The Christmas Promise Read online

  ‘And there’s a perfectly good train, darling. There’s no need for you to put yourself out. I like the train.’ Her voice shifted pitch. ‘I need to start doing things for myself.’

  His hand gripped up on the phone again. I want to put myself out. I want to do things for you! You’re ill. You might even die. I’ve let you look after me every Christmas and your cancer’s made me horribly aware that I’ve taken you for granted. I’ve never invited you to my place for Christmas Day or Christmas shopping before. You ought to have minded. It would have taken hardly any effort on my part.

  The unspoken cry crowded up into his throat and made his voice a suspicious growl. ‘Has the doctor specifically OK’d you taking the train?’

  ‘Yes! We’ll put everything in a wheelie case and Van will pull it. I’ll take lifts and escalators rather than stairs. The doctor said not the bus to the station so Vanessa’s new boyfriend, Neale, has volunteered to take us.’

  He cleared his throat. ‘That’s good of him. I’ll meet you at Euston.’

  ‘I’ll be all right getting a cab with Vanessa—’

  ‘Mum! Have a few days of being spoilt. I’ve got a nice surprise for you while you’re here but I have to finish arranging it.’ Because he’d let himself be distracted by arguing about the bill with Ava and then been caught standing gazing at her like a kid at a sweetie shop window, instead of arranging an actual appointment for Mum’s hat fitting. Ava had looked at him as if he were acting like a twat. No wonder.

  ‘Oh.’ Wendy’s voice gave a wobble of pleasure. ‘A nice surprise will be lovely. There have been so many nasty ones lately.’

  Chapter Eight

  A hat, but no kid gloves

  Tuesday 11 December

  Sam had telephoned late on Sunday and arranged the hat fitting for Tuesday evening.

  Cheered by selling a red glittery fascinator on Etsy, Ava made decorations for her studio from ribbon, cheap silver bells from a pound stall and ivy from the wall near the bus stop. The first Christmas cards had arrived so she tucked them in the top of the mirror, then heaved her bedroom chair into the studio for Sam to sit on while Ava worked with his mother.

  Ava hadn’t been able to shake the memory of Sam’s bleak expression when he’d talked about his mum. It had certainly put her woes and worries into perspective. She’d gone home and phoned her own mother, sobered to think what it would feel like not to be able to hear Katherine’s warm, no-nonsense voice.

  Promptly at seven-thirty Sam arrived not only with his mother, Wendy, but also Wendy’s sister, Sam’s Aunt Vanessa.

  ‘I’m so looking forward to this!’ exclaimed Wendy breathlessly. She looked as if the evening breeze could blow her away and not as if she could possibly have anything to do with creating someone Sam-sized. Next to him she looked like a child, her glasses too large for her face.

  ‘I hope you don’t mind me coming along.’ Vanessa shook Ava’s hand energetically, very much the bigger, healthier, more vibrant and outgoing sister. Both her short stylish cut and Wendy’s shoulder-length bob glinted with the same tawny highlights as were in Sam’s hair.

  ‘The more the merrier.’ Ava led the way upstairs slowly, reminded by Wendy’s careful movements that this woman was recovering from surgery.

  Wendy stared around the studio in excitement. ‘Ohhhh … lovely hats.’

  ‘Have a look around. I’ll get another chair.’ Leaving Wendy time to get her breath back, Ava turned and ran back down the stairs.

  She didn’t realise that Sam had followed her down to the kitchen until he reached around to take one of the folding chairs from her.

  He’d gone for a monochrome look this evening – black trousers, white silk shirt and a black leather jacket. ‘I just want to give you a heads up that she’s emotional at the moment.’ He looked haunted. ‘She burst into tears when I told her why we were coming so …’

  ‘So you’ve chosen exactly the right gift,’ Ava finished for him gently. ‘I’ll give her plenty of time to enjoy the fitting.’

  ‘Thanks,’ he said, gruffly.

  Back upstairs, Ava sat down with Wendy. ‘Are you enjoying staying with Sam?’

  Wendy’s face lit up. ‘It’s wonderful,’ she breathed. ‘But London’s a bit overwhelming. So many people. Sam’s lived in London since university and Vanessa comes on business, but I usually stay at home and let Sam visit me.’

