Page 31 of Snowflakes at the Little Christmas Tree Farm
It makes me laugh again, and I want to carry on the conversation, but his face is as red as the shirt he was wearing yesterday, and he’s got a look about him that says he’d very much like to hide.
Luckily, I’m distracted by a sign coming up on the right-hand side of the road and I lean forward to see it. It looks like another hand-lettered chalk board, permanently printed on weather-resistant plastic this time, but instead of a nice and friendly pumpkin, there’s a cartoon sweetcorn cob with red eyes and the words ‘GET LOST’ in big capital letters. The sign is positioned outside a field of tall green plants with thick silver chains criss-crossing the entrance. ‘Oh, that’s nice and welcoming,’ I say. It might not even be Noel’s land, but the chalk writing is the same as the sign we passed earlier.
I don’t expect him to start laughing, like proper belly-laughing, so hard that the seat shakes. ‘It’s a maize maze, Leah. Maize with ani. It’sah-maze-ingfun! The sign is an invitation, not an insult.’
‘It’s a maze … made of sweetcorn?’ He nods and I lean forward then back to get a better view around him. ‘Wow, I’ve never seen anything like that before. It looks … ah-maze-ing.’ I try to see through the back window as it disappears behind us. Green ears of corn that must be taller than me line the edges along the road, and I get the feeling that you’d need to see it from above to get a clearer picture. ‘Are you sure that’s a good idea? I’ve seen the horror films, Noel. Bad things happen in fields of corn.’
He laughs again. ‘Just another way to maximise revenue. I was growing corn anyway, so I thought why not grow it with proper paths between it to create a maze and let kids run around in there. The corn’s tall enough by late July so I open it seven days a week in the summer holidays, then weekends only until the October half-term when it’s open all the time and the corn’s much taller, and of course the pumpkin patch is open too so people can come for a real family fun day out. At the end of the season, I cut the corn and sell it, and in the spring, I dig over the field and replant it in a different formation so it’s never the same maze twice if people come back year after year. One of my favourite jobs is designing the maze each year.’
‘Wow,’ I say, struggling for any other words. There really does seem to be nothing he can’t do. He’s creative and outdoorsy, and he seems to do so much to stay in business year-round.
I can sense his eyes on me and he must be able to tell how impressed I am, because he says, ‘There are a few around the UK, it’s nothing original before you tell me I’m a genius again.’
I poke another bit of pumpkin spice muffin into my mouth to avoid replying. I do think he must be a bit of a genius when it comes to farm stuff, but he obviously doesn’t like hearing it. ‘You’re really busy, aren’t you?’
‘Aye, but I like it that way. The seasonal growing business isn’t for everyone. It takes a lot of year-round maintenance, but you only get an income generally once a year. It can be a shock at first, especially when you’re used to the nine-to-five guaranteed monthly paycheque. Personally I’m lucky because my dad started Roscoe Farm long before I was born, so it’s had over forty years to build up a reputation. I also got lucky because I made the call to give a few fields over to pumpkins at exactly the time when Halloween started to get as popular here as it is in America, and British people started wanting to visit pumpkin patches like Americans always have. Sometimes in this business you make calls that are wrong, and sometimes you get it right. I’ve taken plenty of wrong turns along the way too.’ He glances over at me and his eyes flick quickly back to the road.
It makes me think about what I’ll have to do to stay in business. Noel obviously works hard to make sure things tick over throughout the year. What on earth am I going to do to make Christmas trees earn a living in any month outside of December? ‘What did Evergreene do to survive all year round?’
‘I hate to say it but he didn’t need to. Peppermint Branches was loved far and wide, it was extraordinarily profitable in the later years. He had a massive wholesale contract that was worth a fortune and turned over a huge amount of stock each year, and he spent the non-Christmas season looking after the trees.’ He taps his nose and puts on the deep, strongly accented voice of an elderly Scottish gent. ‘The more you put into a crop, the more you get out of it, my boy.’
