Christmas at Rosie Hopkins' Sweetshop Read Free

we had sex,” she said. “Then the relaxing bit could have come later.”
    The moonlight caught a glint in his eye.
    â€œWell, maybe . . .”
    She grinned at him.
    â€œYou know, for a wounded war dog, the Right Hon. Lipton, you still have some moves . . .”
    Just as she moved toward him, however, she leapt up out of bed.
    â€œSnow!” she shouted. “Look at the snow!”
    Stephen turned his head and groaned.
    â€œOh no,” he said.
    â€œLook at it!” said Rosie, heedless of the cold. “Just look at it!”
    The previous winter in Lipton, after an early flurry, it had simply rained all winter; they had had hardly any snow at all. Now here it was, great big fat flakes falling softly all down the road, quickly covering it with a blanket of white.
    â€œIt’s settling!” shouted Rosie.
    â€œOf course it’s settling,” said Stephen. “This is the Peak District, not Dubai.”
    Nonetheless, with a sigh of resignation, he got up and pulled the eiderdown off the bed and padded over the cold wooden floor to Rosie, wrapping them both up in it. The snow flurried and danced in the air, the stars peeking out between the flakes, the mountains great dark looming silhouettes in the distance.
    â€œI’ve never seen snow like this” said Rosie. “Well, not that’s lasted.”
    â€œIt’s bad,” said Stephen soberly. “It’s very early. There was late lambing this year, so they’ll need looking out for. And no one can get around; it’s treacherous for the old folks. They don’t clear the roads up here, you know. ­People get trapped for weeks. We’re barely stocked up, and we’re in town.”
    Rosie blinked. She’d never thought of snow as a serious matter before. In Hackney it was five minutes of prettiness that bunged up all the trains then degenerated quickly into mucky, splashy roads, dog poo smeared into sleet and big slushy gray puddles. This silent remaking of the world filled her with awe.
    â€œIf it blocks the pass road . . . well, that’s when we all have to resort to cannibalism,” said Stephen, baring his teeth in the moonlight.
    â€œWell, I love it,” she whispered. “Jake’s going to drop us off some wood, he said.”
    â€œAhem,” said Stephen, coughing.
    â€œWhat?”
    â€œWell,” he said, “he’ll be probably nicking it from somewhere that belongs to my family in the first place.”
    â€œWell, it’s just ridiculous that a family owns a whole wood,” said Rosie.
    â€œRidiculous or not, I can get Laird to deliver it for nothing,” said Stephen. “Seeing as it’s, you know. Ours.”
    â€œYeah yeah yeah. Because your great-­granddad times a jillion shagged a princess by accident,” said Rosie, whose interest in Stephen’s ancestry was hazy. “Whatever.”
    â€œWhatever,” said Stephen, kissing her soft, scented shoulder, “means a warm cozy house. Unlike this icebox. Come, come, my love. Back to bed.”

 
    Chapter 2
    F IVE MILES AWAY , Lilian slept in a single bed in a neat little room filled with her pictures and knickknacks, snoring gently under a duvet she professed to despise. And she dreamed, as she often did, of the past: of a boy with nut-­brown eyes and curly hair and a ready smile and a farmer’s tan who made her laugh when she was happy and comforted her when she was sad, and all the while the silent snow fell and wrapped itself around the house like a blanket, like soft cotton wool covering the well-­heated building.
    She was walking down the road at the end of a day in the sweetshop, a busy Friday when the men got paid and the ration books were out. The Red Lion would be packed tonight. The harvest sun was hanging heavy in the sky, bathing everything in soft gold, and she was going to post a letter to Neddy, not yet dead. . . . In the