Make A Christmas Wish: A heartwarming, witty and magical festive treat

‘I thought it was only people who were susceptible who could see me?’ I say.

‘Usually that’s true,’ says Malachi, flicking his nose up in disgust. ‘But you were making quite a scene, which is hard for most people to ignore. And that child definitely saw you – it’s because she’s young and still has an open mind. You should be more careful.’

I stare moodily at the flowing river. If I wasn’t dead already, I might be tempted to throw myself in.

‘So?’ I say. ‘I’m upset. Wouldn’t you be?’

Malachi doesn’t get it. Here I am, dead, watching my husband and son blithely getting on with their lives without me. I don’t mind about Joe, I’m glad he’s happy, but I miss him dreadfully, and it hurts that I can’t seem to get near him. And it hurts even more to think that Adam doesn’t need me. Isn’t that enough to justify a tantrum?

‘Well stop feeling so sorry for yourself, and start thinking,’ says Malachi. ‘You need to put things right, not make them worse. That’s what I’m trying to tell you. And having a hissy fit and disturbing everyone in the vicinity is not helping.’

‘How am I possibly making anything worse?’ I say. ‘I’m dead. How much worse does it get?’

‘Oh, I don’t know,’ says Malachi. ‘Your old life wasn’t all that wonderful.’

‘What do you mean?’ I say. ‘My life was great. We were a family. We were happy. I’ve only been dead a year and my husband’s got a girlfriend and my son’s talking about a new mum, and buying a present to put on my grave. Wouldn’t you be upset?’

‘Hmm,’ says Malachi, ‘I think it’s time you stopped feeling quite so sorry for yourself and started looking at your life properly. Was it really that brilliant?’

Stop feeling sorry for myself? The cheek.

‘Whose side are you on?’ I snarl at him. ‘I thought you were supposed to be helping me.’

‘I am,’ says Malachi, ‘you just need to pay attention. Now think about it, really think.’

So reluctantly I start remembering things, and I have to acknowledge that sometimes it was less than perfect. In the weeks leading up to my death, Adam and I had been rowing a lot – I think he was upset with me about something, but I’m not sure why. And Joe – I have a sudden flashback to Joe being quiet and retreating in on himself, as if I’d made him sad. I have a nagging feeling I might have done something wrong, but I can’t remember what. Perhaps Malachi is right and my old life wasn’t that perfect. Still, it was better than being dead.

‘You can sort things out,’ says Malachi encouragingly. ‘You just need to remember how. You have to find a way of reaching out to them, so you can say sorry. Only then will you be able to move on.’

‘But none of them can see me,’ I say. ‘Even Joe can only hear me sometimes.’

‘Which is a good start.’

‘I suppose so,’ I say.

Since I’ve been back, I’ve been counting on being able to get through to Joe. He at least can hear me; that had to be grounds for hope.

‘There are other ways of getting heard,’ says Malachi. ‘You aren’t required to throw things and freak people out by switching lights on and off you know. Go back to the house. Watch them, and learn.’

‘OK,’ I say reluctantly. Honestly, it’s come to something when the only person I can talk to is a mangy old black cat.

‘Oi, I heard that,’ says Malachi.

Great, a mangy old mindreading black cat is my sole companion. Maybe he’s right though. Maybe I need to make Adam listen to my side of the story, so we can be a family again.

Adam

It’s Monday morning, and I’m yawning as I stare at spreadsheets that don’t seem to be making much sense. I didn’t sleep well last night. I kept dreaming about Livvy, about our early days together which began with such hope and joy. Sometimes it’s hard to imagine how it went so wrong. When I met Livvy she was fun, beautiful, intoxicating to be around. We spent a wonderful summer together at the end of our first year at university, and by the end of it we were deeply in love. We took an utterly magical trip round Europe together and I knew very early on I was going to get married to her, so when she got pregnant in our final year it seemed like the obvious thing to do. When she lost that first baby, we were both heartbroken, but we bounced back and it was fine. More than fine, it was wonderful. I loved her even more, knowing how vulnerable she was. Our shared heartache made us much stronger.

