It Never Snows at Christmas MP3
Read by Gloria Sanders
‘Every year, she comes, and every year it’s the same. “Have you been on holiday, Laura?” “Yes. Greece, actually.” “Greece? Really?”.’
‘Esme.’
‘“Oh, and I’ve brought you a bottle of Greek wine.” “Oh, Laura, you shouldn’t have.”’
‘Phoebe!’
‘It tastes like wee.’
‘How would you know?’
‘Girls, please stop bickering, please. Greek wine does not taste like wee.’
‘And why must she always go to Greece?’
‘Greece is very nice.’
‘But, mother, it’s all she ever talks about: her utterly tedious cruise from one utterly tedious Greek island to the next. Samos or Patmos or Mikonos or Matalan or Chlamydia or-’
‘Phoebe.’
‘How did you ever get involved with her in the first place?’
‘With Laura?’
‘Yes, mother, with Laura. Of course with Laura.’
‘All right, dear.’
Phoebe says, ‘Every year, every Christmas day evening, she comes here for “supper”. God, I loathe that word.’ And Esme says, ‘Dear God in heaven, how did we ever allow this to happen? What’s to become of us?’
‘Stop being silly, darlings.’
The girls explain to each other, again, how their mother - and therefore all of them - got involved with Laura in the first place. Something about piano lessons, years ago, the exact details lost in the dim and distant mists of time. Mum and dad felt terribly sorry for her, an only child, with her terrible parents, well, her terrible mother anyway (her dad is dead and no-one ever mentions him) and it’s all very sad and you have to feel sorry for her, really, and somehow it’s become this annual ritual, every Christmas Day at eight o’clock, for years and years and years, forever, she comes and has supper with them.
And after supper (just left-overs and salad, really) they will play cards or the name game or In the Manner of the Word (Laura isn’t very good at that), and then the girls might stand by the piano and sing while father hammers away at a carol or two, and meanwhile Laura will glow with drink and good food and happiness and the company of nice people at Christmas.
The girls reflect, not for the first time, that this is probably the only thing poor Laura has to look forward to each year. But, still, they don’t have all of mum’s old piano pupils round for dinner every Christmas, do they? No. Just Laura. Oh, God. And she’s so weird-looking: no chin, and that nose. And why can’t she ever do anything about her hair?
Celia tells the girls to stop being so cruel. She shouts up to Alan. He’s still looking for his cuff-links.
‘Which ones?’
‘The ones you got me last year. Why can I never find anything in this house?’
‘Just wear anything. She’ll be here any second.’
‘Yes, she will,’ says Phoebe, holding five upside-down wine glasses by the base – two in one hand, three in the other.
‘Yes, she will,’ says Esme, arranging the five white napkins in five silver napkin-rings.
‘Will she tell us about all the fascinating things she’s been up to this year?’
‘Yes, she will.’
‘The action-packed life she leads, it’s a wonder she has the time to fit us into her busy schedule.’
‘Girls ...’
‘Addressing the United Nations.’
‘Finding a cure for cancer.’
‘Saving the world from global warming.’
‘Girls, seriously, stop being so monstrous. Where is your father? He has to open the champagne as soon as she arrives.’
‘Why are we wasting champagne on her?’
‘She never even finishes her first glass anyway.’
‘One sip and she’s under the table.’
‘And always going on about a white Christmas. Oooh, will it snow this year, do you think? No, of course it won’t.’
‘It never snows at Christmas.’
‘Girls. Enough. Sit at the table and be quiet, or make yourselves useful, or something. Do something.’
‘But, mother, dearest,’ says Esme. ‘Everything is done.’
And it is. The table is on fire with reflected candle flames in every surface – glass, silver, glossy ribbons, a golden paper cracker at every setting. She smiles in spite of how annoyed and flustered she’s feeling. Her daughters have, as usual, worked wonders. The light in the room is just right, the number of candles is neither too many nor too few, the cutlery is exactly aligned, the glasses are spotless.
