Christmas on Rosemary Lane

He had pleasant memories of long-ago summers in the village, spent stealing redcurrants from Rosemary Cottage’s garden. However, a lot of James’s childhood hadn’t been fun, and he’d been relieved to leave the place for good the minute he’d found a means of escape. These days, he only came to visit his father who still lived here in a clapped-out farmhouse a mile out of the village. Despite the fact that they were hardly close, James had still seen him regularly – dutifully – over the years.

Until a few months ago there had been a sort of system in place. The unspoken agreement was that he and his older brother, Rod, would alternate visits, passing their father back and forth like a parcel that could potentially blow up in their faces at any moment. Then Rod had moved in with their dad – temporarily, he was keen to stress – and the last time James had visited, everything had seemed fine.

At least, fine-ish. Although hardly domesticated, Rod seemed to have things reasonably under control. But the phone call that morning had alerted James to the fact that everything was far from fine after all.

‘Sorry to bother you,’ Reena had said, ‘but I’m really worried about your dad, James. Is Rod meant to be around at the moment?’

‘Um, yes, as far as I know. Why, what’s happened?’ James had asked, immediately alarmed. Reena lived in the village but had a holiday cottage close to his father’s place that she rented out. She had never called him before, and he didn’t know her too well. James hadn’t even known she had his number.

‘I went up to the cottage this morning to say goodbye to my guests,’ Reena explained, ‘and they told me there’d been a bit of an altercation last night. Your dad had been at the door, trying to barge his way in—’

‘Into your holiday house?’ James exclaimed. ‘But why? What did he want?’

‘He … he was convinced it was his place,’ she said apologetically. ‘That he lived there, and they shouldn’t have been there at all. He was quite, um, insistent. He used some terrible language …’

‘I’m so sorry …’ James was aware of a sinking sensation in his chest.

‘But finally,’ she continued, ‘they persuaded him that he’d made a mistake, and he wandered away. I wish they’d let me know last night. They just assumed it was some local eccentric, but by their description – the big beard, the gold earring – it was pretty obvious it was Kenny.’

‘Did he seem drunk, do you know?’

‘No – just confused, I think.’

‘Okay, thanks, Reena,’ James said, rubbing at his cropped dark hair. ‘I really appreciate you calling.’

‘I had to look you up online. You took some finding!’

‘Yes, well, I’m glad you have my number now. Please don’t worry. I’ll try and get hold of Rod and find out what’s going on.’

Perhaps it was just as well his father resembled a latter-day pirate, he’d thought bleakly as he called his brother’s mobile; it made him distinctive. But Rod’s number just rang out. Time after time, James tried it, but no joy.

At forty-four, Rod was three years older than James, and the golden boy as far as their father was concerned. When they were younger, James had wondered if it had simply been an age thing; Rod had done everything first, and had the gift of the gab and a knack of charming everyone. Whilst not wildly academic, he had talked his way into working in ‘investments’ – James had never quite grasped what this entailed – and made a mint, apparently, which had clearly impressed their father. Weirdly, for someone who had possessed the same pair of slippers since about 1973, Kenny Halsall took a keen interest in money.

Meanwhile, James had been more of a practical type, good at fixing and making things. At seventeen he had gained a joinery apprenticeship in Liverpool through a family friend, and fled.

It wasn’t that his childhood had been terrible. Whilst Kenny had hardly been the nurturing type, even as a child James had managed to grasp that raising two boys on his own wasn’t easy, especially with his various one-man businesses to attend to. As it was, James and Rod had enjoyed virtually limitless freedom from the ages of six and nine. Even when their mother had still been there, she hadn’t been one to establish too many rules.

It was rare to be so unsupervised, even back then in the 1980s. Not for James and Rod the tedious rituals of mealtimes and homework supervision. As Kenny was usually out working, dinner for the boys could mean tinned tomato soup and packets of Monster Munch or whatever else they could plunder from the under-stocked kitchen. James had vivid memories of Rod making some kind of ‘pudding’ out of jelly, doused liberally in contraband brandy and set alight. He’d been in awe of his big brother back then.

Although Kenny had various stints of working as a lorry driver, a gardener and a labourer, he always came back to being a woodsman. A couple of acres of forest adjoined their house, and Kenny was often to be found out there, sawing and chopping, then delivering logs all over Burley Bridge and beyond.

Throughout late November and December, Kenny would have virtually decamped permanently to the woods, as he had a seasonal business selling Christmas trees. James and Rod would be enlisted to help with the felling and the dragging of the trees into a makeshift hut, where the young boys were allowed – thrillingly – to use the netting machine. It felt good, the three of them working together when James and his father had little to do with each other the rest of the year. They were a team then. It’s why James had a certain fondness for Christmas. It certainly wasn’t down to any mince pie-making endeavours on Kenny’s part.

