Dear Delia,

I can't remember when I've heard better news! Oh Deels I am so, so happy for you! It is a wonderful sign that it's all coming back so clearly. What does the Doctor say about it? I'm afraid I don't know as much as I could about recovery from amnesia, but regaining these memories must be a good indicator that the rest could come back soon too? Thank you so much for sharing those stories with me, I loved reading about your adventures as a little girl. You have told me before in passing that you were lost at a fair once and that the people who worked there were so kind to you that you hadn't wanted to go home (you were trying to entice me to take the train to visit a fair with you in Brighton at the time!), but I didn't know about Susan, or that you had wanted to work at a fairground because of the candy floss! If I were any kind of an artist I think I might be tempted to paint the image of a small dark haired girl in blue gingham, smiling unconcernedly and hugging a big red balloon in the middle of a busy fairground as if her heart's truest desire had been realized. I would call the painting 'Susan' and everyone but you and I would think it was named for the child! Do you remember how long you kept that balloon after you left the fair? I don't suppose you still have its remnants tucked away somewhere. Alas 'forever and ever' to a three year old is rarely as long as we expect it to be. But perhaps that is for the best or I for one would be eating nothing but bread and butter pudding to this day, as I asserted after a particularly delicious serving as a toddler that I was going to eat only 'nana's bed and butty puddim' forever and ever (I know, who would have guessed that my younger self would have such dreadful diction? But alas, it was so).

Of course I meant it when I said I would visit, I would like nothing better! I actually asked your mother in the hospital if I might be allowed to come and see you now and again, but at the time you were so unwell and the shock so fresh that I don't think she liked the thought of having well meaning friends cluttering up the place and she rather discouraged the idea. After that I didn't want to push, but if you want me to come there is nothing on Earth that could stop me. A trip to the seaside sounds utterly delightful but if it's too much you needn't concern yourself about entertaining me. I would be just as happy planting tulip bulbs in your garden or even just sliding round your bedroom floor in stockings and going for short walks down to the village. I don't mind a bit what we do as I shall be there simply to see you and one way or another, whatever we set out to do we always have a splendid time. If you let me know what dates would suit you best I will talk to Sister Julienne about getting a few days leave. I'm not sure when I last took a holiday and I have never been to Wales, so it's all rather exciting! Ought I to write to your mother and ask her permission to come though? I would hate to make her feel I had forced my way in against her wishes, especially after I asked and was turned down by her once before, even if that was in the immediate aftermath of your injury. If she isn't happy with the idea of a house guest I'm sure I could find a boarding house somewhere not too far away so that we might have day visits at least?

The Christmas concert went swimmingly. The girls' brigade had been working very hard to get their band up to snuff and they acquitted themselves beautifully in their piece. We were all left speechless and Sister Mary Cynthia (who remembers having to encourage the girl even to speak in public a year or two ago) teared up a little when a shy young lady named Sheryl surprised us all with an achingly beautiful solo of 'silent night'. Then there was a sermon of course, with Mrs Turner and her community choir leading the hymns, and then it was our turn. We very nearly had a disaster on our hands even after I managed to get Steven's solemn oath that he would not play Scrooge as Mr Larson (the headmaster I mentioned before).

Do you remember Alfie, the boy I told you about who sat on his camera during the pinhole session we did a few weeks ago? Well it seems he really is extremely accident prone (or perhaps he is in the midst of another growth spurt and it's making him uncoordinated) because just three days before we were due to perform he took a tumble down a flight of stairs and fractured his tibia! (You needn't worry as he's quite alright now and is rather enjoying the status his cast gives him). He was meant to be the ghost of Christmas yet to come, but we felt it might rather detract from his ominous presence to have him limping along in plaster as he showed Scrooge the doom he was inviting on himself. We had to have a last minute cast shuffle so that Alfie could be Tiny Tim - that way the crutches would be entirely in keeping with his character. This would have been a perfect solution if it weren't for the fact that Alfie is a robust and hearty lad and rather taller than the boy playing his father, so all the mentions of poor, frail (and above all LITTLE) Tiny Tim took on a rather comic air. Still, the boys all remembered their lines in spite of the short notice changes and at the end of the show one or two people told us how much they enjoyed the comedy aspect, so of course we all just smiled along and pretended the casting had been done that way deliberately!