But something is missing. At that exact moment, Phoebe is plugging her iPhone into the stereo, and pressing play. Nat King Cole begins to sing, his voice almost drowning in strings and sleigh-bells. Perfect.
‘She’s late.’
It’s Alan, standing in the doorway, still fiddling with his cuff-links.
‘Not like her to be late,’ he continues, coming into the room without even looking at the splendid atmosphere they’ve worked so hard to create.
‘Alan, darling, I hope you remembered to put the champagne in the fridge this afternoon ...’
‘Why are we wasting champagne on her?’
‘That’s what I said.’
‘Never even finishes her first glass.’
‘That’s what I said.’
‘Girls. Alan. You and those wretched cuff-links. Come here.’
‘Ten minutes late. Not like her. Thanks, darling. If there’s one thing you can rely on, every year, it’s Laura, eight o’clock, on the dot.’
‘Mother, suppose there’s been ... an ... an ... an accident?’
‘A hideous mangled twist of metal all that remains of her little blue bicycle.’
‘Phoebe. Esme.’
‘Or perhaps she’s the latest victim of the Christmas Day Strangler. Who knows where the nefarious beast will strike next?’
‘Girls. What have I done, to deserve such monsters? She is late. Darling, get me a drink, will you? Where are her presents?’
‘Under the tree, of course, mother dearest.’
‘Gin and tonic?’
‘Perfect.’
Alan goes to the kitchen to get the drinks. Celia stands with her hands on the back of a chair. Poor old Laura, with her frankly bizarre hair and no chin, and that nose. And her endless stories of the tedious things she’s been up to all year. It’s unbearable to think of her alone, at Christmas. Unbearable, really, to think of anyone alone, at this time of year.
But, God, she’s hard work. That Greek wine she insists on giving them. Every year they all say, with real feeling, you shouldn’t have, but she always does. Just one of those people who never gets the message. And so naïve, so unworldly, for someone almost in her forties. And so childish in her love of what she insists on calling the ‘festive season’.
She sighs. The girls sigh. They are both standing exactly as she is standing, hands on the back of a chair, imitating their mother rather well, she is annoyed to have to admit.
‘Girls,’ she says, shaking her head, as they collapse into giggles.
Then Esme says, back in Laura mode, ‘Oooh, Will it snow this year, do you think, do you, do you?’
And Phoebe says, ‘A white Christmas would be so nice, actually. Just once. Maybe this year. You never know. Oh, God.’
What does Laura think of them? Celia has often wondered. She must enjoy her visits or why would she bother? She’s very lonely, of course. The kind of person who puts a ‘brave face’ on everything. Because she has to. Celia and Esme and Phoebe and Alan have never had to do that because the circumstances have never arisen. They are brave. They don’t need a brave face.
Or are they just rich? Celia calls to her husband, wondering what’s happened to that drink. Still no sign of their guest.
He brings the two glasses through and reminds the girls to please be on their best behaviour. In mock outrage, they protest that they’re always on their best behaviour, Daddy, and Celia says Girls and the whole thing starts again, or just carries on.
Outside, not far away, almost there, Laura Sharp has leaned her blue bicycle against a high wall. She is watching the snow falling, in that silence that only snow knows how to do. The snow falls on the parked cars and the pavements and the bottles of wine in bicycle baskets. It falls everywhere – on the houses of the boring and the brilliant, the houses of the kind and the cruel.
(c) Peter Higgins, 2017
Born in Dewsbury, Peter Higgins now lives and works in London. He work has appeared in Open Pen, Penpusher, and Tales of the Decongested. His debut novel, Death in a Northern Town, is a darkly comic tale of teenage rivalry, chocolate, and the Yorkshire Ripper. Perhaps not surprisingly, it remains unpublished.
Gloria Sanders’s work includes audio-book narration for the RNIB and collaborations with Cabinets of Curiosity. She has performed her devised one-woman show with Hide & Seek Theatre, The Clock, at the Brighton Fringe, the Pleasance, Islington, and the Artscene Festival in Ghent. She is fluent in Spanish.
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