Christmas at Frozen Falls Read online

  ‘Listen, Sylvie. I’ve been doing a lot of thinking about what happened, and I know I probably owe you an explanation—’

  ‘Duh! You think?’ I butt in, enjoying being sarcastic when he’s trying to share his feelings.

  ‘Sylvie,’ he chastises me. ‘It’s been really hard for me to accept what I did. You don’t know what it’s been like, living with this guilt.’

  ‘Excuse me if my heart doesn’t bleed for you, Cole. What do you think it’s been like for me? Ditched a week before our wedding! And you just disappeared like that. Nobody would tell me where you were, not even your mother. What was I supposed to do? Mum and Dad had to deal with all the wedding stuff. They lost so much money, Cole. Where were you then? Then all I get are your solicitor’s letters telling me not to expect a penny from the sale of your house. And now you rock up here as casual as you like and wanting to stay for dinner!’ I don’t mention Barney; if I do, I’ll cry and I point blank refuse to let him see that.

  ‘I know it’s unforgivable, I know! I just freaked out. The wedding came around so suddenly and I panicked and I… I ran.’

  ‘You don’t think ten years was a long enough build-up to our wedding? You needed a bit longer?’

  ‘I know that nothing I say will stop you hating me. I just… really needed to see you.’

  He suddenly shifts over towards me and takes my left hand in his, running his thumb over the spot once encircled by his engagement ring. He frowns, stoops his head and, after a tiny hesitation, kisses the spot, still soft and bearing the smooth indentation from a decade of pressure from the golden band. His lips are warm and I feel a mood of defeat begin to creep over me as, at last, I look into his troubled eyes.

  I’m going to try to brazen this out; he can’t see me weakening. ‘Cole. You can’t just walk back into my life after six months.’ Then it hits me. We’d be going on our honeymoon in five days’ time. Is he here hoping for a reconciliation? Has he had some time to think and calm down and now he wants us to go on our honeymoon together, even though he skipped out on the actual wedding bit of the whole arrangement?

  ‘I need to ask you one question and then I’ll get out of your life forever, if that’s what you want.’

  I feel my eyes widening and my pulse picking up. He’s struggling to find the words to say what’s coming next and a tense silence spreads in the space between us. He squeezes my hand and I can’t tell if he’s trying to reassure me or himself.

  I watch him take a deep breath. I knew it! He’s come crawling back. He can’t live without me.

  Mixed in with the feelings of triumph and self-satisfaction there’s something else, something I’m too delirious to recognise as trepidation.

  ‘You see, I really had to come see you today,’ he says in a low voice, his eyes still cast down at my hand. ‘It’s um… it’s…’

  ‘It’s because you miss me.’

  Cole draws his hand away.

  ‘Um, I was going to say… it’s my mum.’

  What the actual fuck? My mouth clamps shut.

  ‘She wants the ring back.’

  Well, I was not expecting that. The world spins off its axis and my stomach lurches in response. All I can do is fold my arms tightly over the cushion and inwardly count to ten, trying not to scream.

  He knows I’m counting, and he lets me – he’s seen me do this often enough in the past, it’s my way of calming myself down, though, it strikes me, I haven’t needed to run through these numbers for months now.

  Eventually I’m able to speak again. ‘She what?’ It’s more of a growl than actual words but he gets my drift.

  ‘You remember it was my grandmother’s? Mum says it’s a family heirloom, so I have to get it back. She wants to give it to her granddaughter.’ He’s sheepish now. At least he has the good grace to be ashamed of running this horrible errand. Bloody mummy’s boy.

  ‘Granddaughter? Not Clementine? She’s already got the four boys! Poor woman.’

  Cole shakes his head, and I think for a moment before laughing wickedly.

  ‘Has Kelvin got someone pregnant?’ The thought of Cole’s weedy, layabout younger brother even so much as talking to a woman seems wholly implausible, let alone the idea that he might have impregnated one.

