Each year Gabby, Elliott and the girls go to Maple Row Farm for their Christmas tree, where they insist on traipsing through the fields in search of exactly the right uncut tree, despite the fact that there are lines of perfect trees, trees that would, indeed, suit them perfectly, cut and stacked up at the side of the car park.
It never takes less than two hours, the girls darting around calling, ‘Over here! What about this one?’ Elliott tramping over with saw in hand, Gabby yet again cursing the fact that she didn’t bring extra gloves, because Olivia always forgets hers and ends up wearing Gabby’s, while Gabby tucks her freezing hands into her armpits, convinced she will have frostbite by the end of the day.
They buy apple cider and doughnuts at the stand, and sit on low benches around the roaring fire to warm up, while Alanna usually wanders over to the two giant cows lazily munching hay in a small paddock next to the barn.
They haul the tree up to the roof rack, Gabby on one side of the car, Elliott on the other, then loop orange twine round and round, Elliott saying next year they’ll get a smaller tree, and Gabby agreeing, although the tree gets bigger year by year.
There will be no Maple Row Farm this year. Not without Elliott. It wouldn’t be the same, and Gabby could never manage to cut down and haul a tree by herself, and certainly not in this condition.
She drives instead to the Audubon Society, where there are pre-cut trees that are absolutely fine, and they tie it to the roof of her car for her. When she gets home she runs next door to her neighbours and the husband comes out to bring it into the house.
Gabby has become increasingly reliant on the kindness of neighbours. And strangers. She didn’t realize how much she needed Elliott around, until there was no Elliott.
There was the night she heard a rustling coming from downstairs, and came down to find a frantic and terrified squirrel, which had somehow fallen down the chimney, tearing up the living room. She had always adored squirrels as a child – she would crouch down to feed them peanuts in Regent’s Park – but they were, she discovered, infinitely scary when trapped inside your home.
A neighbour’s husband – different neighbour – came to help, swiftly accompanied by two other husbands as word of the rampaging squirrel spread around the local area.
As a thank you, Gabby has baked mince pies and Florentine biscuits, and delivered them, beautifully wrapped in cellophane and plaid ribbon, with wishes for a wonderful holiday season.
More mince pies and Florentines, Elliott’s favourite, are laid out now, on a white platter, on the dining-room table. The turkey is roasting, and Frank Sinatra has been replaced – at Olivia’s insistence – with the Christmas album from
Glee
.
Swags of spruce, garlanded with burlap, drape the fireplace and banister in the front hall, where the theme is white and silver: thick white pillar candles wrapped in silver birch glisten at each end of the mantelpiece with wreaths of white feathers between them, while glittery silver deer traipse along the hearth.
On into the family room, where all is red and green and tartan. Plaid throws adorn the sofa that Gabby and the girls have brought down from her bedroom, making it cosy and warm. More spruce is draped along the mantelpiece, this time with red velvet ribbons. A fire is blazing, but the stockings hang high out of reach of the licking flames.
The tiny electric model ice rink has been dug out, with its twinkling lights and miniature skaters, who do endless magnetic figures of eight. They found this together in Boston one year. The girls were fascinated by the little skaters, and delighted that Elliott and Gabby bought it. Still, today, Alanna will sit and watch the skaters, lulled into a zombie-like state by the repetitive motion. Flicking a switch turns on tinny Christmas carols, but none of them flick the switch, preferring to watch the skaters in silence.
The gifts are piled high under the tree. Large ones
for the girls and, at the back, where no one can see it, a beautifully wrapped bronze box, with a striped gold ribbon, for Elliott.
Elliott will be here soon. And the turkey is almost ready. But there is just time for a phone call. Gabby ladles some eggnog into a cup and takes the phone into the hallway, where she sits on the stairs and dials home.
‘Darling!’ her mother answers. ‘I was just saying to your father that I wondered where you were! Where are you? What are you doing this year for Christmas?’
‘The same as always,’ Gabby says. ‘I invited Elliott to come and he said yes, so we’re all together again. Like a proper family.’
‘Oh. That sounds … cosy.’
‘Why do you say it like that?’ Gabby feels herself bristle.
‘I’m sorry. I didn’t mean anything. I just don’t want you to get your hopes up.’
Gabby remembers how Josephine said the same thing. Her hopes are up, it is true, but why is everyone so worried about it? The worst that can happen is nothing, in which case life will carry on. Gabby is sure there really is no greater hurt that can occur, nothing more that can happen to make things worse than they already are. And would she have wanted the excitement and anticipation of the last few days to have been different? No! They have been the single bright spots in her life of late. Even if that is all there is – and those moments
of joy at the prospect of what might be are followed by days, weeks of disappointment – it will, surely, have been worth it.
