A Very Irish Christmas Read online

  A VERY IRISH CHRISTMAS

  CLAUDIA CARROLL

  AVON

  A division of HarperCollinsPublishers

  1 London Bridge Street,

  London SE1 9GF

  www.harpercollins.co.uk

  First published in Great Britain by HarperCollinsPublishers 2017

  Copyright © Claudia Carroll 2017

  Claudia Carroll asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

  A catalogue record of this book is available from the British Library.

  This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

  All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.

  Ebook Edition © December 2017 ISBN: 9780008276416

  Version: 2017-10-17

  To Phoebe Morgan and all at Team Avon…with fondest love and deepest thanks, for everything.

  Table of Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Keep Reading …

  About the Publisher

  CHAPTER ONE

  I once saw a quote that read, ‘Santa Claus has the right idea. Once a year is quite enough to visit anyone.’ It’s now the third week in December and I’m somewhat coming around to that viewpoint myself.

  A Christmas party, for God’s sake. In a monumental waste of both time and their money, it transpires that my work colleagues have actually decided to organize a staff Christmas party with all the trimmings: ridiculous-looking paper hats, mince pies, the whole works.

  ‘I know it’s going to be the most pathetic Christmas drinks do in history,’ says Greta, my studio floor manager, laying rubbery-looking mince pies onto a few paper plates, patently unaware that the TV studio microphones are picking up on her inane chatter so I can hear loud and clear from where I’m sitting up in the production booth. ‘But we have to do this for Carole, don’t we? She’s all on her own for Christmas, same as every other year, and it’s the least we can do.’

  ‘Don’t tell me we all have to hang around for it?’ groans Tom, our lead cameraman.

  ‘Well what do you think? Course we do.’

  ‘Do I really have to?’

  ‘You’ve no choice,’ says Greta, ‘none of us do. Because if the crew don’t turn up for this, then no one else will.’

  ‘Oh for feck’s sake.’

  ‘None of us want to be there, Tom,’ Greta insists. ‘But like it or not, Carole is the boss, so we’ve no choice.’

  ‘And she’s really going to be on her own for the holidays? I think I’d rather be home opening a vein with a bottle of gin to hand than going to this party. It’s only lunchtime. Whoever has a Christmas party at lunchtime? This is Dublin, for God’s sake, the party capital of Europe! Christmas parties here generally start after work and can go on for days at a time. But a Christmas party for one hour in the middle of the day? It’s pitiful, that’s what it is.’

  ‘I know, but it was the only time I could get Carole to commit to. And even at that, she says we all have to be back at our desks by two p.m. sharp.’

  ‘Jeez, what is she like? Is the woman even human?’

  ‘Look, you have to be there and that’s final,’ Greta insists. ‘I even had to raid petty cash and throw in a couple of bottles of Prosecco just to sweeten the deal for everyone. I’d enough trouble trying to get people to chip in a few quid for a Christmas present for her as it is.’

  ‘Cringe-worthy, that’s what it is,’ sighs Tom. ‘The rest of us all have normal family Christmases planned, like you do. And look at the Rottweiler, would you? Up in the production box snapping at us like she does every other day of the year.’

  ‘She’ll probably start giving out yards to us for chatting on the studio floor in a minute,’ says Greta, ‘and how it’s against regulation thirty-five, subsection B or some shite like that. Wait till you see.’

  You’re absolutely correct there, Greta, I think. I could do exactly that. I could speak to you all on your earpieces at any point so you’d know I can hear you perfectly well. But then, of course, you’d know I’d already heard this much and it would be mortifying. Plus there’s something morbidly entertaining about hearing yourself discussed when you’re not around and the gloves are off.

  ‘Is the Rottweiler really all on her lonesome for the holidays?’ asks a frankly terrifying make-up artist who looks about twelve, with tattooed-on eyebrows and nose piercings, muscling her way in on the conversation.

  ‘Same as every other year, yeah,’ says Greta sadly, shaking her head and draping the walls with dismal-looking bits of tinsel. ‘She sometimes talks about a mother and sister, but apart from them, she doesn’t seem to have anyone to spend Christmas with. It’s heartbreaking really. All she has is her career and that’s it.’

  ‘And cats. I bet she has cats. That one definitely looks like the feline type,’ says Tom.

  ‘She’s going to be working on Christmas Day and New Year, you know.’

  ‘Only because she has no one else to spend the holidays with.’

  ‘Are you all talking about Carole?’ Maura, my PA interrupts, briskly barging onto the studio floor with a fresh running order before the lunchtime broadcast.

  ‘Well, who do you think?’ says Scary Make-Up Artist. ‘I mean, don’t you think there’s a big bang of tragedy off this? Everyone else is going to a big Christmas piss-up tonight and she’s probably going home to a lonely old house that stinks of cat wee.’

  ‘Yeah … to make up a spreadsheet of tomorrow’s studio running order,’ says Greta. ‘Then she’ll probably email me at all hours tonight to remind me of some last-minute change to the schedule.’

