Hope everyone is ok and safe. Usual disclaimers apply. Apologies for the delayed updates, lots of things got in the way. Will hopefully update soon, plus I've got another fic I dug up out of mothballs and might stick up as well. A fair bit of ground is covered in this one but I can promise lots of Joetina developments in the next couple of chapters.
12
The lonely Christmas of Joey Boswell
'Hello? ….Hello?!'
Joey froze, heart doing a tap dance in his ears. He'd thought he was ready. He'd thought he could do this, work up the nerve to give himself the answers he needed and finally close the book on him and Roxy (insofar as that was possible; he had a nasty habit of changing course and running with open arms in her direction, and though she'd completely and utterly destroyed his trust when she walked off in Scotland, and he couldn't see it happening this time, he knew himself too well).
Turned out, even a couple of syllables of her voice through a crackly receiver was enough to turn his knees to jelly. Joey all but fell into a seated position onto the sofa, the phone a weight against his ear.
'Hello?' the husky voice on the other end was getting irritated now.
Joey licked his dry lips.
'Roxy?' His voice shook; his whole body was trembling. He'd thought having your knees knock together was a cartoonish exaggeration, but here was proof it could really happen. They were banging together like anything.
'Joey?'
Joey opened his mouth, but it had dried out completely now – and not just of saliva, either. All the words that had been pooling under his tongue – the demands to know why, how could she do that, how could she get as far as Gretna Green with him and then throw it all back in his face, all the fury he'd wanted to unleash – had been killed stone dead. Her voice was paralysing.
'Joey?'
He swallowed and tried again. Still nothing. His tongue seemed limp, heavy.
'Oh that's your game, is it? Ring me up just to remind me you're there? I told you, Joey, things can't move forward with us until you've done something about your family! If you want to get married, Joey, it needs to be us first! Is that why you rang? To let me know you're finally ready to be a grown man? Or d'you just want to make sure I'm still where you left me?'
Joey opened and closed his mouth to no avail.
'Joey? Joey?!'
A strangulated croak finally forced its way from his voice box, though no words came with it.
'You know what, Joey? Forget it! We've been here so many times before! If your Mam's the great love of your life, then go to her! I won't stand in your way!'
'I –' he finally squeaked out, though Joey wasn't quite sure where he was going with his sentence. The front door slamming open had never come at a better time.
'I've 'ad it! Two pizzas I sold today! Two! How am I supposed to make me commission if nobody's buyin'? How?!'
His Jack had told him, a few years ago, about how Billy had burst into the room, the unexpected hero of the hour in the nick of time, when Carmen had set her sights on him. They'd had a good laugh about it at the time.
Now Joey could see what he meant. Billy's dramatic appearance had snapped him out of his trance and back into his brain enough to act.
'Everything all right there, son?' He found his voice again.
'No point even trying, is there, Joey – I can hear your family in the background – can't even phone me without having a few handcuffed to you just in case – well, forget it, Joey! Until you can make a proper effort, don't bother ringing me again! Go and crawl back into your mother's womb where you belong!'
The tirade hit Joey like a tidal wave, his reassuring smile for Billy's benefit frozen on his face. He shuddered, let it hit him, feeling the salty sting against every fibre of his being and the force of the blow send all his insides tumbling around his body.
'I'm going to bed,' Billy announced, 'if Connie rings, I'm in the pit of a depressive episode!' He stomped halfway up the stairs before slowly descending again.
'Oh, and, er, tell 'er I'll still meet her at the chippy later!'
And he was gone, though Joey had barely heard a word. His hand was still clamped around the receiver, pressing the phone so hard against his head he felt his skull might crack.
He'd tried. He'd completely cocked up what he'd been trying to do.
And yet there was indisputable proof, straight from the horse's mouth – he would never have been able to do enough. Martina had been right.
'Goodbye Roxy,' Joey whispered into the empty receiver, overcome, and slowly put it down.
'You just sat there and said nothing?'
'I don't know what happened…me tongue just sort of…got stuck.'
Martina snorted. 'It's a shame that phenomenon couldn't have occurred in a different time and place…say, in front of my counter during the opening lines of your soliloquy.'
'Yeah, yeah, very funny – eh, eh,' she was walking a bit too briskly; Joey yanked at her elbow, pulling her back into step. She'd be at the other end of the bridge and away before he reached the halfway mark at this rate.
'Walk with me, sweetheart. Walk with me. You're always tearin' off and leavin' me in the dust.'
She had a habit of walking quickly, Joey was discovering, ending up ahead of him if he didn't actively slow her down. He was beginning to see why Shifty had referred to her 'funny little walk'; she always seemed to be in a hurry, an unwarranted urgency in her step. He pulled her arm through his to keep her at his pace.
'I don't know why I couldn't speak,' he returned to the topic at hand, 'I thought it'd be a piece of cake – air me grievances, ask her why...thought it might help me accept for good that it's over and I've got to move on with me life…'
He felt Martina tense against his side.
'Or what's left of it anyway.'
