Coming Home For Christmas Read online

  As if mirroring her thoughts, Gabe said, ‘I hope you get something more permanent soon. This is so frustrating for you.’

  ‘I know,’ said Marianne, ‘but what can I do. I feel bad for your mum too, that I can’t give her more notice.’

  ‘No, don’t worry,’ said Gabriel. ‘She’s always happy to help.’

  ‘I know,’ said Marianne, ‘but if I get anything more permanent I’ll try and get a new childminder.’

  ‘But that defeats the purpose of you working,’ said Gabriel, ‘especially if it’s not every day.’

  ‘So what do you suggest?’ asked Marianne, feeling grumpy. It was too early in the morning for this conversation.

  ‘We could ask Eve,’ said Gabe, ‘it would be good for her, give her something to do. I’m worried that she’s not got any sense of purpose. I think helping us could really help her. It’s the obvious solution.’

  Marianne wanted to say over my dead body, but Gabe was right, it was an obvious solution, even if she didn’t like it. She was saved from replying by the phone ringing. A year five class in Whitchurch required her services.

  ‘We’ll talk about this later,’ she said, getting her mobile out to text Jean. She looked at her watch, the journey was nearly an hour, and she needed to be there at eight. ‘I’m going to have to dash, can you sort the kids out for your mum?’

  ‘Will do,’ said Gabriel a bit grumpily, ‘but I can’t do it every time.’

  ‘I know,’ said Marianne. She went to get ready with a sinking heart. This had seemed like such a good idea. But what if she’d bitten off more than she could chew?

  Cat was at the park with Lou Lou, gently pushing her in a swing. Since she’d started looking after her granddaughter, Cat had got much fitter. She was walking miles pushing the buggy, just as she had when Mel was small. Back then, pounding the streets of North London, always on a timetable, worried about being late, pumped with adrenaline, rushing around and a diet of coffee had ensured she stayed thin. Now she could feel a midlife tummy crisis occurring. No wonder she didn’t fit on TV anymore. She’d seen a really cruel piece in one of the many TV based rags about how ‘the TV Kitchen Totty’ had turned into ‘a tub of lard’. It was grossly unfair and very hurtful. She’d put on a bit of weight certainly, but she was hardly obese. She was so frustrated by what was happening to her, she’d started a new blog, Invisible Woman, which judging by the hits she was getting had really struck a chord.

  ‘Time to go home.’ Cat prised her reluctant granddaughter out of the swing and into her buggy. It was all very well Lou Lou having fun, but Cat had forgotten how much you froze to death pushing swings.

  She walked back up the path to town and was delighted to see Miss Woods and Ralph Nicholas deep in conversation. Her favourite old people in Hope Christmas.

  ‘What are you two plotting?’ she asked with a grin.

  ‘Just chatting about this wretched plan for the new hotel,’ said Miss Woods. ‘Honestly, these property people. They think they can waltz in here and take over.’

  ‘Unless we find a way of stopping them,’ said Cat.

  ‘That is exactly what I was saying to Ralph,’ agreed Miss Woods. ‘I gather there are some plans afoot in that direction?’

  ‘We haven’t got very far,’ said Cat, ‘but there’s a meeting in the village hall in a couple of weeks.’

  ‘Glad to hear it,’ said Miss Woods. ‘I’d like to give that London lot a run for their money, and show them that the people of Hope Christmas aren’t pushovers and can’t be taken over on a whim. I’ve been asking around, and there are plenty of people up in arms about this: Diana Carew, Batty Jack from the turkey farm, Vera and Albert from the café, to name but a few.’

  ‘I couldn’t agree with you more,’ said Cat, ‘we should be more than a match for those in favour.’

  ‘We certainly will be,’ said Miss Woods with relish. ‘We’ll show them we’re not going to take this lying down. Bring it on, I say!’

  Chapter Nine

  Pippa was online looking at ideas – anything to see if there were ways to make money from the farm that they hadn’t thought of. She felt sick to the pit of her stomach with the worry of it all. The baking that Pippa had been doing for several years for Vera’s in town was great, but it wasn’t enough.

