She let out a groan. “Verity’s been cast as a pomegranate in the school play, and I’m supposed to be making her costume, but honestly I can’t make head nor tail of it. Sewing is not my strong suit.”
Duncan picked up the pattern instructions and began to leaf through the cut-out pieces of paper.
“Have you got a sewing machine?”
“My mum had one, it’s in the attic, but I don’t know how to use it. I was planning on cobbling it together with a mix of hand sewing and hemming tape.”
Duncan pulled a doubtful expression.
“Please tell me if I’m overstepping the mark, but this looks pretty straightforward to me. I could have this knocked out in an hour or so if I could use your mum’s sewing machine. Unless you want to make it?”
“Are you serious?”
Duncan appeared diffident. “I like sewing, knitting, anything crafty really. It wouldn’t be any bother. I’m better at sewing than I am tree decorating.” He smiled self-effacingly.
“You, my friend, are absolutely heaven-sent.” Maggie slid the trays into the oven and set the timer for twelve minutes. “And you have earned extra freezer biscuits.”
She crawled back into the roof space and dusted off the cover of her mother’s old machine. When she returned to the kitchen, Duncan had cleared a space on the table and she dumped the heavy machine on it.
“There,” she said, pulling off the case top. “Can you work with that?”
He gave it a quick once-over and nodded.
“My nan’s got one just like it. Leave it with me.” And with that he began pinning the paper shapes to the fabric and cutting them to size. Maggie laid a tea plate of hot biscuits beside him and left him to it.
“Anything you need—wine, cash, my eternal gratitude—you just let me know,” she said, coursing with deepest relief that costume shaming would be one less thing she had to worry about.
“Do you realize this is the first time we’ve ever done this?” said Star, blowing on her hot chocolate.
“Well, we were summer sisters,” agreed Simone.
“You mean you never spent Christmas together?” Verity looked appalled.
“Nope. We all had different mamas and lived in different parts of the country. We spent our summers together and the rest of the year apart.”
“Patrick and I have different dads, only his dad is dead, and we don’t know where mine is, so I guess it’s kind of the same thing as you but different.”
“My daughter, the straight shooter!” Maggie joked as she rested a holly-patterned serving platter piled with the rest of the hot Christmas biscuits on the coffee table. The sitting room looked like someone had ransacked Santa’s grotto. Verity had tipped the boxes of decorations all over the floor “so they could see them better,” and the carpet was now a swamp of tinsel and baubles to be waded through. Dear god, I’ll be hoovering up glitter till next Christmas! Maggie thought as she surveyed the sea of spangle before her, and then she remembered that they wouldn’t be here after next month, let alone next Christmas. Nausea rolled through her insides and settled in the pit of her stomach, ominous and heavy like a concrete slab.
Verity frowned. “I wouldn’t like that. I wouldn’t like to only see Patrick in the summer.”
“That’s kind of how it has been since I started uni,” said Patrick.
“Yes, but you come home for Christmas. I wouldn’t like it if I didn’t see you at Christmas.”
“You’d better warn any future partners that all Christmases must be spent with your sister,” Star said, and laughed as Patrick’s eyes widened in mock alarm.
“And Mama and Joe,” added Verity seriously. “All together forever.”
All eyes flicked between Maggie and Joe. She shifted uncomfortably on the sofa while Joe busied himself with a knot in some fairy lights.
“Joe might have his own family to go to at Christmas,” said Patrick.
“Joe is my family!” Verity protested.
“I am very happy that you feel that way, Verity,” said Joe sincerely.
“Until he leaves,” muttered Patrick. Maggie hoped Joe hadn’t heard, but the pink tips of his ears suggested he had. To his credit, he said nothing. She felt a familiar twist of discomfort.
She had never expected that Joe would become so much a part of their lives. She could keep telling herself that her relationship with him was purely physical, but Verity was right: he had become like one of the family. Quite without anyone meaning for it to happen, Joe had become a paternal figure in Verity’s life.
“You are going to be here for Christmas, aren’t you, Joe?” Verity was relentless when she got an idea into her head. Patrick’s comment had clearly upset her.
Maggie suddenly felt like all eyes were upon her.
“I hadn’t really given it too much thought, Verity,” said Joe. “My mum and sister live in France, and I haven’t seen them for a long time.”
It was an answer of perfect avoidance and she was grateful for it.
“But, Mama, Joe has to be here for Christmas,” Verity protested, as though it was entirely down to Maggie. What could she do?
“Joe is welcome to spend Christmas with us here. We’d love you to stay.” She looked at him.
It felt like everyone in the room was holding their breath. Patrick looked away.
“Are you sure?” Joe asked.
“Yes.” She smiled maniacally. “Yes. Absolutely.”
“Yahoo!” Verity screeched and busted out a victory dance.
* * *
Once the tree resembled a tinsel hairball and all the freezer biscuits had been demolished, Simone went back to the cottage to call Evette, and Star took Verity up to bed with the promise of two stories. Joe helped Maggie to clean up the sitting room while Patrick washed up the plates and cups. The whir of her mum’s old sewing machine was familiar, and it was good to hear the sound after all these years.
“Are you sure you want me to stay here for Christmas?” Joe asked as he swept biscuit crumbs into a dustpan.
“Of course. We’d love you to be here. So long as your sister doesn’t mind.”
“I feel like you were cornered into it.”
“I only didn’t ask before because I didn’t want you to feel like you had to stay.”
“I want to be wherever you are, Maggie. I don’t know how many different ways I can say it.”
She needed to change the subject. “How long has your sister lived in France?”
He shook his head. He knew what she was doing, but he went along with it and she was thankful. “About ten years.”
“And your mum moved out to be with her?”
Joe paused. “It’s kind of complicated. A couple of years ago, our family suffered a pretty monumental bust-up. My granddad had left equal shares in his business to my mum and her brother when he died. Then three years ago my uncle told my mum that he needed to borrow her shares to make a big business deal that would change all their lives. Just borrow them and then when the deal was done, he’d sign them back over.”
“But he didn’t?”
“No.” Joe’s mouth was a tight line. “He did not. He left my mum with nothing, and it’s all legal and above board. Morally reprehensible but legally done.”
“God, your poor mum.”
“Moving to France made sense financially, since she wasn’t getting any money from the business anymore.”