Moonlight on the Thames Read online

  Nicola pulled out the phone. ‘Jules’ came up on the screen. By force of habit, she answered with a cheery ‘hello?’

  ‘Nic – you OK?’ Her sister sounded hassled and out of breath. Jules had what many people would consider the perfect life: a perfect husband, a perfect house and three perfect children – and therefore took it upon herself to appear busy and stressed at all times.

  ‘Yeah,’ Nicola said, ‘I just got home from work.’

  ‘Really? That’s early for you.’

  Nicola went up the stairs. The house had three floors: two bedrooms on the ground floor, a sitting room and kitchen on the first floor, and the master suite taking up the entire top floor. She made a beeline for the kitchen – she needed that glass of wine. ‘Yes, well, I had a client do but it got cancelled.’ The lie came out so easily.

  ‘You didn’t answer my email about when you’re coming over,’ Jules said. ‘Is it Christmas Day, or Boxing Day? Mum, Teddy and Ben are coming on Christmas Day. So that’s probably best. And are you bringing Ollie? I need to finalise numbers.’

  Nicola cringed inwardly. For the last two years she’d made up a story for Ollie’s sudden and unavoidable absence at the family festivities. It wasn’t vanity that made her lie – not just vanity, anyway. It was the fact that all their lives, Nicola had done her best to shield Jules from the ugly truths about life. Not that it had worked, but she still felt it was her duty to try.

  ‘Sorry,’ Nicola said. ‘I just need to confirm, OK?’ Putting the phone on speaker, she checked the bottle rack underneath the worktop. No red, as she’d suspected, but there was a bottle of champagne from a closing that she’d forgotten about. Perfect.

  ‘Sure,’ Jules said. ‘I mean, assuming you even want to come at all. That you’re not jetting off somewhere exotic.’ Jules sighed. ‘God, I envy you. With your career, your glamourous life. Tickets to Paris Fashion Week, business trips to Milan, dinners at—’

  ‘That’s just work,’ Nicola said, cutting off the litany of so-called enviable things. In the beginning, when she’d joined Privé Capital, it had been glamourous. The private equity firm specialised in raising finance for fashion and luxury goods companies. She’d risen through the ranks quickly and become one of the youngest partners. Not to mention the only female one. Jules might see the glamour in it, but she didn’t know about the sacrifices it had taken to get to the top and stay there.

  ‘Whatever,’ Jules said. ‘But if you and Ollie are coming, I need to figure out where I’m putting everyone.’

  ‘OK, sure. I understand.’ Nicola opened the fridge and closed it again. With the hours she’d been working lately, she hadn’t bothered with a grocery delivery. It was looking like dinner would be champagne and Weetabix.

  Jules continued to rattle on about menus, Christmas puddings, quantities of alcohol. In a way, it was comforting to know that these were the biggest stresses her sister was likely to be facing. Nicola pictured Jules in her enormous kitchen, making lists and seating plans. Jules had always been methodical. Every year as a child, she’d written a detailed letter to Father Christmas about what she wanted for Christmas, managing to post it to the North Pole before the start of December. Jules always wanted a puppy, a pony, or a kitten. Up until age eleven, she never got one. Still, despite Jules’ inevitable disappointment on Christmas morning, those years had been happy ones.

  Nicola twisted the wire from the top of the bottle and popped the cork into a tea towel. She fizzed the liquid into a glass and went into the sitting room. The room was tastefully furnished in shades of cream, beige and green, with a wall of books, and French doors that went out to a balcony overlooking the river. There were no Christmas decorations or cards, no photos. The only thing in the room that jarred was the old piano from their childhood home that was next to the balcony doors. She had never played, but she remembered that piano from holidays long ago. Her mum had trimmed it with an advent wreath of fir branches, a red bow and four tall red candles. Her dad had played at family Christmases – lively nights of carolling and board games.

  She sat down on the sofa, staring at the piano. Maybe it had been the choir at the station – their overwhelming enthusiasm and festive cheer – but for some reason, Nicola felt an unusual pang of nostalgia.

  ‘Do you remember when we were kids?’ she said to Jules, the memories taking shape. ‘When Grandma came round just before Christmas and we made a gingerbread house?’

