Page 37 of A Christmas Wish for the Village Midwife

‘Just mental,’ Billie said. ‘Everyone will be able to see it for miles.’

‘That’s the point.’ Alex’s smile faltered. He turned to Zoe, perhaps hoping for some support. And she wanted to give it, but part of her was on Billie’s side here. It was drawing rather a lot of attention to the house. She wished he’d shared his plans with her before they’d left for their walk.

‘It’s a bit early,’ was all she could find to say. ‘It’s November.’

‘So? That’s when you put the decs up, isn’t it?’ he said.

Billie folded her arms. ‘You could have killed yourself up there! Why would you do that?’

‘I thought you’d like it!’

‘I don’t like you falling off the roof!’

Billie marched to the house and pushed past him, muttering swear words as she went, most of them about him and how stupid she thought he was.

Alex’s brow was now furrowed with deep lines. ‘Shit…’ He came from the house and looked up at his handiwork. ‘Own goal?’ he asked Zoe as she stood alongside him.

‘No,’ she said, deciding that nothing could be gained by making him feel worse, despite the fact that a tiny part of her agreed with Billie on this one. It was foolish to get on the roof by himself, especially with nobody around to help if he’d fallen, but the deed had been done now, and he was clearly upset at the mistake he’d realised it had been. And he’d only wanted to do something nice for them, after all. ‘Although, it doesn’t look very secure. One gust of wind and it will be off, flying through the air, and everyone around here will think Santa is real.’

‘I could make money filming that and putting it online.’

‘I’m not sure how that works, but I’d certainly like to see people’s reactions.’ Zoe reached for his hand and gave it a reassuring squeeze.

‘I didn’t think it through, as usual,’ he said ruefully. ‘I thought Billie would love it, you know, that it would make her feel like Christmas was all magical again, like she used to. And I thought she’d love it for Louisa.’

‘Louisa isn’t old enough to appreciate it.’

‘I know that, but still. I thought it might make a nice memory for us to share with her when she’s older.’

‘You’re a soppy old thing, aren’t you?’

‘Stupid, apparently.’ Alex let out a sigh, and Zoe could tell how hard he was trying to bottle up his disappointment in the way his surprise had backfired.

‘She’ll come round. You know how she worries about you, given the circumstances and the people she’s already lost, but she understands that she can’t wrap you in cotton wool or ask you not to live your life. You caught her off guard just now, that’s all. But when she’s had time to calm down, she’ll see it differently.’

‘I hope so. Should I take it down?’

‘God no! Imagine her face if you got back up there!’

‘It’ll have to come down eventually.’

‘It will, but we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it. Let’s not push our luck right now, eh?’

He let out a long sigh as he gazed up at the plastic cheeks of Father Christmas, his vacant eyes staring down at them with a wide absent grin. ‘I’d better go and talk to her.’

‘Give her five minutes. If it helps, I could talk to her, try to smooth the way. After all, she’s not mad at me… Not yet, anyway.’ Alex looked sharply at her. Zoe wafted away his silent question. ‘Never mind. I only mean I think she was getting a bit impatient with me earlier because I was asking questions she didn’t want to answer. I’ll tell you about it later. Let me go and see what I can do,’ she added, kissing him lightly before making her way to the house.

As she looked briefly back, she could see him standing on the path watching her, and he looked so lost she wished she could wave a wand to fix everything. But there was no wand that could fix any of this, and so they’d have to do it the hard way – by talking about it.

Billie was in the kitchen, searching the drawers for something as Louisa grizzled in her arms.

‘Where are all the dummies?’ she snapped, barely noticing Zoe walk in.

‘They’re still in the steriliser… you put them in this morning, remember? Doesn’t she have the one you took out with us?’

Billie whipped round. ‘I can’t find it…’ And then she made her way to the container they used to clean Louisa’s dummies and bottles and peered inside, snatching one up a moment later to instantly soothe her fractious daughter.

‘Are you all right?’ Zoe asked.