The First Christmas Without You:

Ebook Edition © December 2013

ISBN: 9780007562145

Version 2014-09-15

Digital eFirst: Automatically produced by Atomik ePublisher from Easypress.

To my wonderful husband – thank you. Without you I wouldn’t have been able to do any of this.

Chapter One (#u80dcb657-3eae-57c5-a6c9-47b437991cd2)

The harsh, north-east wind whistled through the gap underneath the door of my shop, and it was at that exact moment that I questioned my reasoning for booking a winter holiday somewhere even colder than the country I actually lived in.

‘You could’ve picked somewhere like Tenerife,’ Kat said, almost reading my mind as she settled herself down on the pale-green wicker chair beside the counter at the back of my small but cosy gift shop in the little north-east-English coastal town of Tynemouth. ‘Y’know, a country where you don’t have to put on three layers of clothes just to pop to the pub,’ she went on, picking up a packet of joss sticks from the shelf behind her and examining it closely. ‘I mean, why Lapland, Jess?’

I was actually quite tired of explaining exactly why I’d chosen Finnish Lapland to take my first holiday in a long time – my first holiday since the events of last Christmas that had seen my life change in an instant and my whole way of thinking about things turned completely on its head.

‘You know I’ve always wanted to go there, Kat.’ And I had. I just hadn’t expected it to be under these circumstances. ‘You know we’d both always wanted to go there.’

Kat frowned as she looked at me, accepting the cup of tea I held out to her, putting the joss sticks back down on the shelf.

I leant back against the counter and took a sip of tea, quickly glancing outside at the driving rain that was beating hard against the windows. Despite the wind whistling through the gap in my door it was still cosy and reasonably warm in my lovely little shop, the smell of incense and burning candles creating a wonderfully welcoming atmosphere. I loved my shop – Rainbows – smack bang in the village centre. I’d run it for over fifteen years now, and although it hadn’t exactly made me into anything even remotely resembling a millionaire, it gave me a comfortable and enjoyable way of earning an income. Selling everything from candles to home-crafted gifts, jewellery and cards, clothing and accessories, and even local souvenirs, it was my haven. My escape. Now more so than ever.

‘It’s Christmas, though, Jess.’ Kat’s voice broke into my thoughts, tearing me away from the memories I’d been about to dredge up all over again. ‘Don’t you want to spend Christmas with your mum and dad?’

I closed my eyes for a second, sighing probably a touch too heavily, but I really thought I’d explained this to everyone. Countless times. I thought they’d all got it by now.

‘Kat, believe me, I love them to bits, I really do. And I know they mean well, but, I just can’t do it. I need to get away, y’know? To sort things out in my own head without everybody else around me throwing in their own two-penny’s-worth. I think it’s about time I started doing that, don’t you?’

Kat sat forward in the chair, looking at me with those same concerned eyes that people had been looking at me with for the past twelve months. ‘Well, yeah, but… they’re just concerned, Jess. They’re worried about you. We all are.’

‘I’m forty-two years old, Kat. People seem to be forgetting that. And I really don’t need to be treated with kid gloves anymore, I’m fine now.’

Kat raised an eyebrow. ‘Are you?’

I really didn’t want to get into this conversation again. I’d been through it enough times, and that was the main reason I’d made the decision to spend Christmas somewhere completely different this year. Somewhere we’d always wanted to visit, a place we’d both wanted to experience; only now I was going to have to experience it alone – for the both of us.

‘You’ve still got time to change your mind,’ Kat persisted, sitting back and crossing her legs, still eyeing me with that concerned expression on her face. ‘Maybe delay your trip until after Christmas? I mean, I’m not denying that getting away from here for a while isn’t a good idea, but… You’re not going to change your mind, are you?’

I shook my head, quickly checking my watch. ‘Nope. I’m not going to change my mind. Come on, get a shift on, Katrina. I’ve got to lock up in half an hour and get packing. And there’s a lot to pack when you’re heading off to the Arctic Circle, believe me.’