  She looked at ice cream manufacturing – supermarkets paid so little for their milk it felt barely worth their while selling it sometimes. She’d read somewhere about a farm who’d made a mint on home-made ice cream, but now of course she couldn’t find the article. It sounded like a good solution, but she couldn’t do it alone. She wondered idly, now that Cat had more time on her hands, whether she could co-opt her into help.

  She started a list.

  1. Ice cream?

  2. More baking – but how??? There was only so much time in the day and she was up at five as it was.

  3. Festivals? They had a lot of land. The Hope Christmas Summer Fest was a regular feature on the calendar, maybe she could rent out land to campers? Or perhaps she should start her own mini Glastonbury. Then she thought about seeing Miss Woods’ reaction at a Parish Council Meeting if she suggested it. Maybe not.

  4. Camping? She and Dan had talked about letting out some of their fallow fields in the past, but it had never come to anything. Plenty of people did do it locally. Mind you … health and safety, and insurance was an issue with all these things. And did they really want loads of strangers traipsing past the house and driving up the lane? They got enough walkers up here as it was.

  5. B&B? Ditto.

  Bugger, this was getting her nowhere. It was late, she’d organised the first campaign meeting for the next day, and she needed to get to bed. Richard was on a work trip to town for a few days, so she’d decided to make the most of his absence to get her ideas together.

  ‘I’m not sure if you’re realistically going to be able to turn things round,’ he’d said in an infuriatingly reasonable manner, when she’d broached the subject of diversification, and to avoid an argument, she’d kept quiet. But maybe if she presented Richard with a fait accompli, he’d change his mind. She hoped so. She felt instinctively Richard would prefer it if she weren’t so keen to save the farm. If they were to have a future together, she ought to take note of that. If … That was the million dollar question. She was enjoying spending time with him, and appreciated everything he did for her, but sometimes she wondered if they were too different to make a proper go of things.

  She should try not to worry about Richard too much and concentrate on the farm. If they ended up having to sell, she wanted to be sure she’d explored every option.

  Sighing, she was just about to shut down the computer, when she saw an advert pop up on a website she’d been looking at.

  Easter Eggstravaganza, it said. Come to Farmer Bill’s for some Eggcellent fun. It was just a little farm, doing some Easter fun days, but it got her thinking.

  6, Pippa wrote down, Theme based Farm Days. Now that might be an idea.

  ‘This is a bit of a disappointing turnout,’ said Cat to Noel, as she walked through the door of the village hall, rebuilt after the floods seven years previously. She’d expected the place to be heaving, but it was only half full. The usual suspects were there: Vera and Albert from the café, ‘It makes me so mad to think of what they are planning to do to our woods,’ said Vera, her face flushing pink with frustration. ‘Why can’t they build their hotel somewhere else?’

  ‘I couldn’t agree more,’ boomed Diana Carew, the bossiest and most overbearing woman in Hope Christmas. She steamed up to them, with a determined look that Cat knew meant she felt entitled to take over proceedings. Diana was good-hearted, but she needed containing. Luckily, Pippa had already set up a table at the front of the room, from where she was planning to talk.

  Cat nodded her agreement and then she and Noel found their way to seats next to Marianne and Gabriel, who’d obviously been there for some time.

  ‘Not as many as I thought,’ said Cat, ‘wh
ich is a shame.’

  ‘Maybe people haven’t worked out yet how serious this is,’ said Marianne. ‘After all, none of us have seen the plans.’

  There was a steady hum of conversation as people settled down into their seats and Pippa called the meeting to order.

  ‘Thanks so much for coming to this preliminary meeting to discuss the proposals for Blackstock Farm,’ said Pippa. ‘As you’re all probably aware, LK Holdings are planning to build a huge hotel complex and leisure centre in the area of Blackstock Farm, and the woods near it, and I’m sure you’re all as worried as I am about what that development will entail.’

  ‘I’m not!’ shouted a voice from behind Cat, ‘they’re buying my land.’

  She turned round to look at a small, lean, red faced farmer, with greying hair, who was looking quite pleased with himself.

  ‘Who’s he?’ asked Cat.

  ‘Archie Speers,’ said Marianne, ‘part of his land backs onto Blackstock Farm. He’s dead keen to sell.’