  ‘Don’t talk to me – I’m so sick of her and her bloody midnight emails!’ grumbles Tom. ‘Just because the Rottweiler hasn’t got a life doesn’t mean the rest of us haven’t either.’

  ‘Bitch all you want,’ says Maura, tapping impatiently on her earpiece, ‘but Carole is senior news executive around here, which makes her not just your boss, but your boss’s boss too – so in my book, she’s a trailblazer. Oh and it’s two minutes to broadcast, in case anyone’s interested in actually doing their job.’

  Good on you, Maura, I think, silently blessing the one colleague who actually stuck up for me. I even make a mental note to give her a pay rise and roster her on the weekday news slots from now on, so she can have the whole weekend off.

  ‘Oh yeah, because your career is the be-all and end-all?’ replies Isabelle, our news anchor, from behind her desk. Her make-up is being retouched and she’s sitting like a queen bee, the gossipy little hive buzzing all around her.

  ‘Just mark the words of this married lady,’ Isabelle witters on. ‘It’s one thing to graft at work and scale the corporate ladders, but if you’ve got no one to share it
with, what’s the point? So you can end up spending the big holidays all alone? Trailblazing is all well and good but not at the cost of your own private life, thanks very much. You should all take a long hard look at women like Carole and learn from their mistakes. Now, before it’s too late. The woman is like a walking cautionary tale.’

  ‘Would you even listen to yourselves?’ says Maura, continuing to stick up for me, bless her. ‘You’re all assuming Carole has no one to spend Christmas Day with, but that could be rubbish for all you know. Stop being so presumptuous, will you? And it’s ninety seconds to air, by the way.’

  ‘Oh for God’s sake, everyone knows Carole doesn’t have any kind of a private life,’ says Isabelle coolly. ‘The woman is here eighteen hours a day, seven days a week. She’s the only executive around who’s actually here to let the cleaners in at five a.m. every single day. It’s beyond sad.’

  ‘What did you end up buying her for Christmas with the money you made us chip in?’ Tom asks, like he has all the time in the world, even though we’re live to air in exactly thirty-eight seconds and counting. ‘A new litter tray for her cats, maybe? A scratching post?’

  ‘Houseplants?’ Isabelle puts in from behind her desk, as our show runner plonks a change in her lead story in front of her. ‘The low-maintenance kind would suit Carole. Like a cactus. Something you just throw a bucket of water over once in a blue moon.’

  ‘I could give her a make-over for her Christmas present,’ Scary Make-Up Artist suggests. ‘You know, take the grey out of her hair, introduce her to Charlotte Tilbury and a bit of mascara. Give me one hour with Carole and I could make her look less like …’

  ‘Like what? The Wicked Witch of the West?’

  ‘Well, a bit less like Theresa May for starters.’

  ‘In the end, I got her a monthly subscription,’ says Greta, giving the hand signal that we’re now ten seconds away from air – not that anyone seems remotely fazed by this. But then why would you want to work when it’s infinitely more interesting to rake over the details of your boss’s personal life?

  ‘A subscription to what? Feline Lovers Weekly? Walking tours for the over-fifties?’

  ‘Walking tours? That’s a laugh – Carole never goes anywhere! I’m here ten years and I’ve never once seen the woman taking a single holiday. That one would sleep in the office if she could.’

  ‘The subscription is for a magazine called Bucket List Monthly. It’s got all sorts of suggestions for mad, wild challenges you can take on. Like abseiling down the Grand Canyon, or doing the Camino de Santiago walk – that kind of thing.’

  ‘Carole? Abseiling down the Grand Canyon? Don’t be funny,’ snips Isabelle, as the opening news credits start to roll and the studio floor is instantaneously cleared. ‘She’d have a rope in one hand and her mobile in the other, in case she missed anything back at work.’

  They all titter at that, as Greta gives the hand signal that we’re live to air and the opening news credits begin to roll.

  In fairness, I laugh at that one myself, actually.

  *

  I pretended to be happy when they wheeled out the Christmas cake in the staff canteen at lunchtime. I even managed a gracious ‘thank you’ when they handed over the subscription to Sad Bastards Monthly, or whatever it’s called. There was a muted bit of chatter as I handed out the gifts I had for them, a lacklustre sing-along to ‘White Christmas’, followed by a brief speech from Tim, our head of current affairs, wishing everyone a magical holiday.

  ‘See you all in 2018 – and you all better behave at the party tonight!’

  The same staff party that no one had thought of inviting me to. Not that I would have attended; it was to be held in some class of a nightclub and the very thought of it made me want to break out in hives, but still. It would have been nice to have been asked, that’s all.

  Then, when everyone had been served a slice of cheap Christmas cake, the room cleared every bit as quickly as it had filled up, so minutes later it was just me on my own, left to tidy up the dregs of paper plates and half-masticated mince pies. From the corridor outside, I overheard the same gaggle of women who’d been gossiping about me earlier click-clacking their way back to the studio in good time for the two p.m. bulletin. Getting giddier and giddier, it seemed, the further they were away from me.