  ‘What?’ Jules stopped mid-flow, sounding surprised. They rarely talked about those days – those Christmases before. Before their mum moved out, divorced their dad and married her boss, Teddy. Nicola had been fourteen; Jules, eleven. ‘I guess so,’ Jules said. ‘We made iced biscuits too, didn’t we? And got sprinkles all over the kitchen trying to decorate them.’

  ‘Yes, we did.’ Nicola smiled, thinking of their mum’s face as the sprinkles crunched underfoot, ground into the lino.

  ‘And the tree had pink and purple baubles,’ Jules said.

  ‘Yes,’ Nicola said. ‘And all those awful decorations we made at school.’ They both laughed – for a second.

  ‘God, whatever happened to all that stuff?’ Jules sounded wistful.

  Nicola took a long sip of champagne, the good memories fading away. ‘In my attic, I guess, along with the rest of Dad’s stuff.’

  This time, the pause from Jules was much longer. Nicola wished she hadn’t brought it up in the first place.

  That first Christmas in the new regime, Teddy had bought Jules the puppy she’d always wanted, along with horse riding lessons. Her loyalty and affection thus sorted, Jules went to live with them. Nicola had stayed with their dad – someone had to. Wracked by depression, his decline had been swift and total. She’d tried to take care of him: cook his meals, get his newspaper, return his books to the library. But despite her efforts, it was like the dad she loved – the one who was kind, and funny, and full of life – wasn’t there any more. The next four or five Christmases were spent shuttling back and forth between her mum’s new family (by then, the family had an addition: Nicola’s stepbrother, Ben) and the flat she shared with her dad in Isleworth. Nicola had tried to brighten the place up with a tree decorated with a string of cheap lights and the pink and purple baubles that their mum no longer wanted. She’d got a cookbook and tried to cook turkey with all the trimmings and make mince pies – her dad’s favourite. Her cooking efforts never turned out quite right, but it didn’t matter. In the end, she was powerless to stop the rot. Turning down a place at Durham, she went to uni in London so she could continue to look in on him. Which she’d done almost every day, even on that last morning – when her dad was run over by a woman in a Range Rover doing the school run. The woman swore he’d stepped in front of her. No one, not even Nicola, had tried to argue.

  ‘Yeah,’ Jules said, slowly. ‘Your attic – that makes sense. Do you think maybe—?’

  But Nicola wasn’t listening any more. The memories continued, unstoppable, careering towards the place in her mind that she kept locked away. Christmastime, a holiday party… The breath seized up in her chest; the hand holding the glass started to tremble. Breathe… this was silly. Christmas… She’d never told Jules, or anyone else, the real reason why she hated this time of year. Ice on the pavement… footsteps behind her… that smile… Jules was her little sister – she had a duty to protect her. There were some things that she didn’t need to know—

  ‘Nicola, are you still there?’

  ‘What?’ She gasped out the word. It was fine. Everything was fine. As quickly as it came, the panic subsided. She was home. She was safe. How ridiculous.

  ‘I said, can you come over early and help me cook? Or watch the twins? It would really help.’

  ‘Cook?’ Nicola gave a sharp laugh. ‘Think of your guests – are you sure you want me to?’

  ‘Just to help out. Remember, Mum will be there too. And I’ll email you the list of presents. Ben wants a Chelsea away kit, so I’ve put your name down for that. He�
�s going to be seventeen in February. Can you believe it?’

  ‘Seventeen?’ Nicola hadn’t realised, but she could believe it. To say that she had no relationship with her half-brother was an overstatement. When he’d been a little kid, she’d been at school or at uni, and now that he was a teenager, almost an adult, he might as well be living on a different planet rather than with her mum and Teddy in Esher.

  ‘Yeah.’ Jules sighed. ‘And he’s still a little twat. But family’s family – right? And anyway, it will be good to see you.’

  ‘I’ll let you know by Friday,’ Nicola said. Right now, all she wanted to do was put Christmas – everything really – out of her mind. A hot bath, snuggling up in her pyjamas…

  ‘Mum, Lottie kicked me!’ a tiny voice yelled from somewhere down the phone line.

  ‘I gotta go,’ Jules said. ‘But tell your mysterious Ollie that we all want to meet him. It will be such fun.’

  The call cut off.

