It Happened on Christmas Eve Read online

  It Happened on Christmas Eve

  Kirsty Greenwood

  About

  The top three reasons why I do not like Christmas are as follows:

  1. It's super cheesy.

  2. Everyone drinks boiled red wine that tastes like air freshener and pretends they enjoy it.

  3. Last year the man I was in love with decided that Christmas Day was a perfectly decent time to reveal that he did not feel the same way about me.

  So you can see why, on Christmas Eve, it's totally reasonable for me to just want to get home from work as soon as possible, close the curtains, eat my weight in noodles and watch horror movies until the whole thing is over.

  My boss, Marcy, has other ideas. Her son Adam broke his leg ice-skating and now she needs me to accompany him on his last minute Christmas errands around Notting Hill where we live. It wouldn't be half as bad if Adam wasn't the most irritatingly confident, annoyingly enthusiastic Christmas-giddy man I've ever encountered. And, well, a whole lot sexier than I expected he'd be...

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Exclusive sneak peek of Kirsty’s new novel ‘Nora Tucker and The One’!

  About the Author

  Also by Kirsty Greenwood

  Chapter One

  Christmas Eve Midday

  People say I'm a grump. Not to my face – they wouldn’t risk it – but my boss, Marcy Westbury, tells me that’s what people say.

  Marcy reckons that my ‘constant bitch face, resting or otherwise’ actually makes me very effective as her PA at the Interior Design firm she runs. She’s a sweet middle-aged soft touch who would design beautiful rooms for free if someone asked really nicely. When I’m around, people do not even dare to ask. If they want a Harmonious Spaces designed room, they have to get through me and the six month long waiting list I guard with my life. According to Marcy, I have the best icy stare she’s ever witnessed. I didn’t even know I had an icy stare, let alone the best one Marcy’s ever been privy too. After she told me this I went straight home and tried to recreate an icy stare in the mirror to see if was really as good as rumour suggested. And, oh, it was. My icy stare was colder than an Eskimo wearing nothing but assless chaps and some Vicks VapoRub. My icy stare was so good, so totally terrifying, that I ran away from the mirror and had to neck a G&T just to calm myself down.

  I’ve tried super hard at work this year for three main reasons. The first is that this is the best place I’ve ever been employed; my co-workers are mostly boneheads, but the building is within walking distance of my house, my boss is smart and talented, plus she pays me just about enough to live in Notting Hill – my favourite place in the whole of London. The second reason is because I want to train as a designer, just like Marcy. I’d love to start learning the basics for just a couple of hours a week while still being a PA. Marcy’s on the fence with the idea because I have no formal design training, but she’s agreed to reconsider in the New Year. So there is potential if I continue to impress her. And thirdly, while I wait for the chance to train as a junior designer I would very much like to conduct my PA duties in an office of my own rather than in the current open plan setup with people I mostly want to tell to bugger the heck off. There’s a store cupboard that could work beautifully as my own private sanctuary, but Marcy isn’t so sure we can spare the space. My dastardly plan is to be so good at my job that soon enough she will give me exactly what I want because she, and indeed her business, won’t be able to function successfully without me. I have this little fantasy that I’ll walk into her office one day, maybe wearing a crimson red pant suit with massive shoulder pads. The radio will magically be playing a Lizzo song and I will make all of my demands while affecting a superwoman stance, legs wide, hands on hips. Marcy will respond by pleading and begging and crying out, ‘Anything. Phoebe! Anything you want, you can have it! I, and indeed my business won’t be able to function successfully without you!’ The fantasy’s finale is usually me getting some sort of illustrious award for interior designing, presented by the hot Dothraki guy from Game of Thrones who also wants to take me on a date. A sex date. But in real life my hope is just to have an office of my own, and eventually to tread the path towards becoming a junior designer. Maybe then I will feel a bit more cheerful about things instead of feeling peeved most of the time.

