21
Mum is making honey cakes, and the flat is filled with the rich, sweet smell of them baking. For the first time in weeks, she isn’t working weekend shifts at the hotel. ‘We’ll have a proper Sunday,’ she says. ‘I can’t keep going at this pace, and nor can Jozef. So today we’ll have some family time, a good, Polish dinner and then Mass at the cathedral with our Polish friends.’
‘Where is Dad?’ Kazia frowns. My little sister looks tired too – her cheeks are pink and her eyes are huge and shadowed. I think Mum’s right. We all need some family time, some chill-out time.
‘Jozef will be back soon,’ Mum says. ‘With a special surprise…’
After Friday night, when Dan, Ben and Nate saw their dad with another woman, it seems especially important that my family, at least, are together today. I don’t think I ever realized before how fragile a family can be.
I don’t know what happened on Friday after Dan, Nate and Ben got home, but I don’t think it was good. I held Dan’s hand tightly all the way home on the bus. I could feel him hurting, and Ben and Nate too.
Kazia and I went along to the cafe first thing on Saturday, but the sign said closed, and Ringo was on the doorstep, wondering aloud what might have happened. I wondered too.
‘Girls, don’t look so sad,’ Mum says now, lifting the honey cakes out of the oven and setting them down to cool. ‘No use worrying. Come, both of you, and see what arrived in yesterday’s post…’
She brings out a large parcel, layered with brown paper and decorated with Polish stamps and postmarks.
‘It’s Gran’s writing!’ I say. ‘For us!’
‘Christmas presents!’ Kazia squeals.
We tear off the brown paper to reveal a cardboard box filled with scrunched-up newspaper, packed in tight, as if to protect something. Mum fishes two small presents out from the packing, wrapped in red crêpe paper and tied with ribbons, one labelled for me, one for Kazia.
‘We haven’t even got a tree to put them under,’ Kazia sighs. ‘What else is in there?’
Mum lifts out the last of the packaging, and Kazia’s eyes grow round.
‘The Christmas castle!’ she breathes.
Inside the box is the old tin castle Dad made years ago in Krakow when I was little. It’s a szopka castle, traditional to Krakow, with turrets and towers and little domed roofs, intricate and beautiful. The tin has been shaped and scored and patterned, the whole thing painted with bright, rich colours.
Every year in Krakow, there’s a competition to see who can create the best design, and back when I was three years old, Dad won the prize. He never entered again, but we took the castle out every December and sat it in the window with candles burning beside it, to show that Christmas was coming.
‘It brings us luck,’ Dad used to say.
We couldn’t take it to Liverpool, of course. It was too bulky to pack, and besides, other things were more important. We gave it to Gran and Grandad, and now they’ve sent it over to us, just in time for Christmas – and just when we really, really need the luck.
Kazia and I carry it to the window, and set it on the rickety side table there. It looks beautiful.
In the bottom of the box, a silver star made of beaten tin glints brightly. ‘The star!’ I grin. Again, made by Dad back in the days when he had time to cut and shape and pattern things from tin or wood, the star sits at the top of the Christmas tree every year, watching over us all. There is something comforting about having our old things around us, even in this dump.
‘But no tree…’ Kazia sighs, and right then the door swings open and Dad comes in, a Christmas tree slung over his shoulder.
‘No tree?’ he echoes. ‘This is the best tree in the city, especially for my girls!’
‘Oh, Dad!’ Kazia grins. ‘It’s perfect!’
Well, not quite – it’s slightly lopsided and kind of bare and brown-looking all down one side, but we wedge it into a bucket and edge it into a corner so that you can’t see the brown bits. Mum switches on the radio and finds some Christmas songs, then we cut stars from white paper and make apple and orange slices to dry out on the radiator and string together with nuts and sweets, the way we used to back in Krakow. Dad lifts Kazia up to fix the star on top, and finally I can see that this is the best Christmas tree in Liverpool after all.
‘Have you seen the Christmas castle?’ I ask Dad. ‘Gran and Grandad sent it over in a big parcel, so now we’ll have all the luck we need…’
Dad frowns, as if he doesn’t believe in luck any more, and I know he is thinking of happier times, times in Krakow when the castle glinted bright in the wintry sunlight and silent snow. Even I can see that it looks out of place here, perched on a lopsided table next to the draughty, grey window.
