Page 34 of Christmas Ever After
Instead of answering, he uses his grip on my hand to tug my arm closer and hooks his elbow over it, holding my arm against his thigh as he lifts his head and stretches.
There’s a crick in my neck and my lower back is protesting the position. I can feel his eyes on me as I move, and his gaze makes heat rise up my spine.
‘Thank you,’ he says when I look at him. ‘I didn’t know I was going to react like that, but thank you for not ridiculing me.’
‘The world needs more men who aren’t afraid to show their emotions. I know you’re the strong one for your family, but you don’t need to put on a front with me. Life isn’t easy and it gets really tiring trying to pretend that it is.’
Frank Sinatra’s version of ‘The Little Drummer Boy’ comes on and I decide to lighten the atmosphere. ‘And I couldn’t possibly think less of you than I did before, so the only way is up.’
His adorable giggle turns into a full-blown guffaw, and somehow, his fingers are still intertwined with mine. ‘A surprisingly comforting thought.’
It makes me grin too, until everything goes very still when I meet his eyes and my breath hitches at the intensity in them. His fingers are caressing the back of my hand, and every point where his fingertips touch feels like a sizzling spot of heat that’s gradually pooling outwards. His grip tightens, like he’s going to pull me to him, and I shift minutely closer, surprised by how much closer Iwantto get, and bowled over by how desperately I want to kiss him.
His dark eyes seem darker with intensity, his breathing has gone shaky, and his teeth have still got his bottom lip held between them, crying out to be released by a touch of my lips.
I can feel the tension rising, the temperature building, and one of us has to dosomething, because I’m going toburstif he brushes his thumb across the side of my wrist one more time. The breath he lets out sounds as shuddery as mine is, and I get a little thrill that he’s feeling this too, and just when I think he’s going to come closer and drop his lips to mine…
He pulls back and gives himself a sharp shake, disentangles our hands, and returns to the long-forgotten job of painting the nutcracker.
I’m glad of something breaking the intimacy, and I think it’s best to put some space between us, so I leave him to it and go out for a wander around Christmas Ever After, soaking in the atmosphere. Some shops are closed as it’s Sunday, but most stay open seven days a week at this time of year. Working here was a dream come true when I got my shop. After it became obvious that my leg was never going to be able to cope with the ferocity of a ballet career again, I was searching for a new dream, and this place was it. I’d never been anything other than a ballet dancer before. It was all I was. I felt like I didn’t exist outside of that, and it was Christmas Ever After that helped me find a new version of myself – a version I liked a lot better.
One of the school choirs is practising in the Carollers’ Cabin, and there’s vestiges of the carousel music from the end of Ever After Street, and the vendor who sells chestnuts has arrived so the smell of hot roasted nuts is strong in the air, and the twinkling multi-coloured lights brighten up the overcast December afternoon, and I feel like I’m seeing it for the first time again. How have I forgotten how much I love this place? How have I been so busy for the past few Christmases that I haven’t popped out toseeit at Christmas?
I’m drawn towards Love Is All A-Round. The shop is shut today, but the darkened window display is lit by warm-white fairy lights and the illuminated snow globes that Raff makes, the lava-lamp-esque ones with glitter that swirls by itself when plugged in. Love Is All A-Round is down the opposite end of the street from The Nutcracker Shop, at an angle and facing the road from the curve where the street comes to an end, looking out over all of us. One of the globes is displayed in a circle of a holly leaf garland with red berry lights, and the globe features a miniature version of the Ever After Street castle on a snowy hill, with flakes of snow ready to swirl around it when someone gives it a shake, and I turn around and look up at the real castle behind me. A perfect replica. I’ve thought a lot of things about Raff in the eighteen months since he took over this shop, but I’ve never realised how exceptionally talented he is. It takes years and years of dedication to getthisgood at a craft, and if this shop wasn’t here – magical love gimmick or not – it would be a huge loss for Christmas Ever After. And the thought of Raff not being here… the thought of getting to know him this well and then never seeing him again… it fills me with a cold chill that seeps inside my bones. If I hadn’t pushed so hard, neither of us would be in the position we are now. Raff made one mistake and is trying to make up for it, and now I need to do the same. The Nutcracker ShopandLove Is All A-Round need to stay on Christmas Ever After, and I have to do something about it.
11
‘Franca! Get out here! You’ve got to see this!’ Mrs Bloom bursts through my shop door and I groan internally. More ominous words have never been spoken. They almost always mean that someone is doing something you don’t want to see.
It’s been ages since I was inspired when it comes to making nutcrackers, but today, I’ve had an idea for a new one, and I’m leaning on the counter with a sketchbook open, trying to sketch my vision and I’m glad of the excuse to drop my pencil when she beckons me impatiently from the doorway. Drawing left-handed is as impossible as everything else is, but watching Raff work has reminded me of the times when I couldn’t wait to get to work every day, bursting with ideas for new wooden soldiers to fill my shelves, when I couldn’t draw fast enough to get the ideas out of my head and onto paper before I forgot them, and now my enthusiasm has returned, but my ability to use my hand is still many more weeks away.
‘What’s going on?’ I ask as I follow her.
‘He’s fixed it.’ When I get outside the door, she grabs hold of my arm and drags me further down the road until the entrance to our street comes into view. ‘He’s only gone and fixed it.’
My eyes fall on a small gathering of fellow shopkeepers where Mitch’s pick-up truck is parked, and Raff is holding steady an un-mangled Christmas Ever After archway while Mitch drills in steel plates to secure it to the concrete blocks that keep it safely upright.
Someone’s repaired it. A few days ago, I noticed that the wreckage of crumpled metal had been taken away from where it’s been lying since the accident, but I assumed that was a health and safety thing and someone had finally had the sense to arrange for it to be collected for scrap metal, but this morning, it’s back and being carefully reinstated to its former position. It’s been straightened out and bent back into an arch shape, to the point where you’d have to examine it close up to know there was anything wrong with it.
‘When do you think he had time to do that?’ Mrs Bloom says with waggling eyebrows.
‘Who’s done it?’
‘Oh, come on. The one who knows his way around a…’ She thinks for a moment. ‘Well, whatever type of tools that would be used to fix that. It definitely wasn’t Mitch, look at him, he can barely find that drill with both hands.’
‘Raff? Why on earth would Raff…’ I trail off when he looks our way and smiles, and butterflies start whizzing around in my chest.
‘Hmm. Why, indeed?’ Mrs Bloom says under her breath.
I give him a wave and, seeing as his hands are occupied, he dips his head in my direction, and I don’t realise how much I’m smiling until Mrs Bloom elbows me hard enough to break a rib.
‘Jorge never elicited a smile like that.’
‘It turns out that the most attractive thing about any man is being respectful and having good oral hygiene.’
She nods sagely. ‘One thing you can say about Raphael Dardenne is that he knows how to clean his teeth.’
I can’t help giggling, even though he undeniably does.