He turned her to face him. Martina squinted up at him, her hair tangling and ruffling in the breeze. God, she looked lovely like that – not that it was appropriate for him to think like that, but he allowed himself to all the same.
'What's wrong with me, Martina? Why did I hang on for so long? And why did it take me losin' just about everything to realise it was never gonna…and why can't I find me courage and tell her what she's done to me…why—'
'Slow down a bit, love,' Martina's hand was on his arm now, squeezing him in reassurance. 'You're still processing, that's all. Takes time.'
A spatter of rain interrupted them, steadily increasing into the beginnings of a decent-sized downpour.
'Got a brolly with you?'
Martina made a face. 'I thought I'd be home by now. I didn't expect you to ambush me the second the DSS closed and drag me out.'
'Here,' Joey opened his own, holding it over them both. 'Now, then, any advice from someone skilled in the art of holdin' in their pain in front of the masses?'
'Oh, yeah – don't let yerself go mad with it. You might do something daft – like losin' all your faculties and running off to Scotland to track down yer arch nemesis.'
Joey couldn't help but laugh.
'Wouldn't be that difficult to track you down, though, would it? Ensconced behind that little desk, day in day out. You're a sitting target.'
'Don't push it, Joey. Just because you haven't driven me into hiding yet doesn't mean you won't.'
'You,' they'd reached the end of the bridge now, and much as Joey would have liked to see her home, a previous engagement beckoned. 'Listen, I'd best be off. I'm going to see our Aveline– my turn to keep her company on bedrest.'
'And I thought you weren't doing that anymore.'
'What, keeping her company?'
Martina made a noise of mock exasperation. 'Running about after yer family.'
'Running about after them is one thing… helpin' out when there's a genuine need is different. And since my dear sister was stricken with pre-eclampsia, she…'
'All right, all right,' Martina's hand was on his shoulder now, gripping a bit too tightly. 'I take the point. I do, as it happens, understand the difference between genuine need and waitin' on someone hand and foot.' She shot a pointed look in his direction, and Joey assumed his best sheepish expression.
'Yeah, well…best be off,' he laughed uneasily. 'You keep the brolly; me Jag's not far from here.'
He rubbed her shoulder, the best goodbye he could manage with the umbrella in the way, and started off into the rain.
'Martina?'
'What?' She turned back, her wet hair plastered to her face. Joey had a sudden flashback to Scotland, to finding a drenched, pitiful little version of her on his doorstep, the moment that had begun whatever this was. He was sorely tempted to grin, work in a little reminder just to make that cross look come to her face – but he'd better not. He was running a bit late as it was.
'See you tomorrow?'
She rolled her eyes. 'See me tomorrow, Joey Boswell my friend, or see me tomorrow, Joey Boswell, diabolical leader of the Boswell gang with a daft new claim, come to drive me to an early retirement I can't afford?'
'Haven't decided yet. But one way or another…' he blew her a kiss before jogging off, hearing her shout something after him but not quite making out the words.
Jack and Leonora were in Oswald's parlour when Joey arrived, the latter sipping tea, the former crunching through a plate of custard creams. They glanced up at him, eyes raking up and down in astonishment, and Joey realised he probably looked like a drowned rat. It had taken him longer than he'd expected to reach his Jag in the pouring rain.
'Chucked yerself in the river, did you, Joey?' Jack leered. 'Or, er…did you get a shower in with somebody!'
'Jack,' Leonora hissed, and the warning look she shot his brother tied knots in Joey's stomach. He knew that look too well, many was the time he'd seen it around the Boswell dinner table recently. Our Joey's fragile because of what Roxy did to him.
Not again. He couldn't bear any more pity. He'd almost rather they thought he'd been up to something sordid.
'That's for me to know, sunshine,' Joey tried to laugh nonchalantly as he sat down, continue his brother's tease, but it didn't help. They were both giving him piteous glances through the corners of their eyes.
'How's our Aveline, then?' he tried one more time to change the subject.
'She won't be long – Oswald's just helpin' her freshen her makeup for the next visitor.'
That, they had all learned, was code for Aveline and Oswald were having another row, and given Aveline in her hormonal state had taken to trying to heave tea trays at anyone who upset her, then sobbing about the state of her press-on nails, they tended to try and pretend these frequent little tiffs weren't happening.
Joey nodded, helping himself to a biscuit and smiling uneasily at his brother and almost sister-in-law.
Leonora wasn't starting to show yet, although she was already in the habit of resting her hand on her stomach, a subtle little tender gesture denoting the little life inside her.
Nice room in Sandford Park, Joey's mind flashed up automatically. Better think about booking her in sooner rather than later. Don't want her to end up in Mill Road Maternity, do we?
Joey kicked himself. Let Jack sort that out. She's his girl, after all. It's his kid. His business.
He strove to distract himself.
'You'll never guess who came to see me t'other day,' Joey was expecting a good laugh from his brother when he announced it, a tonic to his inner struggle to keep his nose out, 'Lilo Lil!'
