Christmas Cakes and Mistletoe Nights

  ‘Not good,’ Lija replies and I can hear the tension in her voice. ‘Am out of head with worry.’

  ‘Why? What’s wrong?’

  Unlike Lija, she sobs when she says, ‘Is Stan.’

  My heart nearly stops. My dear friend is ninety-three years old and I know that he can’t last for ever, but how I’ve dreaded this phone call. Oh, Stan. My dear, dear Stan.

  Chapter Three

  ‘He is poorly, Fay,’ Lija continues, clearly distraught. ‘Very poorly.’

  My paused heart kicks in again. I’d feared the worst, but it’s not too late. Stan, thank heavens, is still with us. ‘What’s wrong with him?’

  ‘It started with silly cold,’ she tells me. ‘Sniffle, sniffle, snot, all that. Now is worse. Doctor has been today. He is sick. Very sick.’

  ‘Oh, my poor Stan.’

  ‘He asked me not to tell you.’

  ‘Of course he did.’ Stan never likes to make a fuss about anything, and if Lija’s in this state, I’m thinking that it must be quite bad.

  ‘I cannot manage, Fay,’ she says. ‘I don’t know what to do.’ I can tell, even down the phone, that she sounds strained, on the edge. ‘You will know how to help. Can you come?’

  Danny is standing next to me now and puts his hand on my shoulder. I gather from his expression that he’s overheard some of the conversation.

  He nods to me. ‘Go,’ he says. ‘We’ll work it out. If you need to be there, then we’ll manage somehow.’

  I don’t need any further encouragement. ‘I’ll be there as soon as I can,’ I tell Lija. ‘Don’t worry. I’ll look at the logistics of doing it right away and will let you know as soon as I can.’ My car, not being much use to me on the canal, is still parked in Lija’s drive – I can’t even remember if the tax or insurance is still in date – so I’ll have to go back on the train or bus or something. If I need to be with Stan, I’d even walk it.

  ‘Hurry,’ she says. ‘I don’t want him to do old man croaking it while I am here alone.’

  That makes me smile despite the serious nature of our conversation. Lija is ever the pragmatist. ‘I’ll text you as soon as possible.’

  ‘You will be here tomorrow?’

  ‘I’ll do my very best. You know that. We’re in Wales.’

  There is a pause from Lija’s end. ‘It’s quite a long way,’ I fill in. ‘I know where fucking Wales is,’ she grumbles. ‘Was trying to get train timetable on laptop.’

  ‘I’ll do it. We’ve got a half-decent signal for once. I’ll get the first train or bus that I can. I don’t want to be away from Stan while he’s unwell.’ Lija will have a lot on her plate just running the café, she won’t be able to spare the time to care for him properly.

  ‘OK.’ She sounds quite relieved.

  ‘I love you,’ I say. ‘Hang on in there.’

  ‘Thank you, Fay. Come quickly.’ Lija’s phone cuts off.

  ‘We’ll walk down to the pub,’ Danny says. ‘You’ll get quicker Wi-Fi there. It will take an age to look up train timetables from here.’

  ‘You don’t mind if I abandon you to go back?’

  ‘You need to be with Stan. Lija wouldn’t have asked you unless it was serious. She must be really concerned about him.’

  ‘I know what he’s like. He won’t want to cause a fuss or go into hospital, but it sounds as if he needs more than Lija is able to offer. Poor thing.’ Stan has no other family to call on, so Lija and I are all that he has.

  Danny and I quickly pull on our coats and, jumping off the boat, we head down the dark towpath to the pub, Danny’s torch lighting the way. Diggery trots behind, disgruntled at being disturbed from his snooze and rather surprised by the speed of our purposeful strides in place of our usual meander.

  The canalside pub is modern, busy and is doing a roaring trade in top-priced wine and dinners served on chunky wooden boards. We strip off our coats, assailed by the fuggy warmth after the sharp night air. Danny heads straight to the bar and buys us two halves of a local bitter and I find the quietest corner away from the hubbub of the bar to log into the internet. Soon, I’m on the right site even though my fingers are shaky. I scan the timetables, piecing together the logistics which are never made easy on these things. As I feared, the journey home isn’t straightforward. The route is a little complicated, requiring two buses and three quite tight changes of train. On the plus side, I can go tomorrow.