I kept grasping something of that in my dreams but then they kept changing. One minute I would be holding her hand, laughing, and the next she would be dying, alone on the tarmac, without me there. In reality she had been declared dead soon after I got to the hospital, but in my dreams I am always trying to reach her. Last night’s one is particularly vivid, and this time I nearly get there. I am racing to the car park, and I see her, beautiful and sad, bathed in light as she walks into the car. Her last words break my heart and are still ringing in my ears as I wake up. ‘Why, Adam, why?’

After that, I can’t sleep. I get up early and go downstairs to turn on the kettle and make a start on the mountains of work waiting for me. The marketing company where I work as a financial director helpfully has its year end in December, so while everyone else is on the downward run to Christmas, I am working pretty much to the bitter end. By the time Emily and Joe get up I’m feeling shattered, but there’s no rest for the wicked, so after Emily makes pancakes for us all we pile out of the house together. Emily, who works in IT for a hip design company in London, heads to the station, while Joe goes off to college. I walk part of the way with Joe and, just as I say goodbye, he says, ‘Where do you think Mum will be this Christmas?’

Although I am used to Joe asking questions like this since Livvy died, it never fails to get me. I don’t believe in an afterlife, but I can hardly tell Joe that I think Livvy is gone for good.

I mutter something about her always being with us, and Joe brightens up and says, ‘I think she’s a star in the sky watching over us. Just like Grandad.’

When Joe was eight, Livvy’s dad died. They were very close, and it hit him hard. After that he used to worry terribly that something would happen to me or Livvy, and, tapping into his love of astronomy, Livvy came up with the idea that when we died we’d watch over him as stars in the sky, which seemed to comfort him. He hadn’t mentioned it for years, but it was as good an explanation as any.

‘Grandad’s star is Orion,’ explains Joe. ‘Because he liked hunting and Orion is the Hunter. Mostly it’s too cloudy to see him properly, and all you can see is the three stars on his belt. But sometimes you can see the whole thing, and it’s so cool, Dad, he looks like a hunter, with a bow and arrow and everything. And Mum’s star is Venus. Although technically Venus is a planet – but anyway – Venus is the morning and evening star because she’s the first thing you see in the morning and the last thing at night. Just like Mum used to get me up in the morning and put me to bed at night when I was little. If I look at Venus, that’s Mum watching me.’

‘I’m sure she is, Joe,’ I say in relief. I pat him on the shoulder, and he goes on to college, while I make my way to work.

By 11 a.m. I have had three cups of coffee, and am flagging badly. I seem to have been looking at the screen forever, not getting anything done, when I get the distinct impression there is someone standing behind me. I look round. Nothing. Why would there be? Everyone else is gossiping about the office Christmas party this afternoon, not even bothering to focus on work. There’s an air of jollity about the place which I’m not sharing. I’ve got so much to do that I don’t want to go to the party. A year on and celebrating Christmas somehow feels all wrong. It’s been a year, but still my sadness about what happened to Livvy hangs over me. Emily and I are going through the motions for Joe. He needs the order, the stability; at least that’s what Livvy always said. And his routine and order have been spectacularly shot to pieces this last year.

If it hadn’t been for Livvy managing to get him into that college, I’m sure he’d be in a much worse state. That was one thing she always got spectacularly right. From the moment of Joe’s diagnosis, she worked hard to make sure he always had the best support at school. She gave up the job she loved in advertising so she could stay at home with Joe and fought every bit of red tape, and unhelpful officialdom, to make sure Joe got everything he needed. Without her, Joe would never have come this far. I used to worry terribly that she was making Joe such a focus that she didn’t have much time for herself, and tried to get her to go away on the odd girlie weekend. But she always found it hard leaving Joe, and said she didn’t mind about work, Joe needed her. Perhaps I should have pressed her on that. Sometimes she did seem sad and overburdened but, try as I might, I could never get her to share her thoughts with me. Looking back I can see I failed her there. She made Joe her world, and sometimes I think that was a mistake. She left friendships slide, and didn’t develop any outside interests the way I had. I should have seen that, I should have helped more. But to my deep regret I didn’t.

A familiar mixture of grief, guilt and self-disgust washes over me. I want to put my head in my hands and wake up. But these spreadsheets need doing, and at least they’ll distract me. So I plough on. And then …

… my computer freezes.