  As I’m saying all this, I notice the look on Cole’s face, like a bold little boy caught stealing in a sweetshop. He seems… not ashamed, exactly, but he has a look of cheeky chagrin, as though he’s been rumbled and is enjoying the powerless shopkeeper’s haranguing.

  The world lists again and I try to rein in my shock so he doesn’t see it. ‘It’s you. You’re having a baby.’

  I don’t remember much else, just a few snatches of Cole’s voice, weak and cowardly. She’s a girl in his cabin crew… twelve-week scan… and the time’s never really right to start a family, is it? But he’s excited anyway and…

  I’m half aware of Dad showing Cole to the door with a civil restraint he definitely doesn’t deserve, and it’s possible, just possible, that I shouted out something about fucking the fuck off and never coming back, but I can’t be sure. And that was it.

  Poor Mum and Dad’s New York bon voyage celebration begins and ends with them cradling their daughter on her childhood bed as she wails her heart out for all that she’s lost. The last thing I register before I fall asleep is Dad muttering under his breath to Mum, ‘That bloody bastard! Why did I let him in?’

  Chapter Four

  Nari Bell, travel writer and lone adventurer.

  This is my #nomadgirl blog. One woman, one great big world to explore.

  I’m a romantic, I’m a realist, I prefer the road less travelled. I’m at home anywhere and everywhere but am especially close to Seoul and Glasgow (my parents’ home cities) and Cheshire, where I hang my hat.

  * * *

  Welcome back, and a big Hello to all my new followers.

  Today is my blogiversary! Ten whole years travelling the world, exploring the culture, art, history and food of other countries, sharing it all with you, my readers, through stories and photos.

  If you’re new to the site, expect blogs about independent escapes and all the ups and downs of flying solo with one aim in mind: inspiring you to venture outside your comfort zone.

  I started this blog a decade ago, combining my old dating blog with my passion for international getaways. And I know some of you loyal fans miss the old days where the blog was more Sex And The City than city break travel hacks, but I’m very much your lone travel guru these days.

  I’m feeling pretty proud of what I’ve achieved since me and my blog set off on that first trip a decade ago (spending a sunny winter discovering Agadir and Ouarzazate, and occasionally spilling the deets about hot dates under the date palms) but, even back then, the essence of my blog was there: I travelled alone, relying only on me, my passport, my camera and my GPS. I’ll tell you what I wanted back then (and still want now) from travelling:

  A window seat with a vacant chair beside mine

  Unlimited currency (I wish) to spend on ALL the local food

  Freedom to go any place I please (and to take you, gorgeous readers, with me)

  A holiday romance (even if, nowadays, that’s in fictional form. I’ll always pack one romcom novel – or download one hundred – and let you know if I recommend them for your own travels)

  So, who’s coming with me as I plan a whole new year of adventure, starting with a snowy escape in Lapland? This one’s a real departure for me as I’m going with my best friend, S, but I’ll be sure to blog everything we get up to.

  Remember to hit subscribe, and comment below with your own travel plans.

  Kisses, Nari Bell.

  #Celebrating #tenyears #solotravel #intrepid #Suitmyself #Nomadgirl #FemaleSoloTravel #beachreads #IndependentGetaways #adventuretravelgoals #fearless #female

  Chapter Five

  Cole’s surprise visit was two days ago now and it’s astonishing what you can achieve on emotional autopilot. I drove Mum and Dad to
the airport yesterday and waved them off. We all managed to smile and I think they were close to conquering their concern for me and getting excited again about their big adventure. They suggested we have a family dinner on the thirtieth (Nari included) when they return and we’ll exchange gifts then, so in a way I’ll get two Christmases, which is something to be glad about, but even so, Cole really does know how to put a big fat dampener on everything.

  I’ve had a couple of sleepless nights to think over Cole’s baby news, wondering exactly how long he’s been with this cabin crew girl if she’s already three months gone. If I’d had my wits about me, I might have asked if she was the reason he called off the wedding, but the shock was just too much for coherent thought back at Mum and Dad’s the other night, and I really, really don’t think I could handle any more new information right now. Ditched Bride? OK, that’s fine, I guess; but Gullible Cheated-on Fiancée? It doesn’t bear thinking about. Though of course, I have been thinking about it, and have the sunken black eyes to prove it.

