The Christmas Wish, page 20
‘Oh, sod off,’ I yelled, leaning on the horn, pressing it over and over and over until the woolly chorus of judgement dispersed. ‘Sod off, sod off, sod off, sod off—’
A loud rattle on the passenger side window was enough to scare me out of my skin. An older man in a flat cap glared at me as I jumped so high, I hit my head on the roof of the car. His walking stick and backpack said ‘rambler’ but the fact we were on our own in the middle of nowhere added a fun frisson of ‘serial killer’ and I quickly locked all the doors with my elbow.
‘Excuse me!’ the man shouted when I did not wind down the window. ‘Are you in trouble?’
Exactly the sort of thing a serial killer would say.
‘Oh, no, I’m fine, thanks for asking,’ I said loudly, looking around the front of the car for a weapon. Maybe I could chuck a Coldplay CD at him. Maybe I could play one of the Coldplay CDs. It would be enough to scare me away.
‘You do realize that according to the highway code, a car horn should only be used to indicate danger,’ the man said, his white mutton chops only adding to his stern demeanour. ‘It very clearly states the horn should not be used to express annoyance.’
‘Is that right?’ I replied as my fear boiled away into irritation.
‘Yes. Rule number 112, you can look it up in the copy I’m sure you have in your glovebox.’
He was not a serial killer but a do-gooder which was somehow even worse.
‘So what you’re saying is, I shouldn’t press it now?’ I said, hand hovering over the horn. ‘When I am in fact very annoyed?’
‘One should only use the horn to indicate danger,’ he repeated, chest puffed out like one of the racing pigeons I was very certain he kept at home. ‘I can’t see anything that puts you directly in harm’s way.’
‘No but I can see something that puts you directly in harm’s way,’ I warned, the heel of my hand slamming into the horn over and over and over.
‘This is a nice village, we won’t stand for the likes of you!’ he threatened as he backed away, taking long, speedy strides. ‘I shall call the police!’
‘Call them!’ I shouted as he clambered over a stile and began to run-walk away, the most embarrassing of all walks. ‘Go on, see if I care!’ Collapsing against my dad’s beaded seat cushion, I closed my eyes and stamped my slippered feet in the footwell. ‘Please call them,’ I muttered when he had disappeared from sight. ‘It’s the only bloody way I’ll get home.’
Predictably, the angry rambler turned out to be nothing more than another man full of empty promises. After a whole hour of waiting for the authorities, I gave up, and abandoned the car at the side of the road. Without my phone, and entirely incapable of reading a map, I had no idea where I was, but my old pal, the highway code fanboy, had mentioned a village nearby and while it might be a nice village that wouldn’t stand for the likes of me, I suspected it would still have a payphone that was less picky about its patrons. Armed with my car keys and eighty pence in change I’d found on the floor under the passenger seat, I set off to find help.
The skies were clearer on this side of the hills, fewer clouds in the sky and more patches of bright blue with long, hazy rays of winter sun shining down on the bare trees. It was beautiful really, cool and crisp and peaceful, the kind of day that gave life meaning. If you were the sort of person who actually had a life and weren’t caught in an endless cycle of bickering siblings, vibrators from their dad and pigs in blankets. In spite of my promise not to think romantic thoughts about a taken man, I couldn’t stop myself from wishing Dev was with me. If I ever got myself out of this situation, it might be nice to have an old friend back in my life. Cambridge wasn’t that far from London, we enjoyed vaguely criminal activities, why shouldn’t we be friends? It was entirely possible for two grown adults to enjoy a platonic relationship even if one of the two once used a rudimentary computer program to see what their future children would look like and had developed a mild but more recent obsession with his forearms. I might even like his fiancée, I thought as I followed the path of the rambler, hopping over the stile in my slippers. She was probably a wonderful person, the kind of woman who always had something insightful to say and sent her friends flowers just because. She was probably called Anastasia and taught Pilates on the weekends when she wasn’t helping out at a donkey sanctuary, and didn’t have social media.
