White Christmas For The Single Mum

‘Dad, you’re completely biased.’

‘Nonsense, your father’s right. We’re both proud of you and you need to take that knowledge and expertise where it’s needed most. Those babies and their parents need you,’ her mother argued from the back seat. Her voice was soft but her tone was firm. Gently she kissed the top of her granddaughter’s head. ‘While we’d love to have Bea stay with us if it was for your three-day trip to Auckland, this is not three days. Poor little thing, she would fret terribly without you for any longer than a few days and visiting the UK will be such a wonderful experience for her too. It will be her first white Christmas.’

‘And mine,’ Juliet said, but her tone lacked her mother’s enthusiasm as she drummed her fingers nervously on the leather upholstered seat. There was an uneasiness stirring in the pit of her stomach.

‘Exactly, so stop questioning your decision. It’s made now, you’re both going,’ her father piped up as he took the turnoff to Perth International airport in the dawn light. ‘You’ve been hiding away, Juliet. You’re not the only professional woman who’s going it alone as a single mother. It’s not the eighteen hundreds, and you don’t need a man to help you realise your dreams. You have your career and Bea.’

She was hardly going it alone, in her opinion, with all of the help her parents provided, she thought as she looked out of her window and up into the still-darkened sky. But her father was right, she mused. She didn’t need a man to experience or enjoy life. She and Bea would be just fine on their own. The plane would be up in that same sky in less than two hours, the sun would be up and they would be heading off to the other side of the world. To see four babies...and snow.

Juliet tried to muster a smile for everyone’s sake. Her parents were always forthcoming with their very modern wisdom and they were generally right about everything. The quads needed surgical intervention and Bea needed to be with her mother. And Juliet could hardly stand being away from her daughter for a day, let alone the possibility of three or four weeks. So if Juliet went, then so would Bea.

Initially she wasn’t sure how she would manage but when the information had arrived via email the night before, providing the details of the onsite hospital crèche, it had given Juliet no valid reason not to say yes to everything. Besides which, the tickets had been arranged. There was no turning back. And so it was that, with less than a day’s notice, Juliet and Bea had left their sunburnt homeland behind and were on their way to Teddy’s.

‘It’s a beautiful part of the world,’ the driver announced, bringing Juliet back to the present. ‘I’ve lived here for almost thirty years. Raised my children and now my grandchildren. You’ll be sure to love it too.’

Juliet smiled at the way the man praised his home town. ‘I won’t be here quite that long, but long enough to enjoy the stunning scenery.’ She looked out from the car window across fields blanketed in snow and dotted with trees and bushes in variant shades of green, all dusted by a fresh layer of white drift along the fences. It was so picturesque and a very long way from the long hot summer days of home. Since she could not turn back she had decided that she needed to accept her decision and be excited to share her first white Christmas with Bea. While she knew it had the potential to be a stressful time for her, with the impending surgery she would be performing, she was glad the two of them were together. They were like two musketeers off on an adventure.

Juliet had long accepted there would never be a third musketeer in their lives and that suited her fine. She didn’t need a man in her life. Apart from her father, the rest just brought grief. Even in a new country, a man she had not laid eyes upon, Dr Charlie Warren’s objection to her surgical option was another piece of proof that men caused unnecessary anguish.

And she didn’t need any more of that.

‘So you’re only here for a short visit, then?’

‘I’m consulting at Teddy’s for a few weeks. I agreed because it was a short term. I couldn’t keep my daughter away from her grandparents for too long. They’d miss her terribly.’

‘I can see why. She’s a proper little sweetie,’ the man added, clearly wanting to keep the conversation flowing.

Juliet guessed him to be in his mid-fifties. He looked a little like her father, quite distinguished, greying around his temples with a moustache and fine-rimmed gold glasses. Her father was a chatty man too, even in the operating theatre. Perhaps it was his age that made it easy for her to talk to this man. There was no hidden agenda. Just pleasant conversation.

‘Thank you. She’s my little angel and she’s a real sweetie.’

‘She’s got your curls and pretty eyes. I don’t think her father got much of a look-in there. My granddaughter’s just the same, spitting image of her mother.’

