Christmas at Lilac Cottage - Holly Martin Page 0,122

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Penny stared out the bedroom window at the muted early morning sky as the snow fell thick and fast, swirling and dancing in the wind.

She hadn’t been able to sleep much, hoping that Henry would appear in her bedroom and tell her it was all sorted out. But he never came.

Surely he wouldn’t let this come between them. But Daisy had also been the only reason he had broken up with his previous girlfriends. She would always come first for him.

Her head hurt. After the stress of thinking that her and Henry were finished, to getting back together with him and now this, it felt like they were over again.

Tonight was the Christmas Eve ball and it looked like she’d be going alone if Henry couldn’t right things with Daisy.

She got out of bed and went into the shower, feeling thoroughly deflated, especially as the night before Henry had told her he loved her.

She walked back into the bedroom and saw her phone was flashing silently on the bed side table.

She grabbed it and noticed she’d had three missed calls from Maggie. She also noticed it was a lot later in the day than she had originally thought; the snow had made it much darker and she must have slept a little late that morning without realising it. She quickly phoned Maggie back.

When her friend answered it was clear that she had gone into full-blown panic mode. ‘Penny, the bloody, pissing, sodding snow. Everything is ruined, every fucking thing.’

‘Maggie, what’s wrong, what do you mean?’

She moved to the window and froze in shock. Everywhere, as far as the eye could see in every direction, was covered in a thick blanket of snow. On top of her van’s roof was almost two foot of the stuff and the wheels were almost buried too.

‘The ball will have to be cancelled. Everything was due to arrive today, the tables, chairs, the food, the DJ, the heaters, even most of the waiters and waitresses were coming from different towns,’ Maggie said and Penny could tell that she was almost crying with the frustration of it all. ‘Half the ice carvers lost their sculptures due to the power cut the other night and that was going to be the main decoration for the evening.’

‘Hang on a minute. We are not cancelling the ball. We’re not. Not after all your hard work and planning. We’ve had a ball in the town as far back as I can remember and we’re not going to cancel just because of a little bit of snow.’

‘It’s more than just a little bit of snow, Penny,’ Maggie snapped.

Penny ignored the anger in her best friend’s voice. ‘Give me five minutes to have a think about this and I’ll call you back.’

Penny hung up and paced the room for a moment before scrolling through her phone. The town council had a telephone tree for when they needed to arrange a meeting or if there was a problem in the town like a faulty traffic light that people were being asked to avoid or an escaped cow when people were asked to help round it up. This counted as a really big problem.

She quickly composed a text explaining the problem and asked for help. She included her mobile number on the bottom so people would reply to her and not the person who had forwarded on the text. She sent it to the five people on her part of the tree, knowing that within half an hour almost every member of the town would be informed and many of their friends and family too, which would cover almost the entire town.

She got dressed quickly while she waited. As she pulled her jeans on, the phone beeped. As she did up her belt the phone beeped again, seven times in quick succession. She pulled her snow boots on and quickly did up the laces as the phone beeped again and again and again.

She picked it up, seeing that she already had over thirty messages. Wow these guys were quick.

There were offers of food from most people, mainly sandwiches, crisps and cakes, but probably enough to keep everybody satisfied tonight. Everyone who replied said they would bring their own soft and alcoholic drinks. Kathleen from The Pilchard was offering all her tables, chairs and outdoor patio heaters if someone could come and pick them up. The landlords from The Bubble and Froth, The Mermaid and The Smuggler’s Inn were all offering the same thing