  I never intended to be a grump. I don’t think anyone does, do they? But life happens, shit happens and before you know it, it’s easier to sneer than smile. I suppose angry parents or unkind peers at school didn’t exactly help to form the most chilled out human. I have tried to be loose and smiley and the kind of woman who coos at fluffy kittens and fat babies and cake. But I just can’t do it. It feels all wrong. I’m much more at ease in a state of mild irritation. I like to think of myself as a hardcore bitch. Someone who has no time for fakeness, or frivolity. Hardcore bitch sounds way more badass. And it’s definitely much easier than considering that I might possibly be a slightly lonely, unlikeable person who has lost the ability to relax or feel joy. But I digress…

  Over my twenty-seven years I’ve managed to amass a mental list of things I simply cannot be doing with. The list is extensive and it doesn’t discriminate. To give you an idea, here are seven random annoyances that have made it onto my list:

  Ticking clocks

  The word ‘chipper’

  Cats that think they’re better than you are

  Humans whistling

  Birds whistling

  Kettles whistling

  Peas

  Every time I come into contact with something I don’t like, I add it to my shit list. There’s a sort of comfort in it actually. Like I’m a collector. A collector of stuff that pisses me off… Okay, I admit, it’s weird. But I never asked to be this way. I just am.

  Right at the top of my list of things I can’t be doing with is Christmas.

  I was never overjoyed with it, to be honest – such a load of fuss and noise. But Christmas officially debuted on the shit list last year when an architect named Mitch Birch broke my heart over the roast turkey dinner. We’d been seeing each other for thirteen months and I was deeply into him. I dared allow myself to think that he was someone I could grow old with, and he chose Christmas Day to ask me if we could make one of those pacts that you see in films. He said that if neither of us had found true love by the time we were fifty, we could perhaps, maybe, possibly, get married and wasn’t that a neat idea? Not thirty, or even forty. Fifty. I was clearly his end case scenario while he was my best. I loved him. What a dunce I was. My heart was broken by a man wearing a paper crown, to a soundtrack of Band Aid 30. A man who described things as being ‘neat ideas’. A man called Mitch Birch. It sucked. Still sucks. Whenever I think of it, which is quite a lot at the moment, I get the rage. I feel actual anger and sadness coursing through my veins and I just want to kick something.

  Today is Christmas Eve. Which means that everyone else in the open plan office is being even more annoying than usual. I wouldn’t mind if I had my own little office, away from everyone else. Somewhere to shut the door and keep my head down. But I don’t. The party atmosphere and the mulled wine the team have been drinking since around eleven this morning has made them brave enough to attempt to get me into the Christmas spirit.

  ‘Whooooo! Only half an hour to go until we can leave and get pissed!’ yells Ellie the receptionist, draping a scratchy length of ugly
red tinsel around my shoulders. ‘It’s Christmaaaaas! Whoo hoo! Parteeeeeeee!’

  I remove the tinsel with my finger and thumb and drop it into the wastepaper bin underneath my desk.

  ‘Who are you spending tomorrow with, Phoebe?’ Ellie asks me. ‘Family? Friends? Ooh, a boyfriend?’

  ‘No,’ I state in a manner that indicates that this line of questioning is over.

  The truth is that my family aren’t even in the country. Mum lives in Australia now where she runs a yoga lodge. And Dad got himself a whole new family after the divorce. I asked Mum if I could go to visit her for the holidays – Christmas on a beach and scoffing my weight in barbecued meat sounded like something I could have enjoyed. But she said she had a party of yoga fanatics staying at the lodge for the holidays and she couldn’t turn down the business and didn’t I have friends in London I could spend the season with? So Christmas is definitely not a family affair and hasn’t been for the past ten years. I push away the feeling of sadness and anger that comes with my own mother not wanting to spend Christmas with me. But then I guess family Christmases were always a bit forced and awkward anyway, so it’s probably for the best.

