best friends; a manic, wagging, bouncing bundle of fluff, while the greyhound gazed nobly into the distance, refusing to acknowledge her.
The man – Owen Ferguson, I remembered, from two excruciating parents’ evenings, when we’d all had to fake enthusiasm for Jonas’ artwork – smiled and tipped his head towards Dotty.
‘Quite a handful, I imagine?’
‘Yes.’ I examined his words for hidden layers of sarcasm or innuendo, but couldn’t detect any. ‘She certainly throws herself at everything with unchecked enthusiasm. Literally,’ I added, as Dotty leapt up at the greyhound again. ‘Sorry. Dotty! Come here!’
She ignored me; my voice had a unique pitch that neither dogs nor teenagers could hear. Owen whistled and the greyhound sauntered immediately to his side.
‘Impressive,’ I said, tugging the lead to drag Dotty back. ‘Do you use that trick on the children too?’
‘No, they’d never hear it over the ear pods.’ His smile flashed up, a deep, brief smile that reminded me of Leo. ‘I need a klaxon to round them up.’
I smiled back, but it faded quickly, and I couldn’t think of anything else to say.
‘Are things … okay?’ Owen asked. I nodded, once, and he repeated the movement back at me, which could have looked odd, but was strangely comforting. ‘Good.’ He bent down and ruffled Dotty’s head. ‘Goodbye, Dotty. I expect we’ll see you around.’
He headed off diagonally across the field towards the village, while I went straight on to the kissing gate that opened onto the road a little way down from our house. As Dotty stopped to water the bottom of a telegraph pole, Leo’s car approached and pulled onto the drive. He got out and slammed the door, a rare sign of temper for Leo. Seconds later, the passenger door opened and Ethan emerged. It must have been two years since I had seen him, but he had scarcely changed: hair as thick and blond as ever; immaculately dressed despite a seven-hour flight; confident, athletic movements, even in the way he pushed the car door shut and hauled his suitcase from the boot. It would be impossible to guess, from looks, character, or temperament, that these two were brothers. I watched as they paused in front of the car. Raised voices carried towards me, the words muffled by the mist, but the anger behind them clear; and then Ethan turned and looked right at me. Leo followed his gaze, and after one final heated exchange, they stalked off in different directions, Leo to our house, Ethan next door.
Clark was joining us for Christmas lunch. It had been my idea, and I still wasn’t sure if it was the best or the worst one I’d ever had. But I wanted Leo to be with the children for one last Christmas – wholly with us, body and mind, not sneaking off to make furtive phone calls, or leaving before the pudding in an attempt to split his day between us. So Clark had to come; and the delight on Leo’s face when I issued the invitation clarified things for me. It was the best idea for him, and the worst one for me.
The present opening was a subdued affair, despite the jolly Christmas music, the defiantly twinkling fairy lights, and glasses of Buck’s Fizz all round. It all went on too long: I had overdone it during a manic spending spree the day before, as if somehow a bigger stash of presents could compensate the children for the impending loss of Leo. They were pleased; they smiled; but it wasn’t the carefree joy of previous Christmases. I couldn’t see how we would ever get that back.
I had agonised over whether to buy a different present for Leo. In my usual efficient fashion, I had ordered his Christmas gift months ago: a handmade pair of silver cufflinks, each one in the shape of a miniature book, engraved with the title of his favourite novel by the Victorian author Alice Hornby, Lancashire’s answer to Charlotte Brontë. Leo had spent his academic career studying Alice’s life and work, with me as his eager research assistant; he had already published an annotated edition of her novels, and his biography would be launched in a few months, the culmination of a lifetime of work for both of us.
The cufflinks had seemed the perfect present, and in many ways, they still were. But would he want to wear them, and be constantly reminded of me, and all we had achieved together? I gave them to him anyway, and the delight on his face was almost as great as when I had invited Clark for Christmas. And though I had braced myself for a boring gift from him – because, after all, he had known that our time was almost up and could have shopped accordingly – I should have known him better. He gave me a necklace, with a thick round pendant made of green Murano glass, which reminded me at once of that green Fruit Pastille he had found for me on the day we met. There were tears in his eyes as he watched me open the box, and his hands trembled as he fastened the clasp around my neck. And though I recognised that it had been chosen to mark the end, I knew that it promised a beginning too.
‘A bit late to be making an effort, isn’t it?’ Mum said, when she toddled across from the garage with a bottle of cheap sherry for me, wine for Leo, and a Terry’s Chocolate Orange each for Jonas and Ava. ‘Is that a new dress?’
Of course it was: another emergency purchase yesterday. Clark was coming. I wasn’t going to meet him properly for the first time in the same dowdy skirt and blouse I’d worn for the last four years.
‘A new necklace too?’ she carried on. I fingered it: the glass pastille was comfortingly smooth under my finger. ‘Who’s been buying you jewellery?’
‘One of my lovers dropped round with it early this morning.’
‘From Leo, is it?’ Mum asked, ignoring what I’d said: clearly the pitch of my voice was inaudible to pensioners too. ‘Has he dumped the boyfriend then? You should take him back. You’ll struggle to find anyone else, in the circumstances.’
I turned and led her into the living room, without giving her the satisfaction of asking which particular circumstances she had in mind. My age? My looks? My crabby mother living in the garage, overseeing my every move? Leo drew her over to the sofa, distracting her with his quiet, charming conversation, while I hovered in the doorway, wondering how on earth I was going to survive without him.
Audrey and Ethan were next to arrive. Audrey looked stunning in a red wrap dress, blonde hair piled into a sophisticated messy bun, and yet still managed to hug me and say I looked beautiful with impressive sincerity. Ethan was … Well, Ethan was Ethan, no more and certainly no less than he had always been. He had lived a charmed life, and now even age was favouring him; his face had perhaps filled out a little, but it suited him; the confidence that had once seemed a size too big now fitted him like a jacket tailored to the millimetre. With my confidence so recently shattered, I felt oddly flustered to see him again; so much so that when he leaned forward to kiss my cheek, I opened my mouth to wish him a merry Christmas instead, twitched my head, and somehow managed to catch his kiss perfectly on my parted lips.
‘And a happy Christmas to you too, Mary,’ he said, laughing, and all at once we were teenagers again, partners in fun, and I couldn’t help laughing along with him; the first time I had laughed in days, it felt.
Ethan’s arrival brightened the mood for a while; his liveliness was infectious. Jonas and Ava were fascinated by him, and by the selection of hoodies, rucksacks and other paraphernalia that he insisted all the coolest New York teens were wearing. I could have kissed him again, deliberately this time, when I heard Ava’s laughter drifting into the kitchen, and Jonas sounding more animated than usual as he explained to Ethan the intricacies of one of the Xbox games we had given him for Christmas.
‘It’s a shame they see so little of him,’
