The Perfect Christmas

The man looks at me as though I’m insane. ‘It’s an adult education centre,’ he points out.

‘Yes,’ I say. ‘I want to do swing dancing. I’m going to learn to jive – or I am if I ever get in to put my name down. I can’t wait to start. I love all that 1950s dancing. Apparently it’s brilliant exercise and really good for keeping fit and …’

Normally I’m such an energetic talker that you could wire me to the National Grid and use me to power Britain, but the man is looking at me really strangely, his amazing blue eyes trained on my face in a powerful gaze, and my words peter away. Staring back at him, I’m shocked to find myself thinking how plump and kissable his lips are. He looks rather familiar too. Maybe we’ve met before. Is that why he’s staring at me? Or maybe this is what love at first sight feels like.

Just my luck that I meet the most attractive man in months when I look as though I’ve swum here from Ladbroke Grove. In a novel he would be captivated by my soggy beauty and offer to shelter me under his raincoat rather than continuing to stare.

Just as I turn to make a run for it his hand reaches out and brushes my arm. ‘You’re Robyn, aren’t you? Robyn Hood?’

Oh. It wasn’t love at first sight. Just plain old small world.

I nod, wracking my brains to place him.

‘We’ve met before,’ he continues, and now that he’s forgotten to be angry about the adult education centre he’s smiling, a cute dimple playing hide and seek in his cheek. ‘At the Harveys’ dinner party?’

Good old Faye and her dinner parties.

‘And you remember my name, right?’ I sigh. It’s annoying when a random decision by your parents becomes your defining feature.

‘I remember you,’ says the man, his eyes warmer now and the lashes starry from the rain. ‘You’re the wedding planner who had to dash off to a comedy gig in the middle of the beef Wellington.’

Those were the days.

‘I’m Jonathan Broadhead.’

The memory is hazy but it’s coming back to me slowly. I met Jonathan at one of Faye’s dinner parties last March and we were thrown together because our partners were both absent. We’d chatted for a while and I’d told him about the wedding Hester and I were planning for a glamour model. The bride’s beloved Chihuahua was going to be the ring bearer and Hester had kindly designated me to be the trainer. Never in the history of pampered pooches had there been a more spoiled neurotic dog. Its snapping teeth put Jaws to shame and I lived in fear of losing my fingers every time I attempted to place the ring in the pink velvet pouch that hung on its diamanté collar. As for escaping, believe me, that dog was the Houdini of the canine world. By the time of the dinner party I’d chased the disobedient mutt so many times I could have taken on Ussain Bolt and won! Still, at least Faye’s guests had been entertained by my tales of woe and for at least five minutes the conversation had turned from house prices and au pairs. Gazing up at him I realise how much I must have loved Patrick and how focused I must have been on the wedding not to have been struck dumb by how incredibly handsome Jonathan is. He has the sort of face that makes you want to take a second look and then a third and maybe even a fourth.

‘You’re a lawyer, aren’t you?’ I recall. ‘You work with Simon.’

He laughs. ‘That makes me sound really dull. I wish I’d dropped out of school and joined the circus.’

‘Oh, I don’t know,’ I say. ‘Erin Brockovich’s life was pretty interesting.’

‘I’m no Erin Brockovich.’ He shakes his head seriously. ‘I look ridiculous in short skirts.’

‘Knee length is more your style,’ I nod, and then the ice is broken and we’re laughing.

‘Look,’ says Jonathan finally, ‘I don’t know about you but I think it might be a good idea to go inside until this rain stops. Pleasant as the view is,’ he inclines his head in the direction of the lingerie shop, ‘I don’t think that I can really follow you in there.’

‘Do you buy your fishnet stockings elsewhere then?’ I tease, liking the way that his eyes crinkle when he laughs.

‘I’m more M&S than S&M,’ Jonathan says. ‘Come on, let’s get in the warm somewhere, grab a coffee and dry out.’

I’m trembling like a whippet, partly because I’m soaked right through to my knickers, and partly because I’m not in the habit of going for coffee with strangers, especially ones this attractive. I hardly know Jonathan Broadhead. It makes more sense to go home for a hot shower and try to sign up for swing dancing another day. But sometimes fate likes to pull a moonie at me and today is no exception. Just as I’m telling Jonathan that I’m going back to Ladbroke Grove, a lorry thunders past and showers us both with cold, dirty water. I splutter and the chilly rivulets trickle down my cheeks like tears. I certainly feel like sobbing because my lovely dress is wrecked. Beaten, I sway wearily on the pavement.