  ‘Yeah,’ Nicola said into the dead line, raising her glass in a toast. ‘Such fun.’

  3

  Dmitri took a sip of his orange juice and leaned against the bar. He watched Sophie as she moved among the others, saying her goodbyes. She went up to Carole-Ann, the church organist, and they spoke briefly. Sophie gave her a kiss on both cheeks and went out the door. Carole-Ann shot a worried look in Dmitri’s direction, but he gave her a reassuring smile. He’d been expecting this.

  ‘Here you go, mate,’ the bartender said from behind him.

  Dmitri held out his card as the man put three pints of beer and a glass of white wine on the bar.

  ‘Thank you,’ Dmitri said. He picked up two of the glasses and went to find the new recruits: three men and a woman. They’d joined in with the singing at the station and then decided to give up waiting for their delayed trains and join the choir down the pub. Dmitri had already spoken to each of them, welcoming them and buying them a drink. Two of them lived close enough that they might come to a few rehearsals, maybe do a few concerts or join in the ‘Pop-up Carolling’, as some of the people referred to it, at venues around the city – like tonight’s event at Waterloo. Dmitri liked new people and they tended to get quite a few this time of year. A good thing, as Sophie hadn’t been the first young woman to quit the choir.

  Dmitri sighed. Sophie had joined the choir at the beginning of summer. She had a nice vibrato and a soft, mellow tone to her voice that he’d liked – not shrill and harsh like some of the older, lifetime church choir sopranos. She seemed like a nice girl, a PA at some law firm in the City. Late twenties, early thirties, maybe. For the last month or so she’d started being the last to leave the rehearsals, helping him tidy up the church and stack the music books. She’d brought him a Christmas cake that she’d made herself, and then tonight, she’d tried to take advantage of the mistletoe hanging above the bar. Dmitri had nudged her gently away so that the others wouldn’t see; tried not to embarrass her. He’d talked to her, told her that she was a valued member of the choir and that he didn’t want to see her go. But when he’d clarified that they could not ever be more than friends, she’d whispered in a low fraught voice that she was leaving and wouldn’t be coming back.

  He knew that some of the older women, like Carole-Ann, warned the younger ones about him. But the younger ones never seemed to listen. Like a tick on an old vinyl record, Dmitri was forced over and over to try and ‘let them down easy’. The problem with Dmitri’s reputation was not that he slept with the women of the choir, but the fact that he didn’t. Ever.

  He delivered the drinks to two of the newcomers and went back for the other two glasses. The two new people that he thought might stick: a middle-aged man called John who’d told Dmitri that he was recently divorced, and a fifty-ish woman called Lynn who worked in HR, were chatting amiably to some of the more seasoned members of the group. People joined the choir for different reasons, and at different stages of life. Most of them joined for the company, the friendships – some of which became romances. Sometimes people joined who had recently come back to religion after years away from the church. Very few, he’d found, joined for the music.

  But whoever they were or whatever their reasons, Dmitri always welcomed them. The choir was his life, and Christmas was when the choir was most popular. He liked to get caught up in sharing and spreading the joy of the season. Surrounded by friends, and the lively, bright music, there was no room for the darkness. No room for the other memories that lurked in the shadows.

  He returned to the bar and finished his orange juice. As he set down the empty glass, he noticed that the yarn on one of his fingerless gloves had come undone. His mother had knitted him these gloves, bright and festive for Christmas, a few years before her death. Hopefully he could find someone to mend them before they came apart completely. He pulled at the thread, watching the stitches unravel—

  ‘…Can’t believe it – so incredibly rude.’

  Dmitri turned. Jenny, one of the sopranos, was talking to Carole-Ann and newcomer Lynn.

  ‘Yes,’ Carole-Ann agreed. ‘She’s definitely the first heckler we’ve ever had. Right, Dmitri?’

  In his mind, he pictured the woman at the station. Arresting and beautiful with long red hair, her green eyes flashing with anger like a wounded animal. He’d been unable to look away. What he’d seen in her had brought the ghosts out of their hiding places. For all his attempts to spread good cheer and get swept up in the joy and magic of the season, the hidden part of him had acknowledged the truth of her words. Not everything was merry and bright at Christmas. Not everyone had something to celebrate, or someone to celebrate with. She’d made him feel like a fraud, and that had not been a lie.