  ‘Yes, we know, Archie,’ Pippa swiftly riposted, ‘but it’s not all about you.’

  The hall erupted in laughter, and Pippa moved on and did what she was so good at, describing in clear and precise detail why this development was a bad thing for the town and the area in general.

  ‘We all know what a special place Hope Christmas is,’ said Pippa. ‘It has its own unique charm, which risks being lost if this development goes ahead. And I’m sure none of us want that.’

  ‘But it could bring much needed jobs into the area,’ someone shouted from the back.

  ‘And the leisure facilities could be really good,’ said a youngish, ginger-haired woman near the front, who Marianne whispered was Jenny Ingles, who worked in the local estate agents.

  Jenny turned round to a younger contingent of women, whom Cat recognised from the café as the very orange Yummy Mummys, ‘I mean, I’m sure you guys would love to go to a gym locally and not schlep into Shrewsbury.’

  ‘Too right,’ said Keeley Jacobs, her hair drawn so tightly into a ponytail on top of her head, it made her look like some strange kind of alien. ‘I think it’s a great idea.’

  Cat and Marianne looked at one another in dismay. This wasn’t going at all well. They had been aware that there was some support for the scheme but were not prepared for quite this much.

  ‘Well I don’t,’ Miss Woods boomed, standing up and tapping her stick on the floor decisively. ‘It will change the very character of this place and not for the better.’

  ‘Silly old bat,’ muttered one of the Yummy Mummies, and the meeting threatened to break down into chaos until Pippa called a halt.

  ‘Clearly feelings on this issue are running high,’ she said. ‘And at the moment, we don’t have a complete picture of what LK Holdings are planning. It may be they are thinking of a development more in keeping with the area – they have been known to invest in wildlife sanctuaries in the past. So who knows, that may be what they are planning here. In the meantime, if we all keep our eyes and ears open for any new developments, we can start to think about what action we can take.’

  ‘I hope they don’t build a wildlife sanctuary, what a waste of space that would be,’ muttered Angie Townley, Keeley’s great crony, who was sitting behind Cat, ‘I fancy having a local spa and beauty centre, that would be cool.’

  Cat turned to Marianne in despair, they didn’t have to say anything, it was clear they were thinking the same thing. This might turn out to be a whole lot more difficult than any of them had thought.

  Marianne stood in a class of Year 4s with a pounding head. She’d not slept well the night before after the unsatisfactory meeting. It seemed like there was a lot of public support for the hotel plans, and it made her feel anxious. Were she and Gabriel going to end up living opposite a massive hotel complex? It would mean more traffic on their little lane, destruction of some of the wonderful views, visitors who might not be sympathetic to the area, and all in all be a huge headache. She really hoped it wasn’t going to happen.

  She tried to concentrate on the task in hand: numeracy with a bunch of eight-year-olds who were even less interested in it than she was. Dutifully, she tried to take them through fractions, and multiplication, but they were very badly behaved and she ended up sending two of them to the headmaster before first break. It was going to be a very long day.

  And so it proved. By lunchtime, the children’s behaviour was wilder than ever, and Marianne had received several sympathetic nods from other teachers in the staff room. ‘Their actual teacher is off with stress,’ explained one of them at lunchtime, and Marianne wasn’t at all surprised. They were the most nightmarish class she’d ever had to deal with.

  By the time she’d got to the end of the day and separated three fights, told four children off for using language she had only learnt when she left home, and stopped three very unpleasant girls picking on the smallest boy in the class, Marianne had a pounding headache. She made a mental note that she was never ever going to agree to work in this school again. And to add insult to injury it was on the far side of the county, so it had cost her a fortune in petrol too.

  Marianne was beginning to wonder if doing supply teaching was worth it. If she was going to have to pay for childcare on top of this, then she’d be in massive trouble. But to find a job closer to home seemed to be proving impossible. She got in the car and switched the engine on. It sputtered and died. Resolutely, she turned the key in the ignition again, and nothing. She checked the fuel gauge, wondering if she’d been stupid enough to forget to fill up. Having been dashing in and out so much lately, it was quite likely. To her relief it was still half full, so why wouldn’t the car start? It was as though there was no power in it. Then she realised there was no power in it. She’d been a complete idiot after all, and left the lights on. It had been a damp foggy morning, and the traffic had been terrible. She’d had the lights on all the way, and arrived late. In her hurry to get through the door, she hadn’t turned them off. The battery was flat. Damn, damn and triple damn.