'Oh, yeh,' Jack stuffed the remainder of the biscuit in his mouth, showering most of his shirt with crumbs. 'She's been to see us and all.'
Joey started at this news. Jack seemed completely unsurprised, a far cry from the reaction he'd been anticipating.
'She went on a bit of a rampage when our Dad was missing. Even Mam had a couple of visits – didn't you notice?'
That one made him blink in surprise. He'd been so preoccupied this last year, he'd barely registered what was going on. He'd been running on fumes and instinct, jumping at each crisis as it arose, spending the rest of his time inside his own head, wondering what to do with himself.
'Terrifyin' for a bloke, innit? Bein' confronted with an example of a woman like that. It upsets the natural order of things.'
Joey would have liked to point out that the natural order of things didn't typically amount to dressing in a pinny and doing the housework for your businesswoman not-wife, but he could hardly talk. He'd been trampled into the ground by a woman himself, in a far worse way. Not many blokes could add left at the altar like a pathetic sod to their list of credentials.
'I rather liked her…' Leonora piped up.
Jack shot her a look of utter betrayal. 'Eh?!'
'Well…she's not quite so handcuffed to your little cluster.'
'Is this the mother of my child talkin'? What's that sort o' talk to say in front o' the baby?'
'For the last time, Jack, the baby can't understand a word we say!'
'We don't know that, do we?!'
They were still twittering at each other as Joey headed upstairs, aware his sister wasn't quite ready for him, but desperate to escape being an unwitting spectator to his brother's row.
Aveline was enthroned in her and Oswald's bed, surrounded by cushions and several tea trays, a feather boa round her neck and an enormous bow in her hair, looking less like a bedridden patient and more like a pampered member of the royal family. Oswald's smile was visibly forced, another tea tray in his hands which he was gripping until his knuckles went white.
'How're you keeping, Princess?' Joey leaned in and kissed her cheek. 'Not long now, eh?'
'Aw 'ey, Joey. I'm worn out on this.'
She looked awfully well on it, but Joey kept his mouth shut.
'Just at look at the state of me body.' She gestured to the enormous lump in the blankets.
'Well, that won't last forever, will it? You're almost ready to pop, and then it'll go down.'
'All this lyin' around. Me muscles are wearing away. Look at me arms,' Aveline jiggled one at him. 'Dinnerlady arms. I'm afraid to even look at me legs! It's one of the things nobody tells yer – that your ankles swell when you're pregnant and your feet puff up. I look down and I think I must be sharin' a bed with a hippopotamus! Oh, Joey – this might be it for me career.'
Aveline's career had been over for a few years now, truthfully, but Joey was tactful enough not to mention that to a heavily pregnant woman who'd already had one scare. He gave her a sympathetic smile instead.
'How're you keepin', Joey? Eh, I heard what happened with that Roxy. Oh, she is a cow.' Aveline's eyes widened and she immediately backpedalled. 'I mean – norra cow – I know you love lit'le animals. But that was dead cruel of 'er, wasn't it! Leavin' you there like that.'
Whatever row Aveline and Oswald had been having before he arrived spilled out, urged out of hibernation by this last comment.
'Oh, so now leaving someone to fend for themselves is cruel, is it? Leaving with a half-thawed piece of fish and some batter smeared across the wall to survive on is cruel, then is it?'
'May I remind you,' Aveline said primly, 'that I am carryin' your child about?!'
'Oh, and what about all those months when you weren't? What were you carrying then? Shall we call it the heavy burden of laziness or sheer vanity?'
'I'm a model, aren't I? I was lookin' out for me career!'
'Oh, yes, your glittering career, modelling tights and posing next to car tyres while the house accumulates dust and filth and your own husband has to come home from work and scavenge for food!'
'Work?! You can't call standin' about wavin' at people in a fancy frock and lecturing 'em work!'
'Er…best be off, hadn't I?' Joey wrang his hands awkwardly. Everywhere he went, he was finding himself in the midst of rowing couples – not exactly a tonic to his disastrous phone call with Roxy. 'Things to do, you know.'
Oswald and Aveline tore themselves away from glaring at each other to simper at him. It was disconcerting.
'I'll show you out,' Oswald led the way back downstairs, and Joey followed gratefully, throwing a wave over his shoulder at the tarra, Joey! Aveline had mustered up in the midst of her fury.
'I'm dreadfully sorry about all that,' Oswald said.
Joey shrugged. He didn't particularly want to get entangled in Aveline and Oswald's squabbles. And besides, he'd been planning, when he got Oswald alone, to have a word with him – and now was as good a time as any.
'I've been meaning to ask you – what's your game with Mam, eh? It's not that we don't like you bein' round, but – before I left she could hardly stand yer and now…'
'I know what it looks like, Joey, believe me, but it's not like that at all. I'm not trying to move in on your territory, it's just…if I didn't have your house and your family to go to…I don't know how I'd cope. Between you and me,' Oswald lowered his voice, 'my own family…the circles I move in…emotions and problems are things to be hidden behind a stiff upper lip. Your mother might burst into hysterics at my being a vicar and the rest of you might erupt into chaos at the slightest blip on your horizon…but it's a warm, comforting place to be. There's real, honest, simple love within those walls. And, er…'
Oswald looked decidedly uncomfortable now, leaning back towards the stairs again just to make sure they were well and truly out of Aveline's earshot before going on.
