk around the ward. He thought it would be nice for me to say Merry Christmas to some of the other children, and perhaps make some friends. Some of those children hadn’t been home in a long time and I was pretty quiet when Dad and I were alone together again.
‘Are you OK, love?’ he asked me.
I nodded. ‘Do you think the other children had a nice Christmas?’ I asked, afraid of the answer.
But Dad smiled and said, ‘I think they did. I heard a lot of laughing as we were going around. I think the doctors and nurses have made this a very nice place to spend the holidays. But, I’m sure they and their families would prefer to be at home, like you would. So maybe we should remember that.’
‘And visit them next year if they’re still here?’
Dad squeezed my eight-year-old hand, and kissed my forehead, staying there with his prickly beard in my good eye for longer than he usually did.
With my eyes squeezed shut, I pushed the memory away and asked the bartender for a second vodka shot, drinking it quickly, as if I could outrun what was coming next …
CHRISTMAS 2004 ~ AGED THIRTEEN
They’d been bickering all day, it was nothing new. And nothing serious. In fact, I’d spent the first day of the school Christmas holidays watching the music video for Girls Aloud’s ‘Love Machine’ in slow motion, trying to learn the dance routine in case it ever came on at a party and then I could wow everyone. So I’d tuned out what they were saying hours ago.
Shay, at sixteen, found me excruciating and hilarious, but that hadn’t stopped her setting up camp in the corner of the living room to wrap gifts and sing along to the choon.
‘Nearly got it,’ I said to her after a semi-successful run-through, pausing the video, just in time to hear a thump-thump-thump down the stairs.
I opened the living room door to see Mum standing with two suitcases, Dad sat on the stairs.
‘What’s going on?’ asked Shay, appearing behind me. Her voice had a hard edge, the kind of one she used with me sometimes, like when I’d see her at school holding hands with someone and I’d yell, ‘Woooooooooooo, that’s my sister!’
I looked at the suitcases – where could we possibly be going on holiday this close to Christmas? And then I gasped, and screamed, or maybe the other way around. ‘Are we going to DISNEYLAND?’
I was dying to visit Disneyland Paris at Christmastime. One of my best friends, Rick, went last year and all he talked about was how good Space Mountain was, and how festive it was, and how big the Christmas tree was. I’d been banging on about it to Mum and Dad all year, and now we were going.
Girls Aloud would have to wait.
What was I going to pack? What book would I take? Would we take presents with us to open there or have them when we got back? What hotel would we stay in?
My thoughts came to a screeching halt when Dad got up and put his arm around me and said, ‘Not this year, sweetheart.’
Oh. ‘Then where are we going?’
Mum took a big inhale and I noticed, for the first time, that both she and Dad had pink eyes. She came over and wrapped an arm around me and an arm around Shay. I returned her hug, holding her waist tightly, but Shay was stiff and I didn’t know why.
Mum took another deep breath. ‘Myla, Shay, I’m going to go and stay at Auntie Alexa’s for a little while.’
‘For Christmas?’ I asked. ‘Why doesn’t she come here?’
‘Not just for Christmas,’ Mum said, her voice slow, a tremble sneaking through. She shook her head. ‘I’ll be gone for a little while, but I’ll come and see you and you can come and see me.’
At this point, Shay broke away and ran upstairs, shoving past Dad as she went.
‘Why are you going?’ I asked. Though I think I’d realised by then what was happening, I just didn’t want to believe it.
‘I think everyone will have a happier Christmas this way,’ Mum said.
‘Love, why don’t you just—’ Dad started, with a sigh, but Mum held up her hands.
‘Let’s just … ’ She smiled at him, whispered an ‘I’m sorry’ and then squeezed me so tightly I cricked my neck.
Mum broke away and pulled her suitcases towards the door. ‘I’ll stop back over in a couple of days, try and talk to Shay then.’
And then she left the house. She left our family Christmas. She left everything.
I pressed the ice shot glass to my forehead, forcing myself to feel the cold because if I felt the pain of that on my skin, maybe, just maybe, I could keep myself present. Isn’t that what everyone’s always telling me I should do? ‘Stay present’? I don’t need, I don’t want, to be dancing with ghosts of Christmas past …
CHRISTMAS 2011 ~ AGED TWENTY
I got off the bus and walked the last five minutes along the lane to Dad’s house with a smile on my face. It was icy on the dark ground, I was shattered from the long journey back from university, I was even more exhausted from my course, which, in my second year, was sucking the life out of me. My suitcase had a broken wheel so it made a thunk-scrape-thunk-scrape sound as I walked it along. I’d left my book on the ferry. It was Christmastime; not my favourite.
But I was actually excited. Four whole days with Dad and Shay was just the break I needed. Yes, I’d be forced to watch Home Alone 2 again because it was Shay’s favourite, yes, I’d be force-fed mince pies until it was all I could taste in every burp, but I was determined to enjoy myself.
I hadn’t seen Shay in what felt like so long. She’d finished with uni the year before and seemed to be living the high life in London with some fancy recruitment firm, and she was always busy. I couldn’t wait to catch up with her, and found myself quickening my step to get home quicker.
But when I reached the front door, something was wrong. The outdoor lights Dad insisted on putting around the front door every year weren’t switched on. The woodsmoke smell from the open fire in Dad’s living room wasn’t creating the homely aroma in the air around the house. I opened the door, expecting to hear Shay and Dad chattering, or special Christmas TV episodes playing, or the clank of dishes over the soundtrack of carols.
‘Dad?’ I called into the still house.
At the end of the corridor, my dad walked past an open doorway, listening into the landline phone receiver. He looked up and waved at me, then put his hand back on his forehead and walked out of sight.
I froze on the spot, unable to move with the weight of worry that fell on me. Where’s Shay?
Hearing Dad say in an unusual, croaky voice to the person on the other end of the phone, ‘All right, thank you for letting us know. My other daughter’s just arrived so, um, I’ll call back in a while to get the latest. Thank you. Thank you. Goodbye.’
‘Dad?’ I whispered.
A moment later he reappeared in the door and walked straight over to me, wrapping me in a tight squeeze.
‘Dad, what’s happening? Is something wrong with Shay?’
‘She’s OK, she’s OK,’ he said, kissing my forehead.
‘Then what is it?’
He took my suitcase from my hand and led me to the living room and sat me on the sofa. My heart thudded the whole time, and as he took a deep breath, I readied myself for bad news.
Dad cleared his throat. ‘Your sister isn’t going to be coming home for Christmas this year,’ he started.
‘Why? You said she was OK.’
‘She is. Well, in a way. She’s—’ Dad choked on a sob and in a second I was there, throwing my arms around him, because I rarely saw my dad cry, and the last time was the Christmas Mum left. He cleared his throat again, trying to compose himself quickly. ‘Shay’s unwell, My, she’s realised she’s got a problem with alcohol.’
‘No, she doesn’t,’ I said, confused.
‘Apparently she does.’ Dad shrugged. ‘I didn’t know either. But that was her friend from uni on the phone, Helena, do you remember her?’