  I jot down some notes on my phone. If all goes to plan and I make my connections on time, after a scant five hours I’ll be back home. Your perspective changes completely when you live on the canal and you easily forget that hundreds of miles can be covered relatively easily on other less ponderous forms of transport.

  ‘It’s expensive,’ I tell Danny. ‘The last train is in peak time. Are you sure we can do it?’ It’s more money than we have to spare at the moment, but it’s not an insurmountable sum.

  ‘Take the last of the cash,’ Danny says, as generous as ever. He knows that I wouldn’t use our meagre savings if I didn’t need to. ‘It’s not a problem. The only thing that matters is that you’re there for Stan.’

  I know that in the short time that Danny got to know him he grew to love Stan as much as I do. If you met him, then you’d love him too. Stan’s an old-fashioned gentleman, the like of which you don’t see enough of any more.

  ‘What if I have to stay for a few weeks? Maybe longer?’

  ‘Let’s see how Stan is when you get there.’

  ‘I’ll miss you.’ I stroke Danny’s face and he catches my hand, holding the palm against his cheek.

  ‘As soon as I can, I’ll follow you. I’ll see out this job and then head back on the canal. I’ll bring The Dreamcatcher back to Milton Keynes. That was going to be our plan anyway. We can still have Christmas together.’

  ‘I hope Stan will still be with us too.’ For the first time, I let myself have a little cry.

  Danny finds me a napkin from the bar so that I can blow my nose.

  ‘He’ll be fine,’ he assures me. ‘I’m sure he’ll perk up the minute he sees Nurse Fay coming to his rescue.’

  ‘This is awful. It makes me realise that he won’t always be there. I can’t bear the thought of it.’ I have another blub into my napkin.

  ‘Come on,’ Danny says. ‘Drink up. We’ll go back to the boat so that you can start packing.’

  We down our beer and Diggery wonders why we’re leaving again when he’s only just got comfortable. We pick our way along the towpath in the moonlight, the wind buffeting the trees, my hand squeezing Danny’s fingers in mine.

  On The Dreamcatcher, I fill my bag with essentials and it’s late by the time we fall into bed. We make love slowly, a bit sadly and I hold Danny tight as he falls asleep afterwards. I can’t bear to be away from Stan and yet I don’t want to leave Danny either. My head’s whirring with what ifs and the usual gentle movement of the boat on the water fails to soothe me to sleep. I lie there fretting all night and, by the time dawn breaks, my eyes are gritty with lack of sleep. Gently moving Danny’s arm, which is thrown across me, I ease myself out of bed and prepare for the journey ahead.

  Chapter Four

  I catch my buses without a hitch and, miraculously, make all my train connections on time, getting fleeting glimpses of Chirk, Shrewsbury and Wolverhampton stations as I run from one platform to another. I thank the universe for looking after me. Sort of. Despite the ease of transfers, I spend the entire journey squashed between businessmen shouting into their phones, mums with scratchy toddlers and a slightly inebriated lady who tells me more than I need to know about her boyfriend’s extensive range of peccadillos. By the end of the journey I wonder why she’s with him at all, but then I’m the past master of staying in unsuitable relationships.

  I arrive in Milton Keynes feeling tired and quite emotional. At the train station, the scheduled bus out to my village doesn’t arrive – the first hiccup – so I quickly grab a slightly wilted sandwich and a terrible cup of tea in a cardb
oard cup from the nearest chain café which makes me realise why my customers were so keen on coming to Fay’s Cakes. We did do very good tea and cake. I didn’t have time to get anything else to eat on my travels and the days of any form of catering service on our railways have long since gone. So I sit and eat my sarnie that has seen better days on a granite bench which is covered in graffiti and chipped by the abuse of a hundred skateboards and wonder why the youth of today want to despoil their surroundings so.

  I call Danny, but he’s obviously still at work and doesn’t pick up. I leave a message to say that I love him and that I’m almost back home.