'I love Aveline dearly, but, er…it does make a welcome change to find a decent plate of food waiting for me and people making an effort to think of me once in a while.'
Joey nodded. Much as his loyalty lay with his sister, he could see Oswald's point. Aveline could have had a wonderful life if she'd shown Oswald any appreciation. And instead, her marriage was more or less in tatters, all her own doing.
'Over there in that little terraced house…it's like a taste of real life for a change. Even the family rows,' he laughed lightly, 'it's all so earthy and…real. A blessing when I needed one.'
Earthy, Joey knew, tended to mean common when posh people said it, but he couldn't really focus on that bit.
'God, and here I was takin' off 'cause there they all were, doin' me head in day in and day out.' An intense surge of guilt, not unlike the one he'd felt in Scotland, flooded through his system. It was sobering, realising that while he had been taking his family for granted of late, indulging in far too much resentment, to someone like Oswald his lot was an enviable one.
'Oh, no, I think you're quite right to take a bit of time for yourself – it's all about balance, you know.'
Joey couldn't work out whether this was genuine or what he wanted to hear. Given his brother-in-law was a man of the cloth, he'd bank on the former.
'Yeah, well…'
'Oh, and – er – thank your mother for her kind invitation to spend Christmas with you, but with Aveline in this state, I don't think moving her anywhere would be wise.'
Oh, God, Christmas. It had crept up on so quickly Joey hadn't even realised it was coming. He froze halfway out the door, counted back, counted forwards, counted again just to make sure. Two weeks.
He hadn't really thought about Christmas this year, but the throat-tightening thought came that if things had gone to plan, this might have been his and Roxy's first together…really together, not just in a tryst at the Adelphi whenever he could sneak away, but in their own place somewhere, feeding each other and kissing under the mistletoe and…
Joey bit his lip so hard he thought it might have bled. It was going to be a rough Christmas this year, and though he'd only just realised it was coming, he was already dreading it.
'It's a funny Christmas, just the two of you.' Nellie had been echoing this sentiment, or variations thereof, ever since they got up early to put the poor turkey in. All through breakfast she'd been lamenting the loss of three of her children (although her husband's absence had been more the target of rage, and there had been at least two guilty thank you phone calls that Joey had counted), all through getting the meal together, and Joey suspected that as soon as Christmas dinner was over, and her gob wasn't temporarily glued shut by food, she'd be lamenting it again.
'Our Jack over there with her, our Adrian out in the world, our Aveline shut up in that mouldy old vicarage, confined to her bed…'
'Mould's a fungus, you know,' Billy said, completely missing the point. 'I read that somewhere. Like li'tle mushrooms growing all over things. Fancy 'avin' little mushrooms on yer ceiling when it gets damp!'
'Billy, that's not summat we wanna hear just before we eat!'
'Just thought it was interesting, that's all.' Disregarding the fact that Nellie was at this very second ladling vegetables into serving dishes, Billy reached for the plate of mince pies in the middle of the table and helped himself to one.
'Bill –' Joey began again, cutting himself off mid-chastisement. He wasn't playing the father figure anymore; why should he tell off Billy for swiping a mince pie just before they ate?
In fact, why shouldn't he swipe one himself? Act a bit more like a brother and less like the one in charge?
Joey leaned across the table and plucked one off the pile, stuffing it into his gob.
It might have been the fact that he was taking it when he wasn't supposed to, or that he was making a point of taking it when he wasn't supposed to, but it tasted all the better for it, and he savoured his little personal victory as much as the mince pie itself.
'Eh, Mam,' Billy sprayed crumbs out of his gob and across the table, 'remember that year you got rid of everything…'
'Billy, what good will bringin' that story up do?'
'And we all went out and sang carols and you shoved the Christmas tree out into the street? And all cause we got a card from – '
'Billy…' Joey growled. Much as he wanted to take a step back, he couldn't bear hysterics about Lilo Lil. This day was going to be difficult enough to get through as it was. The eldest Boswell found himself longing for Adrian's exasperation, the poet either shrieking in retaliation or shoving foodstuffs into Billy's gob to shut him up.
'A threadbare table it's going to look this year. I thought we might have our Grandad in here with us, fill one of the empty chairs.'
Both Boswell brothers all but choked on their stolen pastries.
'He won't stand for that, Mam!' Joey's words came out as half a laugh. It had been a strange, sad, lonely year, but that seemed a bit too desperate an act to amount to anything. 'He's embedded over there! You'd have to dig him out with a chisel!'
'Well, I've invited Connie round. She can fill one of the empty chairs, can't she?'
