Page 10 of I’ll Be Home for Christmas

Fred

With the aunts tucked in together on their bench overlooking the sea, glasses in hand, cigar smoke pluming above their heads, Fred wandered into the workshop behind her mum.

It was comfortingly like how she remembered it.

The main workbench ran below a set of large windows overlooking the rugged cliff path and the ocean beyond.

Along one wall three antique plan chests archived the original paintings of every Hallow-Hart final design.

When Fred was a girl, she had dreamed of following in the footsteps of the Hallow-Hart women; designing the papers for the crackers and seeing her work take its place in the archives.

As she grew older her desire to break free of the family legacy had driven her in a different direction, though still with design at its core.

She’d studied advertising at university, followed by an internship at a digital design studio, and then embarked on a master’s degree in visual communications after she’d bagged her first job in advertising.

She thrilled at finding “the hook,” creating a visual campaign that would resonate with consumers and get them to part with their hard-earned cash.

None of it had prevented her from being made redundant, but her design-led way of viewing the world had become so ingrained that she did it almost without thinking.

She found herself doing it now. There was no denying the tingling in her fingers—or the sparks of ideas for marketing pitches zapping through her mind—as she perused her family’s artwork.

Her mum had almost completed another cracker assembly, nimble fingers tying perfect bows. “What time is the van due?” she asked.

Fred checked her watch. “Any time now. I think they planned to leave in the early hours, to miss the traffic.”

“I’ve cleared out one of the spare rooms so you can store anything you’re not sure what to do with right now. There’s room in one of the outbuildings too. Once you’ve settled back into the space it’ll be clearer to decide where to put things,” said Bella.

“I’m not going to settle in, Mum, I’m only perching for a while. Most of the stuff can stay in the boxes so it’s easier to shift when I find somewhere more permanent.” She would need to keep reiterating her intentions, both for herself and her family, or risk getting stuck here.

“This is your home for as long as you want it.”

“I need to start looking for a new job.”

“You have a job. This is a family business and there’s plenty of work to go around.”

“I’m not a charity case.”

“It’s not charity, it’s family. And I need the help.

I’ve been thinking about employing someone for a while, but you would be my first choice…

It’s too much for one person. The aunts still chip in occasionally since they retired, but they shouldn’t have to at their age.

You know how much work is involved, and we’re constantly up against mass producers who can whip up twice as many for half the price. ”

“Yeah, but they aren’t as good as ours; handmade is our USP.”

“It’s also the thing that means I haven’t taken a holiday this year,” said her mum, sounding weary.

Fred hadn’t known that. She’d make sure to lend a hand while she was here. She ran her fingers over the reels of ribbon and looked out at her aunts, wrapped up together and laughing as they sipped their cocktails. They had the kind of relationship she’d always dreamed of finding.

“Do you ever wish you’d done something different?” she asked her mum.

Bella nestled the finished cracker into a box with five others. The gentle susurration of paper rubbing against paper reminded Fred of climbing into crisp clean sheets.

“I consider myself very lucky that I had a family business to grow into,” she said. “I left school before I’d taken my exams, I had nothing to my name. My life would have been very different without Hallow-Hart Crackers. Yours would too.”

“But would you have chosen it?”

Bella stood back, regarding her. “Knowing everything I know now, I would, yes. I get to be creative, and people all over the world have my art in their homes—even if it ends up in the recycling after Christmas. I run my own business, and through it I’m able to promote the work of other creatives.

I’ve been blessed. I don’t take that for granted.

” She picked up another flat-pack box and began to assemble it.

“There’s a place marked out for you here, and it isn’t charity, it’s your birthright.

Your advertising expertise is just what we need to grow the business; I’m no good at marketing.

You’d be coming into it with fresh eyes. ”

“I’m not ready to make any decisions yet, Mum.”

“No, of course not, there’s no pressure. I’m simply letting you know that Hallow-Hart Crackers belongs to you as much as it does to me or the aunts—and it’s here waiting for you, if you want it.”

“I thought you said there was no pressure.”

Bella sighed and Fred could hear the frustration in it.