Perhaps his father’s attachment to wood – and to forests – had influenced James’s own life choices, as once he’d left Burley Bridge and finished his apprenticeship, he had carved out a living as a furniture maker. From building tables and shelves, he graduated towards fitting out boats when his first commission had proven a success. James enjoyed being on the water and seeing a project through from his first visit, when he would start with basic dimensions and often go on to design the whole interior. It was creative, satisfying work. His love life was less successful; he and his ex-wife, Michaela, had split up two years ago, and now they shared the care of their nine-year-old son Spike. But on the whole, life was manageable.

It’ll all be a panic over nothing, he tried to convince himself as he turned off the motorway towards Burley Bridge that night.

After Reena’s call, James had tried to carry on fitting out the narrowboat he had been working on for the past week. But he’d been unable to concentrate. What the hell was going on with Rod? They weren’t close, and never had been really. As for Rod’s marriage to Phoebe, a terrifically capable sort, and a national champion swimmer in her youth, all James knew was it had ended messily with Rod somehow acquiring a black eye and his beloved racing bike being smashed up. After that, Rod had moved back in with their father and rarely seemed to see his three children.

Despite still being ‘highly successful’ in various businesses – which he never seemed keen to divulge any details about – his brother now seemed to have no income at all, as far as James could gather. Still, as Kenny had started to show signs of confusion, it had been a godsend really, to have someone living with him until a long-term solution could be figured out. ‘Dad’s just a bit ditsy,’ was how Rod preferred to describe their father’s current state. ‘I’m sure it’s nothing to worry about.’

As he neared Burley Bridge, James wondered if he had over-reacted wildly by rushing over on this bleak, wet night five days before Christmas. However, there had been no answer on his father’s landline either, and there was no one local he felt he could ask to look in on his dad. James’s childhood friends had scattered all over the country, and he knew Kenny wouldn’t have taken kindly to anyone popping round anyway, checking on his welfare. It had seemed as if there had been no other option than to throw some clothes in a bag, apologise to his client for the delay to the job, and set off. Three and a half hours it took normally, but tonight James had managed it in under three.

As he approached the village, James tried to calm himself in readiness for whatever situation he might walk into tonight. He drove slowly through the quiet streets, noticing how sparkly and festive everything looked. It hadn’t been quite as pretty as this when he was a kid. Now all the shop windows glowed with nativity scenes, and lights were strung from the Victorian lamp posts. James thought of Spike, who was currently at his mum’s place. He was spending Christmas with her this year so James had planned to visit his father, though not quite this early. The thought of being apart from Spike was never easy at this time of year.

The pitted road rose sharply from the village, cutting between steeply sloping fields, then curving through the woodland that Kenny still owned, although it was only minimally tended these days. The shed his father had built, in which to store Christmas trees ready for purchase, was rotting badly and should probably come down at some point. It was almost impossible to believe how successful they had been, back in the day, when numerous garden centres offered not only a variety of firs but vast selections of Christmas gifts too. The fact was, quite simply, that Kenny Halsall’s Christmas trees had been the best around.

As his father’s house came into view, standing alone on a muddied stretch of lane, James noted that the living room light was on, which reassured him a little. Illogical, perhaps, but it suggested that Kenny was home, at least. He had always been pretty diligent about switching off all of the lights before he went out. While his heart was still beating he would never waste a single watt of electricity.

James climbed out of his car. He knocked briefly on the front door and pushed it open. ‘Dad?’ he called out.

‘Who’s that?’ his father boomed from the living room.

‘It’s me – James.’

‘What? Who is it?’

‘It’s me, Dad. Hi!’ He stepped into the room where his father was sitting in an armchair with a newspaper spread out over his lap, gawping up at him.

‘What are you doing here?’

I’m your son, not the bailiff, James wanted to say, but instead he feigned a bright smile and perched on the sofa. ‘Just thought I’d come a bit earlier than planned for Christmas,’ he said, wondering how best to broach things. He wasn’t afraid of his father – not anymore – but he was keen to avoid conflict as far as possible so he could locate his brother and have some kind of discussion of what to do next.

‘Why didn’t you tell me?’ Kenny asked.

‘Dad, I’ve tried to call but you never pick up the landline. And I’m not sure what happened to that mobile Rod bought you.’

‘Oh, I lost that,’ he muttered.

‘Right – okay. So, how are things?’ James asked, taking care to maintain a cheery tone.

‘Um, all right, I suppose,’ Kenny replied.

‘So, where’s Rod at the moment? Any idea?’

‘I’m … not sure.’ His gruffness had subsided a little.

‘Erm, Dad,’ James ventured, ‘Reena called me today. You know, Reena who owns the yellow house?’

‘Uh-huh?’

‘Well … she sounded a bit worried. She said there’d been some kind of business at the cottage?’

Kenny frowned. ‘Oh, she’s a nuisance, that woman. Always sticking her bloody oar in.’

‘She’s always seemed perfectly pleasant to me,’ James said quickly. ‘She was just concerned that you’d been over to the house, and her guests said you’d, um …’

‘Is that why you’re here? To check up on me?’