Page 63 of The Twelve Dates of Christmas

Jake grips the loft railing and leans over to grin at me. “Better, love?”

* * *

One day until Christmas – Christmas Eve

“How could you, Jake? Letting this poor girl spend a December in England without a proper pair of wellies.” Helena stands over me at a bench in the cloakroom as I pull on a spare pair of her boots. They’re a bit big, but she’s so sweet and earnest about it, I can’t refuse.

We spent the first part of the day prepping food for Christmas lunch, chatting all the while. I learn that Indi is the mudlark (and yes, she would take me along, if I wanted to go), Genny and Ewan were best friends since primary school and married when they were twenty-one, Miles is a rural veterinarian, and Caitriona (arriving tomorrow with her wife Maeve) is a pediatric surgeon. She’s the sister who’s into astrology. Now, tonight, Helena is keeping the little ones so we can go to a pub in the village called The Drowsy Cow.

“Are you sure you should go?” Helena twists her hands together, glancing between everyone as we shrug into coats and scarves. “Trevor Pritchard was just saying earlier today, we’re due a big Christmas Eve storm.”

On his way out the door, Miles says, “That old bastard is just trying to get sweet people like you into his hardware store to buy overpriced generators, Mum.”

Slow-motion snowflakes meander above us on our nighttime hike to the pub. There’s a velvety softness to the darkness here. Jake holds my hand, and we walk in step with each other.

The first glimpse I get of the village is the mercurial shimmer of fairy lights on snow. The cottages and shops seem to huddle together against the chill, windows aglow with flickering amber light. The air is rich with hot sugar and sweet cigars and the hearty burn of hearth fires. An eclectic group of carolers sing “Silent Night” on the village green. It’s all a perfect sensory backdrop for sweater weather. I’ll compare every Christmas Eve to tonight for the rest of my life.

The Drowsy Cow is the archetypal English pub from my imagination. Magical, with a gritty earthiness about it. There’s a bit of mud and melted snow on the scuffed hardwood floors, a few patrons with dogs curled up at their feet. Creaking chairs and lively, lilting conversation. A fire, filling the air with the resiny scent of woodsmoke.

Each beam along the ceiling drips with a canopy of cut winter foliage. Sprigs of spruce, downy-soft branches from fir, and the waxy leaves of fragrant juniper. Even the baubles are arcadian—simple shapes covered with dried moss, a ball of pinecones, braids of English ivy. Globe bulbs in bright white and soft amber thread throughout the greenery like silver and gold stars in a winter wood.

We approach the bar. There are rows of old mugs hanging there for decoration, and Jake has to duck his head a bit. The man pulling pints is very Santa-coded, with a bright white beard, pink cheeks and a red nose. Jake raises the hinged service hatch at the end of the counter to go behind the bar. The bearded bartender doesn’t look up from the taps. “Looking for a job, lad?”

Jake thumps the older man on the back, smiling. “I’m considering it.”

The bartender passes four frosty mugs of beer to the people waiting. He turns to Jake, yanking him into a hearty hug. “Good to see you, kid.”

I love seeing how Jake is loved here.

“Evie, this is Hutch.” Jake grins. “He was my school’s headteacher. I called him Mr Hutchinson back then, though.”

“Pleased to meet you, Hutch,” I say.

“Retired now. Living the dream. My wife Bonnie and I bought The Cow few years back. Best choice I ever made, ’side from marrying her.”

“I’m already counting down the days,” Jake says.

“To marriage, or retirement?”

“Yes,” Jake chuckles.

Hutch’s laugh booms, but his smile falls quickly, and his eyes soften. “All will be well, lad.” Something quiet passes between the two men. I can’t decode it, and I don’t have time to linger on it, because Jake claps his hands together, winks, and says, “Right. We need drinks, big man. That Old Hooky isn’t going to pour itself.”

* * *

“So is this a new tradition now, bringing Americans with you for Christmas?” Miles says to Jake.

Jake has his pint glass halfway to his mouth, frozen mid-air. Ewan clears his throat and takes a long drink of his ale, and Jake’s sisters share a matching raised-eyebrow glance. Miles glances individually at everyone. “What? We’d know more about him if he came round more than two or three times a year.”

I remember Jake mentioning another American woman during one of our early dates, but the way he described her didn’t make her stand out in my mind. There was certainly no suggestion that they’d been serious enough for him to bring her home with him for Christmas.

Genny breaks the awkward silence. “Let’s play Make Me Laugh. This is the first time in a while we’ve had enough of us home for a proper game. Last year it was just Ewan and Indi and me mugging at each other over our sad pints. We went home after one round and snoozed through three hours of Rosemary & Thyme with Mum.”

I’m the only newcomer, so they give me a rundown of the rules. “To start, everyone at the table contributes a pound to the pot,” Jake says. “We determine turn order by drawing straws.”

“First person is the Joker. Their goal is to make at least one person laugh,” Indi says. “They can target someone specifically, or say something to the whole group.”

“No touching or tickling,” says Jake. “Otherwise, anything goes.”