Christmas at Rosie Hopkins' Sweetshop (27 page)

“I didn't have you for a God botherer,” she said, kissing him.

“Oh, the Reverend goes to such ludicrous lengths to make it inclusive that I feel obliged to humor him,” said Moray, rolling his eyes. “Plus I can diagnose some poorly folk without getting called out, AND—”

One of the upper land farmers came over cheerily.

“Moray. Thought I'd find you here,” he said. “Thanks for all your help with the old piles.”

“Not at all,” said Moray, lying through his teeth as always. “I didn't even remember what you came in for.”

“I can't believe they still fall for that,” said Rosie, but she smiled appreciatively at the bottle of sloe gin that had just been handed over.

“Where are you having lunch?” she said.

Moray smiled shyly.

“What?”

“Never mind.”

“WHAT?”

“Well, it may just be that a certain young house officer in Carningford . . .”

“It's on again? Fantastic.”

“Christmas brings out that side of ­people. But anyway, he's Jewish, so I don't even have to eat another Christmas dinner! We're having Chinese food! Oh, thank you so much,” he said, accepting a large bottle of champagne from a tiny old lady.

“Prolapse,” he whispered loudly to Rosie.

“You can't say that in church,” she scolded. Moray always cheered her up.

“Can I say, once you've found a Jewish man, you won't go back?” said Moray mischievously, till Rosie kicked him on the shins.

“Ow! No sloe gin for you. Or . . .”

He glanced at the label.

“Petrus. OOH, very nice, thanks so much, Mrs. Hamilton.”

“Amazing,” said Rosie and went back to where Hetty was sitting (in the front pew, of course) and joined in the opening carol, “Good King Wenceslas,” skipping only slightly on the line about the feast of Stephen.

Sire, the night is darker now,

And the wind grows stronger;

Fails my heart, I know not how;

I can go no longer.

T
HE
CHILDREN
OF
the town sang loudly, the sound reaching the rafters, as Hetty glanced around anxiously, looking for her son or for someone who knew where he was. Was he sitting alone at Peak House? En route back to London? The worry and the care of having a child—­she glanced at Rosie's nephews and nieces beside her—­well, it didn't leave you at three, and it didn't leave you at thirty-­five.

A
FTERWARD, THE VICAR
looked on, his fat face smiling benevolently as the entire town greeted one other, wishing each other a merry Christmas. The children all asked after Stephen, and Rosie and Hetty deflected their questions as best they could, as well as also deflecting the vicar on the subject of Henry's funeral. They weren't entirely sure what Edward and Ida Delia—­still legally his wife—­were planning, and both were reasonably certain Lilian would want a hand in it too. There was a family plot in the churchyard, but the hospital had yet to release the body, so that would have to wait.

P
IP HAD PARKED
the car up a little way away from the church, which gave Shane time to do some sledding with his new mates, all of whom looked energized, happy, joyful, and without a screen in sight. The weather was far too hideously freezing for them to stand around for long, though, so they took some photos and bundled the children back into the car and headed home, carols still ringing in their ears, for their Christmas lunch.

S
TEPHEN COULDN'T SEE
. He had no idea where he was or how long he'd been out there. Something was tell him his left leg was in serious trouble, but he used his right, pulling one in front of the other, one in front of the other, over and over again, through the white blindness, along what he thought was the road but that was now so covered over with snow and swirling flakes it could be anything. He had stopped shivering now, his entire body one last clenching of pure will.
I can't go on . . . I'll go on
rang through his head; from a poem he had once read. But when his life had had poetry in it, he could barely recall.
I can't go on . . . I'll go on.

And then, finally, in the distance, he heard the dogs barking.

R
OSIE
AND
A
NGIE
were shaking the snow off the children and rubbing life back into hands that had gotten raw from throwing snowballs through wet woolen mittens, when they heard the dogs going crazy. Suddenly Mr. Dog hurtled out the back door like a tiny plump cannonball, galloping across the snow.

