Christmas in the Snow (2 page)

Allegra burst out laughing in surprise. ‘Well, I wouldn’t know.’

Isobel eyed her reprovingly, dunking the milk bottle in the jug of water. ‘No, you wouldn’t. When
was
the last time you got laid?’

‘
Excuse
me?’ Allegra spluttered again, mortified as she caught a couple on a nearby table looking over.

‘You haven’t had a relationship for ages. You’re thirty-
one
, Allegra,’ Isobel said soberly, as though this was news to Allegra.

‘Oh, don’t start on that again,’ Allegra replied, losing the smile. ‘I’ve got so much on at work I barely have time to wash.’

‘Work doesn’t keep you warm at night.’

‘Actually, it does,’ Allegra shrugged, thinking of the plush room at the Four Seasons that she ended up sleeping in at least two nights a week as she worked till almost dawn and
obligated the firm into providing according to EU regulations.

‘What happened to that Philip chap? He seemed lovely.’

Allegra tutted, drumming her short-manicured fingers lightly on the table. ‘Oversensitive. I don’t have time to babysit.’ Her eyes fell to Ferdy, propped up in a wooden high
chair with three plastic balls attached, which were, for now, holding his attention.

‘“Over—”’ Isobel leaned back in her chair and sighed. ‘Oh God, what did you do? Just tell me.’

‘
I
didn’t do anything.’

Isobel didn’t reply, just narrowed her eyes.

‘I was closing a deal. He kept pushing to see me, going on and on: “Just drinks. Just want to see you and hear your news.”’ Allegra sniffed lightly. ‘So I sent
Kirsty to go on my behalf. That was all.’

A pulse.

‘Kirsty? Kirsty your PA Kirsty?’

Allegra nodded. ‘He wanted to know my news. Kirsty told him my news.’ She shrugged.

Isobel’s jaw dropped open. ‘You actually sent your PA on your date with your boyfriend.’

‘Ex, now.’

‘And we wonder why. Unbelievable.’ Sarcasm oozed from Isobel’s voice as she took the bottle of milk out of the hot water and sprinkled a few drops on her inner wrist, testing
the temperature. ‘Was it worth it?’ Her tone suggested nothing could be worth a broken relationship.

‘Absolutely. That deal tipped us from the two to the twenty. Twenty-seven million pounds in fees.’ Allegra sipped nonchalantly on her coffee, unaware that her sister had no idea of
the 2:20 fee structure on which her business was based. ‘Thanks to that alone, I’m up for promotion in the next round. It’ll put me on the board. You know I’m the only
female president in the company, right?’

Isobel just shook her head, nonplussed, or at least uninformed. ‘No wonder Mum worries so much about you.’

Allegra shot her a look and Isobel immediately looked down, ashamed. They both knew their mother’s worries about her were now, only ever, part-time. ‘Sorry, that was a shitty thing
to say,’ Isobel mumbled, reaching for Ferdy and pulling him out of the chair and onto her lap.

Allegra sat back in her seat, trying to give them both a bit more space as Ferdy began to feed. She sipped her coffee, feeling out of place in this cafe where people snacked and chatted easily,
as though they had nowhere more important to be or nothing more important to do. She stared at the BlackBerry flashing like a satellite receiver on the table and visualized the messages and
urgencies it contained beginning to pile up like planes in a stacking system in the sky. Her blood pressure was rising.

As if on cue, the BlackBerry rang. The sisters’ eyes met – panic in one set, satisfaction in the other – as Allegra got to it first. Isobel had her hands full and
couldn’t reach it without dropping Ferdy. Isobel tutted and looked away.

‘Fisher,’ Allegra murmured, watching her sister as she began cooing down to Ferdy and wondering how they could be so different. To a stranger’s eye, they were clearly related:
both were willowy and tall, at five feet ten, with lean, athletic bodies, but while Allegra entered triathlons as her reluctant concession to ‘downtime’, Isobel had merely been content
to be the envy of all the mothers in her NCT group for getting back into her jeans so quickly. There were one and a half years between them and only seven IQ points – neither of them slow nor
a Mensa star – but while Allegra couldn’t rest till she knew she was the best at whatever she had set her mind to, Isobel had always gone for the easy option, happy simply to be
considered pretty or lucky or privileged.