Kat sighed, hauling herself up out of the chair. ‘Anyway, if you had to go away over Christmas, I don’t understand why you had to go with your brother and his mates. Why didn’t you ask me?’

I looked at Kat, half-smiling at her as I tidied up a tray of friendship bracelets I’d made that morning. ‘Seriously? You? In salopettes? And thermal underwear? Navigating your way around the ski slopes in snow boots and a thick padded anorak?’

‘I’m sure you can get some quite fashionable padded anoraks, if you look hard enough,’ Kat huffed, examining her nails.

I nudged her, smiling as she leant over and hugged me. She’d hugged me a lot over the past year, and every hug from my best friend still meant the world to me. I still needed all those hugs because, on the outside I might give the impression that everything was fine, but deep down inside I was still getting there. Slowly. I just didn’t want everyone else knowing it was taking this much time.

‘Look, Matt had already booked his skiing trip there, and he’s been before so, it just made sense to tag along. Especially as it’s somewhere we… I’ve always wanted to visit.’ Kat didn’t miss the look on my face as I quickly corrected myself, but I avoided her eyes. Now wasn’t the time to get into another deep conversation about how everyone around me still assumed I wasn’t coping. I was coping. In my own way. They just needed to let me get on with it.

I had thought about doing what Kat had suggested and leaving it until after Christmas to take my own trip to Lapland, but I was also big enough to realise that, although I might come across as somebody who could quite easily handle some time on her own, thanks to the vibes I’d been sending out for the past year, I probably was going to need some company at some point. Because this was Christmas. And Christmas wasn’t just any time of the year for me. It was a special time, a time I’d always loved, or it had been, until the events of last year. When Christmas changed forever for me. We’d always spent Christmas together, you see. Just the two of us, holed up in our little two-up two-down close to the sea front. Just the two of us. The way we’d always liked it. And this past year without him had been the hardest of my life. He’d been my world, my whole reason for existing. Oh, my life had been good before he’d walked into it, don’t get me wrong. He’d just made everything that much better, that’s all. I guess you could say he’d been the icing on the cake. He’d completed me. And not having him in my life anymore meant that, as far as I was concerned, Christmas had lost its appeal, it meant nothing now. And I just couldn’t do another Christmas at home without him. Another Christmas without icing…

Chapter Two (#u80dcb657-3eae-57c5-a6c9-47b437991cd2)

The second I laid eyes on Jase Collins, when he’d walked into my shop not long after it had opened, in the summer of 1998, looking for a scented candle for his mum’s birthday, I knew he was the man I was going to marry. I just knew it. With his torn jeans and loose-fitting Metallica t-shirt,messed-up, light-brown hair and beard, and the most beautiful green eyes I’d ever seen, it was as though I’d been waiting for him to walk into my life forever. There’d been an instant connection, something he’d felt too, and it had been the most incredible feeling. Like a bolt of electricity shooting right through me, making me sit up and take notice of a future that had just been laid out in front of me. As soon as he’d smiled, as soon as he’d started talking to me, as though we’d known each other all our lives and not just that second met, it felt as though I’d found the other half of me. He had the same laid-back attitude, the same morals and beliefs; the same taste in music, not to mention that hippie/rocker edge to him that I’d fallen in love with straight away. It had just felt so right. He’d felt right. Jase Collins. My life.

Our first date just two days later had been at a local pub to watch my brother Matt and my dad’s rock band play, and from that night onwards we’d become inseparable. We’d married a couple of years later in a small but beautiful ceremony attended by just a handful of family and close friends, bought our little house in the village of Tynemouth, and began the rest of our lives together. Jase had continued working in his surf shop down by the beach, and I’d carried on making and selling my jewellery and gifts. We’d never had all that much money, and life had been a struggle sometimes, but we’d had each other. We’d had the life we’d wanted, doing the things we’d wanted to do, and that had been more important to both of us than all the money in the world.