  ‘Imagine having to spend Christmas on your own,’ one voice filtered back to me, down the corridor. ‘It’s the saddest thing ever.’

  ‘Mark my words, Carole will spend Christmas Day working. And she’ll be in here at dawn on Boxing Day, same as always.’

  ‘She’s basically living the life of a nun on a six-figure salary.’

  ‘Feminist icon and trailblazer or not – if I ever end up like Carole, shoot me.’

  CHAPTER TWO

  Just to put a few myths to rest, contrary to received wisdom, I don’t live with a clatter of cats in a dilapidated house that smells of cat wee. As it happens, I live in a slick top-floor apartment on Dublin’s trendy Grand Canal Square, with a walk-in wardrobe to house all my work clothes (all in handy, convenient black), a kitchen I barely use and a giant American fridge-freezer neatly stacked with bottles of Pellegrino water – with the labels all uniformly facing outwards, naturally.

  I’m home now as it happens, shoehorning myself into a cocktail dress (in black), which I haven’t worn in years, to get ready for the Christmas Eve drinks do my mother is insisting on hosting, same as she does every other year. Although frankly, I’m hard-pressed to think of anything I’ll enjoy less. Left to me, I’d catch up on work, do some preparation for tomorrow in the studio, and be in bed with a cup of chamomile tea (in a china cup) and my eye mask on by eleven p.m.

  My mother, however, has put her foot down about this and there are some battles in life that just aren’t worth fighting. She’s heading off to the Caribbean shortly, as she’s done every year since my dad passed away, to spend the holidays with her cousins in Trinidad. So tonight is the last time our little family will be together till the New Year. And that’s it. That’s the sum total of my social plans for the holidays.

  Already, it’s seven-thirteen p.m. – which gives me exactly seventeen minutes before I collect Jess, my sister and ‘date’ for the night. But for some reason, tonight I’m moving at half speed. Ordinarily I’d be a powerhouse of energy, buzzing around the place getting organized so I can be punctual to the dot. On a special occasion such as this, I even allow myself a strict limit of 1.5 units of white wine (Sauvignon Blanc, never, ever Chardonnay) served with a single cube of ice.

  Tonight, though, I’m already onto my second glass and it’s not having the desired effect at all. Instead, my mind is unfocused and all over the place, as all manner of unwelcome thoughts bubble to the surface.

  Piteous.

  That’s the word that springs to mind, I think, dabbing on eye make-up that I bought a year ago on the advice of a personal stylist. Which, by the way, is still stuck in the same box that it came in, unused, up till now at least.

  They all looked at me piteously at work earlier today. You may be a big success at work, I could almost see them thinking, but it’s Christmas and you’re all alone and that doesn’t make you any kind of role model for the rest of us.

  Which wouldn’t bother me in the least, ninety per cent of the time. So why is it that tonight their stinging comments hurt me so deeply? After all, this is what I’ve chosen and I’m happy with my lot. Well, reasonably happy. I may not exactly be about to burst into song like some idiot in a Broadway musical, but compared with other people, I’m doing absolutely fine, thank you very much.

  My days are full to the brim. I’m supremely busy. And active. I pay extortionate fees for gym membership and have disciplined myself to take two six a.m. Pilates classes at weekends, to maximize the value I get from it on a strict cost per use basis. I could socialize more if I chose to, but when do I have time? No matter what the twenty-somethings at Channel Ten may think, I actually do enjoy my job and am happy to spend
all my waking hours there.

  Women can have it all, we’re constantly told. In the à la carte buffet of life, you can pick and choose the kind of life you want to lead. But it’s not true, is it? You want to be a working mother with a young family? Fine, away you go, but don’t expect to scale the heights anytime soon. How can you, when family life takes up such a vast chunk of your time? There are, after all, only twenty-four hours in a day, last time I looked.

  But if, like me, you’ve got a burning ambition for work and a real passion for your job that unexpectedly propels you to the top of the ladder, then good for you and away you go. However, you needn’t expect anyone to dance on tabletops at your wedding anytime soon because what man in his sane mind would put up with the hours you need to work, just to stay where you are?

  I’ve done everything that good girls are supposed to do in life, I think, spritzing on perfume that I seldom ever wear. I worked hard when I was young, got great grades, went to a top college and then went on to my dream career – the only career I ever really wanted to pursue. I love working on a news show. It fulfils me; it challenges me every single day to be the best that I can be. I adore the fact that the day’s news stories can change on an hourly basis and it’s never a chore for me to work long hours, because I’m genuinely passionate about news.

  So why is it that at this time of year, when the whole world is out celebrating, there’s a gnawing feeling of emptiness inside me that won’t go away? Ordinarily I’m a mistress of denial; I have the ability to box away emotion like you wouldn’t believe. But today it’s different.

  Carole is basically living the life of a nun on a six-figure salary.

  If I end up like her, spending Christmas all alone, shoot me.

  Why do their words keeping coming back to me? They’re just a pack of idle gossips at Channel Ten, I remind myself, and that’s beyond dispute.