Allegra put it down to their upbringing. Isobel had been their father’s favourite – something Allegra had accepted as fact and without resentment – and hers was the prettier
face, taking after him with her highly coloured cheeks, blue eyes and fair hair. Allegra, by contrast, had a sharper look, which had seemed too precocious, too knowing on a child’s face, with
strikingly almond-shaped eyes in a deep chocolate brown that helpfully hid her feelings, and high-carved cheekbones that had never been appled or dimpled. Only the gap between her two front teeth
– her mother hadn’t been able to afford the private orthodontic bills and it wasn’t covered on the NHS – punctured the illusion of full-blown sophistication with an element
of gawkiness. Everyone called it ‘cute’ or ‘kooky’, both words anathema to a woman who privately gloried in her nickname ‘the Lipstick Assassin’, but it was only
really apparent when she smiled, and in the hedge-fund world, smiling meant you weren’t taking things seriously; smiling meant you weren’t
taken
seriously. So she didn’t
smile much.

It was the hair, though, that really broadcast the breach between the two of them. Isobel’s was long and swishy, like Kim Sears’s at Wimbledon, or Kate Middleton’s: a glossy
mane in perpetual motion that came with a smart postcode and designer handbag. Allegra’s was short and to the point, like her. Barely long enough to be called a bob, it curled in just below
her earlobes, showing off a slim neck she’d never stopped to notice and the kind of tight jawline that only came from years of stressful meetings and grinding her teeth in her sleep.

She hung up abruptly, without courtesies, kindness or kisses. ‘Iz, I’m so sorry but I’ve got to go.’

‘Of course you do.’ Isobel groaned and rolled her eyes.

‘It’s the pitch we’re working on.
Massive
deal. Bob’s been in the office round the clock since Wednesday and his wife wants him home for lunch.’ She
tutted, also glancing skywards momentarily. ‘She doesn’t appreciate that we’re not there on the numbers yet and the pitch is on Tuesday in Zurich.’

‘How
selfish
of her,’ Isobel said drily.

Allegra arched an eyebrow. ‘I’ve got to go in.’

‘But
you’ve
got family commitments too! What’s this, right now?’ Isobel pulled the bottle out of Ferdy’s mouth as she indicated the tired, dark cafe,
populated by strangers in bobbling-wool jumpers and sturdy boots. Ferdy instantly began to wail and she promptly stuck it back in. ‘And we’re supposed to finish going through the house
together. You promised!’

‘Yes, but there’s only the loft left to do, isn’t there?’

‘Only the loft?
Only
the loft? That’s always where the best stuff is; it’s where people put all the things they can’t bear to throw out. God only knows what
we’ll find up there. We’ll be in there for hours.’

‘Oh good.’

‘Come on, Legs. You know I can’t do it on my own. I won’t be able to bring myself to throw out anything and I’ll end up keeping everything, like one of those sad hoarders
with boxes and plastic bags full of clothes in every room, and then Lloyd’ll leave me—’

‘Where is Lloyd?’

‘He’s still jet-lagged from Dubai.’

Allegra aimed for a sympathetic face. She did Dubai for breakfast. ‘Look, Iz, I have loved doing this. Really I have,’ Allegra said, leaning forward with her hands across the table
as she always did in meetings when making an ‘impassioned’ point. ‘I can’t
tell
you how much more relaxed I feel from that walk.’ She slapped a hand across
her heart. ‘And it’s been just heavenly seeing little Ferds.’

‘You haven’t even held him yet.’ Isobel’s eyes showed she wasn’t fooled by Allegra’s lapse into mummy chat. Allegra usually only ever talked in bullet points
and corporate speak.

‘That’s only because he was sleeping and now he’s feeding and I
have
to go.’ She reached for her bag, hanging on the back of the chair – a discreet navy
Saint Laurent Besace filled with a tube of Touche Eclat, her passport and vitamin pills, unlike Isobel’s brightly coloured Orla Kiely vinyl satchel, which was stuffed with nappies, dummies,
toys and a change of clothes. ‘Let’s meet up tomorrow, OK? I’m sure if we blitz it together, we’ll get it done in a couple of hours.’ Allegra bent down, kissing Ferdy
lightly on the top of his head. He smelt sweet, like parsnip or talc, and she could feel him chomping down on the bottle with impressive strength. She kissed Isobel on the cheek, detecting the new
scent of Pond’s moisturiser, now that Estée Lauder was a bit of a stretch. Kids weren’t cheap and she knew Lloyd was already stressing about school fees.

‘What time?’

‘Ten a.m.’

Allegra hesitated. ‘Two.’

Isobel narrowed her eyes. ‘Twelve.’

‘Done.’ Allegra winked.

‘Ugh,’ Isobel groaned as she realized she’d been played. ‘Don’t forget your lucky leaf.’

‘My what?’

Isobel jerked her chin towards the waxy-brown horse chestnut leaf lying like a hand on the table between them. ‘Put it in your purse. You said you’ve got this big deal going through
– you’re going to need some luck.’

