Page 22 of A Winter Kiss on Rochester Mews
‘I’d only think about internet dating if I was thinking about dating, and I’m not. We’ve been through this,’ Mattie said, staring in dismay at her phallic-looking croissants. ‘Also, that dating app was created by Posy’s husband, so I am keeping well clear of it.’
‘So sad,’ her mother sighed. ‘My only daughter. Young, beautiful, pure of heart and yet she’s given up on love.’
Mattie’s mother, Sandrine, was French and had very strong opinions about love, personal grooming and that a woman was never fully dressed without dousing herself in Chanel no. 5.
‘I tried love, it didn’t work out,’ Mattie said as she put her first tray of croissants in the oven. ‘We’ve been through this a million times. I’m concentrating on my career and I’m perfectly happy.’
‘Pfffttt! You’re not happy. Guy agrees with me. There’s a sadness in your eyes,ma petite Mathilde. Also, when a woman gets to your age, she should have sex at least once a day. It does wonderful things for the complexion.’
‘I’m hanging up now,’ Mattie said, sliding in the second tray. ‘And my complexion is just fine, better than fine. I use an exfoliating mask twice a week.’
Her mother wasn’t to be fobbed off. ‘You can’t let one bad man, one bad experience, put you offl’amour,’ she said. ‘Yes, he broke your heart but when you find the right man, he’ll make your heart whole again.’
‘My heart is whole, though it’s actually beating quite fast because you’re being annoying now, Mum,’ Mattie said crossly.
‘I’m going to come down to your little tearooms with this lovely boy who came around to cut one of the trees in the back garden. Couldn’t see a thing out of the spareroom window. We’ll sit on one of your tables ordering endless pots of tea until you agree to go on a date with him.’
‘Bye, Mum. Have a great day and if you come within fifty metres of the shop, I’m getting a restraining order,’ Mattie said, and she was barely joking.
Sandrine had only ever been allowed to enter Rochester Mews once for the official opening of the tearooms and she’d disgraced both herself and Mattie. She’d cried all the way through Mattie’s speech, which had actually been quite touching, but then she’d cornered Posy and Sebastian, who were only just married, and asked Posy how she was managing with the cystitis. ‘They call it the honeymoon disease,’ she’d said as Posy’s face had turned a painful shade of red and Sebastian had choked on one of the profiteroles from Mattie’s croquembouche. ‘I spent two weeks in bed with Mattie and Guy’s father when we first got married and then when I did get up, I could barely walk. He was a marvellous lover even if he was a terrible husband.’
Mattie had dragged her mother away then – and hadn’t been able to look at Posy, much less talk to her, for a good week after that – and now Sandrine was banned. She wouldn’t mean to, because she wasn’t at all malicious, but she’d end up filling everyone in on the whys and wherefores of Mattie’s broken heart.
Mattie felt the hot rush of shame as she imagined Sandrine on one of the sofas explaining to Nina, Posy and Verity why Mattie spent her evenings making cakes rather than sweet, sweet love with a handsome young man, and reminded herself that everyone had a right to their privacy. To their secrets.
Even Tom. She didn’t know why he was hiding his academic interests from his friends and colleagues but he was. So, Mattie had to respect that.
Though that wouldn’t stop her from continuing her own investigations into the puzzle that was Tom Greer. He’d always been a thorn in her side, but now the irritation that he roused in her was less to do with his superior ways and the whole free coffee thing and more that Mattie couldn’t begin to fathom him out.
Tom was like a recipe that just wouldn’t behave itself. But just as she’d made thirty-three attempts to perfect her broken-hearted brownies (finally nailing them by adding some crushed pecan nuts to increase serotonin), so Mattie wouldn’t rest until Tom was no longer a mystery.
With the impending doom of a rapidly approaching Christmas (much like that boulder inIndiana Jones), it very quickly transpired that Mattie had many other things to worry about than unlocking the enigma that was Tom. While she’d been shaping croissants and fending off Sandrine, the Happy Ever After staff had transformed the shop into a glittery, sparkly, tinselly, festivey wonderland. By the time Mattie ventured across the anterooms at ten, concerned that no one had been in for their coffee, it was to find that neither Nina nor Posy had stopped at just a bit of tinsel, or a few paper-chains, or even some Christmas cards from loyal customers strung up about the place. Oh, no. Christmas had come to town and made itself right at home in Happy Ever After.
There were Christmas gewgaws and paraphernalia everywhere she looked. A gigantic Christmas tree, which had to rival the one in Trafalgar Square for size, had been erected in the centre of the main room of the shop and decorated with some fairly tasteful pink and silver lights, baubles and tinsel, to echo the pink and grey colour scheme of the shop. ‘The temptation to add more colour is bloody killing me,’ Nina moaned because she was in full Xmas-zilla mode, but apparently Posy had put her swollen foot down.
As Mattie stood there with her coffee pot in one hand and a plate with her first official batch of clementine-infused mince pies in the other, Verity was telling Nina in no uncertain terms that she couldn’t do a nativity-scene window display with books replacing the key figures. ‘You can’t haveBridget Jones’s Babyas the infant Jesus,’ Verity said aghast. ‘It’s quite offensive.’
‘You’re only saying that because you’re a vicar’s daughter,’ Nina said, but Verity failed to rise to the usual bait.
‘Actually, I’m saying that as a person with a modicum of taste. You agree with me, Mattie, don’t you?’
‘You know, some people don’t even celebrate Christmas,’ Mattie pointed out and Posy, who’d been about to grab a mince pie, grunted in annoyance.
‘Christmas isn’t really about the birth of the infant Jesus any more,’ she said. ‘It’s about togetherness and family and something to look forward to in the bleak midwinter.’
‘Sentimental twaddle,’ Tom called out from behind the counter where he was serving a customer and, unlike his three colleagues, was not wearing a pair of flashing reindeer antlers. As it was, Mattie could hardly bring herself to even glance in his direction, knowing what she now knew. ‘Just be honest, Posy, and admit that the only reason that I’m inhaling fake snow with every breath I take, is because you want to increase your profit margins.’
‘My profit margins pay your wages, buster,’ Posy snapped, snatching up one of the mince pies.
‘For some people, Christmas isn’t about togetherness or family, it’s just a harsh reminder of all the things that are missing in their life,’ Mattie said with great feeling as she looked around the all-flashing, all-glittering Christmaspalooza that had once been an understated bookshop. ‘Every Christmas advert, every Christmas card with a cosy fireside scene, every email with gift suggestions for their loved ones is like a little dagger in the heart. There are an awful lot of lonely people in the world and Christmas just makes them feel lonelier.’
‘Hear hear!’ said Tom, who was now halfway up the rolling ladder. ‘Couldn’t have put it better myself.’
It was the nicest thing that Tom had ever said to her. Mattie allowed herself a small, pleased smile. Posy looked at her, then looked at the mince pie she held in her hand, then she looked at Tom who was saying in a pained voice to Nina, ‘Don’t you think you’ve decked the halls with enough bloody holly by now?’ then she put the mince pie back on the plate.
‘You’re ruining Christmas, you two! I hope you’re happy!’
By mid-afternoon, the anterooms were adorned with pink and silver tinsel, pink and silver bunting swung gaily from the bookshelves, and pink and silver stars of varying sizes hung from the ceilings. Nina had also created a placeholder Christmas window display featuring piles of gift-wrapped books. She was planning a far more ambitious display featuring a Christmas tree made entirely out of books. But it would have to wait until after she had paid a visit to a special Christmas shop-fitting warehouse in Deptford where she could get her hands on yet more festive fixtures and fittings for the shop.