Suddenly it’s as though someone has taken over the keyboard. A new window opens up. It’s Livvy’s Facebook page. I’m reminded I should have closed it down after she died, but I don’t have the password. Besides so many people have left tributes there over the last year, I can’t bring myself to. And secretly I go on it sometimes, and look at pictures of us in younger, happier times. Emily says I’m being morbid. Maybe I am.

The screen seems to have frozen on one particular picture. It was from our first trip abroad, when we went Interrailing round Europe. There Livvy is in a café in Venice, sunkissed, her auburn hair flowing in the breeze, laughing in delight. I remember that day well. We’d overdosed on sightseeing and spent the day wandering the streets, buying knick-knacks in shops, stopping for ice cream in tiny little piazzas; we ended the day sitting in this café, watching the gondolas plying their trade on the canals. It had been perfect, glorious; and there she is captured on my screen; a record of our happiness frozen in time.

I sit and stare at the picture, and have a moment of brief joy, thinking that not all my memories are tainted, followed swiftly by a familiar stab of pain that Livvy isn’t here and I can’t tell her. I stare for a long time feeling immensely sad, and then shake myself out of it. This isn’t going to get my spreadsheets done.

The screen still seems to be frozen, so I press alt, control, delete. Nothing happens. And then an instant message pops up.

It says: I’m sorry.

What? I go cold all over. Is this some kind of sick joke? Maybe one of my colleagues is playing a prank on me. I look around but everyone seems to be chatting cheerfully about the party. Besides, why would anyone do something like this?

Who is this? I reply cautiously. But there’s no answer, just a cold breath on my neck and a chill up my spine.

Emily

Emily was working late. Being in IT meant she had to be flexible, and tonight she was needed to help sort out the office mainframe, which had overheated. Adam had invited her to his company’s work do, and she was still in two minds as to whether to go. Emily had met a couple of Adam’s workmates, but she knew that Livvy had been a popular figure in the office, in and out of there since Joe was tiny. It made Emily nervous to think that people might be judging her, though Adam told her she had nothing to worry about. Emily would much rather go out somewhere just with Adam, particularly as Joe was spending the evening with his new friend, Caroline, a girl he’d met at college. Adam hadn’t been all that keen on going either, but his work colleagues had been a great support to him after Livvy had died, and he felt he had to show his face, so Emily thought the least she could do was keep him company.

‘Come on, Ems, it will be fine now,’ said her boss, a skinny bearded twenty-something called Daniel, who ran Digit AL, the small company she’d found herself temping at for the last few months. ‘Some of us are going for a drink – do you want to join us?’

‘Thanks Dan, but I’ve got plans.’ Emily liked the atmosphere of the place, which was run by geeky lads, most of whom looked barely out of their teens. They were a lot of fun though, and on another occasion she might have been tempted to join them; she found their company energizing. But she was already late for Adam’s party, so she closed down her computer and set off across a chilly, frosty London, squashed on busy trains full of people in cheery Christmas mode. Emily wasn’t quite feeling the Christmas vibe this year – there seemed to be a lot of tricky moments to get through before the day itself, and she still wasn’t sure she and Adam were getting it right with Joe.

Emily’s heart was in her mouth as she entered the room. She’d never been big on work parties – Graham had always made it spectacularly clear that she wasn’t terribly welcome at his. And Adam’s office was small and closely knit and everyone knew each other’s families. She felt that people were curious about this new woman in Adam’s life.

Adam had kept his problems at home very much to himself so nobody at work had known what really went on, and now Livvy was dead she had attained martyr status. Emily was the new woman, suspiciously new to some, and she knew that she was viewed with distrust in some quarters. People wanted him to be happy, but clearly felt he should have left a decent period of mourning. But how long was a decent period? None of them knew Adam was on the verge of leaving Livvy when she died. Emily hadn’t meant to fall in love with Adam; hadn’t meant to be a home wrecker, and yet that’s what had happened, although to be fair she had come along after the wrecking had been done: Adam and Livvy had done that all by themselves. Even so, she couldn’t help feeling the anxious tug of guilt.

Emily scanned the crowds, relieved to find Adam in the corner with his mates Phil and Dave. That was good. She’d met Phil and Dave several times before and they were fun, and had seemed to accept her readily.