‘Maybe I’ll just be friends with Dev,’ I muttered, marching on in my PJs.
Fifteen fretful minutes later, a small limestone cottage with a neatly tended front garden came into view, but there was no one home. Five minutes later, I found another equally deserted house and ten minutes after that, I found myself in the heart of a tiny village, practically a hamlet if not for the beautiful, ancient-looking church in the middle of it all. I’d never really been a religious person, we weren’t brought up with it as kids, but I did love a good church. There was something about the idea of a group of people getting together to say, hey, we haven’t got trucks or diggers or cranes, and concrete is a good couple of hundred years away from being invented, but shall we build a massive building with massive glass windows and a big pointy bit on top to celebrate this thing we all believe in? As someone who couldn’t put together an Ikea coffee table on her own, I had to respect it.
There was a small village green bordered by a post office, a pub and a bakery-slash-coffee shop, all closed, but outside the pub was just the anachronism I was looking for. Honestly, in this day and age, it would have been less jarring to see an actual TARDIS in the middle of the road than an old BT phone box.
‘At least this one won’t be smashed to shit and covered in graffiti,’ I said as I pulled open the door to find a dangling cord with the handset missing and at least three dozen roughly sketched penises. I closed the door, defeated. Yes, I’d broken into a stately home, fallen down some very dangerous stairs, maimed Father Christmas and blown myself, my home and my family to bits, but I was not in the mood to freeze to death in my pyjamas, in a phone box covered in badly drawn knobs.
‘Not today, Satan,’ I muttered as I stalked across the village green. No, I wasn’t a particularly religious person, but needs must when the devil shits in your teapot, it was time to seek help from his arch nemesis, the birthday boy himself.
Not having ever been to church on Christmas, I had no idea what to expect. The nave was empty, not a single soul to be seen on the wooden pews. My footsteps echoed off the stone floors and right away, I felt better. Even though I wasn’t religious, a church still represented faith in something bigger than yourself and trusting that there was a plan. I couldn’t think of anything I needed more than a little faith, apart from maybe a sandwich. I hadn’t eaten all day and I was starving.
Wandering along the rows of empty pews, I paused and picked up a prayer cushion, turning it over in my hands. It was quite nice, navy blue with scarlet and gold embroidery. Michael’s Catholic mum would have loved it and I might have tried to buy her one if her son wasn’t a cheating shitbag and she hadn’t sent me a Facebook message to say how nice it had been to know me and what a shame it was that we would never speak or see each other again less than twenty-four hours after Michael and I broke up.
‘No cushion for you, Moira,’ I whispered, placing it carefully back where I had found it.
On the other side of the aisle was a confessional. I’d always quite fancied a go in one but when I mentioned it on a day trip to Salisbury cathedral, Michael’s Catholic mum crossed herself and went to light a candle.
But there was no Moira to stop me now.
‘If you are up there, you probably think this is hilarious,’ I muttered, letting myself into the dark wooden box. ‘Before I start, you’re not obliged to listen or anything, it’s not like I’m a regular, and I know it’s your son’s birthday. You’re probably very busy, so don’t worry about sending me a sign or anything like that.’
I sat down on the wooden bench, my eyes acclimatizing to the semi-dark as I peeped through the little holes into the unoccupied other side. It was quite pleasant, all things considered. Made me wonder why we didn’t have them across the board, who couldn’t use a good confessional at the end of a stressful week?
‘I’m not sure if there needs to be someone on the other side of the box for this to work,’ I added. ‘Like two tin cans on the end of a piece of string?’
Again, silence.
‘I’ll just start, shall I?’ I rubbed my palms against my thighs, the fabric of my pyjama bottoms pilling underneath. ‘My name’s Gwen and I’m having a bit of a problem.’
Before I could explain what the problem was, the door on the other side of the confessional opened and someone sat down on the bench. I pressed my back against the wooden wall, startled.
‘Hello?’ A man’s voice said through the partition. ‘I thought I heard someone enter?’