“I’d have thought that knowing you have a job if you want it would be removing pressure, not adding to it.”

“It does. It’s just…” How could she tell her mother that working for Hallow-Hart Crackers would feel like giving up?

“If I were to join the business, I’d need to be certain that it was my choice, you know?

I don’t want it to be a fallback because I don’t feel confident enough to get back out there on my own; I’d be doing all of us a disservice if I did.

I want to want to do it.” She took a breath.

“I know how lucky I am to have choices.” It made fucking up your life so much worse when you knew how hard your mum had worked, against all the odds, to give you the head start that she hadn’t had.

“I am grateful. Truly. I just need a minute.”

Bella smiled at her. “You’re working through stuff, that’s how we grow as people. Conclusions can’t be drawn before the experiments have been carried out.”

Her mum’s gentle understanding had always infuriated her.

She had an inability to be black or white; so many times, she’d wanted her mum to just tell her what to do already, instead of sitting on that bloody fence all the time.

But after years of being gently manipulated to do things Tim’s way, she appreciated her mum’s impartiality; there was freedom in being able to make your own mistakes.

She began leafing through one of her mum’s sketchbooks lying open on the workbench.

This one contained scrawled mind maps, pieces of fabric, photographs and pictures roughly torn out of magazines and stuck in, alongside notes and sketches; inspirations and ideas that would go on to be next year’s cracker paper designs.

The sun came out from behind a cloud and its rays fell across a silver star bracelet in the gift box, causing it to twinkle.

She picked it up. This was Martha’s work; Martha Frost had been crafting silver jewelry for their crackers for as long as she could remember.

As Fred surveyed the boxes of little handmade gifts, she recognized the handiwork of other local makers.

If there was one thing that growing up in a close community had taught her, it was that most people had two lives at least running concurrently; nobody was ever only one thing.

Dr. Bayley, for example, ministered to patients and made tiny pottery cottages that doubled as match strikers.

Erin, the farm vet, embroidered the most delicate bookmarks.

Life was made up of many layers, and the ones that fed the soul were as important as those that paid the bills.

Fred had neglected her soul layers for so long they were probably stuck together like the pages of an old photograph album.

A buzzer sounded from an intercom on the back wall.

“Hello?” she said.

“Hey, it’s Ryan, is that Fred?”

Her heart did a little skip. Shush! she warned it. “Oh, hey, what brings you here?”

She heard a horn honk three times quickly followed by one long blast.

“Well, a somewhat impatient man in a van has just pulled up beside me requiring entry…” Fred felt her shoulders slump with despondency.

“And also,” Ryan continued, “you didn’t accidentally take my phone back with you last night, did you?

I can’t find it anywhere and it’s out of battery, so I can’t look up its location. ”

She thought back. Had she? She’d been quite drunk. Last night’s jeans were stuffed in a carrier bag in the back of the car. She pressed the release button to open the gates. “Come on in, and I’ll check.” Then she turned to her mum. “The van’s here with my stuff.”

“Okay then, let’s get this show on the road,” said her mum, laying down tools and opening the door. She called out, “Come along, slutty ecstatics, Fred’s life has just arrived!”

The aunts stubbed out their cigarillos and began to amble back toward the house.

“Ryan’s here too, he thinks I’ve got his phone,” said Fred, rubbing her temples.

“Honey, is everything okay?”

“Yep. Yes. I’m all good.” She wasn’t. She was about to be confronted with the most comprehensive proof so far that she had failed spectacularly at adulting, and she didn’t relish the idea of Ryan seeing her worldly belongings being spilled out onto the front lawn.

She produced what she hoped was a convincing smile, and said, “Okay. Let’s do this. ”

—

When they reached the front of the house, two men were stood by the front door, boxes in arms, ready to be let in.

Bella did the honors, shouting directions of where they should take the heavy boxes, and the aunts followed behind them with some of the lighter items. Behind the van was Ryan in an old Land Rover.

It strangely suited the new rugged version of the boy she once knew.

“Hi!” said Ryan, smiling broadly when he saw her.

Her stomach zinged. Dammit. This was Ryan, she would not allow her stomach to zing for him.

“Hi, yourself.”