Bang! Bang! Bang!!!
“It is Christmas and everything is terrible!”
Flora and Joel had woken up very early, of course, to check on Douglas, and they had brought him into the bed and exchanged gifts, which were, in Joel’s case, the most beautiful diamond bracelet for Flora because he thought she deserved something beautiful, and she nearly cried because she wanted to wear it to more beautiful places, and Joel said, “As soon as you knock sense into Fintan I am taking you to the Bahamas,” and then she burst into tears again because she couldn’t imagine a day when that might be the case and that made her sad all over again, even as she assured Joel she loved everything and gave him a Folio Society–bound set of Dickens’s novels, which she had thought he might like, correctly.
Then they attempted to give Dougie his gift—a beautiful rocking horse—and they both realized immediately that he was far too young to get Christmas at all in any way and they were completely wasting their time, but to his credit he made a fair stab at eating the tail, which was fairly impressive.
They loaded up the car with food and gifts, even though they were going less than a kilometer. It wasn’t really walking weather anyway; the snow had settled and it was treacherous for buggies, although there was no doubt about it: the angel beacon was incredibly helpful. It was amazing, thought Flora as she loaded the boot, how quickly she’d gotten used to it, always checking to see where it was—you could see it from almost anywhere. It was absurd, she knew, to feel like it was looking out for you, looking after them all, huddled together on this little rock. But it made her smile to see it.
Everyone was already up in the farmhouse, Eck by the fire with his morning tea, Hamish running up and down excitedly and buzzing about his new train set they’d all chipped in for, Innes and Eilidh sighing and trying to calm down Agot, who was banging spoons very hard everywhere and saying, “Everything is terrible.”
“It’s not terrible!” said Flora, giving her beloved niece a big kiss. Agot instantly wriggled away.
“It’s a terrible, terrible Christmas.”
Flora looked inquiringly at Innes.
“She is being the brattiest brat in the history of terrible brats,” he said quietly, as Eilidh poured coffee. She looked like she’d been having a very stressful morning. “Would you like another kid? You’ve already got one, it shouldn’t be too much trouble.”
“Most people wait till after eight A.M. on Christmas morning to try to give their children away,” said Flora. “Oh dear. We have some lovely presents for you, darling!”
“Is there ice skates?”
Flora blinked. “No . . .” she said. “There might be Shopkins.”
Agot sighed and her chin trembled. “I haaate Shopkins.”
“This is something of a change from her birthday,” whispered Flora.
“I know,” said Innes.
“When she loved Shopkins more than anything on earth.”
“I know.”
“That was only two months ago.”
“Seriously, you don’t even have to keep her, you can sell her to pirates,” said Eilidh, looking a tad too longingly at the champagne Joel was unloading into the fridge.
Agot looked around at the adults, then ran out of the room.
SHE HAD GONE to Flora’s room, her favorite, because it still had Flora’s old Highland dancing trophies and ribbons. Agot had just started dancing, but Flora had found her, on occasion, holding up Flora’s gold medal and announcing, “I would like to thank everyone for this award.”
Flora followed her now, leaving Joel to start breakfast while Eilidh cuddled Douglas and made lots of cooing noises about how nice it was to remember what it was like to have a lovely baby.
Agot was lying facedown on the duvet. She wasn’t doing performative crying, making a big loud fuss about everything so people would hear. Instead, she was sobbing gently, like a real child, rather than the changeling she sometimes resembled.
“Hey,” said Flora. “What’s gone so wrong?”
“Miss Lorna said . . .” sniffed the child. “Miss Lorna said if we were good and wrote to Santa Claus, we would get the thing that we wanted. And I was so very good.”
“Were you?” said Flora doubtfully.
“I did not shout in class! And I did not do chatting chatting chatting, and when Miss Lorna said, ‘Agot, no chatting,’ I did not do chatting. And I took hands with Hamish when it was time to take hands, and I did not say yuck yuck yuck. I was very, very good—ask Miss Lorna!”
“I will do that,” said Flora.
“Everyone says, ‘Agot is very naughty,’” said Agot, looking heartbroken.
“They don’t say that,” said Flora, stroking the girl’s long pale hair.
“Yes,” said Agot, with a resigned look. “‘Agot, she is very naughty and spoiled.’”
“Oh, sweetie.” Flora took the small body in her arms. “Well. You’re still one of the very favorite people I’ve ever met.”
“You love Bugglas now. Everyone loves Bugglas now.”
“There is room,” said Flora. “There is room to love everyone.”
“My mummy and daddy didn’t have room. Then they did.”
Flora hugged the little girl harder. “Grown-ups are complicated,” she said. “And they are very sorry about that. But everything is all right now, isn’t it?”
“But! I did try,” wept Agot. “I did try to be good for Santa. So I could go ice-skating. But he brought me . . .”
And her voice wobbled, on the brink of total collapse.
“Stuuuupppiidddd Shoppppppkinnnnnnssss.”
FLORA STAYED WITH her until, to her surprise, Agot actually dozed off on the bed, having been up at regular intervals till midnight and from two A.M. onward. Flora rather fancied joining her, but it was a very busy day. She tucked the child in and went back to the sitting room, where the pleasant smell of scrambled eggs from the yard and locally smoked salmon was filling the room. Eilidh had given in to temptation and poured everyone a mimosa, which Flora reluctantly refused.
“There’s nowhere for her to skate!” Eilidh was trying to explain. “If I’d given her the stupid skates, there would just be a big tantrum after that!”
“Well, she’s having a sleep,” said Flora. “I’m sure she’ll feel better after she’s woken up.”