This time, Joey actually did choke on his mince pie, spluttering it out all over the table. That wasn't going to go down well with their Mam.
'You invited that…that little tart to our home on Christmas Day?!' Never had so many words in the same sentence been emphasised. It seemed Nellie couldn't work out which aspect of this news was the worst bit.
Steady on, Mam, immediately sprang to Joey's mind. if he wants to bring his person, we can't well stop him. He stopped short of saying it, though. Billy needed to fight his own battles – and given his innocently glib expression, he was fairly oblivious to the seriousness of Nellie's objection anyway.
'Eh – I asked her again if she'd marry me last night,' Billy beamed as he regaled his brother with the anecdote, 'and she said maybe, Billy, in a couple of years when I've lived a bit more first.'
'Ah,' Joey didn't know what else to say. He reached for his paper.
'That's great, isn't it? Only two more years!'
'Two more years of those legs under my kitchen table,' Nellie harrumphed, scouring a pan until some of the Teflon came off. 'And then what? More sobbing when the second divorce comes around – nothing good'll come of it, son! Nothing good!'
'I'll, er…' Joey got to his feet before either he or they decided it was time he intervened, 'I'll go and see if we can coax Grandad out of his shell. Back in a tick.'
'Where's me Christmas dinner?' Grandad demanded the second he opened the door, peering at Joey as if trying to glimpse a picture of his meal inside Joey's mind.
'It's next door, Grandad.'
'Fat lot o' good it'll do me over there! Fetch it!'
'Ah –'
'Don't just stand there wonderin' which side yer 'air's parted! Fetch it, I said!'
'We thought you might have it with us this year, Grandad.'
'Have you gone soft in the 'ead?! I eat me Christmas dinner in me own 'ome! Don't hang about – fetch it! Ooh, treatin' me like a mongrel to call at will…you'll be sorry when I've gone!' he shuffled back inside, and Joey hastened to follow.
A loving, family Christmas, eh?
He shook his head to himself in mirth as he stepped into the parlour to find the old man had planted himself firmly back into his armchair. He'd been ridiculed by Martina when he'd expressed this sentiment to her, the DSS lady reminding him that loving family meals seemed to be a daily occurrence in his house, if his spiels down the Social Security were anything to go on.
It would be nice to ring her later, have a good laugh about Grandad's shock uprooting, though he knew that wasn't likely. She'd gone to stay with her parents over Christmas; there wasn't much chance he'd hear from her. Funny, in spite of her digs about the Boswells and her insistence she wasn't as close with them as his tight-knit little unit, she spent quite a lot of time with her family, talked about them frequently, seemed to miss her cousins and worry about her brother a lot. It was endearing, the thought of her gathering around the table with them, probably showing her softer side.
'What's that daft look on yer face? That woman 'asn't got her claws in again, has she?'
Joey blinked. Grandad was glaring through his pince-nez, his beady little eyes scrutinising him with suspicion.
'Ooh, you've come over all soppy! I'd thought you'd 'ave learned yer lesson after she made an idiot of you! Don't let them get yer on a lead! Go crawling back and they'll only keep doing it until your dignity wears away…'
'No, no,' Joey hastened to correct, snapping himself out of it. 'Roxy's…she's gone. For …for good.' His voice still shook to admit it; it wasn't something he could come to terms with overnight. His dreams were still plagued with her, relentless even as he tried not to think of her during the day.
'You all think I'm soft in the head! That I can't see what's in front of me eyes! I know that look! Those soppy eyes and that winsome smile…she's in that brain of yours…'
'I was just thinking about what me friend was doing, that was all.'
'Friend? You don't waste much time do you?! Well, tsek yer Grandad's advice – go and get the hanky panky over with. Get it out the way! Clear your brain and get back to normal.'
'No – no—she's just a friend, that's all.' Martina would never let him get any hanky panky out of the way, either, he supposed.
'I called Edie Mathieson a friend to anyone who asked,' Grandad was giving him that cheeky boyish grin Joey normally loved, but was irking him a bit today. 'Fell for it, they did. May and Edie's friends…but you can't fool yer old Grandad. I've done it all! I know all the tricks.'
'Look, Grandad, it's not…' Joey gave up. It seemed his grandfather had a one track mind at times – that track being Edie Mathieson. He was off again, rambling and reminiscing about her, his eyes glimmering as he regaled Joey with yet another account of their little affair, and the eldest Boswell reflected upon the fact that the older his grandad got, the higher Edie Mathieson's pedestal seemed to grow. He'd elevated her to a point that vastly surpassed perfection, and Joey had begun to wonder, as his Grandad's Edie stories became more outlandish, the heroine herself more angelic, whether the old man's mind was simply playing tricks, creating a lovely un-memory of something that never was.
And it made him wonder…had he done that with Roxy? He still thought wistfully of some of the lovely memories…strolling through Sefton Park arm in arm…that first night at the Adelphi in all their passionate, new-relationship bliss…
…leaving Sefton Park separately after Roxy had got the hump over something trivial…bellowing at each other from opposite sides of the suite in the Adelphi, because Joey's mobile had rung…
Perhaps he'd better have a word with himself about romanticising the way things never were. Seemed those rose-coloured glasses ran in the family.
