A Merry Little Christmas

Chapter 21

Nell

Twenty minutes after leaving Yvonna, Nell had made it back to Merry and Bright.

‘What a day. Thank goodness you’re still here,’ she said to Woody, stifling a yawn. She dropped her bag and car keys on the counter and tugged off her coat. ‘Is there any of that mulled wine left?’

‘Yes, loads,’ said Woody, turning off the vacuum cleaner and taking her coat from her. ‘I almost threw it away and then couldn’t bring myself to do it. I’ve had two glasses while I was clearing up.’

‘Good.’ Nell picked up a handful of nuts from a bowl and crunched on them. ‘I’m going to get drunk.’

The drive from Yvonna’s had passed in a blur. The constant low-level anxiety was nothing new after the rubbish couple of weeks she’d had, but tonight everything had ramped up tenfold and her mind was in a whirl.

What had possessed her to even consider asking Yvonna if Olek really was Max’s father? As if she was likely to admit otherwise after all this time. And now she’d laid herself open to all sorts of trouble. If Olek ever found out that she’d been asking his ex-wife probing questions, it was all bound to come out. Olek being infertile would be difficult enough to accept, given Nell had told him she was the one with the issue, but to discover that he hadn’t fathered Max either and she’d kept it from him, he’d … well, she didn’t know how he’d react, and she’d rather not find out, ever.

Woody lifted the lid of the slow cooker which was keeping the mulled wine warm. A delicious smell of orange, cinnamon and nutmeg wafted out. He poured her a large mugful. ‘Just checking you’re not driving home?’

Good question. Nell sank onto a stool and took a long sip, her eyes widening as the alcohol hit the back of her throat. That felt good.

The shop’s Christmas lights still twinkled, the smell of a myriad of scented candles lingered, and Woody had changed the music to soothing carols, and for the first time in several hours, Nell could feel her heart rate returning to normal. The thought of going back out into the cold again didn’t appeal at all. And right now she was scared that if she looked into Olek’s lovely trusting eyes, she’d blurt out her truths, lies and suspicions.

She shook her head. ‘I don’t want to go home. I might just stay here. Oh, I keep forgetting you’re a paying Airbnb guest. Sorry. Of course I’ll go home, I’ll get a taxi.’

‘Don’t be silly,’ he said, pouring some for himself. ‘I can make the bed up on the sofa for you. Anyway, it’ll be fun to have a guest, it gets a little lonely here at night.’

‘That settles it, but I’ll make the sofa bed up,’ she insisted.

He laughed. ‘You haven’t even had a drink yet, let’s play it by ear.’

‘Such an odd expression that,’ Nell mused.

He gave her a curious look. ‘I just mean that we’ll see how we go, no need to follow a plan.’

‘I know that, but playing something from memory without the music in front of you to follow is amazing. It implies you can get by without putting a foot wrong, or without playing the wrong tune. All I ever do is put my foot in it and play bum notes.’

‘O- K .’ Woody gave her a wary look. ‘That’s a bit deep. Oh don’t cry!’

‘Ignore me, it’s just been a hell of a day. This tastes better than it did before,’ she added, sniffing her mug.

‘Ah. I should have warned you that I’ve added a glug of something your mother-in-law left for you. She said it in Polish and I can’t remember what the word was, but I think it’s cherry-flavoured vodka.’

Nell gave a little moan of pleasure. ‘Now we’re talking. Her home-made brew is legendary. Top me up, Woody, and pour another one for yourself. Let’s get this party started.’

Within twenty minutes, the shop floor was pastry-crumb and mulled wine-spills free, and Woody and Nell had retired to the flat upstairs with the rest of the cherry vodka.

‘Oh knickers,’ she said, patting her pockets. ‘I’ve left my phone downstairs in my coat.’

‘And it can stay there,’ said Woody. ‘Give yourself a break and relax for a while.’

‘I’ll try,’ she said, kneeling in front of the log burner. ‘But I’m going to have to let Olek know where I am. And then there’s Merry. I need to speak to her.’

Poor Merry. Goodness knows what was going on with her dad, but it hadn’t sounded good.

‘Far be it for me to interfere between you two, but maybe it’s best to give each other some space tonight.’

