The Christmas Wish, page 24
‘You’re so full of it,’ I said, covering my face with my hands. ‘You did not have a crush on me.’
‘Did too, for years,’ he argued, beaming from ear to ear. ‘I remember when I was seventeen, I used to lie in bed at night listening to “Sex on Fire” by Kings of Leon, thinking about you.’ His smile faltered for a second as my eyes bulged out of my head. ‘I don’t think I really understood what the song was about to be honest.’
‘At least it wasn’t “She Bangs” by Ricky Martin,’ I replied, and he laughed.
‘I used to put my hand on the wall and pretend you were doing the same thing on the other side,’ Dev shook his head as I cackled happily. ‘What an idiot.’
‘Our houses aren’t attached,’ I pointed out, almost hysterical. ‘How was that going to work?’
‘I don’t know, I was a very emo teenager.’ He moved slightly, blocking the lamp behind him and the hot tub was plunged into darkness for a moment. ‘It’s not like you were lying awake on the other side of the wall thinking about me anyway.’
‘Well that, Dev Jones, is where you are wrong,’ I replied, my laughter bubbling away until all that was left was a smile I doubted would ever leave my face. ‘And I still don’t believe you because I had the biggest crush on you that anyone has ever had on anyone. Including Manny’s crush on Justin Timberlake which was so intense, he bleached his hair during fresher’s week and wore nothing but double denim for six months.’
We sat quietly for a moment and I could hear him breathing over the sound of the bubbles. Under the water, his toes brushed against mine and neither of us moved away.
‘You really had a crush on me?’ he asked, no trace of a smile left on his face.
‘Yes,’ I replied, breathless. ‘I really did.’
‘And I had a crush on you.’
‘Allegedly.’
‘Nothing alleged about it. Why do you think I was always hanging around with you and Manny?’
‘Because you moved here when you were thirteen and you didn’t know anyone in the village and didn’t have any friends?’
‘Yes, OK, that is true,’ he admitted. ‘But other than that it was because I spent every third minute of every single day wondering what it would be like to kiss the girl next door.’
I swallowed hard as he moved across the hot tub, the water up to his waist, and stopped right in front of me. He moved slowly, raising his hand to sweep a single strand of hair away from my forehead, just the very tips of his fingers touching my skin.
‘And now,’ he whispered, inching closer, ‘here we are.’
‘Here we are,’ I whispered back, alive and electric. All I had to do was reach out. All I had to do was touch him. Never in my life had I wanted anything more than this moment, I’d imagined it so many times, fantasized about it, dreamed about it and now we were here, not even a heartbeat away from a kiss. But in all those dreams and fantasies, Dev was mine and mine alone. He didn’t belong to someone else.
‘I’m sorry, I can’t,’ I said, clasping my hand around his and sadly pushing it away. It wasn’t supposed to be like this, even if I was the only one who would remember it. Dev pulled back, the muscle in his jaw ticking as he gritted his teeth and retreated to the other side of the hot tub. He stared at the palm tree in the corner until the clouds that covered his face began to clear.
‘Because you have a boyfriend.’
‘What? No!’ I exclaimed. ‘Because you have a fiancée!’
‘I don’t have a fiancée?’ Dev replied, looking as confused as I felt.
‘You don’t?’
‘Nope. I was engaged but we called it off months ago.’
‘What?’ I was completely incapable of processing this information. Dev was single? ‘Why? How? When?’
‘It’s not much of a story, I’m afraid. It just wasn’t right,’ he said with a half shrug, as if it was the most casual thing in the world. ‘She wanted to get engaged before her thirtieth birthday and we’d been together for ages, so on paper, it seemed to make sense. A week after her birthday, after I proposed, we both realized it didn’t. So we called it off.’
‘You called it off?’ I was still struggling with the concept. ‘Amicably? No one cheated, no one left, no one had sex with their receptionist?’
Dev frowned. ‘That’s a very specific question but no, not to the best of my knowledge. I don’t think she has a receptionist and mine is a sixty-year-old lesbian who’s been with her wife since they were eighteen so I don’t fancy my chances there.’