‘Right, that’s it,’ says Jonathan firmly, his hand steadying me. ‘I’m taking you to Starbucks to thaw you out. It was very brave of you to wear such a lovely summery dress in early May—’

‘I think you mean stupid rather than brave,’ I sigh.

‘You’re an optimist and that’s a great quality to have,’ Jonathan says warmly. ‘Now, Miss Hood, no arguments,’ he adds when I open my mouth to protest. ‘Simon will never forgive me if I let his best friend get hypothermia. Here, come under my coat and get out of the rain.’

He’s offering to shelter me under his raincoat! I’m so bowled over by the sheer romance of this that I forget to protest and seconds later he’s pulling me close against his side and gently draping the fabric across me. His hand grazes my cheek and then I’m snuggled beneath his arm, breathing in the delicious tang of his skin while the rain pitter-patters on the coat.

‘OK?’ asks Jonathan.

Even though my goosebumps have got goosebumps and my favourite dress is ruined I haven’t felt this OK for a very, very long time. We venture into the street, laughing as we dodge puddles and cannon off one another while we try to walk in a straight line. Somehow we make it into Starbucks without stumbling from the kerb and falling under a bus. I’m almost sorry to enter the warm fug of the coffee shop because it’s such fun being huddled under his raincoat.

Nothing to do with the fact that it’s nice to be held by an attractive man, of course.

‘We made it.’ Jonathan releases me and shrugs off his coat. His dark hair is beaded with raindrops but he doesn’t seem to care. The cross expression of earlier has been replaced by a smile of incredible sweetness and that cute dimple is back too.

‘What would you like?’ he asks. ‘Coffee? Cake?’

Now there’s the one million dollar question. I peer up at the menu board and then into the cabinet of yummy pastries. What I’d like is a big wedge of carrot cake washed down with syrupy white mocha latte, extra cream and about a zillion calories. What I ask for will, of course, be another matter entirely.

‘Skinny latte, please,’ I say. ‘Nothing to eat, thanks.’

Jonathan rolls his eyes. ‘You women! Why are you always dieting? My wife, Anita, is exactly the same.’

His wife? Ten bums in row! Typical of my Swiss-cheese memory to forget that little snippet.

‘I can’t speak for your wife,’ I say with a smile, ‘but maybe we look lovely because we’re careful about what we eat?’

‘It’s a shame.’ Jonathan shakes his head, ‘Take a seat, Robyn. I’ll bring these over.’

What a gentleman! See, it’s always the good ones who are taken.

I find a couple of battered armchairs and bag them for us. While I peel off my soggy cardigan and rearrange my hair by peering in the display of my phone, I try to dredge up anything that I might have once known about Jonathan Broadhead. He has a wife but she wasn’t at Faye and Simon’s dinner party. I seem to remember that she was held up at work and does something really high powered. Merchant banker? Neurosurgeon? Astronaut?

Oh dear, I really can’t remember. In my defence, we last met at around the time things were going pear-shaped (or should I say Jo-shaped) with Pat. Maybe I can wing it?

‘Here we go,’ Jonathan places the coffees and a large piece of carrot cake onto the table. ‘Get warmed up.’

Carrot cake. The man has excellent taste.

‘Thanks,’ I wrap my hands around the mug and instantly the warmth starts to thaw my frozen fingers.

‘What a shame about your shoes,’ Jonathan remarks. ‘Will they dry out?’

‘I hope so.’ I look sadly at my poor shoes. ‘They are fifties Dior; quite my favourite thing. Collecting vintage clothes is one of my passions.’

‘What are the others?’ he asks, smiling at me.

I think about this. ‘Weddings, obviously! I love all things fifties too. And,’ I smile back at him, ‘carrot cake!’

Jonathan pushes the cake into the centre of the table. ‘I suspected as much,’ he says with mock seriousness. ‘Which is why I brought two forks.’

I laugh. ‘Wow. A mind reader. What talent.’