  ‘Where’s home?’

  ‘Middledip. It’s a village in Cambridgeshire with stone cottages and a village green.’ Wendy giggled, her glasses catching the light. ‘I’ve no idea when I’ll wear a posh hat unless someone in the village gets married. My only hat’s a woolly one for walking the dogs.’ She gazed at Ava’s hat display with an expression of awe. ‘These look as if they deserve an invitation to a Buckingham Palace garden party at least.’

  Ava paused. ‘If you want another woolly hat you’ve come to the wrong person. Don’t let Sam push you into this if you hate the idea.’

  Behind her, conversation between Sam and Vanessa halted abruptly. Ava kept her gaze pinned on Wendy.

  But Wendy’s eyes were shining. ‘Oh no, I want a lovely hat. I’m just not sure … I’ve never had a dress made for me, much less a gorgeous, frivolous hat. I feel a bit weird about it.’

  ‘Let’s see if we can make it fun instead.’ Ava set the mirror in front of Wendy, then began to talk about different hat shapes: the elegance of a beret, the dash of a fedora. Taking her time, she displayed various materials, describing them as ‘fine’ or ‘rich’ and ‘jewel colours’ or ‘pastels’. She showed her the versatile material that was sinamay, woven from fibre from the abaca palm of the Philippines. ‘Sinamay has a bias, so it’s flexible and versatile,’ she said. ‘I use three layers if I block it for a hat, but in smaller quantities for curvy three-dimensional shapes like spirals and bows.’

  ‘You’re so clever.’ Wendy began to visibly relax as she stroked the fabrics or crumpled them in her hands.

  Ava began to place hats on Wendy’s head. ‘This is a pillbox, a classic and enduring style. It’s deceptively simple with its brimless, flat-crown shape, but so versatile, tipped to one side, forward, back or set squarely on your head. Its mood’s determined by how plain or decorated it is. Black and stark, like this, or’ – a change to a pillbox hat in lemon –‘a softer colour like this.’ Another change. ‘Or maybe a picture hat, if you want something more fun? Lots of people love wide-brimmed hats.’ She changed the hat again, this time for a burnt-orange disc with a spiral of stiffened sinamay and a fall of black netting. ‘This is a contemporary cocktail hat; very fun and flirty.’

  Wendy sighed happily. ‘I love them all.’

  Ava prepared to move into sensitive territory. Every milliner came across clients facing chemotherapy hair loss and was used to exercising tact about comb fixings and scratchy materials. ‘I’m wondering about a nice soft felt. Maybe a cloche? A twenties style would be dashing but would perfectly suit your face.’

  Wendy proved in no need of kid gloves, though. ‘It’s important that it fits me when my hair’s fallen out. I’m having chemo soon.’

  Ava glanced at Sam. His face had gone very still. ‘I can use an elastic head fitting so the hat will fit with or without hair.’ She picked up a pretty cloche from her samples and turned it over to show Wendy inside its bell shape. ‘This is the head fitting, the band that runs around the inside of the hat. I can use silk for the lining so that it’s soft against your scalp.’

  ‘Let me put my hair up so I can get an idea of how it looks without.’

  Throat tightening, Ava carefully held Wendy’s upswept hair in place and slipped the hat over, adjusting it delicately until the brim came just above Wendy’s eyes.

  Wendy tilted her head and studied her reflection. ‘Nobody would really know whether I had hair or not, would they?’

  ‘No, and it looks very good without hair showing. In fact, the Eton Crop often went hand-in-hand with the cloche – or head-in-hat,’ Ava agreed h
uskily. ‘It’s the perfect style for you. Not so large as to overwhelm your face but stylish enough to have presence. If you’re sure about the shape, shall we talk about colours?’

  After much poring over charts and decorative materials and Ava making sketch after sketch, Wendy settled for elegant jade wool felt with gold ribbon loops and a geometric spray of trimmed peacock feathers.

  As Ava measured Wendy’s head, just above her eyebrows and ears, Izz came home, appearing in the doorway with her coat unbuttoned and a bottle of wine in each hand. ‘Anyone care to join me?’ Her gaze flicked to Sam with a mixture of hope and apprehension. Ava hadn’t said anything about Sam helping put Izz to bed on Saturday, and Izz appeared to have forgotten. Or had chosen to forget.