I held my breath and closed my eyes. There was no point running away, I had nowhere to go and really, what was the worst that could happen? I was in a confessional, in a church and yes, I’d seen all the films with the scary nuns but I wasn’t getting those vibes. They were almost always set in the seventies anyway, you didn’t get possessed murderous nuns in Derbyshire in the twenty-first century. Very often.
‘Hello?’ the priest said again. ‘Are you all right?’
‘Hello,’ I squeaked, my voice breaking like a twelve-year-old boy. ‘Busy day?’
‘You could say that,’ he replied, clearing his throat. ‘Any chance you’re new at this?’
For someone who actually made her living by Being Clever, I felt extremely stupid. I knew less than nothing about this sort of thing, religion was always Michael’s forte at the pub quiz. How was I supposed to know the law, learn about Catholicism and memorize the birth order of all the Kardashian-Jenner children and grandchildren? Simply couldn’t be done.
‘Reasonable chance.’ I nodded, even though he couldn’t see me. ‘In that I have never done it before and I’m not entirely sure why I’m here.’
‘Let’s start at the beginning then. This is where people come when they have something to confess. They tell me what’s troubling them and we talk it over. Does that sound like something you’d like to do?’
His voice was so friendly and warm and kind, I one hundred per cent believed he could reassure me about anything and everything, even the ending of Game of Thrones.
‘I’m not sure it’s so much a confession as a confusion,’ I replied, trying to come up with the best way to describe my predicament without having to actually describe my predicament. ‘It’s a bit complicated.’
‘Whatever you’re about to tell me, I can almost guarantee, I’ve heard it before,’ he assured me.
‘Christ, I hope not,’ I murmured. ‘Sorry, inappropriate language, won’t do that again.’
He took a long, calming breath in before he replied.
‘Let’s give it a try. Even if I can’t help, I can listen, sometimes that’s enough. My name’s Father Declan, how can I help?’
‘I’ve had a rough few months,’ I said, trying not to stare through the holes. It felt so weird to be talking to someone I couldn’t see, although that didn’t stop me getting into a month-long feud about the musical episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer with a TheChosenOne84 on Twitter, so I wasn’t going to let it get in the way now. ‘I’m not sure where I fit at the moment and I’m feeling a bit lost, a bit stuck.’
Also, I’ve been reliving the same day for a week and I’m two Christmas carols away from firing myself into the sun, I did not add.
‘Is that important?’ he asked. ‘Fitting in?’
‘Not in the schoolyard sense, no, but I’d like to know where I belong in the world. Me and my boyfriend broke up and I’ve been off work for a bit.’ I paused and gnawed on my thumbnail for a moment. ‘I’m not sure I know who I am without my job,’ I admitted.
‘Perhaps you’re just you,’ Father Declan suggested.
What a terrifying thought.
‘Have you talked to your friends or family about all this?’ he asked.
I pulled the sleeves of my jumper all the way over my hands until they completely covered the dodgy DIY manicure that should have been gone a week ago.
‘No, not really.’
‘Any reason why not?’
‘I don’t want to worry them,’ I explained. ‘They’ve all got their own problems and I’ve been trying to help them but nothing I do seems to make any difference.’
The confessional creaked as Father Declan shifted in his seat. ‘It’s commendable that you want to help the people you love but have you considered you might be putting a lot on yourself here? You’re happy to shoulder the burden of others, but you have to allow them to help you carry yours. You can only take so much before you break.’
It was good advice, I just didn’t know how it could help me out of my current situation.
‘Tell me more about feeling stuck,’ he said. ‘What does that mean?’
The bright flickering possibility of telling him the truth dangled in front of me. There was a chance he’d believe me. He did work for the guy who sold the world on immaculate conception after all, although no matter how hard Yvonne Aylsford in Year Eleven tried to convince people that was what happened to her, no one believed her ever. Compared to some of the stuff that happened in the bible, my story wasn’t that much of a reach. And if he didn’t believe me, so what? We weren’t likely to bump into each other in Tesco any time soon.