Nell pondered on that; Woody might be right. They’d both said hurtful things to each other. Nell regretted hers and Merry was probably feeling the same. ‘I will fetch my phone soon, but the thought of turning the world off for a while and giving my brain a rest sounds amazing.’

‘You’re such a tonic, Nell.’ Woody stretched out on the sofa and plumped up a cushion for behind his head. ‘I was feeling very down when I arrived in Wetherley, but spending time with you has done me the power of good.’

‘Me? Bloody hell, you must be desperate.’ Nell built a wigwam of kindling over some scrunched-up newspaper and set a match to it. ‘I’m more miserable than Eeyore at the moment.’

‘Oh, darling, that is sad. Tell your Uncle Woody what’s wrong,’ he said kindly, ‘A problem shared and all that.’

Nell gave him a sideways glance, weighing up whether to confide in him or not. She’d already dropped hints to Merry, and divulged far too much to Yvonna, but she still hadn’t told anyone the whole truth. Could she tell Woody? It would feel good to confess to someone, and then at least she could get another opinion. Plus, the benefit of telling Woody was that not only was he neutral, but he was only here for a short time, so less chance of him having the opportunity to tell anyone. ‘Do you know what,’ she said, feeling a rush of relief already. ‘I think you might be right. So how about I tell you my story if you tell me yours?’

‘My story? I’m not sure what you mean.’ He gave a brittle laugh and poured them both a shot of Irena’s vodka.

She raised an eyebrow. ‘Oh come on. You’ve taken an impromptu solo break just before Christmas, leaving your husband home alone, but you nip back and make dinner for him while he’s out. You’ve left a job which you apparently enjoyed and by your own admission you were feeling down when you arrived. If that isn’t the basis for a good story, I don’t know what is.’

He laughed. A proper laugh this time. ‘OK, Sherlock, I submit to your powers of detection. I do have a story.’

‘So, deal?’ The fire was burning nicely in the log burner; Nell added a couple more logs for good measure and closed the door.

He nodded. ‘It’ll be like show-and-tell at school, except ours is the depression edition.’

‘Never let it be said that we don’t know how to have fun.’ She let out a snort and crawled on her knees from the fire to the table, where the two shots of vodka were waiting for them both. She held hers up and waited for Woody to do the same. ‘If we each share our problems, does that mean they get halved or doubled?’

‘Maybe it just means that, for tonight, we put them aside altogether and get drunk,’ said Woody.

‘Good plan, Woody, I’m in.’ Nell giggled and tapped her glass against his before knocking it back. ‘Whoah. Gosh, that was good!’

Woody’s eyes watered and he spluttered. ‘Wowzers! No wonder your mother-in-law had a smile on her face if this is what she keeps in her handbag.’

‘Oh God.’ Nell groaned at the thought of Irena and Gienek, and how devastated they’d be if the truth of Max’s parentage ever came out. ‘OK, I’m just going to tell you the whole thing. It’s about babies, so I apologise if this is not your thing.’

‘Oh, darling.’ Woody let out such a big breath that his body visibly slumped. ‘I’m so sorry to hear that, but babies are my thing.’

He understood, thought Nell, and at once she knew she had made the right decision to talk.

‘Come here.’ Woody held out a hand to pull Nell onto the sofa beside him. ‘Do you want to go first or second?’

‘Um.’ Nell’s throat felt so tight with the effort of holding in her sobs that she couldn’t have gone first if she’d wanted to. She sat down, tucked her feet beneath her and held out her glass for Woody to top up. ‘Second please.’

‘OK, so the reason I’m staying in an Airbnb and working for free in your shop is that Spencer and I have had the most traumatic of years and I needed a time-out from him. I thought our relationship was strong enough to withstand anything, but now I know I was wrong.’

Nell nodded. ‘Sounds familiar.’

She’d always thought the same about her and Olek, but like Woody, she was having her doubts.

‘We deliberated for the longest time about starting a family,’ Woody continued. ‘He was mad keen from the get-go, desperate to be a dad; I was more cautious. I love our life as it is, we’re social butterflies, we go away at the drop of a hat and please ourselves. Both of us work long hours, mine being especially unsociable, running events all over the country. Anyway, we decided to go for it. I was primed to go through the adoption route. But Spencer flat refused. He wanted the child to be biologically ours and found someone who was prepared to be our surrogate. I had so many questions, so many reservations, but long story short, for Spencer’s sake I went along to meet Jenny, and credit where it’s due, she was lovely.’

