Beckett
Hi, Mary. I’ve been thinking a lot about what happened on Friday evening, and I wanted to apologise for letting the emotion of the moment take over. Kissing you was wrong.
What? It wasn’t wrong! Beckett kissing me had been one of the rightest things to ever happen!
Beckett
You said you couldn’t be friends with me now, but I sincerely hope we can both move past this rash mistake. It’s probably best to take a bit of time apart, given the situation, but I would hate to lose your friendship altogether. Best wishes, Beckett.
A rash mistake? Time apart? Best wishes?!?
Was he serious?
Wow. How could two people experience the same two-second kiss and come up with such completely different conclusions about it?
I slunk back to my seat, huddled over with humiliation, hurt, and a growing flicker of anger.
How dare he act all pompous and rational, after flipping everything upside down, making me believe I could find love again after the crappiest year ever?
How could he do this to me, three days before Christmas? What was I meant to do now? Spend the day alone, me and Bob? Crawl back to Sheffield, my miserable face gatecrashing my sickeningly in love friends’ first Christmas as a couple?
Beckett could take his perfectly punctuated brush-off and stick it up his stocking.
Thankfully, at that moment the house lights dropped, so no one could spot the tears about to pour down my face.
After the wackiest, wildest, most wonderful carol concert that surely ever graced a community church stage, while the crowd whooped and clapped their approval and Cheris and Carolyn burst out of a giant Christmas cracker to yet more rapturous applause, I slipped out of the audience. Collecting Bob from where he slept as peacefully as the baby Jesus in his makeshift manger, I mumbled some incomprehensible excuse about having to get straight off and practically ran to the bus stop, Bob bouncing against my broken heart.
The next day, Monday, I woke up feeling as if I’d slid back three months. As if all the worst things I’d ever wondered about myself were true after all. The urge to hide under the duvet was overwhelming.
I had to get up, though. After I’d fed Bob in bed, he produced the kind of stink that needed a changing mat and a bath, if not a hazmat suit or breathing apparatus, and by the time I’d sorted that, I decided I might as well decamp to the sofa. At least there was a TV there, and leftover crisps and mince pies from Saturday.
There I stayed, until, when I was thoroughly lost in a haze of cheesy Wotsits dust, foil wrappers, damp tissues and The Holiday, someone knocked on the door.
Clambering off the sofa, the blanket slipping to the floor, I scrambled to answer it, knocking over a tub of Quality Street as I went, only one person on my mind.
Surely he’d realised that the message was the mistake, not the kiss or the conversation?
Or not.
Standing there, with the biggest, fakest grins on their faces, were the absolute last two people I expected to see.
‘What?’ I blurted, before seeing the smiles freeze and realising that this probably wasn’t the way to greet the parents I’d not seen in eighteen months.
‘I mean, hi. Hello. I mean, sorry, this is a surprise.’
When she’d asked for my address I’d assumed it was to send me a Christmas card.
‘Can we come in?’ Mum asked. ‘We’ve travelled rather a long way. It would be a shame if you’re busy.’
She gave one of her quick full-body scans, and I automatically shrivelled a little. I was still in my pyjamas, which weren’t exactly clean, my hair a mass of tangles, the effort I’d put into yesterday’s make-up now smeared around my eyes.
‘Obviously not busy,’ I said, trying to sound more humorous than horrified as I stepped back to make room. ‘It’s great to see you.’
Mum left her coat on the banister and vigorously wiped crumbs off the sofa before sitting down, smoothing out the charcoal Hobbs dress bought from a charity shop several years ago.
Dad went to give me a stiff hug, angling his jacket to avoid the hot-chocolate stain on my pyjama top.
I ran upstairs to throw on jeans and a jumper, made us all drinks, then fetched Bob from where he’d been napping in his pram. Mum gingerly cradled him, eyes solemn.
