It Won’t be Christmas Without You. Beth Reekles

sighed, licked the last mince pie crumbs off her finger and set down the plate on the sofa before reaching for her phone and swiping the screen open. “Hi, Mum.”

      She was greeted by the sound of Mele Kalikimaka playing from somewhere, and a pair of snowman deely boppers wobbled on her mum’s head.

      “Why are you wearing sunglasses?” she asked, before her mum had chance to say hello.

      “Oh, darling! I thought it was dark!” This was punctuated by a giddy laugh that made Eloise wonder if her parents had cracked the Christmas Baileys open a little early. Her mum swept the sunglasses off her face. “We’ve got news! Your dad’s just on FaceTime to Cara to tell her now. Actually, it was all her idea. Sort of. That boyfriend of hers, George. He gave us the idea.”

      “What are you talking about?”

      “We’ve booked a holiday!”

      Eloise caught sight of herself in the little window on her phone: one eye squinted shut, brow furrowed, top lip pulled up on one side in utter confusion. “Um, okay. That’s nice, Mum.”

      “For Christmas!”

      Eloise practically heard Santa’s sleigh crash-landing to Earth.

      Her mum, oblivious, carried on, talking a mile a minute, eyes glazed and mouth in a beaming smile. “See, Cara told us all about how George’s parents have booked a last-minute holiday to get some winter sun for a week over Christmas, so we had a look and oh, sweetheart, you wouldn’t believe the deal we got! A week in Tenerife, all inclusive! Absolute bargain! We fly out on the twenty-third, so we’ll be back just in time for New Year. I’d hate to miss Sandra’s New Year’s do down the pub. They put on a cracking night.”

      Oh, yeah, Eloise thought bitterly, fighting hard not to say it out loud. God forbid you miss the New Year’s do at the local pub, but sure, skip Christmas; that’s not a big deal. It wasn’t like Cara hadn’t already mucked things up by deciding to travel home on Christmas Day instead of a few days earlier. It wasn’t like she wasn’t already kind of dreading her first Christmas in years without Josh and looking forward to a few days with her family more than ever. Especially with Cara. It felt like forever since they’d really hung out or spent any time together.

      “I’m so glad I’ve been going to those fitness classes with the girls to shed a few pounds ready for Christmas. I don’t know where I would’ve got a swimming costume and sundresses at this time of year if I didn’t still fit into them! And your dad’s bought one of those Hawaiian shirts, a bright yellow one with big pink flowers on. Looks bloody ridiculous, of course, but there was no stopping him!”

       There’s no stopping you going, either. Clearly.

      “So …” Eloise swallowed the lump in her throat. Vin Diesel was back on the TV, and she reached for the remote to mute it. “So you’re going on holiday for Christmas. And Cara’s not coming home. So I’m – I’m spending Christmas all on my own.”

      “Oh, no, don’t be silly! Of course you can still come home, and Cara will be here – just not first thing in the morning. And she’s said she can work from home for a day or so if she has to. And you could always go see your aunt and uncle and your cousins.”

      The aunt and uncle and cousins who lived over an hour’s drive from home, who she didn’t actually talk to all that much, and only saw a few times a year since she’d gone off to uni. And who didn’t even cook a turkey on Christmas Day, because ‘it was too much hassle’.

      Her mum was still going on: about the hotel (four and a half stars on TripAdvisor, you know) and the one utterly scathing review (but of course it was probably a one-off) and how close they were to the beach, and –

      And Eloise could see how excited her mum was. Her dad’s voice was faint, somewhere in the background under what was now Michael Bublé’s Holly Jolly Christmas, chattering away to Cara to tell her exactly the same news. He was just as excited.

      And why shouldn’t they be? They loved their sunny holidays in the Mediterranean. Of course they’d love a bit of winter sun for a change.

      It wasn’t their fault she didn’t like to let on how homesick she got or how lonely she could be here.

      So she plastered on a smile, asked her mum all the right questions, pretended that this was fine – they’d FaceTime from the beach! Her parents would have the best time! Of course Eloise didn’t mind! They’d send each other pictures of their Christmas dinner! Ha ha!

      (God, Christmas dinner – that was always her dad’s domain … What the hell would they do? Would Cara expect her to do it all? They couldn’t not have a roast dinner on Christmas Day.)

      It was all Cara’s fault. Cara and that bloody guy she was seeing, George. Eloise had only heard wonderful things about perfect, dashing, handsome George so far, but this made her kind of hate him. He’d ruined Christmas.

      Cara had sort of ruined Christmas when she’d phoned a few days ago, to say she wouldn’t be there the whole day. But Eloise could just about live with that. It wouldn’t be great, but they’d still have most of the day, and it wasn’t like she’d be off to Josh’s in the evening like she had the last several Christmases.

      She could live with Cara bailing on Christmas morning.

      But this?

      Christmas was the best time of year. For Eloise, it properly started as early as November. She’d been so excited about going back home and spending a few days with her family, watching the usual suspects on DVD, playing games, eating too much …

      And now she’d be waking up on Christmas Day all alone. In a big, empty house.

      Alone at Christmas.

      Did it get much worse than that?

       Eighteen days to Christmas

       Chapter 3

      “You coming?”

      “Huh?”

      Jen rolled her eyes, absently tapping her card wallet on the dividing wall around Cara’s desk. “Starbucks. I literally just explained. You said you were listening.”

      “Sorry.” Cara stared intently at her screen, eyes scanning the email once more, deleting one more exclamation mark before she hit send. She looked up at Jen again. “Sorry. I swear I’m listening this time.”

      “Starbucks time. Are you coming?” Cara’s eyes flicked towards Dave’s office, and she barely opened her mouth before Jen added, “Dave was the one who asked if anybody else wanted to go out and grab a Christmas coffee in the first place.”

      “I don’t know. I’ve just got so much to get through for next week’s last-minute gifts campaign …” As if on cue, an email from some boutique candle company from North Wales pinged into her inbox. Promptly followed by a reply from the high street retailer they were still hoping to pin down. “I’m just …”

      “Oh my God,” Jen sighed, exasperated but half-laughing, “don’t bother. You’ll just have your nose in your phone. What shall I bring you back?”

      Jen had started her role in the PR team the same week as Cara had joined the company. Despite the four-year age difference, they’d clicked instantly. It hadn’t been long before their joint coffee breaks and lunches turned into after-work drinks and weekend wanders around the shops. Jen was a brilliant friend, especially at times like this, when she understood how much Cara had on her plate.

      The company – Klikit – had been around for maybe four years now, but it had only really started taking off about a year ago, hitting the front page of the App Store, their followers spiking on Twitter until they were real competitors, a real household name. They still had a