Juliet felt her stomach sink a little, the way it always did at the mention of Bea’s father. The man who had caused more anguish than she had ever thought possible. A man who didn’t want a look-in. He was the one time she had let down her guard and the reason she would never do it again. After the one romantic night they had shared, he had walked away and never looked back. Married the fiancée he had forgotten to mention to Juliet while he was seducing her. And as quickly as he had swept into her life, he was gone. Well before she had discovered she was having his baby. Two months after the night they spent together, Juliet had caught sight of his wedding photo complete with huge bridal party in the society pages of the local newspaper.

She had instantly felt overwhelmingly sad for his new wife.

Heaved twice with morning sickness.

And sworn off men.

For ever.

Juliet paid the driver and asked him to take her bags to the boutique hotel where she was staying for a few nights. The hospital had contracted the car service and, after their conversation, she felt she could trust him to take her belongings, including Beatrice’s pink fairy princess suitcase, and leave them with the hotel concierge. Being over fifty meant he fell in the trustworthy category. Men under forty had no hope in hell of being trusted with anything belonging to Juliet.

Not her suitcases...her medical decisions...or her heart.

* * *

With Juliet holding Bea’s gloved hand tightly, the two of them stepped inside the warmth of the main entrance of the hospital to hear the heart-warming sound of piped Christmas carols. Juliet slipped off her coat and laid it over her arm and then unbuttoned Bea’s as she watched her daughter’s eyes widen at the sight of their surroundings. Teddy’s, as the hospital was affectionately known, was certainly dressed in its Christmas best. Neither Juliet nor Bea had seen such a huge tree and certainly not one as magnificently decorated as the one that filled the glass atrium. It was overflowing with brightly coloured baubles, and tiny lights twinkled from behind the gold tinsel generously covering the branches. Their eyes both scanned around the foyer to see a Santa sleigh and carved wooden reindeers welcoming patrons to the hospital tea room and all the staff appeared as happy as both Juliet and Bea felt at that moment.

‘Ith very beautiful, Mummy.’

‘It is indeed.’

Taking hold again of her tiny daughter’s hand, Juliet approached the information desk and introduced herself and mentioned her appointment with the OBGYN with whom she would be working.

‘I’m sorry, Dr Turner, but Dr Warren hasn’t arrived yet. He was due an hour ago but, to be honest, I haven’t heard anything so I can’t be sure what time we’ll see him.’

Juliet’s expression didn’t mask her surprise. She had flown almost eight thousand miles and had arrived on time and Dr Charlie Warren, whom she assumed to be a resident of the Cotswolds and who therefore had a significantly shorter journey, was the one late for their meeting. She was not impressed and hoped he had a darned good explanation since she and Bea were each in need of a bath and some sleep and had gone without both to meet with him.

‘Is Oliver Darrington available, then?’

‘Mr Darrington’s on surgical roster today so, I’m sorry, he won’t be available until after four-thirty.’

Juliet was trying to think on her feet. And both her feet and her brain were tired. ‘Then while we’re waiting for Dr Warren perhaps I can take my daughter to the crèche.’

‘Of course, that’s on this floor but the other side of the building overlooking the visitor gardens,’ the young woman told her. ‘If you follow the corridor on your left to the end then turn right, you’ll see it.’ Then smiling, she added, ‘And hear it. It’s quite the noisy place with all the little ones.’

Juliet hesitated; she didn’t want to walk away with Bea and have Dr Warren arrive. She checked her mobile phone for messages. Perhaps Dr Warren had been delayed and sent the hospital a message that hadn’t reached Reception but had been relayed to her in a text. It seemed logical and it would give her an indication of how much time she had to settle Bea into the crèche, but after quickly finding her phone she discovered there was no such message.

‘I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised,’ she muttered under her breath. ‘Another unreliable man.’

‘Pardon, Mummy?’

Juliet looked down at the angelic face staring back at her. ‘Nothing, sweetie, Mummy was just mumbling. Everything’s just perfect.’

‘Okay,’ Bea replied as her eyes darted from one festive decoration to the next before she began pulling her mother back in the direction of the main doors.