  Ellie gives me a small smile. ‘Well, I hope you have a nice day, whatever you’re doing.’

  ‘Thanks. You too.’ I give her a small smile in return. I might be a grump, but I’m a well-mannered grump, and I quite like Ellie, even if she sometimes whistles while she’s walking to and from the printer.

  Jim, one of Marcy’s junior designers struts over, brandishing a piece of mistletoe like a sword. He wafts it above my head in what I think he thinks is an enticing manner.

  ‘Leave,’ I say.

  ‘Come on, Phoebe! Don’t be such a bore!’

  He leans in towards me and, Christmas joy making him oblivious to my very icy stare, he puckers his rubbery lips and approaches my very own lips. I can smell the mince pie on his hot breath.

  I use my feet to push against my desk and wheel away from him in my twizzly office chair. By the time he realises what I’ve done he’s already started tonguing the air.

  He opens his eyes when his mouth has failed to make contact with my face.

  ‘Bah humbug,’ he grumbles, heading back over to a giggling Ellie. ‘It’s Christmas, Phoebe! You ought to relax and have a little fun for once!’

  ‘Ought I, Jim?’ I say brightly. ‘Maybe you ought to go and screw yourself, but I didn’t hear either of us asking for advice.’

  I admit this response might be a little strong of a comeback for daytime in the workplace. But it’s effective, because after that, everyone leaves me alone to get on with my tasks in peace.

  The team at Harmonious Spaces spends the next hour waiting for that next hour to pass so they can go home and start their celebrations. I clock-watch so I can go home too, but there will be no celebrations for me. At least not in the traditional sense. I have made a very specific plan to get through the holiday season without too much irritation or thinking about Mitch and how I couldn’t keep his interest. Or absent family. Or how cold it is. Or everything else that makes me feel prickly at this time of year.

  Digging it out of my handbag, I open my little black leather diary where I have written myself notes for getting through the next seven days.

  Download every horror movie I’ve never seen. I need plenty to entertain me.

  Go to the shops and pick up the least Christmassy food I can think of. Chinese noodles. Cheese pizza. Cornflakes.

  Buy all of the alcohol. Drink all of the alcohol.

  Turn off my phone to avoid chirrupy mass text messages.

  Turn off the internet to avoid smug holiday social media updates.

  Close all the curtains in my flat to avoid snow, twinkle lights and the sounds of neighbours’ joy.

  Wait for it all to be over.

  Return to my life as if the holidays had never even happened.

  Do not think about Mitch.

  STOP THINKING ABOUT MITCH, YOU GOON.

  I run my finger down the list, feeling ever more desperate to get done with work so that I can get round the shops as quickly as possible and then home to safety. I’m thinking about whether Mitch is spending Christmas in London and who he might be spending it with. The Mitch thoughts are coming thick and fast today – Ellie is playing some sort of Christmas playlist from her phone and it’s setting them off. I’m about to ask her to turn it down when I hear Marcy’s voice calling me from her office.

  ‘Phoebe! I need you!’

  Glad of the distraction, I jump up from my chair and dash into Marcy’s large, airy studio where she’s pacing around her desk looking stressed. Marcy doesn’t usually look stressed. Part of my job is to make sure she is never ever stressed.

  ‘What’s wrong?’ I ask, holding my blackberry aloft, ready to take away whatever’s causing her to be upset.

  I like Marcy. She’s one of the few people I genuinely, wholeheartedly like. Not only did she give me a job I love fiercely but she is kind and hardworking and easy and, I don’t know, a tiny bit maternal towards me. In a professional way, of course. Most impressive of all is that she never judges people – she just takes them in her stride. It’s a quality I don’t think I’ll ever possess myself, but one that I admire and covet.

  ‘Who do you need me to call?’ I repeat, trying to avoid rolling my eyes at the festive cinnamon and winter berry candle Marcy is burning on her desk. Scented candles – another thing to add to the shit list. They’re so expensive! Imagine paying twelve pounds for something that, much sooner than you would ever expect, melts into a useless stinky goop.

