She’d always been that rare kind of person who’d never cared what anyone had thought of her. She’d always been unashamedly herself – and had made me feelIcould be unashamedlymyself, in a way that no one else had since. My little sister had been my confidante, my best friend, my favourite human – by quite some margin. But then we lost her when she was just fifteen.
And losing her was the catalyst that, eventually, caused the rest of my family to lose each other, too.
Chapter 2
?Solo Christmas ahead
‘Hey, Mum.’
‘Hi, sweetheart. How’s work today?’
A total write-off, Mum, but I’m hiding it well.
I swiftly swallowed my gut response; Mum always had enough on her plate without my woes piling her worries up even higher. Even discounting my hangover, everything about today was hard after last night’s email thunderbolt and the resulting sleepless night I’d had. Not that I could ever talk to Mum – or anyone – about that, of course. No one knew I’d been emailing my dead sister every single day for two decades.
‘It’s fine. My boss is away so it’s pretty full-on this week. I’m about to go into a meeting so I can only talk for a minute. Is it urgent?’
‘Oh, I was hoping to catch you on your lunch break.’
I stifled a sigh. No matter how many times I told my parents that I left my flat at seven in the morning each day and rarely stopped until I got back twelve or so hours later, they still operated under the assumption that I enjoyed a daily lunch hour and got home in time for tea at five thirty. After all, that’s what my dad’s full-time working routine had been like at my age. They couldn’t get their heads around the concept that the working practices of a small-town accountancy office in the twentieth century and an international online publication in the twenty-first didn’t overlap in the slightest.
‘Yeah, Mum, like I’ve said before, I don’t often get time to have a—’
‘I’ll keep this brief, then. Your dad and I – well, this is kind of awkward…’
‘Just say it, I’m sure it’s fine.’
‘Okay, well, we’ve been invited to Auntie Sandra’s place in Florida…’
Oh wow, this was big. Mum and Dad had barely slept in a different bed for the last twenty years, let alone gone overseas.
‘Ooh, at last – get you!’
‘…for Christmas.’
Ouch.Not that our family Christmases were particularly joyful occasions these days. But they still felt important, somehow.
‘Oh.’
‘Yes, I know. Not the best timing, hmm?’
‘You’re going, then?’
‘Well, we’ve not made up our minds yet. We’d hate to let you and your brother down, but you know how much we’ve been meaning to get out there at some point. Her friends Neil and Nina have had to pull out – something about Nina’s inner ear – and we think it’s finally the right time to go. Your dad and I were just saying that it may even be the last chance we get.’
‘Mum, you’re sixty-five, not ninety-five. Have you spoken to Josh about this yet?’
‘He just replied to my message. He’s fine with it. Got the impression he’s been under some pressure from Saskia to spend Christmas with the in-laws, anyway.’
I rolled my eyes as I squashed my handset between my ear and my shoulder while topping up my stainless-steel water bottle ready for my meeting.
‘Fair enough. Have you spoken to him recently?’
‘Not on the phone, no. You know what he’s like.’
Like me, my older brother, Josh, had moved to London after graduating from uni. But even though we only lived a few miles apart, we never met up outside of family occasions. I mean, why would we? His wellness lifestyle of fitness, ‘clean eating’ and online influencing couldn’t be further away from my sedentary instincts, shameless sugar addiction and unwillingness to engage in any social media platforms at all.
‘So, what are you thinking, love?’