  And that’s not all that’s been niggling away at me, if I’m honest. Since Cole’s visit I’d known there was something I had to do and it had been making me even more anxious. Now it’s over with, I suppose you could say I’m relieved.

  On my way home from the airport I called in at Patricia Jordan’s house. After making sure Cole’s car wasn’t parked outside, I summoned up all my courage to ring her doorbell. The wait for her to answer felt interminable.

  She blanched noticeably when she discovered me standing on her doorstep. I didn’t give her much processing time, I simply put her mother’s precious ring into her hand and said in my biggest, proudest, most dignified voice, ‘I believe you wanted your ring back? Consider it returned. Cole and I have no further business together so if you want any other errands running ask the new girl.’

  She didn’t say a word but I know she watched me as I walked back to my car. I kept my head up all the way, even though my legs were wobbling. Once I was safely back in the driver’s seat with the door locked (irrational, I know; women like Patricia Jordan don’t run after ex daughters-in-law so they can shout at them like fishwives in the street), I drove around the corner, pulled to a stop in the car park of a veterinary surgery, and I cried out all the nervous energy that seeing Patricia again had generated, hoping nobody was watching.

  As I’d rung her doorbell, it had all came flooding back, all the strange tension that had hung in the air at every encounter we’d ever had, even when we were meant to be enjoying a family meal in her smart dining room or at one of Cole’s legendary barbecues at the Love Shack – the only times he ever set foot in the garden of that place. There was always something amiss, and I’d never fully understood what it was.

  We’d hit it off relatively well enough, in the first moment that we met. She’d looked me over and told me she’d always known that one day Cole would ‘bring home a supermodel’. I’d laughed and brushed off the ridiculous compliment at the time. It had taken years to realise that it hadn’t been a compliment at all, but was, in fact, an affront. Patricia’s weapon of choice was to think the worst of someone but smile and say the exaggerated opposite. Over the years I’d heard that kind of thing many times.

  ‘Sylvie, you’re working so hard at that school, the weight’s just dropping off you, and I don’t know how you manage to look so rested.’ That’s Patricia for: ‘You’re overweight and you’re haggard through overwork’.

  Or I’d be told, ‘IKEA curtains, you say? Well, Clementine could learn a lot from you when it comes to scrimping and saving with the housekeeping.’ A Patricia double whammy, flagging her dislike of my cheap and cheerful furnishings while also undermining poor absent Clementine and her elegant, expensive tastes.

  The long and the short of the situation, I realised, was that there was no way of pleasing the woman.

  When I worked part-time she teased Cole over seemingly never-ending lunches at her house about how wonderful he was for taking extra flights in order to ‘keep me in the manner to which I’d become accustomed.’ And when I moved to working a five-day week, she’d wondered aloud at how I was managing to run a house with only the help of online grocery deliveries and doggy day care for Barney: ‘I don’t know how you do it, Sylvie, always juggling. I’m sure if I tried it, there’d be absolute chaos and my home would resemble a bombsite.’

  If I’d prepared us all a meal she’d tell me how she’d recently dined in a restaurant where she’d ordered the exact same dish and it had been ‘cooked to perfection’ there. If I talked about holiday plans with Cole she’d let me know how a couple in her extended circle of friends had visited the same resort and found it ‘fuddy-duddy’ but then would say, ‘you never know, you might like it Sylvie, dear.’

  And all the while, as Patricia smiled placidly and launched her little spite grenades, Cole would sit by her side, utterly unaware, shovelling a towering barbequed burger into his mouth, content in the knowledge that Patricia wholeheartedly approved of everything he did, and thinking how convenient it was that the women in his life got along so well.

  Much later on, when I’d given up striving for an ounce of approval from her, I’d broached with Cole the idea that his mother might not be very keen on me, and that, in fact, she might be a perfectly permed, passive-aggressive narcissist with a smattering of son-worshipping Oedipal weirdness. He’d just laughed loudly with the usual slack-jawed incredulity that any of my protests were met with.