‘So,’ I took a deep breath in and held it, the heat of the hot tub suddenly overwhelming. ‘You’re not engaged?’
‘I am not,’ he confirmed, that dangerous smile very slowly returning to his face. ‘And you don’t have a boyfriend?’
‘No,’ I replied. ‘No boyfriend. No girlfriend. No partner of any kind.’
‘That’s interesting, isn’t it?’ He moved back towards me, gliding through the water until his hips pressed against my knees and I realized I was still holding my breath. Relaxing my legs, he slid between my thighs and I blew out a long, slow exhale.
‘So interesting,’ I whispered.
Wrapping my arms around his neck, I pulled him in closer, Dev’s hands exploring my hips, my waist, my back, his touch igniting sparks across my skin. This. This was how it was supposed to be. The hot water swirled around us, tracing the path of his fingertips along my body, and I slid my hands up into his hair. I hardly dared to open my eyes, but I had waited for this for so long and I had to see it all, remember it all. How his teeth caught on his bottom lip, the way his eyes filled with wonderful disbelief. Excruciatingly slowly, Dev dropped his head towards mine and I could feel his breath on my face, our foreheads resting against one another, teasing out the moment until I couldn’t stand it for a single second longer. I brushed my lips against his, just barely, as if to test the moment. Was this real? Dev’s lips on my lips? Dev’s heart beating hard against my own? Everything turned hazy as our lips met, colours, shapes and feelings, a sharp intake of air, the smell of the chlorine on his skin and water lapping against my body when I pulled away. He pulled me back to him, holding my body so tightly I gasped, and when he kissed me again, time stopped and nothing else mattered. I was completely lost and, for once, I had no desire to be found.
It could have been one minute or one hour, I really couldn’t say, but I pulled away first and when I was brave enough to raise my eyes to Dev’s, I saw all my longing reflected back at me.
‘Well,’ he said, still holding me close enough to feel every hard line of his body.
‘Well,’ I replied, not quite sure what to do with myself.
‘We could go back to mine,’ he said, a promising growl in his voice. ‘But my mum says I have to keep the door open when I have a girl over.’
I laughed but it really wasn’t very funny. I felt as though I might explode but it seemed rude to explode in someone else’s private pool, especially when you weren’t supposed to be there in the first place. With endless regret, I slid my hands down his neck and rested them on his chest, widening the gap between us. So this was what it felt like to be in the moment. I had never felt so present in my life. Certainly not in my four years with Michael.
‘If you could wish for anything, what would it be?’ I asked as he ran a line of kisses down my neck and along my collarbone, each one exploding on my skin and making me gasp with delight.
‘Anything?’ Dev murmured.
‘Anything.’
‘The same thing I’ve been wishing for since I was thirteen.’
‘We really should go somewhere,’ I murmured as my resolve weakened and his lips found their way back to mine, irresistibly drawn.
‘We are somewhere,’ Dev replied, whispering directly into my ear and unlocking every ounce of desire in my body. ‘And there’s nowhere on earth I’d rather be.’
We melted against one another, my legs locked around his waist as my back scraped against the tiles and I pressed my mouth to his as hard as I dared, forcing every single thought out of my head. Somewhere above us, fireworks exploded in the sky and just for a second, as Dev moved against me and my back arched against the wall of the hot tub, I found myself wishing this moment would never end.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
The bottom of the garden was quiet the next morning. The perfect place for me to sit with myself before the day began. There was so much to do, the walk, the lunch, the pub, the party. I clutched my cup of tea and settled on the swing, looking out over the fields and revelling in that weird sense of calm that blanketed the outside world on Christmas morning, like we’d all agreed to treat it like a Sunday even if it wasn’t one. Although maybe it was? I couldn’t really remember anymore, it was just like lockdown all over again, baked goods were plentiful and time meant nothing.