‘What’s the worst that can happen?’ Gabby says lightly. ‘That my hopes are dashed? So what? Mum, he’s my husband. I love him. I never wanted us to be apart, and please don’t say I should have thought of that before I was unfaithful, because I already know.’
‘I wasn’t going to say that, darling. I know you love him. We love him too. Nothing would make me happier than for the two of you to get back together, and I can’t bear seeing you in pain.’
‘You haven’t seen me.’
‘Ah. Yes. I know. But I am planning on coming when the baby’s born.’
‘You’d better, because the only thing I’m certain of is that I won’t be able to do it all by myself.’
‘Actually, I beg to differ,’ her mother says. ‘I will come, and I will do everything you need me to do, but, Gabby, you have always been the most independent and self-sufficient of children. I so wanted you to need me when you were little, but you never did; you were always perfectly happy off on your own.’
But that’s not true, Gabby wants to say. I did need you. I just couldn’t tell you because you never wanted to hear me.
She doesn’t say that. It’s Christmas. Why rock the boat now?
‘Elliott? Will you carve the turkey?’ Gabby frowns, wishing she didn’t have to call him in such a formal way to come into the kitchen to help. Yearning for the old days, when he automatically assumed certain roles, turkey carving being one of them.
‘Coming!’ he calls from the dining room, where he has been laughing with the girls, who are giddy with delight at their family being back together again. Elliott has been on fine form. He looks wonderful, thinks Gabby, much more … handsome … than he used to be. He has lost weight and looks younger.
He is wearing his old cords tonight, his old loafers, but the shirt is new, and it galls Gabby slightly to see him in something she doesn’t know, something she has not bought him, because Gabby has always been in charge of Elliott’s wardrobe, Elliott professing to hate nothing more than buying clothes.
‘That’s nice,’ she said when he walked in and took off his Barbour. She fingered the soft sleeve of the shirt. ‘It brings out the blue of your eyes.’
‘Oh this?’ He looked down, as if surprised to see himself wearing that particular shirt on this particular day. ‘I got it a couple of days ago. Glad you like it.’
Gabby smiled, attempting to keep her voice light, wanting to know more. ‘You hate shopping for clothes. Where did you get it?’
‘Somewhere on Main Street,’ he said nonchalantly, turning away and leaving Gabby wondering why he seemed reluctant to pursue the conversation.
‘Here,’ Gabby says as she pulls open a drawer and withdraws Elliott’s apron. ‘You don’t want to stain your new shirt.’
‘Oh. Thanks.’ He smiles a smile of genuine gratitude as he ties the apron round himself, and the awkwardness they have both been feeling finally loses its edge as he falls into a routine unchanged for many years.
‘Honey? Can you bring me the board with the ridge?’ he calls after a while, and Gabby’s heart skips a beat. Honey. He called her honey. This meaningless word seems loaded, has more meaning than anything else Elliott has said in months.
Seeing how friendly and warm, how relaxed he is, eases Gabby’s anxiety and makes her see a burning light at the end of the tunnel.
If you were to peep through the window, and didn’t know otherwise, you would look at the family eating this meal together and think them unutterably happy. No, more than that. You would think them unequivocally
right
. They all look right together. The two pretty girls, one brunette, one strawberry blonde, the proud father and the expectant mother glowing with happiness.
Gabby looks round the table not only with happiness
but with overflowing hope. Her family is back together again. When she smiles at Elliott, with love in her eyes, he smiles back, and the girls look from one to the other with delight.
As Elliott pours brandy over the Christmas pudding and sets it alight, he and Gabby cheer while the girls roll their eyes, neither of them liking Christmas pudding, but both of them loving the tradition of doing the same thing every year; doing the same thing this year.
The mince pies follow, and the chocolate log Gabby made for the girls – the chocolate log she always makes for the girls.
Then, stuffed, they retire to the family room, where Elliott builds up the fire while Gabby starts to string popcorn and cranberries onto floss. The girls excitedly unwrap the decorations, and, catching each other’s eye from time to time, they make surreptitious gestures at the sofa, where their parents are sitting together, gestures that are filled with hope and optimism.
Gabby is waiting until the girls go up to bed before giving Elliott his gift. They send Olivia and Alanna upstairs, amidst much grumbling, but then Elliott stands up, announcing he’d better make a move.
Gabby’s heart plummets. ‘I thought you were staying.’ She wishes her voice hadn’t emerged in a whine.
‘I can’t,’ he says. ‘I need to go home.’