  ‘Mum?’ he’d say. ‘No, Sylve, you’re being paranoid. I know she loves you, really, and she’s been so good to you over the years.’

  So I gave up pointing out her little jellyfish sting asides, instead storing them up and spilling them to Nari during late night phone calls when Cole was away.

  ‘You’re in Bates Motel territory with those two, Sylve,’ she’d said. ‘If the motel were done out in Farrow & Ball “Wimborne White” and new season Laura Ashley chintz.’

  * * *

  Having at last faced my recent hideous past, I sat in my car, clutching the steering wheel with white knuckles. After sobbing for a good ten minutes, I attracted the concerned attention of the vet’s assistant as he popped out to the shop on the corner, so I blew my nose and hurriedly left the scene.

  Confronting the crinkly old bat had felt like one great big leap towards leaving Cole behind, not a great feeling exactly, but a positive one nonetheless.

  After a short while in self-imposed solitary confinement (eight hours straight watching QVC with a box of Milk Tray – thank you, little Selina Dawson in year nine), I dusted myself down and put my festive game face on.

  By this morning, the nineteenth of December, all my presents for Mum, Dad, the extended family and, of course, Nari, were wrapped and under my twinkling tree – my only concession to the season. Having sorted out the house, I turned to Cole’s shoebox, tipping the contents into the kitchen bin, saving only the cashmere socks and the photo of Barney.

  The picture was taken on the day I found him when he was just a few months old – nobody at the rescue centre knew how old exactly – and he’s sitting on his fat, wrinkled little bottom and gazing up at me with big soppy Labrador eyes. It hurt to put his picture up there on my mantelpiece but I’m hoping in time the pain will ease a bit. Anyway, I’d resolved not to cry any more so I gave myself a stern talking to and locked away the memories, at least for a while. Thinking about what happened with Barney is just too much, given my December so far.

  * * *

  Nari took me to the out of town shopping mall to pick up some Lapland essentials this morning. With festive music and the smell of coffee and fast food in the stifling air, we made our way to one of those outdoorsy stores, the kind of place where you’d buy a tent and a tin mug. I’ve never set foot inside one before but Nari was clutching a list and was a woman on a mission, so I let her take control. As she inspected the microwavable hand warmers, I told her Cole’s baby daddy news and her summation of the situation was, I must say, succinct, i
f a bit unpleasant.

  ‘Good riddance to him, the great steaming turd.’

  ‘Quite. But, honestly, I feel OK about it. In fact I don’t really feel anything. I think it was the perfect closure.’

  ‘Good. You needed some. Hopefully by the time we get on board that plane you’ll be totally clear-headed and ready to chill.’

  ‘Literally chill?’

  Nari laughed and rummaged through a rail of thermal long johns. ‘Yep! You’ll need some of these, but buy a men’s size small; they fit better than the women’s ones under your snowsuit, less pinchy round the waistband.’

  ‘Must they be this colour? They’re godawful.’ I inserted my finger into the beige flap at the front, pulling a squeamish face and realising this wasn’t going to be a glamorous holiday. Of course, Nari’s got everything she needs for snowy travel, having skied in Aspen, trekked in Mongolia, and seen polar bears in Alaska. I’m the cold weather newbie. ‘How many layers will I need? Two?’

  ‘Try four… as well as a snow suit.’

  ‘You’re kidding?’

  ‘We’ll be outside for long stretches in minus twenty degree temperatures and waist-high snow drifts. You’ll be glad I made you buy hideous flappy men’s drawers,’ Nari said, having bundled multiple pairs into the basket.

  ‘What’s next on your list?’

  ‘Convert some cash into Euros. Then its balaclavas, ear muffs, merino vests and socks and then… you’re sorted. And I think we should grab a hot chocolate so we can get in training for drinking pints of the stuff on holiday.’

  I followed her dutifully to the checkout, mumbling as I went. ‘Balaclavas and ear muffs? Ooh, I am going to look all kinds of hot in Lapland.’

  * * *