  ‘Lovely!’ chorused Wendy and Vanessa.

  ‘We’ve finished, so would you like to go downstairs where you’ll be more comfortable?’ Ava didn’t want wine all over her hats. ‘I’ll follow you down when I’ve made a few notes.’

  Picking up her pad and pen, she listened to their voices fading down the stairs. Then, feeling the presence of another person, she looked up.

  Sam was watching her. ‘Thanks,’ he murmured.

  Ava laid down her pen. ‘Your mother’s lovely.’

  He moved closer. ‘She’s also a frightened woman trying to be brave. You brought some fun into facing the future and she’ll look fantastic in your hat.’

  Ava’s throat ached with tears. ‘We should have talked about the subject of hair loss before I brought it up in front of you all. I didn’t think.’

  ‘You handled it beautifully. Whatever your fee, it’s worth it. You’ve made her happy.’

  ‘I wish I could grandly waive the fee—’

  ‘Don’t even think about it.’ His laugh was shaky. ‘I’d have to scour my brain to think of something else to buy her for Christmas and it couldn’t be a tenth so good. Can you tell me the cost now or do you need time to do the sums?’

  ‘I can tell you in a few minutes. Wendy didn’t ask for anything hard to source.’ He sat back down and she returned to her notes, consulting online catalogues for material costs, estimating her hours. It didn’t take long to come to the total.

  Sam didn’t blink at it. ‘Would it be helpful if I paid the whole sum up front?’

  ‘It would.’ Though appreciating his sensitivity to her precarious finances, honesty compelled her to add, ‘But most people usually just pay one-third as a deposit.’

  He waved that information aside. ‘Give me your bank account details and I’ll pay electronically later tonight.’

  Ava managed not to jump up and hug him in gratitude. ‘Thank you.’ She wrote out the necessary strings of numbers just as Izz reappeared at the door.

  ‘I’ve brought Vanessa back up because she wants to ask Ava something.’

  ‘Thanks again, Ava. I’ll go see if there’s any wine left.’ Sam stood back to allow Izz to precede him from the room. Izz looked flustered.

  ‘Could I buy one of these fascinators?’ Vanessa patted at her hair self-consciously. ‘I have a Christmas ball shortly and I wouldn’t mind impressing my date. There’s no time for you to make me one from scratch and my dress is black so you don’t have to match to anything.’

  Hardly daring to believe her luck at a second sale falling into her lap in one evening, Ava scooted off the stool and beckoned Vanessa to take her place. ‘What about embellishments? If the dress has sequins or something it can be fun to echo those.’ In twenty minutes she’d sold Vanessa a flirty black and white beaded fascinator with black roses and curled coque feathers, one of the most expensive amongst her samples.

  As she wrapped it carefully in tissue paper and boxed it she thanked the Jermyns from the bottom of her bank account.

  When Sam, Wendy and Vanessa left, Wendy looked tired but was still able to give Ava an excited hug.

  Feeling warmed by the events of the evening, after she’d closed the door behind them, Ava plonked herself down in the sitting room with Izz, laptop at the ready to finalise her list of materials for Wendy’s hat.

  But Izz wanted to chat. ‘Sam talked to me tonight. He said I was doing a good job at Jermyn’s.’ She smiled uncertainly. ‘I don’t know if he likes me a bit now. What do you think?’

  ‘I think he wouldn’t say something and not mean it.’ Ava tried not to feel anything, knowing that if Izz ever did succeed in snaring Sam then Ava would have to try not to feel a whole lot more. Ava had instigated a man embargo for good reasons and wasn’t about to bring up her own feelings for Sam. Partly because she didn’t know what they were and partly because it was definitely in the best-friends’ code that you tried hard not to like a man your best friend liked, even if – or, maybe, especially because? – he was her boss and unlikely to see a workplace relationship as appropriate.

  Izz began to flick through the channels for music documentaries. Ava helped herself to wine just as her phone signalled the arrival of a message.

  Harvey: How about dinner on Friday evening? Grovelling apologies for being difficult recently. It’s just you’re doing my head in. We were good together.

  Ava’s answer was brief. Not dating at the moment. All my attention on business matters.