‘Maybe,’ Dad says. ‘But right now, what we need is some of your mother’s stew with dumplings and rye bread, then honey cakes to sweeten us up.’
‘I’m not hungry,’ Kazia complains. ‘I’m all tired and hot and achey.’ Mum rests a palm against my little sister’s forehead.
‘You’re very warm,’ she says. ‘And clammy. You don’t look well at all. I hope you’re not sickening for something, Kazia.’
She makes my little sister a nest of blankets on the threadbare sofa, settling her against the cushions with lemon squash and a warm honey cake. In minutes, Kazia’s head droops and she is sleeping, one blonde curl sticking damply to her cheek.
‘Oh dear,’ Dad sighs. ‘I was hoping we could eat and then take a walk up to the cathedral… catch up with our Polish friends. Perhaps one of them might help with the business? A small loan, perhaps, just to tide us over?’
Most of Dad’s contacts from the Polish Mass at the cathedral are struggling as much as we are, but I don’t say that. If Dad is desperate enough to be asking acquaintances for a loan, things must be bad.
‘Well, we’ll eat, anyway,’ Mum says. ‘Perhaps Kazia just needs a rest?’
Mum is dishing out stew and dumplings when the doorbell rings. It’s Dan. He looks even worse than Kazia, as though he’s been up all night, and maybe the night before that too. He’s forgotten to put on a jacket, and his eyes seem shadowed, dull.
‘He’s gone,’ Dan blurts out. ‘This morning. He packed his bags and moved out, to be with her. My dad’s gone, Anya… and it’s all my fault!’
It doesn’t matter how many times we tell Dan he’s not to blame – he’s just not listening. ‘If I hadn’t got angry,’ he argues. ‘If I hadn’t yelled and told him to get lost…’
‘You were upset,’ I tell him. ‘Anyone would be angry, Dan.’
‘I made everything worse,’ he sighs. ‘I always do. I should have told Ben and Nate to stay quiet, forget what we saw. Maybe then things wouldn’t have gone crazy?’
Dan is sitting at the table with us, staring down into his stew.
‘I don’t think so,’ Dad says. ‘Keeping quiet wouldn’t have made this go away. Sooner or later, the truth always comes out.’
‘I’m worried about Mum,’ Dan says. ‘She didn’t open the cafe yesterday, but today she was down there before nine, even though it’s a Sunday. She opened up and a couple of people wandered in, but it’s no use. She’s acting crazy. She took all of the presents out of the window display and dumped them into the wheely bin out back, pulled down the tinsel and the lights. It’s a mess. And now she keeps putting sad songs on the CD player and crying into the cake mix…’
‘I see,’ Dad frowns. ‘That is not good.’
‘She needs a friend,’ Mum says briskly, clearing away the dishes. ‘She has been so good to Anya and Kazia, making them welcome at the cafe after school. Now she needs our support in return.’
Mum wraps some honey cakes in foil and takes her coat from the rack. ‘I will go and see her,’ Mum says. ‘Tell her to be strong. She can get through this.’
Dad reaches for his coat. ‘I suppose we can see our Polish friends another day,’ he sighs. ‘Kazia’s not well enough for Mass, anyway.’
So Dan takes Mum and Dad over to the cafe, and Mass at the cathedral – and the chance for Dad to ask his friends for help with the business – is shelved. I stay in with Kazia. She is still sleeping an hour later, when Dad comes back in and scoops up the Christmas castle.
‘I thought I’d let Dan’s mum borrow it, for the window display,’ he explains. ‘I’ve cleared up the mess and rigged up some new fairy lights, and this will make a great centrepiece. And, of course, it brings good luck…’
‘But, Dad!’ I argue. ‘What about us? Don’t we need all the luck we can get?’
‘It’s just a loan,’ Dad promises. ‘It will be back in time for Christmas. And besides… you can’t give luck away. The more you pass on, the more you get back again.’
I really hope he’s right.