Page 5 of The Christmas Express
‘I would,’ pipes up the customer behind the couple, at the same time as someone pouring sugar into her coffee at the napkin station mumbles, ‘Hell no.’
‘Didn’t you say she was paying for it all?’ the barista asks, while raising her eyebrows at the boyfriend, signalling she was ready to take his order.
I shuffle down the counter. ‘I mean, she’s offered to. Which is wild because that’s five flights she’s saying she’ll cover. And she says there’s this huge lodge belonging to her fiancée’s family on Vancouver Island where we can all stay over Christmas and up until after the wedding, and I googled it and it’s absolutely massive.’ It’s so spread out that, actually, if I think about it, all six of us could probably keep a civil distance from each other if need be.
I could take some books with me, ones I’ve been meaning to read, and go out on hikes in the snow, and totally keep to myself if I wanted. It’s not like I’d have to snuggle under a faux-fur blanket with Luke for the duration of the trip or anything. Nothing like that.
The girlfriend interrupts my thoughts. ‘It sounds like, um, Bryn . . . ? really wants to make amends with you all. Be friends again, and move on. That’s one hell of an olive branch.’ The couple are collecting their drinks now, and the barista’s stopped listening to me, angling her whole body away to serve people further down the queue.
All those things that were said, all those months and years that have passed since, and now those friends I was once inseparable from are just . . . memories. People who used to be my neighbours. And I’m okay with that, I’ve been fine without them. JUST FINE.
‘That’s the thing though, do I actually want an olive branch—’ Oh. The couple are leaving the café, arm in arm, steam rising from their drinks and drifting up into the misty morning air.
I follow them out – not in a weird way – and join the crowds cruising through the streets of London. I’m surrounded by people – commuters, tourists, joggers, dog walkers – and I fall in step with them, lost in the throng, a protective, anonymous wave for me to ride.
My walk to work takes me along the Thames, where water glints under the low winter sunshine and swooshes as boats trundle along carrying morning deliveries.
‘Morning, everyone!’ I say in my sunniest tone as I climb the stairs to my floor. ‘Morning,’ I repeat, louder. It’s always boisterous in here, our PR office a constant buzz of telephone calls, stand-up meetings, break-out groups, brainstorming sessions. I love the atmosphere; never a dull moment.
Where shall I sit today? I wander the rows of hot desks, new and familiar faces flicking their eyes up at me as I pass, offering a smile or a yawn-wave combo. We’re an international company, so staff from all over the world are dropping in and out all the time. It’s a great way to meet new people, not so much to make any lifelong friends. I don’t mind though. I’m not clingy, or needy.
A few hours in, I’ve circumnavigated all my work duties and done precisely nothing other than google information about Canada, how long it would take one to learn to snowboard, psychological tricks to make people like you again, example bucket lists and social media stalked my old friends.
I’m lost in a daydream about Luke and I getting so swept up in the romance of reuniting that Bryn invites us to have a double wedding with her under the falling snow and then we all honeymoon in that big log cabin of hers, which wouldn’t be a great honeymoon for Bryn, I guess. Also, it’s bloody shaky ground putting us all in one place for a holiday again, isn’t it?
Anyway, I’m somewhere on the west coast of Canada in my thoughts when beside me, Nadia, a woman who pops into the office about once a month, asks, ‘You wanna come for a drink with us?’ Turns out, it’s the end of the day already.
‘I’m fine, but thank you,’ I decline, automatically. I watch her head towards the door and slump my chin down on my hands. Maybe I should have gone, maybe I could have talked through some of this with her, got a fresh perspective on what I should do. ‘Nadia?’ I call out in my quietest voice, but lo, she does not hear me.
There’s something that scares me about getting too chummy with anyone these days.
I pack up my crap, put my New York skyline mug in the communal dishwasher, and wrap myself up in my ten thousand layers again. When I emerge back onto the streets of London, darkness has fallen, and I’m embraced by the thousands of lights and the protective shield of a million different shapes and sizes of buildings. It’s noisy and alive and people are everywhere and I am not alone. I am not alone.
But I do miss my friends.
Why is it that something can feel like it’s working so well, that a group of people can be practically living on top of each other, in each other’s pockets, know every detail of their lives, and then it’s like that ball of energy suddenly becomes too much, and it implodes outward, and everything that worked now feels broken?
That holiday was supposed to be the best week ever. All six of us had been so excited – me, Luke, Bryn, brother and sister Joe and Joss, and Sara. We’d planned every detail, play-fought over who got to share a room with who, told each other daily what the predicted weather forecast was due to be in Spain.
Then, seven days before we left for Spain, Luke and I finally got together, and it was amazing and exciting and blissful, and it changed everything.
The last time I saw Bryn was one week after our holiday. She was the first to move out of the townhouse, her mum owning a large home with a self-sufficient annex in Hertfordshire, and Bryn being self-employed. She nearly left without saying goodbye, but I happened to be climbing the stairs to leave some of Luke’s things outside his door since I knew he’d gone out, and we crossed paths. She had a suitcase and that ridiculously huge sunhat on her head that we all made fun of her for, the one that was a gift from her ex, Ember. But there was no sun out that day.
‘Are you leaving?’ I’d asked her, even though it was the most obvious question on earth. There wasn’t a chance in hell that hat could be packed in a box or bag. I should know. She nearly took my eye out with it boarding a plane once upon a time.
‘I’m going back to Hertfordshire for a bit,’ she told me, avoiding my eyes, no smile on her lips. ‘For a lot, actually.’
‘You’re moving out?’
And that was it. She’d paused for a moment on the stairs, and then kept going. I think she said a quiet goodbye, but I never knew for sure.
Now she’s getting married. My Bryn, my best friend, all grown up. Of course I want to be there . . .
About eighty-five times during my commute home, I nearly reply to Bryn’s email. Sometimes I’m going to reply with a yes please, sometimes a no thank you. Sometimes just to her, sometimes a reply all.
‘What do you think I should do?’ I ask Mum on the phone that night. She’s got me on speaker because she’s repacking her suitcase into a giant backpack for New Zealand, as she’s decided she and Dad and my brother are going to ‘go hostelling’ while they’re over there and she doesn’t want to look out of place.
‘I think you should go.’ Her voice is tinny and muffled and I can hear her shaking out her huge winter coat.