Jase had been my soulmate, simple as that. I can’t say we’d had the perfect marriage – we’d had our ups and downs, whose marriage didn’t? But they’d never lasted long because we were both people who believed in living each day as though it were the last; we’d believed in making the most of life, so stupid arguments and disagreements were always dealt with quickly and forgotten even quicker.

We’d been free spirits. Happy as long as there was food on the table and a roof over our heads. Jessie and Jase – just the two of us. And that’s the way it had been for over ten years. Until last Christmas, when he’d gone out with Matt and their friends, to a biker-friendly pub just outside of Northumberland for a mate’s birthday. Over the years, ever since Jase Collins had walked into my life, he and my brother had become really close friends. Best friends. With their shared love of surfing, motorbikes and rock music, they’d had a lot in common, and I’d never minded them spending time together. I’d loved seeing my brother and my husband so close. But I’d never been all that keen on Jase riding pillion on Matt’s Yamaha, even though Matt wasn’t some wet-behind-the-ears speed-freak. He’d been riding those things for years, both of them had, and it wasn’t the first time Jase had been out with him. But that night, something just hadn’t felt right.

I’d watched him from the living room doorway as he stood by the Christmas tree laughing with Matt, joking about something, and whatever it had been it had made Jase laugh out loud and I’d always remember how handsome he’d looked that night. How relaxed and happy and handsome. So I’d tried to push those niggling feelings to the back of my mind, even though they were constantly fighting to come to the forefront.

He’d kissed me goodnight, holding me close and making me smile with the things he’d whispered in my ear, things that I’ll never, ever forget because they were the last things he ever said to me. And I can only thank God that one of those things had been ‘I love you’ and I’d told him I loved him too, because he never came home. My beautiful husband died that night when a driver, who we later heard had been three times over the limit, had crashed into the bike as Matt and Jase had made their way home along a narrow country lane. They’d taken a short cut because Jase had wanted to get back to me, Matt had told me later at the hospital as he was treated for nothing but a fractured wrist and bruised ribs. Jase had missed me, and he’d wanted to get home before I went to bed because he’d just wanted to be with me. But fate had seen to it that he never arrived.

I said my last goodbye to him just two weeks before Christmas, but, as far as I was concerned, there was no Christmas anymore. Not without Jase. Oh, my family had been there with more support and love and strength than I could ever have asked for, but without Jase I could see nothing ahead of me. I could see nothing but a bleak and pointless future, the guilt of his death weighing heavily on my mind because I should have stopped him from going out that night. I should have stopped him; I should have told him what I was feeling. Because he trusted me, he would have listened. I know he would. But I’d let him go, knowing that something just didn’t feel right. I’d let him go, and that guilt had never gone away. Ever.

It had taken a good few months before I’d even attempted to start putting my life back together again after Jase had died. I’d thrown myself back into work at the shop, taking comfort from the warm surroundings I’d created and the people who came in to talk about Jase, because I’d needed to talk about him. I needed to feel as though he was still around, still a part of me, because it had scared me to think that I might forget anything of the life we’d had together, even one second of it. So I’d spent every day in the shop, and every night I’d go back to our cosy little home and relive every memory of my wonderful husband, replaying our life together over and over in my head until I could do nothing but cry myself to sleep. And every morning I’d wake up, and for a few seconds before I became completely lucid I’d be tricked into thinking that everything was fine, before, once again, being thrown back into a world of loss and loneliness when I realised that Jase wasn’t there. That he was never coming back.

But whilst friends and family saw my routine as something that wasn’t particularly healthy, I saw it as a way of keeping Jase alive, of keeping his memory vivid and clear so that I could still see him there when I closed my eyes, still remember everything about him. And although it may have been a year since he’d died now, I still needed to do that, still needed to have him with me, despite what everyone else was saying – that I should move on. What did that mean anyway? Did they mean I should find someone else? Fall in love again? That was never going to happen as far as I was concerned. Jase had been the love of my life, and I knew I could never love anyone else the way I’d loved him. I didn’t want to love anyone else; I was quite happy being alone – with my memories.