I’d tried everything I could think to try but the wish still hadn’t been granted. I’d helped my mother, found a way for Dad to reconnect with his loved ones and if last night didn’t count as sorting out my love life at Nan’s request, I didn’t want to know what would. I’d even gone above and beyond, helping Manny and Cerys for extra brownie points, but I was still here on Christmas morning number ten with more questions than I had answers. But perhaps, I thought as I blew on my hot tea before taking a sip, that was OK.
Three months ago, I was so sure of my place in the world. I was a proud, ambitious workaholic on the fast track to partnership at my prestigious job. I was Michael’s girlfriend, hoping to be promoted to fiancée any day. I was the youngest of the Baker kids, the one who happily kept the peace and had an unrequited crush on the boy next door. Now I had to wonder how much of that had ever been true. Were any of us the people everyone thought we were? Good Time Guy Manny was lonely. Tough as Nails Cerys was afraid. Mum was overwhelmed and my dad had never truly found a way through his grief.
Then there was Dev.
What did I know about Dev? He was kind and funny, a good cook and a good listener. He cared about people so much he’d made it his career and when I closed my eyes, all I could see were flashes of the night before, his hands, his mouth, his body against mine. It was entirely worth the almost twenty-year wait. Every time we saw each other, he told me the truth when I asked for it. Dev had shown me who he was, I didn’t need to guess, he was an open book.
Which left only me.
I wasn’t sure of anything anymore. When someone waved a red flag you were supposed to stop, not wave back and keep on going because the map you’d been following for ages told you to. Roads changed, bridges crumbled. Old maps needed to be replaced with new ones. Sometimes you had to find a new way to get to your destination.
Sipping my tea, I felt the chilly wind on my face and breathed in.
All this time I thought I was in control, but like so much else in my life, that control was an illusion. Manny had been right to throw my Ronan Keating CD out the bedroom window when I was ten, and not only because it wasn’t very good but because Ronan was peddling a dangerous message to impressionable youths. Life was not a rollercoaster and you did not just have to ride it. It was more like one of those rental scooters that had popped up around the city: mostly fun, sometimes unpredictable, but frequently impossible to control and occasionally trying to kill you.
A robin landed on the fence at the bottom of the garden, hopping back and forth and showing off his scarlet waistcoat before taking off into the Joneses’ garden. I smiled, hoping he might land on Dev’s windowsill. If he didn’t have any telly to watch, the least the universe could do was send him a bird to keep him entertained. It hurt, knowing he wouldn’t remember the night before when he woke up, but I couldn’t change that. There was no point breaking my heart about something I had no control over. Like Manny always said, what’s for you won’t go by you. If we were meant to be, we’d find a way.
Finishing my tea, I stood up and stretched.
The funny thing about reliving the same day over and over was that the only person who had to live with the consequences of my actions was me. Nothing really mattered anymore.
And when nothing matters, it’s much easier to see what really does.
‘I’ve got an announcement to make.’
I tapped my knife against the side of my glass once we’d finished our mains, the whole family sat around the table, lolling in a tryptophan daze.
‘You’re going to burn that awful dress?’ Nan guessed, raising her wine in my direction. ‘I support your decision entirely.’
‘No,’ I replied, glancing over at Dad and reminding myself that whatever happened, the chances of it sticking tomorrow morning were slim to none. I could do this. ‘I’m leaving Abbott & Howe.’
No one said anything at first. Manny reached for my hand under the table and gave it a squeeze, Oliver and Cerys shared a smirk and Mum looked straight at my dad, bypassing me completely. Nan refilled her glass and shrugged.
‘I don’t see how that helps you get that frock out of your life but all right. Cheers to your future.’
‘You’re leaving?’ Dad said slowly, as though he was struggling to make two and two equal four.
‘Yes, Dad.’
‘You’ve been headhunted?’ he guessed, a slim thread of hope in his voice. ‘Denton Henry have offered you partnership?’
‘No, Dad.’
‘Then where are you going? Why would you leave?’
It was a good question but I had a good answer.