“Where's he going?” said Angie, shading her eyes against the flurries. “I've never seen that dog move so fast. I hope Shane didn't stick a cracker up his arse.”

Rosie turned around slowly. There was a figure looming perilously slowly out of the terrible storm. A gray figure, nothing she could make out, eerie in the distance.

Then, gradually, one side resolved itself, and she could make out the shape of a stick.

 

Chapter 27

T
HEY
ALL
HAULED
him in together, gracelessly depositing him in a heap in front of the fire. Angie stepped back to let Rosie in and shepherded the children away. Hetty was staring at him, her hand in front of her mouth.

“What has the ridiculous boy been up to now?” asked Lilian, puzzled.

“Tea. Blankets,” barked Rosie shortly before bending down and pulling off his too-­thin coat. His skin was as pale as marble. Rosie pulled him up in front of the fire and opened his damp shirt to his chest, then, unable to think of a better idea, wrapped a blanket around both of them until they were close together.

Lilian and Hetty were exchanging wildly overt glances and looks and coughs, until finally Hetty said, “We MUST see how lunch is getting on.” Meridian's voice could be heard outside complaining loudly, “But I want to see Uncle Stephen as a snowman,' ” but gradually all the voices faded away as they crossed the wide hallway into the dining room, and finally they were alone.

Rosie felt their hearts beating together, his so slow. His eyes opened and started to blink, as they sat together in front of the fire, Rosie willing the heat of her body into his.

“Rosie,” he said finally, and she let out a full sigh of relief and laid her head on his shoulder. After a while, she moved away and fetched him a glass of whisky. As she handed it to him, he started to shake uncontrollably.

“That's a good sign,” she whispered as he stared at her.

Mr. Dog tiptoed forward, licked Stephen and then took up residence on Rosie's lap. Stephen was still a deathly color, but there was life in his eyes as he sat up. He took another sip of the whisky, but it choked him rather and he had to cough and drink a little water. Then he turned to look at her.

“I need you,” he said simply. “I needed you.”

“I know,” said Rosie. “I know.”

“After the accident . . .”

“I know. I didn't want to put the family thing on you, but you know . . . I love them too.”

“I know.”

“ And I can't . . . I can't always just fix you,” she said. “We're not Chris Martin and Gwyneth bloody Paltrow. I'm not your nurse. You're not my case.”

“I know,” said Stephen. “That's why I tried to pull myself together. I did try, Rosie, please believe me.”

“But you vanished.”

He shook his head.

“I promise you. I tried so hard. I just . . . everything got so noisy. With everyone around. I kept having flashbacks, all the time. I couldn't sleep; you were so busy and all I could hear was . . . Every time I heard the children talk, to me it just sounded like screaming.”

Rosie looked at him in dismay.

“I went . . . I went to see someone. Moray recommended them. On Harley Street. They were very good to see me on such short notice. Well, first he recommended some awful local person, but they sent me in the right direction.”

“He never said,” murmured Rosie.

“Well, good. He's not meant to.”

“He's not.”

“But Rosie. It was so hard. To admit I was sick again . . .”

Even now it was difficult for him to form the words, to say them out loud.

“Anyway,” he mumbled. “Anyway . . . They . . . they helped a lot. I have to see them again, but . . . well. It was a good thing to do.”

Rosie sighed. “I wish you'd just TOLD me how hard it was. I thought you were being—­”

“—­an arse?”

Rosie smiled. “A bit.”

“Also, you forgot just now to pull me up on using private medicine.”

Rosie looked at his taut jaw, the beautifully shaped lips, one of which he was currently biting and realized how hard this had been for him to face up to.

“I must be forgiving you then,” she said softly.

Stephen looked down and took a deep breath.

“You know, I want . . . I want to look after you too.”

She stared at him. Suddenly it burst from him in a rush.

“I want you to look after me, and I want to look after you, and you know, I am never, ever happy, Rosie, my love, I am never happy when you're not with me. And I think that's the problem maybe . . . My life . . . Rosie, my life SUCKS without you. Whereas you succeed in whatever you do, whether I'm there or not.”