'Come 'ed, Grandad,' he slapped his thigh and stood up, not quite pulling off his old cheery self but doing his best, 'let's go and have us dinner, eh? No sense sittin' in the cold by yourself on Christmas Day, is there?'
'I'll put me fire on,' Grandad folded his arms, clutching at the sides of his cardigan.
'Just think,' Joey thought on the spot, 'you can have your allotted portion on a tray in here…or you could be right in front of the entire spread! Second helpings…pudding fresh out of its cloth, no waitin' for it to come lukewarm from next door…'
He hadn't really expected this coaxing to work, but it had given Grandad pause.
'Second helpings?' What was left of his eyebrows twitched.
'There won't be as many of us, either. You might even get thirds.'
He could see the little lights flash in his grandfather's mind.
'Ay, go on then,' the old man struggled to his feet, tapping his cane around on the floor until Joey came over and steadied him.
By the time they got back Billy and Connie had already started the meal, their first course consisting of each other's tongues.
'All that canoodling…they'll wear themselves out! Get out of it! Put us all off, you will!' Grandad waved his stick in their faces, practically shoving their faces apart. 'Go on, get out of it!'
'You came, Grandad!' Nellie was made up – more so even than Joey had expected. He supposed his and Adrian's disappearances, and Jack's decision at the last minute to spend Christmas with Leonora's posh family instead of his own, were weighing on her even more than her lamentations gave away.
'Ooh, summoned round like a common servant!' Grandad grumbled to Nellie the second he'd sat down. 'I eat Christmas dinner in me own domain, I do!'
He made a sour face at Joey as the eldest Boswell set his plate in front of him.
'Brussels sprouts?! Brussels sprouts?! What've you given me them for?! You know I don't eat the middle bits on them! Go on, tek it back! Cut them out! Go on!'
Joey sighed, taking the plate, which Grandad was still jabbing in the direction of his nose, and resigning himself to cutting the hearts out of the Brussels sprouts. Funny, he hadn't really thought as far ahead as Christmas, but the possibility of what could have been came seeping in under the cracks of his mind like a winter wind. Him and Roxy in a little flat somewhere, or maybe the Adelphi, clinking glasses of champagne, laughing, embracing, and then…
No. That avenue was closed to him. And besides, Joey thought, blinking a tear back as he handed Grandad's plate over again, last time he'd been at the Adelphi with Roxy, she'd guilt tripped him about spending Christmas day with his family and then spent the rest of the visit making eyes at members of the hotel staff – whether genuinely or just to spite him he wasn't sure, but it had stung all the same. That's what his life would have been, he had to remind himself. Roxy digging in the knife where it hurt, every time he didn't toe the line.
Forget it, Joey. I'm going…
—No. You're not doin' this, son. Not on Christmas.
He forced himself to concentrate on his Christmas dinner, but he didn't feel like doing much other than pick at it.
The afternoon wore on, only getting worse. As Christmas Days went, this one didn't quite take the biscuit as the worst (his Mam's nervous breakdown two years ago was still reigning champion), but it was a far cry from Joey's favourite.
Seeing the afternoon out watching telly, Billy and Connie entangled with each other in and all over the armchair, his Mam and Grandad muttering to themselves, wasn't doing much to lift his spirit.
He was still moping, wondering if a quick trip to the pub might be in order, when his mobile burst into life.
Well, she couldn't say she wasn't expecting her Christmas to be dull, but Martina couldn't help but be disappointed anyway. It was like this every year – she'd turn up at her parents' flat on Christmas Eve, get roped into doing most of the chores and slope away on Christmas night with indigestion and a dim sense that things at home were getting more and more disjointed.
She'd got a jigsaw off her parents, one of the few remaining traditions they had, but that was just about the only bright spot of the day. Only her Mam had bothered to come to Mass with her; her brother had turned up around eleven with his wife and overexcited kids and left Martina to deal with them while he and her dad disappeared to the pub. She'd been up since six peeling potatoes for her Mam, only to find, once they got the turkey out at two and realised it wasn't ready yet despite being in all morning, that that was all they'd be eating until four o'clock. And now all she could do was wait until it had finished cooking, her family ignoring her in favour of the idiot box.
Her thoughts wandered towards Joey. She had a good mind to ring him, just to cut a swathe through her boredom.
It wasn't good for her, this friendship of theirs. She'd known that from the minute she'd agreed to go for lunch with him. Befriending someone for whom you had once harboured a resentfully dying flame of unrequited love wasn't exactly sensible. It could potentially help put that flame out, cure her of it, evolve their relationship into something happily platonic – or it could backfire, exacerbating her feelings, pouring paraffin on them and letting them rage out of control. And that was before she even began to factor in the Social Security, and all the complications that came with befriending someone she had to deal with there.