‘But I bought a bed for the spare room. It’s an inflatable bed but it’s really comfortable. I made it up …’ She stops, not wanting to sound desperate. ‘The girls
want you to stay,’ she tries a new tack. ‘They’ve been talking about waking you up in the morning. It’s Christmas, Elliott. Why not stay? Think of all the drunk drivers you’ll be avoiding. I promise I won’t try to seduce you.’ This last is an attempt at a joke, which falls flat to both their ears.
‘I’m not worried about that,’ Elliott says gently. ‘It’s just better if I go. I’ll be back early and we’ll make breakfast. I won’t miss anything. I promise.’
‘Wait.’ Gabby reaches down towards the back of the tree, where she fumbles until she finds his gift. ‘I got you something. I wanted to give it to you when we were alone.’
Elliott’s face falls. ‘Oh, Gabby. You didn’t have to. I don’t have anything for you.’
‘That’s okay,’ she lies. There is nothing material Elliott could give her that she would want, other than as evidence that he had thought of her at all. Still, she reminds herself, he is a man. They don’t think in the way women do.
He stands for a while tapping the box in the palm of his hand, looking as if he doesn’t quite know what to do with it.
‘Open it,’ she encourages, no longer certain this is the right thing to have done, to have spent quite as much money as she did on a watch for her soon-to-be-ex-husband.
Reluctantly, slowly, Elliott unwraps the paper. He folds the wrapping paper into a neat parcel then insists
on rolling up the ribbon, while Gabby refrains from clicking her fingers with impatience.
He stares at the box, at the watch company’s lettering on the top, looking bewildered and sad.
‘Open it,’ Gabby says again, softly, wishing the floor could open up and swallow her shame, for it is blindingly obvious now what she was trying to do, even though she couldn’t see it at the time. This is her guilt gift. Like the gifts of adulterous men, men who leave their mistresses and stop on the way home to buy glittering bracelets for their wives. A wordless apology, an expunction of guilt.
Elliott says nothing as he opens the box and gazes at the watch.
‘It’s the watch you loved,’ whispers Gabby. ‘Remember?’
He doesn’t gasp with pleasure, or amazement, or joy. He doesn’t take the watch out of its box and try it on as he did all those months ago in the store, when his eyes feasted on it in awe.
Elliott closes the box and looks at Gabby. ‘Thank you. It’s beautiful. But I’m not going to accept it.’
Gabby feels the prick of tears. ‘Why not, Elliott? It’s just a gift. It’s a thank you for … I don’t know. For being such a good husband. A good father. It’s an apology for everything I put you through. I want you to have it …’ She’s babbling now and tails off as Elliott gently places the watch on the hall table.
‘There’s something I have to tell you,’ he says quietly.
A million things go through her head. Cancer. He has cancer. Oh God, that’s why he’s got so thin. He’s being transferred. He’s moving to Alaska. Or Canada. Somewhere far, far away. He’s – oh God, please no – he’s seen a lawyer and he’s started divorce proceedings.
Gabby looks up at him with fearful eyes as Elliott swallows.
‘I’m seeing someone,’ he says, not looking at her as he says the words.
‘Seeing someone? What do you mean?
Dating
?’
He gives an embarrassed smile. ‘Yes. I suppose “dating”. I wanted you to hear it from me rather than from anyone else.’
‘Anyone else? Why would I hear it from anyone else?’ Gabby narrows her eyes as it dawns on her. ‘Do I know her?’
Elliott nods. ‘It’s Trish.’
Gabby sucks in her breath. Trish. Perfect, blonde Trish. Trish who is doubtless a millionaire several times over. Trish who has always made Gabby feel inadequate in every way.
Afterwards, Gabby thinks back to the moment Elliott uttered the word ‘Trish’, and sees herself physically deflate, like a character in a cartoon. She sees her shoulders slump and her chin drop down onto her chest, her legs giving way as she wobbles to the floor.
Of course that doesn’t happen. Not externally. Externally her shoulders slump just a little, her eyes widen to a startled understanding, a disappointment, but nothing
gives Elliott any indication of the pain and grief she actually feels.
Gabby doesn’t say much after that. She forces a smile to acknowledge his thanks for a lovely evening, and nods when he says he’ll be back in the morning. Of course he has to leave. Of course he can’t stay the night. He has to go and curl up with Trish. He has to make love to Trish. He has to take Trish in his arms and kiss the tip of her nose, just as he used to with her, and tell her how much he loves her.
She waits until she can no longer hear his car driving off down the road, then she slowly sinks onto the bottom step of the stairs.