‘It means, I’ve been stuck reliving the same day over and over,’ I said, relief pouring off me as I said the words out loud. ‘It doesn’t matter what I do, who I help, who I hurt, no matter how hard I try, I keep waking up on the very same morning as though nothing at all has happened.’
On the upside, he didn’t laugh.
Both sides of the confessional fell silent and I crossed my fingers, hoping he wasn’t texting someone to come and take me away. After what felt like far too long for someone who did this for a living, he cleared his throat and I clung to the edge of my seat, waiting on his wisdom.
‘Life can feel like that sometimes, can’t it?’ he said, his voice packed with wisdom. ‘Like we’re on a hamster wheel, reliving the same day, repeating the same mistakes. And Christmas can be the worst of it, going through the motions, acting out the same rituals and traditions as though nothing has changed even if everything is different to the way it was last year. Sometimes all we want is someone to hear us and acknowledge our pain. I hear you, child, I hear you.’
‘Oh, for fuck’s sake,’ I muttered under my breath. ‘I mean, thank you, that’s lovely. Good to know.’
It wasn’t as though I’d expected him to have the answer but a flat-out rejection of the concept was a little rich for someone who believed a man once turned water into wine yet didn’t want to hear a peep about a Christmas-related time loop. As hard-to-believe miracles went, mine was nothing compared to feeding 5,000 people with five loaves and two fish. I couldn’t even make a meal for Manny out of that.
‘My advice is make the most of each moment, be present. I hope that’s given you something to think about.’
‘Surely has!’ I said, slapping my hands against my thighs, officially confirming we were done. ‘Right, I’d better let you get on. I’m sure the Christmas rush is about to start.’
‘There are only twenty-four homes in the village,’ he replied with a good-natured laugh. ‘I’ve got all the time you need.’
‘Time is the one thing I already have too much of,’ I said, opening the door and preparing to head back out into the never-ending afternoon. ‘Merry Christmas, I hope you have a good one.’
‘Everything you learn today will help you tomorrow,’ he called after me. ‘Remember that.’
I paused outside the confessional, blinking up at the stained-glass windows.
‘But what if there is no tomorrow?’ I asked.
‘Tomorrow is nothing more than yesterday’s today. Think on it.’
I heard a gentle chuckle on the other side of the partition as I made my way up the aisle and out the front door.
‘Just what I needed,’ I muttered, bracing myself for the cold. ‘A bloody riddle.’
An hour later, I arrived back at the car, a small can of petrol kindly donated by a nervous-looking teenage boy in the very tiny petrol station on the edge of the village in one hand, and the second of two Snickers bars, also kindly gifted, in the other. I had hoovered the first one in three bites the moment it was in my hand and there was a good chance I’d eaten some of the wrapper as well but it was fine, probably good roughage.
Removing the petrol cap, I replayed my spiritual counselling in my head and wondered if perhaps Father Declan wasn’t the only one who had missed the point a bit. Admittedly, he didn’t jump on board with my time loop problem but I wasn’t really listening to his advice either. He was right, asking other people for help was something I found hard.
‘But I did ask for petrol and a Snickers,’ I said out loud, over the reassuring glug glug glug of the petrol going into the tank. ‘So I must be getting better.’
As much as I needed to work on checking in with myself, I definitely needed to work on checking in on other people as well. Just because they said they were OK, didn’t mean they were. I always said I was fine when I wasn’t, whether I was suffering with period pains or had spent three hours crying in a corner about the fall of western civilization, so I could hardly expect other people to be telling me the truth when they said everything was fine and dandy.
As for the rest of his advice, that was a bit trickier. Be present, live in the moment, that was all well and good for yoga instructors on Instagram but what about the likes of me? At the side of the road, the same three sheep I’d come across earlier kept a reproachful watch.
‘You probably know all about this living in the moment guff,’ I said, swinging the empty petrol can in my hand. ‘How does it work exactly? I thought we were supposed to make plans? I thought that was a good thing?’
