‘We shouldn’t be surprised, but hasn’t he just?’ Robert holds William’s face in his hands a brief moment, then turns to his mother.
‘Happy Christmas, Evelyn. Good to have him back?’
‘What do you think?’ she replies snippily. ‘Sit down and I’ll finish in the kitchen. Sherry? Tea?’
‘Sherry,’ they reply together.
Howard sits on the settee, Uncle Robert in the armchair opposite. William places himself on the floor between them by the coffee table.
‘Here you are, William.’ Robert puts the two parcels before him.
‘Thanks, Uncle Robert. Thanks, Howard.’
As William unwraps the 250-piece puzzle and an LP – the soundtrack to Leonard Bernstein’s West Side Story – he chatters about his first term. He keeps a close eye on Uncle Robert; his thick brown hair, straight nose, the dimple in his chin, and – his favourite bit – the three sharp creases that fan out from the corner of each of his eyes when he smiles. Which is nearly all the time, as William relaxes quickly back into entertaining them. He’s more outgoing and extrovert with Howard and Robert than with anyone else. It’s a hangover from all the time he spent with them and his father, when he was always the centre of attention.
When Evelyn comes back in with glasses of sherry and nuts in a wooden bowl, the three of them are rocking, silent with laughter.
‘What’s funny?’ she says with a bright smile, putting the tray on the table.
In a perfect Donald Duck voice, William says, ‘I’ve been singing the “Te Deum”。’
They collapse into laughter again.
Evelyn straightens the cloth and sits at the table. ‘It always worries me you’ll damage your voice doing that,’ she says, and bites into a crab paste sandwich.
Later, Howard sits cross-legged with William at the coffee table and they start the jigsaw of the Cunard liner. Howard smells woody and crisp. They wonder if the piece in William’s hand is the grey sky, or the metal of the boat. They give up and concentrate on the red funnels. Uncle Robert and Evelyn are talking at the table about nothing. He asks if she needs the window frames painting, because he wouldn’t mind doing that. She says no, but thank you. After a while, he asks if they can play the LP they gave William.
William says, ‘Yes please,’ before Evelyn can say something unkind.
He and Howard carry on with the puzzle; Uncle Robert and Evelyn listen to the music with their eyes shut. Eventually they go into the kitchen and wash up.
Howard relaxes, swings puzzle pieces in the air in time to the music. Soon, every rummage in the box for a piece, every attempt to fit one into place, has become a giggled piece of choreography.
William wonders, suddenly, if Martin has sung ‘Myfanwy’ to his family yet. ‘I’ve got a song to sing you all.’
Howard puts down a puzzle piece, smiling. ‘That would be marvellous! What is it?’
‘“Myfanwy” – I can do it in Welsh if you like.’
‘I can’t help it, William!’ Evelyn sighs and flops onto the sofa two hours later. ‘I miss your dad. Especially at Christmas. You can understand that, can’t you?’ She picks up the tea towel that lies next to her.
He shrugs, sitting back down at the jigsaw, running his fingers over the completed funnels. He steals a glance at her. She’s twisting the tea towel round one hand. He looks back at the remaining pieces in the box and spots the fluffy bit of steam that connects the funnels. He and Howard were hunting for that for ages. He slots it into place.
‘But I like being with him.’ His eyes stay fixed on the box. ‘It’s the next best thing to being with Dad.’ He forces himself to look at her.
‘Not for me. It just makes me sad.’
‘Well, I wish being sad didn’t make you nasty! I wanted to sing a song for you all, but you looked so mean when you came back from washing up, I couldn’t.’
She stares at him, the tea towel now draped over her red flecked skirt, then sits upright on the edge of the settee. ‘Well, maybe next year I’ll just stay in the kitchen and you can have a far better time without me.’ She leans back, then sits up straight again. ‘And I’ll ask you not to call me nasty, William.’
‘They miss him too, you know.’
She walks to the table and slaps the towel down. ‘I wouldn’t mind, if just once, Robert came on his own! Why do they always have to be together, when I haven’t got anyone to be together with!’ She marches out of the room and slams the door.