But I’d finally come to the conclusion that getting away from Tynemouth for a few days was a good thing. For almost twelve months I’d never really set foot outside of the town, preferring to stay in close proximity to my comfort zone. But, as another Christmas without Jase loomed, with only the prospect of days back home with my parents lying ahead of me, despite them being the best parents anyone could ask for, I’d had to do something. So, maybe making this effort, showing people that I was at least willing to try and move forward and get on with my life, perhaps that would make them back off slightly. And, in reality, maybe it really was time to try and move on. Even though that was going to be the hardest thing I’d ever done, because I just didn’t know if I could do it without Jase.

Jase Collins. My husband. Now and forever. Always.

Chapter Three (#u80dcb657-3eae-57c5-a6c9-47b437991cd2)

I looked out of the window as the plane slowly made its descent into Kittila airport, snow falling from the already darkened sky even though it was only one-thirty in the afternoon. Craning my neck as the plane grew ever closer to the rapidly whitening runway, I was sure I could see ice forming on the wings but, thankfully, I had no time to inspect more closely as I was thrown back in my seat, the bumpy but otherwise perfect landing signalling our arrival into the Arctic Circle.

I closed my eyes for a second and exhaled. There was still a very small part of me that hoped that, when I opened them, I’d be back home in Tynemouth, sitting by my beautiful open fire listening to some old-school Stevie Nicks and wishing – wishing things were different. But they weren’t. And I was trying hard to get used to it, so I hoped this holiday might actually make that journey a little easier. Matt had certainly promised to help take my mind off things, although I doubted very much that a snowboarding lesson from a thirty-six-year-old rocker who was having trouble growing up was something that would suddenly help me turn my life around.

‘You okay, Jess?’ Matt’s voice broke into my thoughts and I looked at him. My baby brother. We’d always been close, but ever since Jase’s death we’d grown even closer. After all, Jase had been one of Matt’s closest friends, so losing him had been hard for the both of us. He’d just handled it a hell of a lot better than me.

‘I’m fine,’ I replied, squeezing his hand as the seatbelt signs clicked off and everyone began shuffling about, standing up and moving out into the narrow aisle to retrieve their luggage from the overhead lockers.

‘You sure?’ Matt asked, his blue eyes looking at me with that same concerned look that I was actually quite tired of seeing now. Yeah. It was definitely time to start pulling myself together and showing people that I didn’t need their sympathy anymore. I was strong. I could do this. I just wished I didn’t have to.

‘Matt, I’m fine, alright? Stop fussing. You’re as bad as Mum.’

‘I just care about you, Sis,’ he said, stuffing a copy of Kerrang! into his bag.

‘Yeah, I know you do,’ I sighed, wrapping my scarf tightly round my neck as the cabin doors were opened and a blast of ice-cold air surged through the plane’s interior, causing many of the passengers to gasp out loud at the freezing temperatures that were waiting for us all outside. But this was Christmas in Lapland – and it just wouldn’t be the same without the snow and the cold and the prospect of cosy nights in warm, wood-panelled bars and restaurants, would it? Suddenly, a small surge of excitement shot right through me, something I hadn’t felt in a long while. Maybe this holiday really would be the making of me. Maybe this was what I’d needed all along, a break from the memories and a past that people always told me was holding me back. Deep down I knew I didn’t have to stay locked inside some kind of bubble to remember Jase. He’d never leave me; I knew that. He’d always be there; he’d always be with me. I would never let the memory of him fade and I was sure, more than anything, that he wouldn’t want me to be sad. He’d want me to move on. He’d want me to be happy again. Isn’t that what people had been telling me for months now?

‘You’re smiling,’ Matt pointed out, edging his way into the narrow aisle as everyone began shuffling towards the exit.

‘So?’ I asked, following him out of our seats, pulling my hat down firmly onto my head as another blast of cold air swept through the plane.