Rosie looked at him, her face full of pain.

“Is that what you think?”

“You're surrounded by family and ­people who love you and lots of opportunities . . . the world is your oyster. You don't need me the way I need you. I can barely handle a winter walk . . .”

They were both crying now, and Rosie desperately tried to wipe the tears away with her hand.

“But . . .” She felt pathetic. “All I want is you. All I've ever wanted is you. But you don't want this and you don't want that and you don't want to get married and you don't want to settle down, and so I'm clearly not enough for you. I don't want to be second best; I don't want to be your nurse. I want to be everything to somebody, and I want them to be everything to me. You're . . . you're everything to me, Stephen. Everything.”

The last words dissolved in a flurry of tears as she buried her face in Mr. Dog.

“It is very unfair you having Mr. Dog to cuddle,” said Stephen. “At this point.”

“At what point? What are you doing?”

It was agony, the blood flowing back into his fingertips and toes, the thawing-­out process. It hurt like buggery. Nonetheless, slowly, carefully, Stephen maneuvered his back leg under his good one and just about managed to kneel on the fine old rug in front of the fire, his shirt still wide open.

“Rosie Hopkins, esteemed sweetshop proprietor of this parish,” said Stephen, but he couldn't keep it up because he was crying too. “Rosie—­you are everything to me. You are . . . you are everything to me.”

And carefully, with hands now shaking for a very different reason, he held up the little box.

“I don't want you to be my nurse. I don't want you to be my second best, as if you ever ever could be. Rosie, I really, really want you to be my wife.”

“CAN WE COME IN NOW?”

Kelly had grown impatient at the door. She disliked being left out of adult things and other ­people knowing things she didn't. However, if she was being sneaky today, she was only being sneaky with six anxious adults by her shoulder (including Mrs. Laird).

Rosie and Stephen looked up from where they were kissing in a way that probably wasn't entirely appropriate for a seven-­year-­old to witness and burst out laughing.

“Of course, come in, come in,” said Rosie, her cheeks pink with happiness. She had no makeup on, but the glow from the joy and the heat of the fire and the redness of her full happy mouth from being kissed suited her better than any cosmetics ever could.

“You know how I promised not to lean on you as a nurse any more?” whispered Stephen, clutching her little hand in his big one. “Um, could I possibly postpone that promise for about five seconds while you help me up?” His leg had stiffened horribly underneath him, and his muscles were still very uncomfortable. But he had never felt better in his life.

And they stood, side by side, hand in hand, utterly together, in front of the glorious roaring fire, on Christmas Day in the great room of Lipton Hall, waiting as their family, old, new, foreign and familiar, came charging in to embrace them, full of joy and good wishes and happiness, for the day, for the future.

A
ND
AFTER
ALL
, thought Lilian, carefully turning over in bed where Rosie, slightly squiffy, had helped her settle after a long jolly afternoon with hats and crackers and silly jokes, and after Hetty had wheeled out an ancient television so Meridian could watch the James Bond film, which she had done, rapt, open-­mouthed and in complete silence, and Rosie and Stephen had stolen away for a few quiet moments of being together and looking at the stars. After all, thought Lilian, as Rosie had said to her, over and over, “I love him so much, Lil. I just love him SO MUCH”—­this was right, and as it should be, and it was good.

And one day, soon, somehow, somewhere, she too would be hand in hand with the man she loved, who she had loved so much, and she wondered for a moment whether the stars would look different there.

The golden harvest sunshine hung heavy again on the village, as it always did, and Henry was lifting his hand to her, waving, as he always did, and she darted toward him as she always did.

But this time—­this time—­he stood and waited for her, and she caught up with him at last, and he took her little hand in his big one, and they went on together.

And outside, over Lipton, the snowflakes swirled and flurried; danced and settled, over fields and rooftops and the kissing gate, and on far into the night.