Juliet knew everything in their lives was not perfect but she would make it as perfect as she could for her daughter. She would devote her life to ensuring that Bea never felt as if she was missing out on anything. Particularly not about the lack of a father in her life. Juliet often felt sad that, while she enjoyed a wonderful relationship with her own father, Bea would never experience that bond. Although, she conceded gratefully, while the special father-daughter relationship would never be a part of her daughter’s life, an unbreakable grandfather-granddaughter relationship had already formed. Juliet’s father and Bea were like two peas in a pod and seeing that closeness brought Juliet joy.

She was drawn back to the current situation, caused again by a man. Bea’s grip was tight and she was clearly on a mission as she tried to pull Juliet along. Juliet tugged back. ‘It’s so cold outside, darling. Let’s stay in here where it’s nice and warm.’

‘But, Mummy, it lookth like the top of my cake.’

‘What looks like the top of your cake, sweetie?’

‘Out there,’ the excited little girl replied as she pointed to the snow-covered ground. The branches of the trees and even the cars that had been parked for a few hours had been blanketed.

Juliet had to agree that it did look like Bea’s fourth birthday cake. Her grandmother had baked a triple-layer strawberry sponge cake with a generous covering of brilliant white icing and decorated with four different fairy tale princesses for her beloved granddaughter. But this was not a cake, it was their reality for the next few weeks, and, despite her reservations and her annoyance with Charlie Warren, it was very pretty. Postcard pretty. And it was the first time either of them had seen snow up close and she couldn’t blame her daughter for wanting to go outside and enjoy it.

‘But I need to stay inside and wait for the doctor. He’ll be here any minute, I hope, and I don’t want to miss him when he arrives because after my meeting with him you and I can go to the hotel and have a nice nap.’

‘Pleeease can I play in the snow?’

Juliet felt the sleeve of her blouse being tugged by two tiny hands, still gloved, and Bea’s eyes were wide with anticipation and excitement. Juliet looked out to the fenced area near the entrance doors. There was a park bench, see-saw and a small slide and the playground was secured with a child safety gate. It was clearly a designated area for children to play on a sunny day but it wasn’t a sunny day. It was freezing cold, overcast and the ground was covered with snow, which she knew was the draw card for Bea but a cause for concern for Juliet. Although she didn’t want to impose a fear of almost everything onto her daughter, she couldn’t help but worry.

After a moment she took a deep breath; she had made her decision. ‘All right, you can play outside but only if we button up your coat again, put on your hat and keep your gloves on...and only for five minutes. And I mean five minutes—you’ll catch a terrible cold if you stay out any longer.’

‘Yeth! Yippee! Thank you, Mummy.’

With trepidation, Juliet buttoned up her daughter’s heavy overcoat, pulled a knitted cap from her bag and popped it over Bea’s mass of honey-blonde curls, pulling it down over her ears, and then slipped on her own coat again before walking the little girl outside into the wintry weather. She was still worried about leaving Bea for even five minutes, but common sense told her it would be safe. It was ten o’clock in the morning not the middle of the night and it was no longer snowing.

Her father’s words rushed back into her head, ‘You can’t keep Bea in bubble wrap. Let her have some fun sometimes or she’ll grow up scared of taking chances. Who knows what she can do in life if she’s allowed to really live it? She might even become a surgeon like her mother...and grandfather.’

Although Juliet loved her work, she wasn’t convinced medicine was the life she wanted for her daughter. Part of her wondered if the lack of a social life due to the years of heavy study load, and then the long shifts at the hospital as an intern, then as a resident didn’t assist Bea’s father to deceive her. She was far from streetwise about men. She’d had friends but never a love interest until she met him and he’d swept her off her feet and into his bed. Making her believe their night together was the beginning of something more. She wanted Bea to be wiser and not naive about the opposite sex.

But that was many years away and this was a playground. But it was still making Juliet very nervous.

She paused at the playground gate and looked down at her daughter, trying unsuccessfully to mask her concern.

‘Mummy, I’ll be good, I promith.’

Juliet realised she was being silly. It was only a children’s playground and one she could see from inside and so too could all of the staff in the hospital foyer and the tea room. Juliet needed to meet with the now quite late Dr Warren. There might be a message from him any minute. She also wanted to meet the quadruplets’ mother as soon as possible to discuss her treatment plan. Bending down and looking Bea in the eyes, she said, ‘Mummy has to talk with the nice lady at the desk inside. I’ll be back in five minutes. You know my rule—don’t talk to strangers.’

