Are you back already bror said. Weren’t you meant to stay in town. Yes I said but it didn’t work out.

Has something happened he asked. We’ll talk tomorrow I said. It’s that bastard john he said. As always.

You might be right I said. Never mind. You seem happy. I won’t disturb you I said and closed the door behind me. Mostly to shut out jameslast.

My tea water boiled. Texts pinged in. The washing up had been done. Even the cooker had been cleaned up. I made tea and stirred in honey.

The phone pinged again. And again. I turned off the sound and then the phone.

302

FIFTY

The church was filling up with people who had come to the early christmasday service. Most had come by car or on their kicksleds.

I had walked. It wasn’t very cold. Only a few degrees below.

Bror and angelika were not going. They were cooking instead. Since that evening on the sofa angelika hadn’t gone back to her own place. She moved into bror’s boyhood room. I couldn’t think how they managed in his narrow bed.

I didn’t object in the slightest. On the contrary. Bror was wallowing in angelika’s loving care and stayed reasonably sober. Besides she was an orderly person and not a slob like bror.

I felt the need to thank somebody. Went to sit in the front of the house because of the candles.

The weeks between john’s exhibition and christmas had passed quickly. I had been working all extra hours there were and apart from work I went bird shooting or made clay figures. Without john and diana I felt an emptiness as greycold as the afta hill. I had no idea what to do about it.

Across the aisle a few rows further in front I spotted his black hair. He turned now and then to try to catch my eye.

We have a cancellation of this morning’s service the church warden said speaking so close to the mike scratchy noises came through the loudspeakers. The minister who has recently become a father is too unwell. 303

I felt he was out of order. Just this morning he could surely have taken an aspirin and pulled himself together for a mere pathetic hour. For the sake of his congregation. This was after all the most important holy day of the year. People were coughing and snivelling everywhere in the pews. The timbers of the old wooden church were creaking. Cold draughts swept around our legs and made the flames of the altar candles flicker.

We have to help each other to make this christmas service feel as heartwarming as possible she said and went on to read a passage from the christmas gospels.