  Eventually, the next bus comes and I join the half a dozen other passengers who board. As soon as the driver finishes his conversation on his mobile, we bounce out of the city and into the countryside. It takes more than an hour to get to Whittan. It’s not that far in distance, but the bus goes all around the houses before we get there. However, it’s nice to see the area where I grew up through the grimy window and my heart starts to settle. By the time we reach Whittan I’m the only one left on the bus. I check the time and realise that it will be just about time for Stan’s supper by the time I arrive, so I can take it to him.

  The bus drops me off at the end of the main road, so I hitch on my backpack and balance myself with the two other bags I’ve got and set off towards the house. At the end of the lane that leads to my former home, Lija has changed the sign. It now reads THE CAFÉ IN THE GARDEN. Fay’s Cakes, as it was, seems to be gone now. It’s a much better name, no doubt, but it still makes my heart feel a little bit heavier. I’m coming home, but not to the place as I knew it. Now this is someone else’s home and I have to remember that.

  I carry on down the lane which is bordered on the right by hedgerows, beautiful in the summer, but now the leaves are falling and too soon they’ll be bare. I pass Stan’s cottage which is on the left before my old house. I stand outside Canal House and look up. It seems so familiar and so strange all at once. It’s a big, square house. Not the most attractive you’ll see, but it’s the setting which lifts it to another level. ‘Highly desirable’ as the estate agent called it. The lane peters out beyond, so this is the last house. After that and in front of the property is nothing but wide open fields. I lift my bags and walk round to the back. This is definitely where the place comes into its own.

  The long, secluded garden stretches right the way down to the Grand Union Canal. It’s enclosed by high brick walls weathered by time and, in the summer, covered with honeysuckle, clematis and rambling roses. There’s a small orchard of apple trees down by the canal and a jetty that my dad built to moor the Maid of Merryweather. I can just glimpse her nestled down by the canal bank and a chink of happiness edges into my weary body. The garden at this time of year is well past its best, but it still looks beautiful to me. Tears fill my eyes to see it again. It’s such a lovely spot. And once I thought it was mine.

  The ornate café tables that grace the lawn are empty now. The day too cool, the hour too late to accommodate any customers. Perhaps I can help Lija to put them all away for the winter while I’m here. She’ll have no use of them until next spring when the sun has some warmth again. I stop the sob in my throat before it has a chance to rise, but I can’t deny that it’s hard to think it no longer belongs to me.

  Edie didn’t want Canal House. Of course she didn’t. As soon as she was old enough my sister upped sticks and skedaddled out of here as fast as she could. She hated this place, the canal, the countryside. Edie made her home in New York and came back here as infrequently as she could manage. She has never seen the beauty of the waterways, the joy of living somewhere remote. She’s a townie through and through. So it shouldn’t have been a surprise when she didn’t want to live here after she inherited the house.

  It was a grand gesture on Lija’s part to take on the house and café. She bought it lock, stock and barrel. All the furniture and fittings have remained, so, on the surface, very little changed. Lija thought we could continue to run the business together, and perhaps we could have done so in different circumstances. However, no one reckoned on Danny Wilde coming into my life and encouraging poor, mousy, downtrodden Fay to become a roaring lion. Well, maybe that’s pushing it a bit. I’m still more of a pussycat – but at least I know where my claws are now.

  Edie promised me some money from the sale of the house but, of course, it has yet to materialise. Much like everything else that Edie promises. She gave me a few thousand pounds, supposedly to tide me over after making me homeless, and I expect that will be the end of it. That’s already been blown on luxuries such as diesel for The Dreamcatcher and food for me, Danny and the dog. The half a million quid that Edie banked from the sale of the house has never been mentioned again. Funny that.

  All this rationalising hasn’t stopped my emotions from being all mixed up. I feel as if I’m home, yet it’s no longer my home. My home is with Danny on The Dreamcatcher now, but the ties to this place are as strong as ever.

  Turning away from the garden, I step onto the veranda, which is surrounded by a pretty ironwork trellis running the length of the house at the back, one of my favourite nooks. When it’s covered with the rambling, lilac wisteria, there’s no nicer place to sit.

  Feeling more anxious than I should, I knock at the back door and Lija comes to open it. ‘No need for to knock,’ she snaps.

  ‘I wasn’t sure.’

  She tsks at me. ‘Stupid woman.’

