Seeing Things in a New Light

I stand on the doorstep. In one hand I’m clutching a carrier bag with a medium-priced bottle of wine and two tubes of Pringles in it, and with the other hand I ring the doorbell. Around the doorframe is a string of flashing multi-coloured lights. You’d be forgiven for thinking they were Christmas decorations, but I can assure you, they’re here all year round. 

The door is opened and someone who doesn’t live here, someone I’ve never met before, beckons me in. For some reason this is perfectly acceptable when you’re going to a house party on New Year’s Eve. On their part and on yours. 

I’ve always been a big fan of seeing in the New Year in a big way. Christmas is for family, for being at home, for long-standing traditions, but New Year’s Eve is for friends, going out, letting your hair down, and making resolutions that you break as soon as your almighty hangover lifts. 

‘Coats in the back bedroom on the first floor,’ the stranger says, before disappearing into the living room. One creaky tread at a time, I walk up the stairs and knock before going into the bedroom (you and I both know what goes on at house parties) and after hearing nothing, I push open the door. The pile of coats on the bed is so big there could be a dead body underneath. I throw mine on top. 

In the kitchen I unpack my offerings and search around for an open bottle. There are plenty, most with a few dregs at the bottom, so I decide to open my own and pour myself a generous glass. I open the Pringles too and start slotting them into my mouth. 

‘Line your stomach,’ my mother always said, putting a massive plate of food in front of me on New Year’s Eve. ‘You’re only allowed out if you eat first.’ I don’t live at home anymore and the last thing I ate was a cheese sandwich about four hours ago. 

‘Sarah,’ Meg calls out, her hands cupped around her mouth like we’re in a club. She weaves her way through the people in the kitchen and gives me a hug. ‘How was Christmas?’

I shrug. ‘Quiet. Yours?’

She rolls her eyes. ‘Went skiing with Gray, he larked about and we ended up in hospital on Christmas day because he thought he’d broken his ankle. Same old, same old.’

Nothing about an American boyfriend who takes his girlfriend skiing is every day to me, but this is Meg we’re talking about. We met at uni when we were both studying law. She’s now got a well-paid job in a swanky (rhymes with… just leaving that there) law firm and is dating a man ten years her senior who has even more money and works for an even swankier law firm. I, on the other hand, am working for the smallest law firm ever, well maybe not ever, but there’s just me and one lawyer. I’m more of a secretary than an assistant. ‘Learning the ropes,’ my mother so generously said. 

It’s hot and loud in the kitchen and under the pretense of needing the loo, I slip out into the garden. The cold air is refreshing and I breathe in and out a couple of times before perching on a low wall. At times like this, I wish I smoked; at least I’d have something to do. 

A woman with very short and very blonde hair sits down next to me. ‘Gabrielle,’ she says, with a hint of an accent.  

I almost groan. The last thing I want, having realised that coming here was a mistake, is to have to make small talk with a stranger, but politeness dictates that I can’t get up and leave. ‘Hi.’

‘How was your Christmas?’ 

‘Quiet.’ 

‘How so?’ 

The follow up question takes me by surprise. ‘I have twin brothers who are seventeen and constantly glued to one device or another and my dad worked the nightshift before Christmas, so was pretty tired and spent most of the day snoozing on the sofa.’ 

‘And your mum?’

‘I don’t want to talk about my mum.’

She smiles, and rearranges her long white skirt. ‘Yes, you do.’ 

‘I really don’t. I just want to go home.’ 

‘Hey,’ she says, holding her palms up, ‘I’m not stopping you. If home’s where you want to be, then that’s where you should be.’ The glow from the kitchen lights up her hair, like a halo. 

I shake my head. ‘Not my home, not even the home I left on Boxing Day, but the home from a year ago.’ Tears are starting to gather and I don’t want to cry. 

‘Just tell me. I’m not going anywhere.’

‘It was awful. My dad hadn’t ordered a turkey and I went to three supermarkets on Christmas Eve and there were no bloody turkeys anywhere. Obviously, because it was Christmas bloody Eve. So I thought to myself: I know what I’ll do; I’ll buy a turkey roll. You know, one of the Bernard Matthews ones? When we were little, Mum used to make us one. Not very often, just every now and then and we thought it was a real treat, so I thought it would be okay. Well, what I hadn’t thought about was that it was only a treat because it was instead of fish fingers or a frozen burger. Eating a turkey roll on Christmas day instead of a roast turkey didn’t go down very well.’

The kitchen window is opened and laughter tumbles out into the quiet garden. 

‘Go on.’

‘So, my brothers, my dad and I all sat round the table on Christmas Day eating in silence, the only noise being the clanking of cutlery and Dad slurping on a beer. Mum would never have let him drink beer on Christmas day, but he’s not been himself since she… she…’ The tears are falling faster than I can wipe them away. ‘And I was always so quick to escape after Christmas. Always left on Boxing Day claiming I had a party to go to, or work on the 27th. Sometimes I did, but sometimes I just wanted to be by myself and I never stayed for New Year’s Eve. Not once since I was fifteen. And now all I want is to be at home with my mum.’

She puts her arm around me; I lean into her shoulder and cry. 

Clouds gather and obscure the moon, then drift on. 

I run my fingers under my eyes. ‘I must look a right state.’ 

‘Don’t apologise for grieving for your mother.’

I was about to say I didn’t when I realised she was right. ‘Thank you for listening. My dad and brothers, they don’t want to talk about her.’

‘Have you tried?’ 

‘I think I’m going to go home now. Maybe I’ll catch the train back this weekend and try talking to my dad again.’

‘I’m sure he’d like that. Will you be okay getting back? Do you need to call a taxi?’

‘No, I’m just around the corner. Nice meeting you.’

‘And you, Sarah.’ 

I say goodbye to Meg on my way out. ‘Just been chatting to your friend, Gabrielle. We should all hang out some time.’ 

‘Gabrielle?’ Meg asks. ‘I don’t know anyone called Gabrielle.’

‘Short, blonde hair? Foreign?’

Meg shakes her head. 

‘Whatever.’ Too tired to pursue it, I leave.

Cheers erupt from various houses on my short route home, ringing in the New Year, and I have a funny feeling I’ll never see her again.