She couldn't bring herself to stay away, though. She was enjoying being around him, she really was – and if she could detach herself from that little part of her heart, they could be onto something quite good here.
Her hand seemed to move on its own, dialling his number.
'Season's Greetings!'
She couldn't stop her eyes rolling at that one. 'You were just waiting for someone to ring so you could say that, weren't yer?'
'Martina!'
'No need to get so excited. It's not Father Christmas or anything.' She'd never let him know how made up she was to hear him react to her like that.
'Just pleased to hear from you, that's all. Where are you ringin' me from?'
'Me parents' flat.' Now they'd got this far into the conversation, Martina wasn't sure how to proceed. She hadn't thought much further than ringing him, consumed by her own boredom enough to pick up the receiver and dial. It was a bit awkward to ask him what he was doing.
She asked anyway, just to keep the conversation going.
'Not a great deal, to be honest. Me fam-i-ly are watching Fools and Horses.'
Again, an oddly ordinary and boring activity for a family she had been sure not long ago did nothing other than sit around thinking up devious ways to get more money and going off to enigmatic mafia-style jobs. Strange as well that both of them were here, on the phone to each other while their respective parents sat around doing almost exactly the same thing.
Just showed. Life wasn't all that interesting, no matter what you did to try and pretend otherwise.
'And mine are.'
'I'm not really payin' attention to it, to be honest.'
Martina hummed. She wasn't really either. She had a Radio Times open on her lap, but the idea of flicking through it to find something else to watch didn't hold much interest.
'It's a bit hard to when Billy and Connie are turning snogging into an Olympic event on me armchair.'
Martina laughed then, unable to stop herself.
'And I thought my family nattering to each other and providin' a running commentary on something dull was bad enough.'
'Obligatory family gatherings aside, what are you doin' tomorrow?'
'The jigsaw puzzle I got for Christmas.'
Joey's disbelieving snort whistled down the line.
'What an exciting life you lead, Miss Hennessey.'
'Don't pretend yours is any more interesting, Mister Boswell. I know you better than that now.'
'Fancy going out for a bit tomorrow morning? Break the routine?'
'You don't suppose I've got better things to do?'
'Like doing jigsaws and watching Christmas specials you're not interested in?'
He had her there.
'Won't your united little family notice you're missing?'
'My united family, as you put it…'
'Namely because that's how you refer to your family when you're trying to con money out of my department…'
She heard Joey snort down the line.
'Have all scattered to the winds,' he finished. 'Leaving me alone with my mother and aged grandfather, who are both more or less asleep in front of the television, and my obnoxious youngest brother and his equally obnoxious girlfriend, who are at the moment more interested in extractin' each other's tonsils than they are spending any quality time as a family. I doubt they'll be up to much more than the same again come tomorrow morning.'
Joey sighed heavily. 'It's not the same. Come on, Martina. Let's go out tomorrow. Out out, I mean. Outside. Somewhere with fresh air.'
'And why d'you need me to do that?'
'Would you deprive a pathetic, lonely soul a bit of much-needed company during this charitable season?' A bit of a whine crept into his voice at that. God, she wished she'd never been sympathetic about his loneliness. He seemed to use it as an excuse just about every time he saw her, in a bid to get her to go places and do things she wasn't in the mood for.
'Oh, go on, then.'
She'd have been lying if she said she wasn't a little bit flattered. He wanted – genuinely wanted – to spend time with her, something that didn't happen often. Most of the time, her company was usually something fellas put up with in the hope of getting something else later in the evening, or she was nothing more than a verbal punching bag for restrictions on allowances that the government had decided on, not her.
And knowing that Boxing Day now held a visit with him, much as she was loath to admit it, was enough to brighten the rest of a dull day.
Martina hadn't got home til gone eleven last night, and yet she'd still managed to be up early today. It messed with her sleep routine, being away from her own bed – or perhaps it was the knowledge that she was meant to be meeting Joey this morning that had kept her from getting a full forty winks. She was turning into a bloody fool, letting Joey Boswell mess with her senses like this, and yet here she was again, turning her plans inside out to snatch a bit of extra time with him, wrapped up and out on the street waiting for him while the rest of the city slept off their post-Christmas hangovers and indigestion.
It wasn't hard to spot him.
His nose looked a bit red, bitten by the cold; he was swaddled in so many dark leather garments he looked like a strange coal-coloured snowman, he was grinning at her in that annoying manner of his, and yet Martina had never been so pleased to see anyone.
'I didn't think to get you anything,' Joey said apologetically.
Martina shrugged; it hadn't even crossed her mind. 'Neither did I.'
And then she smirked, a memory coming back to her. 'I've still got that present you gave me a couple of years back to sustain me.'
Joey frowned. 'What present I gave you a couple of years back?'
'Dear Martina,' Martina recited. She had kept the little card that came with it, amused out of her mind even if she didn't like to admit it, and she had read it so many times in a state of mirth that she remembered it by heart, 'instead of screaming next, press one and squeeze two.'
Joey's startled laugh echoed across the docks.
'Oh, that present!'
