I close my eyes and think of all the films I’ve seen where the characters go to buy a Christmas tree. ‘We need loads of lights and some carollers. People are always walking around fa-la-la-la-la-ing in festive movies. At the very least, we could play Christmas music. Some of the trees need to be transplanted to the outer fields so it looks attractive from the road. I can string them with lights all along the driveway and the lane down to the fields. And hot chocolate! I could set up a stall outside the house. Hot chocolate is pretty much a requirement on a Christmas tree farm.’

He’s smiling as he looks at me with a sort of proud smile, his eyes twinkling as the morning sun reaches its peak in the sky.

‘What about the caravan?’ I ask, trying not to think about what that smile means.

‘I think it’ll take more than a cup of hot chocolate to fix that.’

‘No, I mean, it’s wrecked anyway. What if I drag it out of the garden and clean it up and paint it festively red. I could use it as a hot chocolate stand. It’d give me a little kitchen area to work in, everything would stay dry, and the back window could act as a serving hatch …’ I know I’m talking too fast as my excitement builds.

‘You don’t have a license to serve food to the public. And it’ll take longer than six weeks to get one.’

‘Oh.’ I try not to show how disappointed I am.

His smile goes from playing around his mouth to spreading all the way across his face and making his eyes dance. ‘But I do.’

I narrow my eyes at him, trying to ignore the fluttering in my belly at the sight of that smile. It’s just excitement about the tree farm. Nothing more.

‘If you take out the garden fence, which is rotted away anyway and shift the caravan about three feet to the right, it’ll be on my property, and I have all the necessary licenses. You can shift it back and get your own by next year, but it would do for this season.’

‘And you’d let me do that?’

He shrugs. ‘Sure. It sounds like a lovely idea. We do hot drinks when the pumpkin patch is open and they go down like, well, hot drinks on a cold day.’

We stand together looking out at the rows of silent trees until Gizmo starts pulling to chase a dried up oak leaf that’s had the audacity to flutter by.

‘Ideas.’ Noel nudges his shoulder into mine as the little dog catches the leaf and tears it apart with teeth and paws. ‘Maybe you’re not quite as “not cut out for this” as I thought you were.’