“Ready for the big day?” said Innes.
Flora grimaced. It had seemed such a good idea at the time. “You’re asking the wrong person,” she said.
Fintan woke up curled in the strong arms of Gaspard, snoring gently beside him. It took him a moment to remember, just as he was waking, that they were sleeping in the hotel Colton had paid for, that he had funded and built. That he was betraying the man he loved.
Who was dead.
Suddenly Gaspard’s tattooed arms felt like a trap, felt too heavy on him. He stared at the handsome, scruffy, dissolute Frenchman, whose face, unfurled from its customary snarl, looked younger and softer in the clear white light. Fintan looked at it for a moment . . . then thought of his day ahead, and his heart sank.
No. He did not want to walk the halls of Colton’s great dream. Did not want to oversee the kitchen that had been Colton’s pride and joy, look around the ridiculously over-tartaned dining room and remember Colton’s absurd tartan outfits (he had liked nothing better than dressing up as monarch of the glen, stag feather in his cap and all).
He hated the Rock, hated everything about it. It was a millstone, nothing else. He got up crossly to get ready to head to the farmhouse first and see his family before pulling himself up to play the jolly host at their grand opening lunch. He assumed everything was ready; Flora had been sticking her nose in all over the place. And Gaspard had told him not to worry, although that was also when Gaspard was trying to get him into bed, so he may or may not be able to take that as gospel. There were almost certainly issues involved in guiltily sleeping with your chef, but Fintan pushed those onto the huge pile of problems he had that couldn’t get any higher and slinked off to Gaspard’s en suite shower, the weight of the world on his shoulders.
Gaspard sat up. “You are sad!” he shouted, but it wasn’t really a question.
Fintan turned back. “I don’t know what’s going to happen,” he said.
“Nobody know what going to ’appen.”
“I hate the hotel.”
“So walk away. Whenever I am sad, I walk away.”
“Are you sad now?”
Gaspard eyed him up seriously. “Non.”
JOEL WATCHED FLORA carefully when Fintan came in, trying to smile as he handed over another huge gift for Douglas. “You’d better try to dress him,” she said. “I’m crap at it.”
Joel went over to her. “You’re not,” he said, surprised. “Of course you aren’t.”
Douglas was already waking up from his morning nap and preparing to make a wail. Joel looked at Flora’s face—she was almost flinching—and suddenly something dawned on him.
“Darling,” he said. “Can I take you next door for a second?”
IN FLORA’S OLD bedroom, beside a snoring Agot, Joel took Flora’s hands in his.
“All this time,” he said quietly. “All this time. I didn’t realize.”
“What?” said Flora, anxious to get on to the Rock.
“Darling,” said Joel. “Have you had trouble staying at home with the baby?”
“No!” whispered Flora loudly. “I love him!”
“I know you love him,” said Joel with infinite patience. “I mean, have you found it difficult?”
Flora froze. He knew. He had seen it. She had tried so hard to make it look like she could do everything, when it was obvious that she couldn’t. That she was failing Douglas. Pam was right. She barely saw him. It was awful.
She burst into tears.
“He doesn’t love me!” she whispered. “He prefers you! I’m shit at it! I get bored and frustrated and distracted, and he cries all the time with me! All the time!! He loves you and I’m shit at it!”
Joel wanted to laugh, although sensed, correctly, that this perhaps wasn’t the time. “He cries all the time with me too,” he said soothingly. “He’s a baby.”
“But you’re so patient with him.”
Joel looked at her. “But this is all new to me,” he said, astonished it wasn’t as clear to her as it was to him. “I’ve never had a family before. You’ve been surrounded by brothers and children and relations and so many people your whole life you don’t even realize it! I’ve had nobody. Nobody ever. And then I had you and now I have Douglas, and oh my God, Flora. Oh my God.”
They were both crying now.
“But . . . you don’t think I’m a terrible mother? For doing other things?”
“God no,” said Joel. “You’re great. And wanting to run the Rock . . . it’s okay. I’m not sure, between you and me, and I’m sure absolutely nobody else has noticed . . . I’m not sure Fintan is quite cut out for it.”
Flora swallowed a half-gulping half laugh. “You mean that?”
“I take absolutely no responsibility for interfering in MacKenzie business,” said Joel. “But I am happy, Douglas is happy, everything is well. Fintan is miserable, and as for you . . . you’ll be fine, my darling.”
He hadn’t been planning to do it quite at that moment, but suddenly, it seemed fitting.
“I’m not sure if this is the time, because you are very, very tear-stained, but . . . I brought you something to go with that diamond necklace . . .”
And he took a small box out of his coat pocket.
“If you can get enough time off between shifts . . .”
Now he was going down on one knee. Flora was just staring at him, astounded. Then she wiped her face furiously.
“Oh my God, this is so unfair,” she said.
“I know,” said Joel.
“Oh my God.”
“In your own time.”
He smiled up at her widely and she returned his grin.
“Oh my God.”
“I know, Mark and Marsha are going to kill us for not doing it when they were here.”
She flung her arms around him. “Yes please! Yes please!! Yes please!!!”
“Shh,” said Joel. “You’ll wake him.”
But it was too late. She heard the familiar wail from the sitting room. But somehow—somehow—it wasn’t as hard as it usually was. Just knowing that Joel understood . . . and omg, she was engaged!
She danced into the sitting room.
“Where are you, my darling little man?” she crooned.
Joel stayed behind in the bedroom for a moment, slightly stunned with himself.
“I knew that was a bad baby Bugglas,” came an unrepentant voice from under Flora’s old duvet.