Nell listened intently, completely in awe of how this couple had approached parenthood, determined to overcome any obstacles to have a family. Such a contrast to her own attitude of burying her head in the sand.

‘It seemed too good to be true, especially as only a couple of months after us investigating the legal side of it all, Jenny was pregnant and expecting our baby. A few weeks in and the three of us attended her first scan. And that was it.’ Woody smiled at Nell, his eyes starry with love. ‘From the moment I saw that little chap waving his arms on the screen, and noticed the giant head which Spencer teased was the same shape as mine, I was in love. All my doubts about surrogacy evaporated. There in Jenny’s tummy was the future of our family. Spencer and I had never been so happy. We were in our element, thinking of names, decorating the nursery, immersing ourselves in a brand-new world of buggies and cots and a wardrobe full of adorable clothes. And then—’ Woody’s chin wobbled.

Nell felt tears prick at her eyes.

‘At twenty-eight weeks …’ He covered his eyes with his hand. ‘You know what I’m going to say.’

‘She lost the baby?’ Nell said softly.

He nodded. ‘No warning, no reason, just … I still can’t talk about it, and this happened in September.’

‘Of course it’s still raw and fresh in your mind. I’m so sorry, Woody.’ She reached for his hand and held it tight.

‘Our first concern was Jenny. It was terrible for her, physically and mentally. It was her first experience with surrogacy. She’s vowed never to do it again.’

‘Poor Jenny, she would have felt the weight of your grief on top of her own.’

He smiled sadly. ‘We did everything we could to avoid that, but it was inevitable.’

‘And since then,’ Nell probed. ‘What are your thoughts now? Or is it too soon?’

‘This is where the problems began.’ Woody pulled a face. ‘I think we need a break from it, but Spencer was straight back on the case looking for another potential surrogate. His way of coping is to move on and try again. But not me. I feel the same as Jenny. Surrogacy was great until it wasn’t, and meanwhile there are hundreds of children on adoption lists hoping for a better life than the one they’ve had so far. And Spencer and I can offer that, Nell. Yes, I know the adoption process is rigorous, but it would be worth it. We’d be getting our family, and making a life-changing difference to a child who needs a loving home.’

Nell’s heart ached for him. She knew the pain of longing for a baby, but what Woody and Spencer had been through was in another league. To have seen your living, breathing baby on the screen of a scanning machine only to lose it must have been unbearable.

‘So if Spencer wants to go with surrogacy and you want to adopt, where does that leave you?’ She nudged him gently to continue, even though it was clear now why they were having some time apart.

‘When we were pregnant, he and I were united in our family plans. Now our dreams have diverged, we’re on different paths and we can’t find our way back to each other. I’d given up my job, ready to look after the baby full-time. My boss is hoping to have me back, but how can I return to work, knowing that everyone feels sorry for me, knowing that I should be on parental leave? Spencer is adamant that he wants a child to be biologically ours, but there are so many more important aspects to parenthood than sharing DNA. I’m ready to take on a nurturing role, I want to give a child a home; Spencer wants to procreate. So I’m here to figure out what I want my future to look like and to get some perspective on our marriage, decide what’s most important. With Jenny, we thought we were out of the danger zone for miscarrying; next time around I’d never be able to relax for a moment. But because I love Spencer so much, the only way I can see this ending is if I’m the one to compromise.’

‘Relationships only work if there’s an element of compromise on both sides,’ Nell began. ‘Maybe you need to be honest with him … Oh.’ She stopped mid-sentence, realising that honesty was something she hadn’t afforded her own marriage.

‘Wow.’ Woody peeled away from her, and looked deep in thought. ‘Maybe you’re right, I think I’ve been too scared to voice my truth, not wanting to drive a deeper wedge between us. I just need to come up with a way of broaching it.’

‘Honesty should be easy, shouldn’t it?’ said Nell in a small voice. ‘But sometimes it’s the hardest option.’

Woody picked up on her tone and eyed her curiously. ‘So what about you? You said your story was about babies too. Are you ready to talk?’

She nibbled her lip, nervous suddenly. Woody’s problems were not of his making, whereas she’d got herself into this mess.

