Joe and Clara's Christmas Countdown by Katey Lovell

Author:Katey Lovell
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780008260637
Publisher: HarperCollinsPublishers
Published: 2017-09-07T04:00:00+00:00

Joe

Monday, December 11th 2017

Joe yawned.

He’d not slept well last night, and woken up stiff and sleepy, momentarily confused about where he was. Then he’d seen Clara, peacefully sleeping underneath her blankets, and remembered the previous night’s unexpected lock-in. He’d called Deirdre straight away and was relieved when she answered on the second ring. She’d not sounded surprised to hear from him, even at that early hour, and when Joe had explained the predicament Deirdre had searched her handbag and found that she’d somehow managed to take both sets of keys. She’d arrived soon after to let them out, and Joe had had time to get home and shower (and, most importantly, brush his teeth – he hated the slimy feeling of unbrushed teeth) before heading for his shift at the hardware shop. He’d left an emotional Clara berating Deirdre. She was still emotional nine hours later.

‘I’m getting nervous.’

Joe could tell. Clara had been jiggling in her seat for the past fifteen minutes – twisting her rings distractedly round and round her fingers, tapping her feet against the tiled floor of the corridor, leaning first forwards and then backwards in her seat, as though fighting to get comfortable.

‘You’ve nothing to be nervous about,’ he replied softly. ‘The presentation is great – it’s got all the facts and figures and enough emotion to tug on the heartstrings of the committee too. They’d have to be soulless creatures not to take pity on the club.’

‘It’s more that I’m nervous about getting up there and talking in front of them all. What if I get flustered and end up missing out key points?’ Clara wrung her hands together, before wincing and adding, ‘My palms are sweaty. I thought that was just a saying. I didn’t think it actually happened in real life.’

‘You’re not going to miss out anything, and even if you did it’s there on the slides for them to read for themselves. Honestly, the run-through you did earlier was brilliant. I was on the verge of tears myself, and I helped you put the whole thing together.’

Clara smiled at that, which gave Joe a warm feeling in his core. It felt good to be able to put her at ease.

‘I knew they were tears I saw building in your eyes!’ she said with glee, before her smile faded and she added, ‘I’m not confident about speaking in public, and this feels more important than any of the times I’ve had to stand on stage in the youth club and ask families to give generously.’ She fidgeted again. ‘I’m genuinely not sure if I can do this.’

Joe smiled kindly and reached out to place his hand on hers. Clara’s constant twitching was making him feel restless too, so smothering her delicate hand with his meant neither of them were able to squirm.

‘You can do it. I know you can. And I’ll be right there next to you. If it does get to be too much then give me the nod and I’ll take over.

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