Bea nodded. ‘Okay.’

With that Juliet closed the childproof gate with Bea inside the playground wearing an ear-to-ear smile, already making small snowballs with her tiny gloved hands. Juliet tugged again on the gate to check it was closed properly before she headed back inside. She doubted she would leave Bea for five minutes, estimating it would only take two to check again on Dr Warren’s whereabouts and see if there had been an update on his ETA. And she would be watching her the entire time through the large glass windows.

* * *

Charlie Warren pulled into the Royal Cheltenham hospital astride his black motorcycle. Both he and the bike were geared for riding in the harsh winter conditions of the southern English countryside. The sound of the powerful engine reverberated across the grounds as he cruised into the sheltered area of the car park. Charlie climbed from the huge bike that would have dwarfed most men, but, at six feet one, his muscular frame dressed in his leather riding gear stood tall against the bike. He removed his snow-splattered black helmet and heavy riding gloves and ran his still-warm fingers through his short but shaggy blond hair. It was cold riding to work every day, even brutal his colleagues would tell him some days in the middle of winter, but Charlie wouldn’t consider for a moment taking a car. He couldn’t; he didn’t own one. Not any more and not ever again. He hadn’t driven a car of any description in the two years since the crash.

Two years and three days to be exact. The anniversary was only a few days earlier, and, he assumed, was the reason the nightmares had returned. He knew he would never forget the date. It was the day the life he loved had ended.

After that, little brought him joy outside his work.

He had nothing to look forward to each night he rode away from the hospital. So he didn’t stay away from Teddy’s for too long.

* * *

Juliet watched Bea giggling as she climbed carefully up each rung of the tiny ladder on the slide. Her gloved hands gripped on tightly, her tiny feet, snug inside her laced-up leather boots, struggled a little not to slide, but she still smiled a toothy grin at her mother. Juliet loved seeing her daughter so happy and she smiled back but her smile was strained. Worry was building by the minute as she watched her only daughter take each slippery step, but her father’s words resonated in her head, forcing her to stay put. Reminding her not to run to her daughter or call out, Climb back down...it’s dangerous.

No, on this trip she would heed his instructions and let her daughter have a bit of fun after all and the slide was only a few feet tall.

What could possibly go wrong?

Bea looked down at each rung then back to her mother. Juliet could see that Bea thought she was such a big girl and seeing that reinforced that her father did know best. Juliet had to let Bea try new things. She had to unwrap the cotton wool that she had lovingly placed around her daughter...but only just a little.

Juliet gave a little sigh and resigned herself to her four-year-old’s growing independence and her desire to encourage it but her fear at the same time. She wondered how she would cope when she turned sixteen and asked to get her driver’s permit. Mentally she shook herself. That’s twelve years away...you have time to prepare for it.

With any luck Dr Warren would arrive before then, she sniggered to herself.

At that moment, a smiling Bea lifted her right hand and waved at her mother. But Juliet didn’t have time to smile back as she watched in horror as Bea lost her concentration and then her footing. She gasped out loud as her daughter’s tiny hands lost their grip too. Helplessly Juliet watched from inside the building as Bea fell backwards to the ground.

CHAPTER THREE

CHARLIE SAW THE small child fall from the playground equipment. He was only too aware that while there was a thick blanket of freshly fallen snow in some places, in other areas there was only a thin covering. The shade the trees gave in summer when they were covered in lush green leaves was lovely but the branches had acted as natural canopies preventing the snow from building up to a level that would have broken her fall. He felt a knot in the pit of his stomach at seeing the child lying motionless on the ground and he rushed across the car park.

While it wasn’t an overly tall slide, the child, he could see, was very tiny. As he drew closer he could see there was no one with her. Why would anyone leave a child out in the freezing weather unattended? He looked around and there was no one in sight. No one running to help. Fuelled by concern for the child and anger at the parent or parents, he raced to the gate.