‘A problem shared, remember,’ he prompted.

‘I haven’t been honest with Olek,’ she blurted out in a rush. ‘It started a year ago when I was secretly trying to conceive without telling him. I told myself it didn’t matter, he’d be happy if I got pregnant, but I should still have been open about it. Then, when nothing happened, we were both tested …’

She shouldn’t have told a virtual stranger things she hadn’t been able to tell even her closest friend, but it felt so liberating to hear herself speak about the matters which had been churning away like acid in her system for the past few weeks. And Woody, bless him, listened with nothing but compassion and kindness in his eyes.

‘I know there are much worse things happening to other people in the world,’ she said, wiping tears from her eyes. ‘I know I’m lucky in so many ways, but I always assumed that one day I’d have a family of my own, and now that it turns out that I can’t, I can’t focus on anything else. I’m trying to be happy for Merry, but it’s so hard when she seems, at best, so blasé about it, and, at worst, grumpy and ungrateful. I’d imagined us both having babies at the same time, and them growing up together. Instead, she’s entering this new phase of life and I’m being left behind.’

The booze was taking effect on her, smoothing the sharp edges off the day, and she was feeling nicely fuzzy. She sipped her vodka, savouring the cherry sweetness before the hit of alcohol.

‘I’m just so sad,’ she said.

‘Of course you are. That’s the most heartbreaking thing I’ve ever heard.’ Woody reached for the tissue box on the table and took one for each of them. ‘And I know how much pressure this sort of thing puts on a couple. I hope you and Olek can support each other through this tricky patch?’

She mopped her eyes. ‘We can’t because I can’t talk about it. And I can’t talk about it because I told him a lie, the lie has snowballed out of control and now I don’t know what to do about it.’

Woody chewed his lip. ‘As you just said, honesty is usually the best policy.’

Nell pressed a hand to her forehead; it was getting more difficult to focus now, she was quite tipsy. ‘I was trying to do the kindest thing. There’s no obvious reason why I can’t conceive, I’m healthy in every way. It’s Olek who’s infertile. The doctor said it was unlikely that he’d ever have been fertile, and I panicked.’

‘But I thought Max was Olek’s son.’ Woody’s jaw dropped.

Nell nodded gravely before letting out a loud hiccup. ‘Olek thought so. Olek thinks so . Now I’m not convinced he can be. But I do know that he must never find out.’

‘Poor Olek.’

‘It’s a shame I can’t just use your sperm and—’

Woody spat out his vodka. ‘What!’

Nell giggled. ‘Well, I could, couldn’t I? You could get me pregnant. No one would ever suspect.’

Woody went pink. ‘Um, Nell …’

She waved a hand at him and laughed. ‘Don’t worry, I’m only—’

Downstairs, a door slammed. Nell and Woody jumped out of their skins.

‘What was that?’ Nell hissed.

‘We’re being broken in to.’ Woody set his glass down on the coffee table with a trembling hand. ‘We’re in the middle of a robbery.’

They clutched at each other and strained to listen. Nell held her breath; her heart was pounding so loudly in her ears, she couldn’t hear a thing.

There was silence from downstairs. Which might mean that whoever it was wasn’t on their way in but on their way out.

She ran to the window and peered down to the car parking space behind the shop and her heart almost burst out of her chest as she watched with horror the lights of Olek’s van come on and the van accelerate away into the darkness.

‘Oh shit. It wasn’t a burglar, it was my husband.’ She squeezed her eyes shut as a wave of nausea rose to her throat. Oh, darling, I’m so, so sorry , she murmured under her breath.

‘Ooh, shall I go and let him in?’ Woody rubbed his hands together.

Nell shook her head. ‘He’s already gone. He must have heard what I just said. Oh god, this is a disaster.’

But how much had he heard? That she’d lied to him, or just the joke about using Woody’s sperm? Her heart thudded as she ran downstairs to fetch her phone. She had to call him, get him to come back, at least let her try to explain that she’d only lied because she loved him.

Where was her phone? She frantically searched both pockets in her coat, tipped out the contents of her handbag to try to locate it, but it wasn’t there. She’d thought that today couldn’t get any worse; turned out she was wrong. And this time she couldn’t see how to make it right. How was she going to get out of this one?