Your parcel arrived safely and I have put it away ready for Christmas morning as you asked (though it took a great deal of self control as I am as excited as a child about it!). I will open it at 7.30 on the dot, and perhaps you could open yours from me at the same time? I'm not sure what your family tradition is on Christmas morning, but hopefully you'll be able to take a few minutes at that time. Trixie, Barbara and I have agreed to have our own little family Christmas morning together, but I have made sure that it won't begin until 8am so you and I can exchange our Christmas presents first. That way it won't get lost in all the hullabaloo that is bound to ensue when Barbara bounces in in her pyjamas like a child coming to tell her parents it's Christmas day! Trixie and I have been putting our heads together the last few days to come up with ways to make the holiday special for her as we're afraid she may feel rather sad and homesick otherwise. There tends to be quite the religious focus here at Nonnatus House for the rest of the occupants (they are nuns after all, so what can one expect?) so it can be quite a solemn occasion if we let it (at least until Christmas dinner when everyone is in a more celebratory mood) and although Barbara comes from a church family and must be used to that, she has also been telling us all sorts of stories about the little family traditions she has back home. She was supposed to be going to spend the holidays with her family in Liverpool, but she just received word from her father saying there has been an outbreak of scarlet fever and she should stay away to avoid bringing it back to the newborns of Poplar, so the poor girl has found herself at a bit of a loose end.

The day she got the letter telling her not to come home I found her sitting on the steps looking utterly woebegone and as though she might be about to shed a tear or two. She told me about how her father still has her write a letter to Santa Claus and send it up the chimney the way he had done when he was a little boy, because he says someone who does so much for others as she does ought to send a little wish for herself heavenward at this time of year, and how he still makes sure she has a stocking to wake up to on Christmas morning even now she's grown up. She made all the games and laughter of the morning sound so jolly that it rather made me want to be a part of it too. Trixie and I are old hands at Christmas spent away from the trappings of childhood, but as this will be Barbara's first Christmas away from her family I feel almost maternal towards her over it and have been planning to recreate the experience for her as best I can.

So last night I brought out paper and pens and told Trixie and Barbara we were going to write our Christmas letters to Santa. Trixie was a little bemused at first, but I think she understood when she saw the look on Barbara's face and after that she joined in gamely enough. It wasn't so much the activity itself after all, but the family feeling behind it and the fact that we were doing it to give Christmas to a friend who had thought she was going to miss out (and really, after having a beach party in December simply writing letters to a magical wish granter from the North Pole seems tame by comparison!). We had a whale of a time coming up with preposterous Christmas wishes and when Sister Monica Joan saw what we were doing she showed us the trick she learnt as a girl to create a draft that would ensure the letters went straight up the chimney (and so directly into the hands of jolly old St Nick) instead of catching in the flames and being burned away.

In spite of the fire trick I have decided to not to rely solely on our letters to bring about a merry Christmas morning and am over at the Noakes' house this evening, watching little Freddie while Chummy and Sergeant Noakes go out to the cinema in exchange for the use of Chummy's Singer (we do have a sewing machine at Nonnatus but I wanted this to be a surprise). I'm afraid I will never win any awards for my sewing, but I can manage well enough to piece together a couple of big stocking shapes out of red felt and I had fun earlier today going round the market choosing little presents to fill them for Trixie and Babs. We never really had big family Christmases when I was a girl so I am rather enjoying putting the extra effort in to planning this one, especially as the unexpected lull in both the number of women going into labour and medical disasters to be dealt with has left me with rather more energy and time than I am used to!

I do hope you'll like your gifts Deels, I'm sending the parcel along with this letter all ready for Christmas. The package on top is your present from the nuns, but it will be best fresh so you might want to open that one right away rather than waiting for Sunday. The rest should be perfectly safe to be kept though, and I made sure that all the parcels in the box are individually wrapped and labelled with the name of their sender, so if you want to you can take them out and put them under a tree or at the foot of your bed (wherever you feel best to display them).

Merry Christmas Delia!

Love,
Patsy

... ... ...

Dearest Delia,

It's really true. You remember. Not me, perhaps, but even so you are really, truly regaining your memories! In spite of everything else as the weeks have gone by I have been so afraid this would never happen; that you would never know all of yourself again. It's lucky that I've gotten into a routine of opening your letters when I am alone because reading this one I couldn't stop myself from sobbing. I feel as though a dam has burst in my chest and all the fear and sadness I have been storing up seemed determined to flood its way out through my eyes with the relief of your letter. It has left me feeling raw and shaky, but I can't contain the hope I feel anymore that perhaps what we once had is in reach again.