  I smile. Exactly the sort of homecoming I’d expected from my prickly friend. Dropping my bags, I hold open my arms and she steps into them. Lija is always pencil-thin, but when I hug her it feels as if there’s nothing of her at all. Clearly, she isn’t eating much of the gorgeous cake she makes.

  She lets me hold her for a few moments – which is never a given – and then says, ‘I will put kettle on.’

  I let go of her and ease myself into one of the chairs at the big pine table that dominates the centre of the room. The kitchen, as usual, is filled with the scent of a cake or something baking in the oven and I’m instantly taken back to our time here together. ‘That smells good.’

  ‘Scones for tomorrow,’ she says. ‘Christmas afternoon tea.’

  I nod my approval.

  ‘You look tired,’ Lija says.

  ‘I’m knackered. It’s quite a way back from deepest, darkest Wales.’

  ‘Hmm.’ Lija doesn’t look at all impressed by the thought of Wales. ‘Bad journey?’

  ‘It was all right,’ I say. ‘Scruffy trains. Screaming toddlers. Sweaty businessmen. I’m just glad I could get back so quickly. How’s Stan today?’

  ‘Not good.’ She glances at me and her face is grim. ‘I have called doctor again.’

  ‘Someone’s coming out? Dr Ahmed?’

  ‘Yeah. Could be one hour. Could be three.’ She shakes her head at the unsatisfactory nature of the situation.

  ‘I’ll have a quick cuppa and then go over there. I’d like to be there to see what the doctor says.’

  Lija hangs her head. ‘I am sorry to call you. I did not know what else to do.’

  ‘I’m glad you did.’ Lija never looks like the healthiest person on the planet, but I’m quite alarmed by her appearance. She’s tiny, frail and the colour of milk. Even in the height of summer, when my face was always a riotous mass of freckles, Lija stayed deathly white. But now she looks drawn and her eyes seem too deep in their sockets. ‘Is everything else OK?’

  ‘Yes.’ Lija is instantly defensive. ‘Why would not be?’

  ‘I’m only asking.’ She plonks a cup of tea down in front of me followed by a pleasingly large slice of Victoria sponge. There’s no one bakes it quite like Lija. This cake would make Mary Berry proud. Next to the plate, she slaps down a fork and I have to stifle a smile. ‘I have missed you.’

  She softens slightly. ‘Have missed you too.’

  ‘Is the café busy?’

  ‘Very much so,’ she says, proudly.

  ‘I want to hea
r all about it, but first I should quickly drink this and try your lovely cake before I go next door to Stan. I’m desperate to see him.’

  ‘Do not be shocked, Fay,’ Lija says flatly. ‘Is not good.’

  Chapter Five

  I leave Lija to tend to her scones and I go round to Stan’s house. I knock and, after what seems like an age, he shuffles to the door. As Lija warned me, he isn’t looking good.

  Lija’s nickname for our dear neighbour is Stinky Stan – cruel but, in fairness to Lija, he doesn’t always smell as fragrant as he might. But the poor old soul is ninety-three years old and manages entirely by himself. He’s never been married and you can tell that he lacks a woman’s touch in his life.

  He was always quite dapper, if you ignored that his cardigan was never buttoned up quite right or there were a few random soup stains down his shirt. Now he looks every one of his ninety-odd years and he’s almost bent double. It’s heartbreaking to see. He’s in his pyjamas and a rather scruffy dressing gown. It looks as if he hasn’t shaved for days.

  ‘My dear Fay,’ he says when he sees me. ‘What on earth are you doing here?’

  ‘Lija called in the cavalry,’ I tell him. ‘I’ve come to look after you.’

  ‘No, no, no,’ he says. ‘You can’t do that.’

  ‘I can. Now let me in, Stan, or we’ll both catch our death on the doorstep.’

  ‘Sorry,’ he says. ‘Very sorry.’ He opens the door wide and I step inside.

  ‘You shouldn’t even be up,’ I admonish. ‘Why are you not tucked up in bed?’ The tiny living room smells fuggy and stale. Lija had said that Stan had recently lost the cleaner who came in once a week and it’s clear that he’s not yet replaced her. When I look close, it’s obvious that Stan is sleeping downstairs as there are rumpled blankets and sheets on the sofa.

  He gestures at his makeshift bed, then shuffles ahead of me and sits back down.