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As John walked her to her car, parked behind the high street, the sun had already started to slip behind the trees, and there was a chilliness in the air that reminded Gwen how close it really was to winter. As she fussed in her handbag, looking for keys, he enveloped her in a quick, tight hug.
“Take care, Gwen, and I’ll see you tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow,” she agreed, and as she got into her car, she found her cheek was warm and still tingling where John had pressed it, briefly, to his.
CHAPTER7
ELLIE
“Mummy…Mummy!”
Ellie blinked the sleep out of her eyes, her mind a haze of confusion, as she felt an insistent tugging on her arm. The clock on her bedside table read 3 a.m., and Ava was standing about six inches from her face, Matthew sleeping on her other side, snoring gently.
“Ava!” Her youngest hadn’t woken up in the middle of the night in years now. Ellie had got used to a good night’s sleep; she felt completely disoriented at being woken up at such an hour. “What’s wrong, sweetheart?”
“I’m wet.”
“Wet?” Ellie’s heart sank. She reached one hand to touch her daughter’s nightgown and felt that it was sodden. “Oh, Ava…”
“And my bed’s wet.”
“Let me come and see.” Half-stumbling in the dark, Ellie threw on her dressing gown, shivering in the cold night air, while Matthew slept on. The heating had switched off a few hours ago and the attic rooms where they all slept were freezing. In Ava and Jess’s room, Ellie saw with dismay that the sheets were soaked right through to the mattress. “Ava, darling,” she asked helplessly, “what happened?” She hadn’t wet the bed since she was about three.
“I don’t know.” Ava began to cry, and Jess stirred groggily.
“What’s going on?” Jess muttered as she drew her duvet up over her head. Two years on, she’d become mostly accepting of having to share a bedroom with her little sister, but at times like this, her fifteen-year-old daughter understandably resented it.
“Shh, shh, it’s not a problem, Ava. Don’t worry, darling. I’ll sort it out for you.” She gave her daughter a hug before remembering she was wet, and now Ellie was wet, as well. She really didn’t need this kind of hassle in the middle of the night, especially when she’d been up past midnight herself, trying to find a cheap way to source red velvet ribbon for the Christmas decorations. Ten pounds a meter was extortionate, but it looked so lovely, and Ellie wanted the Bluebell Inn to be every bit as welcoming as the photo spreads she’d printed out and which had caught everyone’s imagination. “Come on, sweetheart. You need a quick rinse off and then we’ll sort out the bed.”
While Ava was standing under the shower, Ellie stripped the bed as quietly as she could, and then laid a towel on top of the mattress to absorb what had soaked in before fetching a spare set of sheets from the linen cupboard. She’d have to do a proper disinfectant and clean in the morning.
She’d just finished making the bed when Ava shouted from the bathroom, “Mummy, I’m DONE!”
“Argh,” Jess groaned from where she was buried beneath her duvet. With typical teenaged drama, she turned over with several theatrical sighs, her back to Ellie.
She hurried to fetch Ava, wrapping her in a towel. It took another fifteen minutes to dry her off, comb her hair, and get her in a clean pair of pajamas, and then another fifteen minutes after that before her daughter finally dropped off to sleep and Ellie staggered back to bed. As she crawled in next to Matthew, he let out a satisfied little snore.
Ellie sighed, rolling onto her side, closing her eyes, and willing sleep to come, which of course it didn’t, because it was now four o’clock in the morning, she’d already been up for an hour, and she had far too much racing through her mind to drop off now. She gave herself another hour, tossing and turning and trying to sleep, before she finally slipped out of bed and went downstairs to make herself a cup of tea.
The kitchen was quiet, Daisy curled up in her bed, opening one eye to gaze dolefully at her mistress before she snuggled back down to sleep. Ellie made the tea and sat down at the kitchen table, shivering in the chilly air, as she pulled the to-do list she’d been working on toward her. They had three families booked in for half-term next week, which meant breakfasts and family dinners every day, plus crafts for the children in the afternoons, games in the evening, and the offer of a hike to Sugarloaf Mountain one day, and a trip to the Brecon Beacons the next. Plus, there would be the usual rigmarole of letting guests help out—supervising children as they collected eggs or helped to make scones or whatever else Ellie dreamed up for them to do. She’d offered a “harvest day” as well—picking pumpkins in Gwen’s little patch, and making apple sauce. There would also be an evening of fun Halloween-themed games, including bobbing for apples and pinning the tail on the donkey, although, in this case, it would be pin the eyes on the ghost.
It would be busy enough, arranging all that, but on top of it all, Ellie had to think about Christmas. The journalist from the national newspaper would be here, photographer in tow, the day after the last guests left, and the Bluebell Inn was going to have to look like a Christmas fairy tale come to life. Ellie kept airily insisting to everyone that they could do it, but at five in the morning, when her eyes felt gritty with fatigue and her to-do list ran to two pages, she wondered, and even started to doubt, whether it would happen at all.
The trouble was, Ellie reflected as she took a sip of tea, Christmas had to besuperspecial. It was a big decision for a family to go away for Christmas, to forgo the comforts of home for the unfamiliarity of a hotel, where your bed might not be comfortable, or the food to your liking, and where everything might seem just a bit strange.
“You’re up early,” Gwen remarked as she came into the kitchen, knotting the sash of her dressing gown firmly at her waist.
“So are you,” Ellie replied with a tired smile. She knew Gwen was an early riser, but not this early.
“I couldn’t sleep, so I thought I’d get a start on some scones for the afternoon teas next week. They freeze well.”
“Good idea. The kettle’s just boiled, if you’d like a cup of tea.” She took a sip of her own tea. “Why couldn’t you sleep?”
“Oh, you know.” Ellie couldn’t help but think Gwen sounded a bit evasive as she moved to the kettle to make herself a cup of tea. “Just lots to think about, I suppose.”
“I forgot to ask, how was your catch-up with your old friend yesterday?” Ellie asked. In the usual chaos of a normal family evening, when dishes had to be washed, homework done, gym kit found, as well as her continued work on preparing for the Christmas week, she hadn’t had time to chat with Gwen. “You said she’s staying nearby?”
“He, actually, and yes, in Monmouth.” Gwen turned around, raising her cup to her lips, her gaze lowered to its rim.