‘How damned irresponsible,’ he muttered under his breath and shook his head. But his words were driven by something deeper. His dreams of being a father had ended the day his wife died and that made it even harder to see that this child had been left alone. If he were the father he would protect his child at any cost and he would never have left one so tiny out in the cold. Alone.

He undid the safety latch with a sense of urgency as he heard soft moans coming from the child he could then see was a little girl, lying still on her side. She was conscious. He quickly crossed to her and knelt down. ‘You’ll be okay, honey. I’m a doctor at this hospital. I just want to see if you’ve been hurt.’ He kept his words to a minimum as he could see just how young she was.

‘Where’th Mummy? I want Mummy.’ Bea’s eyes suddenly widened and began to fill with tears.

‘We’ll try and find Mummy,’ he said as he wondered the very same question.

Where the hell was the little girl’s mother? And her father?

As he began to check her vital signs he guessed she was between three and four years of age. ‘Where does it hurt?’

‘My arm hurths,’ she said, abruptly sitting upright with tears running down her ruddy cheeks.

Charlie was surprised but relieved to see her level of mobility and suspected her tears were fuelled by fear and pain in equal amounts. ‘Anywhere else?’

‘No. It’th jutht my arm. Where’th Mummy?’ Her chin was quivering and the tears were flowing freely.

Charlie reassured her again they would find her mother as he continued his medical assessment. As she awkwardly tried to climb to her feet, it was obvious to Charlie that she had only injured her arm so he scooped her up ready to take her to the emergency department. Neither a stretcher nor a paramedic team was needed and he wanted to get her out of the bitter cold air immediately and into the warmth of the hospital where she could be thoroughly assessed.

‘Put my daughter down now!’ Juliet’s loud voice carried from the gate to where Charlie was standing.

Charlie’s eyes narrowed on her. ‘I’m a doctor, so please open the gate for me and step aside. This child’s been hurt,’ he told her as he approached with Bea still firmly in the grip of his strong arms. ‘I’m taking her to have an X-ray.’

Juliet hurriedly opened the gate. ‘She’s my daughter. I can take her,’ she said, reaching out for Bea, but Charlie ignored her request and moved swiftly, and in silence, in the direction of the emergency entrance with Juliet running alongside him.

‘I said, I can carry her.’

‘I heard you but I have her, so let’s keep unnecessary movement to a minimum.’

Juliet nodded. It was logical but she still wished her injured daughter were in her arms, not those of the tall, leather-clad stranger who was supposedly a doctor. ‘I saw her fall but I couldn’t get to her in time.’

Charlie’s eyebrow rose slightly. ‘That’s of no consequence now. I saw her. I’ll get her seen immediately in A&E and then you can perhaps explain why she was left unattended out in this weather at such a young age.’

‘Excuse me?’ Juliet began in a tone that didn’t mask her surprise at his accusatory attitude. While she thought it was unfair and unjust it also hit a raw nerve. ‘I wasn’t far away—’

‘Far enough, it would seem, for me to get to her first,’ Charlie cut in with no emotion in his voice. As the three of them entered the warmth of the emergency department, the feeling between them was as icy as the snow outside. ‘I need her name and age.’

‘Beatrice, but we call her Bea, and she’s four years and two months.’ Juliet answered but her voice was brimming with emotion. Overwhelming concern about Bea and equally overwhelming anger towards the man who was carrying her child. How dared he be so quick to judge her?

‘Four-year-old girl by the name of Bea, suspected green stick fracture of the forearm,’ he announced brusquely to the nursing staff as he took long, powerful strides inside with Juliet following quickly on his heels. Charlie carried Bea into one of the emergency cubicles and laid her gently on the examination bed. With the curtains still open, he continued. ‘We need an X-ray stat to confirm radius or ulna fracture but either way, if I’m correct, we’ll be prepping for a cast. And bring me some oral analgesia.’

‘Ibuprofen, acetaminophen or codeine?’ the nurse asked.

‘One hundred milligrams of suspension ibuprofen,’ Charlie replied, then, as it was a teaching hospital and he was aware that three final-year medical students had moved closer to observe, he continued. ‘Generally paediatric fracture patients have significantly greater reduction in pain with ibuprofen than those in either the acetaminophen group or the codeine group and they suffer less negative side effects.’