  ‘My dear friend Jemima, you know Jemima?’

  ‘Jemima Crossley Jones the Bafta winning actress. Um, yes, of course I know who she is.’ I laugh under my breath, because Marcy takes every possible opportunity to name drop her famous friends and clients.

  ‘Yes, that Jemima! She’s having a design disaster. She’s hosting her regular Christmas eve shindig at the Oxo Tower tonight, but the venue has got the staging all wrong. They’ve done the up-lighting red and she said it looks like a hellscape themed sex dungeon. She’s very upset.’ Marcy shakes her head forlornly. ‘And apparently the centre-pieces are all wrong. They don’t match the table cloths she had imported from Milan. And then there’s the party favours. They were supposed to be small glass paperweights, but the supplier has sent medium glass paperweights!’

  I just about stop myself from screaming in horror, ‘Not medium! Please, God, noooooooo!’. Instead I say, ‘Do you need me to send Jim over there to sort it out?’

  ‘Oh no, definitely not,’ Marcy frowns. ‘I need to do it. Apparently tons of celebrities are going to be there tonight, so Jemima has insisted it be me that goes. Drat!’

  ‘Would you like me to come and assist?’

  ‘No, no, lovely. What I need you to do is to pick up my Adam from the airport.’ She glances at her elegant gold wrist watch. He’s due to get into Heathrow from New York in about an hour and I was supposed to pick him up because of his leg. Poor thing.’

  I spot the framed picture of Marcy’s son on her desk. It’s a photo of Adam collecting some sort of award for his series of popular young adult books. He’s very handsome in a dark eyed, cocky lothario type of way. Not that I’m interested in any men for the foreseeable future, not since Mitch. I’ve never met Adam but he’s Marcy’s pride and joy. He’s also, in my opinion, a real dummy. I mean, what kind of adult goes drunken ice skating in Central Park, tries a double axel and then breaks his leg?

  ‘I can order him a cab?’ I suggest, wanting to get home as soon as possible without having to chaperone a thirty-two year old man. This morning has already been overly busy and noisy. I’ve got the beginnings of a thumping headache, I can’t stop thinking about Mitch and I just want to go bloody home!

  Marcy must be able to tell what I’m thinking, because she gives me a desperate pleading look. ‘Please, Phoebe? I know you were due to leave for the holidays in ten minutes but Adam’s poor
leg is in such a mess. I don’t want him to endure some soulless, uncomfortable cab ride on Christmas Eve. You can take my car…’

  Oooh! I think of Marcy’s gorgeous, roomy silver Jag, her second pride and joy after Adam. She’s never let me drive it before. I’m amazed she would even consider it. She must really be learning to trust me…

  Hmmm…I suppose it’s only an hour of my time.

  And I do pride myself on being the most excellent PA in all of London.

  Plus I really want my own office and this good deed will help to get me into Marcy’s good books.

  Then maybe she’ll train me to design harmonious spaces like she does.

  And, well, if anything’s going to cheer up this miserable day a tiny bit, it would be having a little go on that car.

  ‘No problem. I’m on it.’ I hold out my greedy little hands for the Jaguar keys.

  ‘Great! Thanks, Phoebe. Oh, and this is for you. Don’t open it until tomorrow.’

  Marcy digs into her desk drawer and passes me a small box wrapped up in brown paper and tied up with string, all Julie Andrews like. I find myself smiling at how thoughtful this is and then swiftly tell myself that Christmas presents are nothing but consumerist propaganda. That quickly wipes the sentimental smile off of my mug.

  I take the package and plan to shove it in a drawer until after New Year.

  Marcy smiles with relief as I pocket the car keys and head for the door. ‘Phoebe, you are an angel.’

  Just as long as it’s not a Christmas angel.