Trixie came into the room while I was still a bit red eyed and I was terrified that she would start asking awkward questions (how on Earth could I explain why I was so emotional over your story of balloons and gardeners after all?) but she didn't ask, just glanced from my face to the letter in my hand then quietly came to sit beside me and gave me her handkerchief. We stayed that way for what seemed like a long time, her with her arm around me and her head on my shoulder while I pulled myself together, but even when I was back in control she didn't ask why I was crying, just gave me a little nod and said 'that's better old thing, big smiles. It will all be alright you know. And if it's not… you can talk to me. It won't change anything if… well, I'm your friend Patsy, and you can talk to me, that's all'. Perhaps she saw my fearful look, or perhaps I was simply reading more into her words that she intended, but a moment later it was as though it had never happened and Trixie was her usual self again, talking about a new dress she was simply dying to find an excuse to buy and discussing the newest styles in Vogue. I never realized quite how much of a brave face Trixie puts on, but I think she wears glamour girl image the same way I do my 'Nurse Mount' one. We are both of us just playing a part to keep the broken parts of us hidden from the world.

Deels, I can't help thinking about how this should have been our first Christmas together in our own home. No matter how I try to push the thoughts away I keep imagining it. Waking up in our own bed, close enough to reach for your hand and whisper a 'Merry Christmas' in your ear, then cuddling back up under the covers for an extra five minutes, because finally, finally there would be no risk of anyone walking in and catching us if we lingered too long. Then we'd make breakfast together and sit under our own little Christmas tree to exchange gifts. Perhaps we would both be on duty that day (after all the work of nurses and midwives doesn't stop even for the baby Jesus) but even if we spent the day apart, at the end of it we would be able to come home and close the door and return to just being us again. Do you want to know a secret? That day is what I wished for in my letter to Santa. Oh not the one I wrote with Trixie and Barbara of course, for that I wished for silly things, like enema pots that dispose of themselves and uniforms that repel bodily fluids, but somehow I couldn't get the game out of my mind and after they had both gone to bed I snuck back downstairs and wrote a different kind of letter. It might be foolish fancy but it will do no harm to 'send a little wish for myself heavenward' as Barbara's father would say.

I hope you like your presents. Just as you said to me, it somehow feels important that I get this right. The jug was my first idea – a nice, modern geometric design of course, not roses or violets, but it wasn't enough. I kept thinking about your first letter, when you told me your room was full of 'prim water colours of flowers', and how the last time we were together you told me that you wanted the only flowers in the room to be real ones. I thought that if you were here in Poplar I'd make sure there were always fresh flowers for this jug. But you're not here, and I realized that that is no reason to stop me from sending you flowers anyway. I had to find a map of the area in the library archives to find the names of the nearest towns, then spend an hour calling directory enquiries to track down a florist that would be near enough, able to deliver and willing to do what I asked for a sum I could afford. But eventually I managed it and it is all arranged – for as long as you are staying in your mother's house you will always have fresh, colourful flowers delivered fortnightly to your door to remind you that I love you (even if you don't know that that is what they're saying).The balloon you will find tucked inside the jug was a late addition, and I hope it will make you smile. I picked the one that promised to be the biggest and reddest in remembrance of Susan, as a celebration of your childhood memories returning to you.

The rest of the box was filled by others here in Poplar. Everyone put in a little something to let you know you aren't forgotten. The nuns donated a parcel of gingerbread men (after the last cake they sent as a gift arrived with a slice missing courtesy of Sister Monica Joan they decided biscuits would be safer, and more traditional than a cherry sponge for the time of year in any case). Fred kept with the ginger theme by supplying a couple of bottles from his new batch of ginger beer, but Trixie warned me of his last attempts at brewing, so I have included a note to drink with caution in case he got his figures wrong and made it highly alcoholic again! Mrs Buckle has very kindly sent a pretty length of blue fabric with white polka dots, in case you should wish to practice dress making to keep you entertained while you are away from work. Trixie sent the chocolates and Barbara the sherry and the bag of shells (because I told her you wished you could have a summer beach party in winter too). The card is from the cubs - they made if for you in their last session and have all signed it and added their own jokes and stories. I hope you like the photographs from their 'Christmas Carol' performance as well! Dear Timothy Turner made then up for me and asked that I wrap them with a ribbon (which he had bought with his own pocket money) and send it as his own contribution to your gift. I was really quite touched when everyone told me they wanted to send something on to you. I forget sometimes how much a part of a family I am now.

I love you Delia.

Merry Christmas Sweetheart.

Love,
Patsy