  Not dating anyone? Or me?

  Anyone.

  Hard to believe.

  Ava restrained herself from returning Go to hell!, and turned her phone onto ‘do not disturb’. She opened her laptop but instead of running comparisons on the price of peacock feathers and silk lining she typed ‘revenge porn’ into Google and clicked on the site highest in the rankings.

  Revenge porn is the sharing of intimate images of someone without their consent, often by an ex-partner, hence the word ‘revenge’.

  She skipped down the page. Disclosing private sexual images to cause distress was made an offence in February 2015. It carries a maximum jail sentence of two years plus a fine. There are both men and women currently serving prison terms thanks to this law. That was fantastic … but didn’t help if the images hadn’t actually been shared.

  She found something that seemed more relevant. ‘Sextortion’ is a term used when someone, often an ex-partner, threatens to release sexual images as a form of blackmail. Unfortunately, technology can leave the victim open to ridicule while keeping the bully anonymous. Past innocent play becomes a terrible weapon and providing proof that threats have been made can be difficult. Bingo.

  Izz looked away from the television as a tinselly advert came on. ‘Are you on Facebook?’

  ‘No. I’m worried about Harvey being a dick with those photos. I’m trying to find out if there’s any way of stopping him. He says he’s deleted them but it’s hard to believe a word he says.’

  Izz didn’t glance back at the television screen, even though Hugo Boss Christmas Man came on. She looked close to tears. ‘I hate how horrible Harvey’s being to you. He’s making threats. Get the police. Your dad was a senior cop.’

  Ava rubbed suddenly sweaty temples. ‘That’s one of the reasons I’m trying to avoid it. The idea of him somehow finding out makes me squirm. Or can you imagine me telling him? “Dad, Harvey has images of me naked giving him a …”’ She let the thought trail.

  ‘Oh.’

  Ava returned to her reading. Although revenge porn is sometimes used against men, in ninety-five per cent of cases the victim is female and the revenge porn is intended to bully, humiliate or control. Typically, victims are scared, embarrassed and emotionally devastated. They perceive the threat as real whereas perpetrators frequently see this digital crime as a prank, however juvenile and obnoxious.

  That resonated.

  Victims report being told they should never have allowed the photographs to be taken and fear they’ll be blamed, or dismissed, under the stereotype that women overreact to problems and are overly sensitive complainers.

  Finally came the positives. A government campaign has been mounted to advise the public of the facts about revenge porn, with its own helpline. The hashtag #NoTo
RevengePorn has been introduced to encourage awareness in social media. With a heavy heart, she bookmarked the article in case the day came when Harvey carried out his threats and shared the images on social media.

  But then, with growing dismay, she read of sites that made Facebook and Twitter look the soft option, sites that existed purely to exhibit revenge porn – making a handy income out of advertising owing to plentiful traffic on their site. She glared at a headline pointing out that these sites were not concerned with making friends of women. Advocacy groups actually existed to protect the rights of the posters to post whatever they wished, however it was obtained, no matter whose life was being ruined. The proponents of such groups demonstrate an impulse to favour the democratic values of some at the expense of those of others. The right to privacy of the victims is not seen as an issue.

  The internet can be untamed, lawless and with undefined frontiers. It often lacks accountability or clear areas of jurisdiction, so the introduction of the new law is a welcome step in the right direction. We may even see fewer reports such as this from a revenge-porn victim:

  ‘Perhaps it’s understandable, but the police pay more attention to exes wielding axes than wielding explicit images.’

  By the time she’d read to the end, gloom perched on Ava’s shoulder.

  Izz’s voice swam into her haze of misery. ‘Harvey’s such a shit.’

  Ava blinked away a sudden tear. ‘No argument from me.’

  Chapter Nine

  Seeing, not ‘seeing’

  Wednesday 12 December

  It hadn’t been a great day. In view of time constraints, Ava had visited her favourite millinery suppliers in Victoria rather than waiting for the materials for Wendy’s hat to be delivered. Frustratingly, they’d proved to be out of stock of peacock feathers. Ava’s second-favourite supplier was in Spitalfields, so she’d ridden east on the District Line.

  At intervals during her day, texts from Harvey had buzzed into her phone.