'For all that card said it was from all of yer, I could see your devious mind written all over it. Nobody would have given me a prank gift like that except you. Certainly not your brothers. They don't have that infuriating sense of humour you think you've got.'
'Shame I don't see you use that horn,' Joey teased, nudging her shoulder. 'It'd give your poor tonsils a break.'
'I use it to scare away stray cats from around me building,' Martina informed him, causing the eldest Boswell to erupt in a fit of laughter again.
'Shouldn't be tormentin' poor little strays like that,' Joey admonished. 'All they're doin' is looking for a few scraps and somewhere to stop the night.'
'All they're doing is getting into brawls, finding other cats to satisfy their urges and screeching all night. Anyway,' she changed the subject, not keen to get into another discussion on his (in her opinion) pretend love of animals, 'I 'aven't got any tonsils. I had them out when I was twelve. Thought I might as well set the record straight for next time you want to use that one down the DSS.'
'Mine are still intact,' Joey boasted, and she smacked him on the shoulder.
'Is everything a competition with you?'
'Never mind that now. I always wondered what happened when our Aveline dropped that off with you. You'll have to finish the story now—I don't think me nerves can stand the suspense.'
'Your Aveline brought it to me,' she said, remembering. 'That was the first time I realised there were even more of yer. Females to perpetuate the species. I don't think I've seen anyone look so trapped by their own clothes and shoes, either. She could barely move her legs enough to propel herself over to me counter.'
'A good, kind soul, our Aveline, if you can look past her dress sense.'
'She spent about half an hour at my counter arguing with her husband because she'd been in there too long and got him a parking ticket.'
She was treated to another of his ringing laughs, echoing across the docks.
'Well, then, Mister Boswell, we're out here, what do we do?'
Joey shrugged, and it surprised her that cunning, scheming Joey Boswell had come out without any sort of plan.
'Fancy coming back to mine? We could watch telly, get bored and – and—you could be interrogated by me fam-i-ly. Happy times all round.'
'I think I'll pass on that one, if it's all the same.'
'You'd love bein' surrounded by Boswells, admit it, sweetheart.' Joey pulled her woolly hat down over her eyes.
'Oi!'
Wrestling with her impromptu blindfold may have impaired her vision, but she didn't need it to enjoy Joey's ringing laugh. She could picture his head thrown back, the way his mouth curved, the way his eyes twinkled. He was still grinning by the time she'd righted her hat and fixed her hair, and the sight of it made the reprimand she'd been planning die on her tongue.
'Losing your agility there, are you? Not like you to be defeated by a hat.'
'Probably me Christmas dinner still sitting in me stomach and slowing me down. We didn't have it til four.'
Joey frowned. 'That's a bit late for Christmas dinner.'
'The turkey wasn't ready.'
'Go vegetarian, sweetheart. It'll change your life – and you need never worry again about how long to time poor little dead animals in the oven.'
'And if I believed for even a second that you genuinely were a vegetarian,' Martina tugged at his leather jacket in retaliation, 'I'd be more inclined to listen to yer when you say things like that.'
She sighed, righting her hat and scarf. 'I'd best be off. I've got all me washing and cleaning to sort today after being away.'
Joey had grabbed her hand so quickly, so suddenly the surprise almost knocked her off balance.
'Stay five more minutes, won't yer?'
'What for?'
'Cure me loneliness just a little bit more?'
Martina looked down at their joined hands, a tangle of red wool and black leather. There was a desperation in his grip she wasn't expecting, his fingers vice-like, crushing her own. Joey didn't even seem fully aware of it, either. He may be putting on a brave face, play-acting at being all right, trying to make her believe his violin-worthy tirades about his loneliness were just a joke – but she knew better than that. Something about Roxy was hitting him particularly hard today.
She probably shouldn't have – she was trying not to be too familiar with him, let herself get too attached – but the urge to lean against him and rest her head on his shoulder was too strong. She gave in to it, feeling Joey's head come to rest against hers.
'The more you play that card, the less effect it has on me, Mister Boswell,' Martina said, but her voice wasn't convincing enough. 'Five minutes, mind, and then I'm off, and no sob-story or guilt trip is gonna change me mind.'
Staying five more minutes was the thin end of the wedge, she knew, in spite of what she might insist to him. It would lead to staying out and having lunch with him, then staying out to go for a bit of a walk in the park and she probably wouldn't get home til dinnertime. If she gave in now, she was indirectly agreeing to spending the whole day out. Oh, well.
It was an exhilaratingly peaceful experience, a paradox of a moment in which she was thrilled and calmed at once. It was wonderful standing here, Joey's gloved hand clasped around hers, and for one brief, daft moment she wondered if it would be possible to never let go.
Not that she still had those thoughts about Joey Boswell. Those thoughts were long gone, chased away by his arrogance over the years, and by a friendship that had revealed a rawer, realer version of him. And that friendship had cured her of any desire for him she might have once had.
Well, that was what she kept telling herself, anyway.
It wasn't true.
