Humbugs and Heartstrings: A gorgeous festive read full of the joys of Christmas!. Catherine Ferguson
the goal posts is filled with paint. When we reach our target, there will be nothing but blue sky.
Occasionally, I am overcome with guilt at the money I shell out in rent. But as soon as I mention it, Mum shakes her head and says that I need my own space and to remember what it was like when we were living on top of each other and having fights over the bathroom. She’s much calmer about everything than me.
‘Look, don’t worry, I’ll talk to the gas people tomorrow,’ I tell her. ‘Stay at home, keep warm and tell Tim to behave or I’ll sort him out tomorrow.’
I go back to fiddling with the boiler. Usually, I can press a sequence of buttons that will rev it into action. But this time, it is resolutely dead. So I phone the landlord and leave a message, then I pull on my cow onesie and a pair of slipper socks, and prepare supper to eat on a tray in front of the TV.
I’m just finishing, when the lights in the room start to flicker.
I stare at the lamp on the chest of drawers opposite. Please, not a power cut!
On and off it flashes.
Three times in all.
Then, with a big electronic clunk, the TV cuts out.
Damn! That’s all I need.
Except it can’t be a power cut, because the lights are still on. And the next minute, the TV springs back to life. But just in case, I go in search of candles and matches, thinking it’s probably just as well that Mum and Tim stayed at home.
Remembering I left the street door open to let them in, I go into the hall and pull on some wellies, the only footwear I can squeeze on over my thick slipper socks.
When I open the door, my heart nearly leaps out of my chest.
Someone is standing there in the gloom on the landing.
A big, shadowy shape.
With a racing heart, I step back to slam the door shut.
Then I hear a familiar voice.
‘Hey, it’s only me. The door was open so I came straight up. I was trying to find the switch.’
He snaps on the landing light and there he stands.
My good friend, Fez.
He grins at my onesie. ‘Nice.’
‘Thanks.’ My heart hasn’t caught up with my brain and is still hammering away like it’s about to explode from my chest. ‘Yes, I was on my way out, actually,’ I say, motioning him to come in.
‘Hence the lucky wellies.’ He nods solemnly. ‘Irresistible, that onesie. You’ll be beating them off with a stick.’
‘You think?’ I grin, hopping about, removing the footwear.
‘I brought you this,’ Fez says, handing me a DVD in a clear case. ‘I think it’s the last.’
Fez, who’s a bit of a techie, has been transferring all my ancient camcorder home movies onto DVD for me.
Taking it out of its case and slipping it into the DVD machine, I offer to make him coffee but he shakes his head.
‘I’m on my way out. Dinner with the parents.’ He pauses. ‘I was going to ask you if you wanted to come. Free meal and all that. But … ’
He shrugs awkwardly and I hate having to say no. But I’m just not in the mood.
I wave him off at the door. ‘See you Friday?’
He nods and disappears down the stairs. I wait until I hear the street entrance clunk shut. Then I retreat and close the door, double-locking it and putting on the chain for good measure.
The lights start to flicker again.
On and off.
Three times.
And a voice calls to me from the living room.
‘Bobbie? You’ve got a message!’
I freeze with shock.
A strange, high-pitched whine starts up in my head and I think I might faint.
I know the voice.
It belongs to Carol.
How did she …?
My legs are shaking but I force myself to walk into the room.
And then I exhale slowly.
Of course.
It’s the home movie DVD.
I collapse back onto the sofa, weak with relief. Gee thanks, Fez, for giving me the fright of my life twice in one night!
On the TV screen, Carol is laughing into the camera. ‘You’ve got a message! You’ve got a message!’ She’s in a bar, surrounded by faces I know from my London days, and she’s waving my old mobile phone about. I lean closer to the screen. Her blonde hair was longer then, swinging on her shoulders. She looks relaxed and carefree. And so young.
‘It might be Bob!’ she sings teasingly to the person operating the camcorder, who, presumably, is me.
There are butterflies in my stomach but I can’t tear my eyes away.
I remember the occasion as if it were yesterday. It was a Christmas night out four years ago and for some reason, I’d decided to be the mildly irritating person who records the occasion by pointing a piece of technology in her friends’ faces all night.
Dark-haired Roz, with her exotic Dita Von Teese looks, is loving it, posing and pouting like a B-list celebrity, really playing up to the camera. She nudges Carol out of the way then leans towards me for a sultry close-up, prompting shrieks of laughter from around the table.
God, they’re all there.
I peer closer.
Sally, Nicola and Emma, who shared the flat below Carol and me, sit along a banquette, giggly and glammed up in party dresses with red tinsel in their hair. They raise their cocktails to the camera and begin wailing a flat and drunkenly shambolic rendition of ‘White Christmas’.
Then the camera swings to Carol, in a skinny green strapless dress. She’s trying to access my message.
‘No! Give it here!’
I start at the sound of my own voice.
Suddenly, a blank grey wall fills the screen as the camcorder is hastily put down.
Then one of the girls – Nicola, I think – shouts, ‘Come on, Bobbie, what does he say?’ and the camera wobbles around before settling on me.
Seeing how I looked then makes me catch my breath. My hair is much shorter – sleek and shoulder-length – and I’m wearing a pretty, beaded shift dress in deep turquoise.
I could be looking at a stranger.
‘Get lost, Nic,’ squeals the person who used to be me, holding up her hands to shield her face.
‘Does he want a second date, then?’ she persists. ‘Is he coming back for more?’
Then Carol leans in and shouts at the camera, ‘He’d bloody better be back, or he’ll have me to answer to. Nobody disrespects my best friend!’
And I’m laughing and saying, ‘Oh God, poor Bob. He doesn’t know what he’s let himself in for!’
Carol raises her cocktail. ‘To Bob, who hasn’t the bloody foggiest, bless him.’
I clink her glass and we lean together, smiling broadly at the camera. Two best friends – one small, dark and curvy, the other blonde and reed slim – enjoying a Saturday night out with the girls. Apparently without a care in the world.