  She looked around her for any signs of life, and then spotted a man she’d vaguely seen round the building that morning.

  ‘I’m so sorry to trouble you,’ she said, ‘in fact, I feel a bit embarrassed to tell you this, but my battery has gone flat. I’ve got some jump leads in the car. You couldn’t possibly give me a jump start could you?’

  ‘My pleasure,’ said the man. ‘Wait a minute, I’ll bring the car round.’

  He was as good as his word, driving round to get as close as he could to Marianne’s car, showing her the correct way to connect the leads together.

  Within seconds the car had started.

  ‘Thank you so much,’ said Marianne with relief.

  It turned out her helpful stranger was the deputy head of the school she’d been working at. He was so young, Marianne had thought he must be a junior member of staff. Which was a bit embarrassing. She drove off at speed, worried she was going to be late back.

  The journey home was quicker than she’d anticipated, so she was glad to pull into the driveway in time to sort the twins’ tea out. But to her surprise the house was in darkness. She came into the kitchen to find a scribbled note from Gabriel.

  Sorry. Kids with Mum. Had to go out on fields and Mum couldn’t come over here. Eve out somewhere.

  Love Gx

  Great. Now she was going to have to pick up two hungry hyper kids. What an end to her day. She was about to go out again, when she suddenly became aware of an insistent beeping sound and realised the answerphone had been flashing since she came in.

  ‘Marianne, this is Mum, can you ring me?’

  Marianne frowned. Her mum didn’t sound quite right, and besides it was Tuesday, she never rang her on a Tuesday. She always rang on a Sunday. Something must be wrong. Heart pounding, Marianne checked her mobile. Two missed calls. Mum never rang her mobile.

  Marianne picked up the phone with shaking fingers and dialled home.

  ‘Mum? Is everyth
ing ok?’

  Her mum’s voice sounded tinny and far away.

  ‘Oh Marianne,’ she said. ‘It’s your dad. He’s had a heart attack. You need to come right away.’

  My Broken Brain

  Day Sixty Six. 4am

  So I seem to be doing really well in the cocking things up department. Sometimes I think this brain injury has robbed me of any sense at all. Which is why I’m sitting here, wide awake with a blinding headache, when I should be sleeping.

  We have to sort out a sensible future, but my head gets fogged up thinking about it all. Pippa’s always been much better about that sort of thing than me. Even before my accident accounts have always made my brain hurt. It’s even worse now. Maybe we should let the developers in. God knows we could do with the money, and from what I heard at the meeting Pippa organised, there are a lot of people in town who think it’s a good idea.

  If we had the money, it would give us the freedom to start again, properly …

  But I know Pippa. She will never give up without a fight. And I don’t want her to either. It’s our legacy to the kids and I don’t want to see that farm go. But when the divorce is finally through we’re going to have to make some decisions about the farm once and for all.

  This is a half life, and it’s killing me. I’m close to Pippa, and yet know that’s all gone. I need a clean break, she needs a fresh start.

  I want to save the farm. I hope we can save it. But what if we can’t? What then?

  Part Two

  It’s going to take some time

  15 years ago

  Married Christmas

  ‘I still can’t believe we’re actually in,’ said Pippa, looking thrilled to bits. The farmhouse was still full of boxes, though they’d decided to defer unpacking the rest of them till after Christmas. There was a lot of work to do to bring it up to the twenty first century – during their tenure here, Pippa’s parents hadn’t done much modernisation – but finally, the farm was theirs. Pippa’s parents had decided to retire and were moving to an old farmhouse belonging to Pippa’s grandfather, while Dan and Pippa bought the farm off them. They couldn’t afford it outright, but Pippa’s dad had generously agreed to come in as a silent partner till such time as it was viable for them to buy him out altogether.