Christmas at the Comfort Food Cafe. Debbie Johnson
inevitably followed by Laura muttering ‘hang on…’ as she scurries around, opening and closing doors, and otherwise catering to the needs of her newest baby – an eight-month-old black Labrador puppy called Midgebo.
He was originally Midge, and mainly still gets called that, but the ‘bo’ was added as tribute to all of David’s dogs – also black Labs, and all called either Jambo or Jimbo.
Jimbo, the late, the great, the sadly departed, had gone to the great sausage shop in the sky not long after Laura and the kids moved to Dorset.
I knew she still missed him, but I also knew that Midge had helped to fill in the gap. As had Matt, the local vet who’d bought him for her. Matt, I suspected, was filling all kinds of gaps – and I was looking forward to meeting him. He looked a bit like Han Solo, so who wouldn’t want to meet him?
I was looking forward to a lot about this trip. Like seeing my sister again and checking that her apparent progress was genuine, not just faked for my benefit. Seeing my wondrous niece and nephew, who always made me feel glad to be alive. Seeing their new home. Meeting the famous Matt, and Laura’s legendary boss, Cherie Moon, who owns the Comfort Food Café. Being introduced to all her new friends.
Yep, I was looking forward to a lot of it. I just really, really wished it wasn’t at Christmas. It’s never been my best time of year.
‘Right. I’m back. Sorry about that,’ she says, and I can tell from the change of background noise that she is now outside, probably watching Midgebo have a pee in the garden.
‘That’s okay. When a dog’s got to go, a dog’s got to go. Anyway… I should be there before dinner.’
‘Assuming there isn’t an earthquake or a zombie apocalypse, that is.’
‘I think both of those suggestions are ridiculous,’ I reply, standing up and throwing my empty coffee carton into the bin. ‘But the meteor shower could happen. I think it was predicted on the weather last night.’
‘Actually it was snow that was predicted,’ says Laura, sounding distracted again. Having a puppy, I realise, is very much like having a baby.
‘So drive safely,’ she adds. ‘Don’t accidentally-on-purpose head back for Manchester. And don’t forget the Krispy Kremes.’
I arrive at the Rockery, where Laura now lives, just as evening is drawing in. The promised snow has arrived, coming in small ineffectual flurries, none of which has settled. Half-hearted snow, really a very poor effort.
I was tired on the journey, and almost hypnotised by the sight of white flakes landing on my windscreen and promptly getting squished away by the wipers. It felt wrong somehow, like I was committing some random and callous act of snowflake genocide.
I know, when I start to have thoughts like these, that I probably need a good sleep.
It is strange pulling into the gravel-topped carpark at the cottages; an odd feeling of déjà vu, even though I have never been here in the flesh. As soon as Laura and Lizzie and Nate arrived here over the summer, Lizzie started taking pictures and posting them on her Instagram account.
As a result of living those months vicariously through social media, I feel as though I have been here before. That I’ve already seen the smooth green lawn and the little fountain in the middle of it. That I’ve already strolled past the individual cottages with their odd names: Cactus Tree and Lilac Wine and Poison Ivy. They’re all named after bands or songs from the sixties and seventies, christened by Laura’s former rock-chick boss and owner of the cottages, Cherie.
I feel as though I have already stood in this very spot, looking around at the snow-dusted trees and little patios and the dark, rolling hills beyond, but on much sunnier days. It was a scorching summer – destined to become one of those famous ones, talked about in the way my parents still do about 1976 and 1977, when there was a hosepipe ban and the Queen’s Jubilee and Britain basically turned into the Med with strikes and bell-bottomed trousers.
Now, though, at the start of December, the sky is a dull gunmetal grey, patchy clouds marking it like bleach stains. The gravel is damp from the failed snow, and the cottages that are inhabited are lit up, bright lights shining from windows, curtains starting to be drawn.
It’s still beautiful here, but not the oasis of wildflowers and birdsong that I have been programmed to expect by my second-hand encounter with the place throughout July and August. Lizzie’s Instagram pics have slowed down since she started to live here for real, so for me, it’s a sudden jump from the height of summer to the bleak midwinter. It’s odd, like I’m in a movie and we’ve just done a huge flash-forward.
I heft my bag over my shoulder, lock the car and enjoy a few more moments of solitude before I enter the cauldron of life that I expect my sister’s cottage to be.
Don’t get me wrong – I love that cauldron of life. I’m thrilled to be diving into it for a while. But I have lived alone since I was eighteen years old and have never shared my space as an adult human being. Not even with a cat, or a budgie.
I am used to solitude and it is used to me. We understand each other, me and solitude. I don’t get annoyed when it keeps me awake at night with its echoing loneliness, and it’s always cool about me sometimes bringing friends home to chase it away for a while.
Like a grumpy but dedicated couple, though, we always come back to each other at the end of the day.
Now, I am voluntarily putting myself in a situation where I will be surrounded by people for a whole month. People I love, admittedly, but still… it’s not going to be easy. I have to be careful with myself, I know that. I have to watch my mental health, stay on an even keel, and try super-hard not to let things start to swamp me. Because not only are there all those people, but it’s bloody Christmas as well.
I freeze on the spot for a second, feeling my resolve falter; feeling my fear start to twitch and flutter inside me like a moth trapped in my intestines. I could still escape, a little voice tells me. Me and my solitude could jump straight back into my bright-red Suzuki Swift (my Noddy car, according to my sister), and leg it up the motorway. There would be nothing left to show I was ever here. Well, apart from the Krispy Kremes. It’d be mean to take those with me.
I’m not really considering it, I tell myself. I wouldn’t really do anything so insane. And yet… my fingers are gripping the car keys so hard I know they’ll leave bright-red marks, and I’m chewing my lips, and I’m already planning the reverse route…
‘Freeze!’ says Laura, emerging from a path by the side of the lawn. She is pointing a finger at me like a fake gun and walking briskly in my direction. ‘We have you surrounded; don’t even think about making a run for it!’
I laugh out loud. I have to, really. She knows me way too well.
I plonk the doughnut box down on the roof of the car and meet her half way. We engulf each other in a big, comfy hug, and I feel at least some of the anxiety drain out of me. As soon as she has her arms around me, I wonder why on earth I was worried. Why was I feeling so crazy?
That, however, is the mystery of The Crazy, isn’t it? It doesn’t really make sense, or it would be called The Logical instead. And that wouldn’t sound right – I mean, nobody ever spends a night with me and then says ‘hey, you’re such a Logical Bitch’. It’s always the other one.
We pull apart and I get my first proper look at my sister. It is a look that makes me feel immediately much happier. We both have dark-brown hair, but while mine is long and straight; hers is wild and curly and all over the place. She dyed a strand of it bright pink over the summer – I suspect alcohol was involved – and that is partly grown out, but still there, flicking around vividly in the fading light.
She’s wearing a pair of washed-out old jeans with grass stains on the knees