‘Because I don’t want to be there,’ I told him, thinking back to my conversation with Dev. ‘And I don’t have to stay. I’ve got a little bit of money saved up, it’s not like I’m spending a lot on rent right now, and I’ll find another job. I’ve had a lot of time to think about it and I’ve made a decision. It isn’t the right place for me.’
I waited for a rush of triumph, a clean and clear internal sign that I’d done the right thing. But all I felt was the unpleasant queasiness that came from eating too many potatoes.
Mum stood up, grabbing empty plates and stacking them loudly on top of each other.
‘I’m going to clear the table,’ she declared. ‘Gwen, help me put them in the kitchen? We can talk about this later.’
‘No, I’m afraid I don’t understand,’ Dad said, placing a hand on my forearm before I could make a move to help her. ‘You can’t just leave a job. Not when you haven’t got another one to go to.’
‘She can if she’s been sacked,’ Oliver muttered into his napkin.
‘Hardly,’ Dad snapped. ‘She’s on track to be the youngest partner in the company’s history.’
‘Youngest female partner,’ Oliver corrected. ‘My friend Felix Johnson made partner at thirty-three. And I very much doubt she’s looking at promotion since … the incident.’
‘Felix Johnson whose dad is a senior partner,’ I replied calmly. ‘And I wasn’t sacked. Technically, I’m on leave.’
But Dad wasn’t in the mood for technicalities. His normally placid face began to puff up with irritation. My father did not like to be the last person in the room to know what was going on and I could hardly blame him for that.
‘Gwen, what’s he talking about?’ he asked. ‘What incident? Why are you on leave?’
I folded my napkin into four neat squares and placed it on the table where my plate had been.
‘I cobbed a stapler at a sexist pig and now I’m facing disciplinary action.’
‘Oh my,’ Nan said, taking a sip of her wine.
‘But this isn’t about that,’ I insisted as my dad turned puce. ‘I’m not leaving because I’ve been fired, I’m leaving because I want to. Every day I go to the office and work a stupid number of hours to make more money for an awful man and dozens more awful men just like him. There’s nothing in it for me except a pat on the back from the boss, the promise of more work, more hours and eventually the chance to slack off a bit while some other poor girl works herself into the ground for the chance to repeat the cycle again and again and again.’
From the expressions on their faces, no one other than Manny seemed to understand why this would be a problem.
‘There’s a poster in the women’s toilets that says “Pressure creates diamonds”,’ I said, picturing it in my mind. ‘That’s messed up. They haven’t got the same poster in the gents and I know that for a fact because I went in once when I was bursting and the only thing in there is a picture of Denise Van Outen ripped out of an issue of Nuts magazine that is probably old enough to vote. But that’s beside the point, which is, why are we celebrating treating women like bits of rock? I don’t want to be pressured into being the hardest substance on earth, Dad, I want to be happy.’
‘I can’t believe I’m hearing this,’ he said to no one in particular, picking up his fork, putting it down then picking it up again. ‘She wants to be happy? Jesus wept.’
Manny reached over and plucked the fork out of his hand, passing it through the serving hatch to my mother. ‘You’ll be telling me they’ve got a live, laugh, love poster in the staff room next.’
‘It’s a law firm, Manny,’ I replied. ‘All three of those things are forbidden on company time.’
‘I’m not talking about the bloody poster!’ Dad roared. Everyone fell silent and in the kitchen, I heard a sharp smash as Mum dropped something breakable on the floor. Dad had never raised his voice to me my whole life. Manny? A million times and he’d definitely had stern words with Cerys a few times when she was a teenager, but me? Not once. I’d never given him a reason until now. ‘You are not giving up that job. Do you know how difficult it is to even get your foot in the door at a firm like that?’
‘Yes, I do,’ I replied. ‘Because I did it.’
‘Then what on earth is wrong with you?’ The atmosphere in the dining room darkened faster than the sky outside. ‘I would have done anything for an opportunity like this and you’re going to throw it away because you want to be happy?’