I smile at the impression but it doesn’t ease the knot in my stomach. The wholesale contract is obviously long gone and my current crop of trees wouldn’t have a hope in hell of getting anything similar. ‘What about growing something else? You grow and sell other things outside of pumpkin season, right?’ He nods but my mind’s already whirring. ‘Strawberries? They could grow in the shade between the trees, and they’d be long gone by the time the farm opens.’
‘Depends how much time you’ve got to waste planting and caring for a crop that aren’t Christmas trees, and how many you’d have to grow to make a profit.’
‘If there were enough, I could open the farm as a pick-your-own in the summer too … Oh! Opening the farm in the summer!’ I nearly spill my coffee as I sit up straighter and the idea bubbles into life. ‘Christmas in July is a thing, right? I could do something festive at that time of year. Meet Santa in the summer for a riverside picnic or something?’
‘Drown Santa? Send a few Santas white-water-rafting down the river and have a race to see which one makes it back by December?’
‘I was thinking more along the lines of meet Santa by the river for an afternoon tea of candycane cupcakes and gingerbread houses and get a mid-year update on his preparations for Christmas? There could be festive-themed games and presents, and a theme of keeping the spirit of Christmas alive all year through, like Scrooge says at the end ofA Christmas Carolwhen the last ghost leaves.’
I expect him to laugh at me, but when I pluck up the courage to look at him, he’s still watching the road but his lips are tucked together and both his eyebrows are raised. He doesn’t look completely unimpressed.
It gives me the courage to continue. ‘There could be scavenger hunts to find presents hidden under the trees and elf hide-and-seek. Don’t you think it would be nice for kids who love Christmas to get to celebrate it in the middle of the year too?’
‘You’re planning on sticking around that long then?’
I flinch at the harshness of his words but he continues before I have a chance to snap something back at him.
‘In my experience, when things get tough, people usually don’t.’
‘I didn’t come here thinking this was going to be easy.’ I don’t mention that I expected it to bemarginallyeasier than it is, but that’s beside the point. ‘I wanted something to completely change my life. Something my parents would’ve been proud of. I’m not going to give up at the first hurdle. That would defeat the object.’
‘Well, summer Santa and elves and scavenger hunts sound great. You’re not going to make Santa wear his summer uniform of tiny red Speedos with a white furry trim, are you? I don’t think my eyeballs could take all the bleach they’d need after that sight.’
The thought makes me giggle even though I’m annoyed at him for thinking that I’m going to leaveorthat I’d dress Santa in swimming trunks that don’t look good onanyone, especially a man of Santa’s traditional age, body type, and hirsuteness.
‘Maybe we can team up and do some co-advertising next year, your festive summer picnics and my corn maze. They’re close enough that people can easily visit both, and we could think of a way to incorporate each other’s produce and extend both the Christmas and Halloween season.’
‘I’d like that.’ I accept it for the concession it is. He must’ve been hurt by someone leaving, and he hasn’t got a high opinion of anyone from a city, and he obviously doesn’t like me enough to tell me about it, so there’s no point in pushing it.
I finish my muffin and slurp the last of my coffee, then pull my hair over my shoulder and try to finger-comb it into resembling something other than a rats’ nest. I push my fingers through the top and flatten it down, trying to work it into a plait without a mirror.
I can feel him watching me and it makes me blush even though there’s no reason to. When I tie the end with the spare band that’s always on my wrist and flip it back over my shoulder, I feel fluttery for no reason at all.
‘Welcome to the lively, buzzing centre of Elffield.’ Noel slows down when we eventually reach a more built-up area. I’ve lost track of how long we’ve been driving. The distance between things seems so wide here, and everything seems so far away from everything else.
I realise he’s being sarcastic as we turn down a narrow street with houses on both sides. Among them is a post office on one side and a convenience shop on the other. That’s it.