  ‘That’s right,’ he said, pushing her from his mind. He walked a few steps over to the others and smiled warmly. ‘Please believe me, Lynn, when I say that Christmas carolling is not usually so dangerous.’

  Lynn and Carole-Ann laughed. Jenny looked on him with soft blue eyes. She had a husband and three kids, but he knew that look. He moved back a few steps towards the bar and was relieved when John, the other newcomer, came up and stood next to Lynn. His pint was nearly drained and Lynn was near the bottom of her glass of white wine.

  ‘So, it’s Dmitri, is that right?’ Lynn asked.

  ‘Yes. Dmitri Orlov,’ he said, smiling.

  John signalled for the bartender’s attention. ‘What are you drinking, Dmitri?’ he asked in a husky baritone.

  ‘Just orange juice for me,’ he said.

  Lynn frowned for a second, as if at this time of year, people out at a pub with friends or colleagues had a duty to drink alcohol. John turned back to the bartender to place the order.

  ‘Orlov – is that Russian?’ Lynn said.

  Dmitri looked closely at her face. Perhaps she was younger than he’d originally thought – mid-forties maybe. Kids – yes. A husband – maybe.

  ‘Yes, that’s right,’ Dmitri said. ‘I am from Novosibirsk in Siberia. But I have been here, in London, since I was nineteen.’

  ‘Wow, Siberia must be very cold,’ Lynn said.

  ‘Yes.’ For most English people, this was the impression. A vast frozen wasteland with herds of reindeer, gulags, railroad tracks and snow. And of course, it was cold – winters were long, summers were short. But there was much more, too. When he imagined his homeland, he thought of the vast pine forests, completely silent as the first snow fell. Ice skating on the frozen lakes, sledding, the colours of the shadows on the ice. Sometimes, he missed it almost unbearably.

  ‘And are you married, Dmitri?’ she asked.

  He ran a hand absently through his hair. ‘No,’ he said. ‘Though sometimes, it feels like I’m married to the choir.’

  ‘Hmm,’ John said, turning back to them with the glass of white wine and the orange juice, ‘I guess that’s one way to avoid complications.’

  Dmitri thought of Sophie, and the others like her who had come and gone over the years. He forced a laugh. ‘I am not so sure.’
r />   Though they had all just met, John seemed to be eyeing up Lynn. Dmitri’s cue to step back, let them talk to each other. ‘I live with my sister Tanya,’ he said. He pointed in the vague direction of the door where he could just glimpse her sleek, dark hair through the crowd. She was chatting to Charles, one of the tenors, and two older altos – probably gossiping about him. Or about ‘The Heckler’.

  ‘Tanya. Of course.’

  ‘Yes. She works at a café and bakery off Clapham High Street. It’s called “The Braided Loaf”.’

  ‘I know it,’ Lynn said enthusiastically.

  ‘They supply all our mince pies. Which, as you will discover, is a very important part of choir practice.’

  Lynn laughed brightly. ‘Then I’ll definitely be signing up.’

  Next to her, John patted his stomach. ‘A mince pie would certainly hit the spot right about now. Haven’t sung in years, but with all that carolling, I’ve worked up a bit of an appetite.’ He turned to Lynn. ‘Fancy a curry or something?’

  Dmitri smiled to himself. Yes, people joined the choir for different reasons, but at least they came. And whether they stayed for a single night, or for years, somehow, their lives would be changed.

  He turned to the side as if he’d spotted someone in the crowd that he had to talk to. ‘Excuse me, please,’ he said to John and Lynn. He left the two newcomers to get to know each other and make their plans, edging towards the door. Although it had been a good night – that is, until the woman at the station, and then the business with Sophie – Dmitri was ready to leave. He could feel an attack of the holiday blues coming on. Because as much as he enjoyed the idea of Christmas, spreading joy and making other people happy, his life would stay exactly the same.

  He went over to Tanya. Carole-Ann had brought her a drink, and the two of them were talking and laughing with Charles and the altos. He signalled to her that he was leaving, but she just nodded and returned to her conversation. The dark mood began to close in. He pulled the loose piece of yarn on his glove again and watched the stitches fall away, then shoved his hand into his pocket.