Mistletoe and Mayhem: A cosy, chaotic Christmas read!. Catherine Ferguson
mountains, swum in freezing lakes and run thousands of miles (well, okay, probably hundreds, but it’s still more in the last three months than I have in my entire twenty-seven years on this planet).
There are days I stagger back to my own flat, collapse onto the sofa and remain in the position in which I landed until bedtime. Barb, my flatmate, thinks it’s hilarious. She says I look like a doomed beetle on its back. (Except I can’t wave my legs about. No energy left.) She’s good about bringing me food and tea top-ups during the reviving process, though.
I’m not quite sure what Nathan and I are tackling this morning, but it will undoubtedly be good for me.
What is it Nathan always says?
Variety is the spice of fitness!
And he should know.
Nathan is quite simply the sportiest, most energetic person I’ve ever met.
The man himself raps once more on the door and shouts, ‘Eight minutes.’
‘No problem,’ I call back, turning on the cold tap and splashing my face with icy water in an effort to wake up. ‘What is a climbing ball challenge, anyway?’
But he’s gone. Even over the hum of the bathroom extractor fan, I can hear him singing in a rich baritone as he gets into his workout gear.
Nathan’s great. We’ve been seeing each other since July and I continue to be amazed by his reserves of stamina and his sheer enthusiasm for life.
He’ll make a fantastic personal trainer. He’s got this knack of boosting my confidence and making me realise I can achieve far more than I ever thought I could.
I’m an admin assistant at Premier Furnishings in Pottersdale. The town is only a five-mile bus ride from Scarsby, the village in the Lake District where I live, so it’s really very handy. And the salary is okay.
I’ve been there almost two years now and, to be honest, I’ve never really had any ambitions to rise up the ranks – although Marla, my boss, keeps trying to nudge me in that direction.
But to get ahead in the workplace, you need self-confidence and the conviction that you’re worthy of success. And not everyone has that inner belief.
I’ve always felt like the plodder in the family. The very opposite of my younger brother, Rob, who heads up his own financial consultancy business and is brilliant at everything he does. His wife, Justine, is similarly driven and, until recently, was chief marketing executive of a small luxury hotel chain, based in Scotland, where she and Rob live.
And I’m nowhere near as brave as my older sister, Rosie, who flaunted convention at the age of nineteen by chucking in her university course and going to live in Spain. With a waiter called Romeo who she’d met while on holiday.
Sadly, Romeo failed to live up to his name; Rosie was his Juliet for no more than a year before he shagged an accounts clerk from Wigan (and possibly her mother too, although this was never confirmed) and declared himself far too young to settle down.
But luckily for us, by then my lovely nephew, Josh, was already on his way.
Now, Rosie and Josh live in a tiny, white-washed apartment near Malaga, where Rosie runs a water-front café with her friend, Jo, who’s also an ex-pat. She has a new man in her life now called Alejandro, but she insists it isn’t serious. They’re just having fun.
I am totally in awe of the way Rosie launches herself on life. She couldn’t give two hoots about what anyone thinks. She just goes out there and grabs it.
And me?
There are times I don’t even have the confidence to brave a communal changing room, never mind anything else. Which is probably why I still live in the Lake District, five miles from the old family home, telling myself I’m fairly content with life.
Nathan keeps saying I’m wasted where I am.
And lately, I’ve begun to think that maybe I could fly a little higher without falling flat on my face.
Sandra, our office manager, is retiring at Easter. And Marla has hinted on several occasions that if I were to apply for the post, I’d be in with a good chance of landing the job. At first, I didn’t really take her seriously. But I mentioned it to Barb and then Nathan, and I was quite surprised at their reaction. Barb told me very firmly that I could do Sandra’s job standing on my head, juggling print cartridges with one hand, while on the phone to stationery suppliers with the other. (She has great faith in my ability to organise and multi-task.)
So then I started thinking maybe I could do it.
Every time I think of being promoted, a little quiver of apprehension ripples through me. Or maybe it’s excitement?
I strike a confident, Dragons’ Den pose in Nathan’s mirror. Chin up. Eyes steely and determined. Yes, think positive. This could be the start of a whole new me.
Rubbing my face vigorously to gee up the circulation, I peer out of the window. It’s still dark outside, and overnight the first silver-white frost of autumn has carpeted the grassy area way below Nathan’s apartment.
Another rap on the door.
‘Lola? Food. You can’t do this without fuel inside you.’
My nauseous stomach perks up at the thought of its favourite hangover cure: the crispiest of bacon nestled between two slices of buttered crusty white bread with perhaps a dab or two of tomato sauce. And a big mug of builder’s strength tea…
The door opens and Nathan hands me breakfast.
I can tell instantly from the green sludge in the glass I’m holding that it’s the seaweed, avocado and linseed special.
‘Thank you.’ I raise the glass as if to say ‘cheers!’ and my stomach emits a gurgle of protest. ‘I’ll just – er – drink it when I’m finished in here.’
My eye wanders to the plughole.
‘I’m setting the dishwasher off,’ he says, beaming encouragement. ‘Knock it back and I’ll take the glass.’
My fake smile freezes.
Right.
Here goes.
I eye the sludge and glug it down the hatch.
My sneaky after-burp has a sort of fishy/foresty tang to it.
‘Lovely.’ Handing Nathan the glass, I think how lucky I am to have a boyfriend who cares so much about my health that he’s forever whipping me up all manner of exotic, super̶̶food smoothies.
It’s just a shame they taste like shite.
But Nathan is a fabulous advert for healthy living. And he wears Lycra very well indeed. (Even my flatmate, Barb, was forced to admit that and she can be extremely spiky and judgemental.)
Nathan leans over and plants a kiss on my nose. ‘Only the best for my little athlete in the making!’
‘What is a climbing ball challenge anyway?’ I ask again, when we’re in the car heading for the venue. (I’m having slightly distressing thoughts about being required to juggle all the way up a mountain.)
‘Um – not quite sure, to be honest,’ says Nathan, two rather attractive grooves appearing above his nose. ‘Just caught the end of the announcement on the radio. But it’s probably one of those things where you push a big ball up a hill. Endurance, you know?’
‘Right.’ I nod, none the wiser. ‘Because I’m hopeless at juggling.’
He grins, shaking his head at me. ‘Whatever it is, it’ll be something different, which is great because you don’t want your body getting complacent, doing the same old work-outs. After all, variety—’
‘Is the spice of fitness!’
‘Exactly.’ He turns to me