‘Come on,’ said Issy. ‘We haven’t got all day. Well, we have, because it’s Christmas Day and neither of us has anywhere better to go. But let’s not think about that right now.’
Kelly-Lee listened, at first half-heartedly, then with closer attention, as Issy talked her patiently through the right temperature for creaming the butter and sugar, the importance of not overmixing, the right height for sieving the flour, which Kelly-Lee had never heard of.
Twenty minutes later, they put four batches into the oven, and Issy started to unravel the secrets of butter icing.
‘Wait for this,’ she said. ‘You won’t believe the other muck you were churning out.’
She whipped the icing into a confection lighter than cream, and made Kelly-Lee taste it. ‘If you don’t taste, you don’t know what you’re doing,’ she said. ‘You have to taste all the time.’
‘But I won’t fit my jeans!’
‘If you don’t taste, you won’t have a job and you won’t be able to buy any jeans.’
The smell – for once, heavenly rather than overwhelmingly of baking soda – rose up in the kitchen, and instantly Issy felt calm and more relaxed. She was here. He was here, somewhere. It would all come good. She picked up the phone to call her mother.
‘What the hell?’ said Marian.
In Queens, the situation became clear. Issy turned up accompanied by two dozen of what her mother insisted on referring to as fairy cakes.
‘Darny!’ said Issy, as he flew into her arms. She wasn’t expecting that.
‘I’m sorry,’ he muttered. ‘I’m sorry. I was grumpy with you and you went away.’
‘No,’ she said. ‘I was bossy and being like a mum and it was wrong and I hurt you. I’m sorry.’
Darny mumbled something. Issy crouched down so she could hear. ‘I wish you were my mum,’ he said.
Issy didn’t say anything, just held him tight. Then she remembered.
‘You know why my bag is so damn heavy?’ she said. Darny shook his head. ‘I brought you a present.’
It had been a last-minute idea; a silly one as she was toting it around. But she could get something else for Louis.
Darny’s eyes widened when he saw it.
‘WOW!’ he said. All the other kids rushed towards it too.
‘MONSTER GARAGE!’
Issy smiled at her mother. ‘He’s only little,’ she murmured.
‘He is,’ said her mother. ‘Well. Now. This is a mess.’
Issy sat down with a large glass of kosher red, which she was developing a real fondness for. She shook her head.
‘I don’t think it is,’ she said wonderingly. ‘I really don’t. I can’t believe … he’d drop everything. Travel all that way. Oh, I wish I was there now. I wish I was.’
Then her phone rang.
‘Don’t say anything,’ said a strong, humorous, familiar voice. ‘And I’ll text you.’
‘OK … I … I …’
But he’d already hung up.
Chapter Twenty-One
Issy had received a text message with a simple street address on it – cryptic, but to the point. When she got there, first thing on Boxing Day morning, it was quiet, but already people were starting to queue. He wasn’t there. But if she’d learned anything, Issy thought, it was that she could no longer wait for Austin. Or anyone.
‘One, please,’ she said politely. She figured out her skate size in American and strapped on the black boots, then, wobbling slightly, walked out on to the ice. Gramps had used to love to skate; they’d built a municipal rink in Manchester in the fifties, and he liked to go round it with his hands insouciantly behind his back, a funny sight in his smart dark suit. Issy used to go with him sometimes, and he would take her by the hand and whirl her round. She loved it.
Slowly she rotated on the ice, the sun glinting off the surface crystals, 30 Rock towering overhead, people running in, rushing back to work the day after Christmas. She looked around at the pink light glancing off the high buildings. It was, she thought, spectacular. Wonderful. She and New York had had a rocky start, but now … Lost in thought, she attempted a small spin, failed, then stumbled. A hand reached out and grabbed her.
‘Are you all right?’
She turned. For a moment, the sun was so bright she was dazzled and couldn’t see. But she could still make out the shape of him, there, in that long coat, back in the green scarf she had bought him which matched the green dress she was wearing.
‘Oh,’ was all she could say. Now she could see again, she noticed he looked very tired. But apart from that, he looked so very, very happy. ‘Oh.’
And then, balancing on their skates, they were completely and utterly wrapped up in one another, and Issy felt as if she was flying; rushing round and round like an ice dancer leaping through snow flurries, or racing down a snowy slope, or flying through the cold air faster than a jet plane.
‘My love,’ Austin was saying, kissing her again and again. ‘I was such an idiot. Such an idiot.’
‘I was stubborn too,’ said Issy. ‘Didn’t give a thought to what you were up to. So unfair.’
‘You weren’t! You weren’t at all.’
They looked at each other.
‘Let’s not talk any more,’ said Issy, and they stood together in the centre of the rink, as bemused but indulgent skaters continued to weave around them, and the sun melted the ice, which dripped down from the high towers above them like crystal.
They checked back into the hotel and stayed there for a couple of days, then set about making it up to Darny with outings and exhibitions and treats until he begged for mercy. On the third day, Issy took a phone call and came to Austin with a very strange look on her face.
‘That was Kelly-Lee,’ she said. The flash of guilt that crossed his face reminded her that she hadn’t mentioned that she’d met her, and she decided not to tell him what Kelly-Lee had said.
‘I ran into her and helped her make some cupcakes … that’s all,’ she said firmly. ‘Anyway, apparently her boss came in and was totally astounded, and wants to send her to California to open up a new store, and apparently Kelly-Lee feels she’s much more suited to California.’
‘I think she is too,’ said Austin.
‘Anyway, there’s an opening to run the New York store if I want it, apparently …’