Allegra went to say something – a dismissive refusal, a pithy putdown of her sister’s nostalgic sentimentality – but thought better of it. ‘Yes, you’re quite right.
I need whatever luck I can get. Thanks.’ She opened out her large black caviar-leather wallet and slid it in the notes compartment across the back. It fit almost perfectly.

She smiled, wondering whether her sister still read her horoscopes too. ‘See you at Mum’s, two o’clock tomorrow, then,’ she said, turning and marching quickly out of the
cafe, past all the Saturday-sloppy regulars slurping cappuccinos and updating their Facebook statuses on their iPhones, her phone to her ear before she was even at the door. By the time Isobel had
Ferdy strapped back into his buggy and was texting her that they had agreed twelve – twelve o’clock! – she was in a cab driving over Tower Bridge, and five minutes after that, she
was striding through the silent marble lobby, flashing her security pass to the guards, a smile on her face as she jabbed the buttons to take her up the twenty storeys to the office, home
again.

‘Oh my God, Legs, this place is a death trap,’ Isobel cried, her arms gripping the thick beam overhead as she cautiously placed one foot in front of the other like
a tightrope walker and made her way over the joist to where Allegra was sitting on the small, square patch of plywood. Plumes of marshmallow-pink roof insulation billowed at her ankles, obscuring
the joist from view, and she let out a whimper of worry. ‘I’m going to go through the ceiling, I know I am.’

‘No, you won’t. You’re nearly there,’ Allegra said reassuringly, as Isobel advanced in baby steps, her head bent awkwardly to the side of the beam as her lofty height
worked against her for once.

Isobel’s foot touched down on the relative safety of the ply and her hands fell from the beam and folded over her clattering heart instead. ‘Phew. Scary stuff.’

‘White knuckle.’ Allegra sat patiently as Isobel folded herself down into a cross-legged position like an origami model, her long, lean limbs jutting out at loose angles as she made
herself comfortable on their little island in the sea of pink fluff.

Isobel rubbed her nose with her forefinger. ‘Gah. This stuff always makes me sneeze and itch. Doesn’t it you?’

‘Not really.’

‘I bet it’s ’cos of my hay fever.’

‘Maybe. Just try not to touch it.’

‘Yeah, but it’s just like . . . in the atmosphere up here, isn’t it?’ Isobel said, rubbing her nose harder.

Allegra scanned the loft distractedly. A single hot light bulb on the beam above where they sat drenched them in harsh light, but its strength couldn’t spread to the far corners of the
space and she strained to make out silhouettes in the shadows.

‘So, this is the end of it,’ Isobel said, eyeing the small, neat pile of taped boxes and a 1980s hard suitcase that was bulging at the sides, a frill of lace peeking through.
‘Just this lot to sort through and then we’re done.’

Allegra nodded with relief. She reckoned they’d be out of here in ninety minutes, tops, and she could get back to the office. ‘This is it.’

Isobel grabbed her hand suddenly. ‘I’m so glad we’re doing this together, Legs. It’s the end of an era, isn’t it?’

Allegra looked down at their blanched hands, feeling a knot of emotion rush at her like a tide and closing her throat. She nodded wordlessly. It wasn’t just
an
ending. It was
the
end – of their family, their childhoods, their lives where they had belonged only to each other.

Even just being up here signalled a new dawn. As children, they’d never been allowed into the loft, their mother worrying unduly about them falling through the pink fluff and the
plasterboard beneath it, into the bedroom below. But they weren’t children any more. Everything had changed, swapped round, and they were the adults now.

With a quick sniff, Allegra pulled her hands away and climbed up onto her knees, pulling a tall box closer to her and slicing the yellow, crackling sellotape with her thumbnail. ‘Oh, now
that’s what I call a good start,’ Allegra said with a relieved smile. ‘We can throw out the lot of these. They’re just old school books.’

‘No way!’ Isobel said excitedly, her hoarding instincts rushing to the fore as she plunged in her arm. She pulled out a clutch of school workbooks and reports, passing over those
with Allegra’s handwriting and keeping her own.

Allegra saw that they had her old name on – Allegra Johnson – and she felt her chest tighten. It was so unfamiliar now. She wondered whether it would feel as foreign if she said it
out loud, but she didn’t dare make a sound. They were already in dangerous territory as it was, plunging through the past like this. They were here because they were losing their mother; the
last thing she needed to do was remind Isobel about when they’d had a father. She began flicking through it briskly. It was her ‘morning’ book from year one – her second
ever year of school – smiling, bemused, at the miles of crayon sketches of rainbows and bright pink stick people with hair that was seemingly always worn in bunches and feet that pointed
outwards, Mary Poppins style. In year two, she had seemingly moved on to a craze for pigs – page after page was filled with profile images of them, their tails curling extravagantly, and even
her friend – Codi – had drawn her renditions of pigs for her too, as gifts.