Christmas Wishes by Katie Flynn

Mrs Lubbock’s ever so nice, but …’
    ‘I know,’ Alex said, smiling. ‘She’s not the best cook in the world. But her scones are all right, aren’t they? And she knows how to fry an egg and boil a spud.’
    ‘I’d rather watch Mrs Clarke cooking, if she were to offer. But she does so much for everyone that she probably wouldn’t have the time. As for the cleaning and that, Gillian and me manage all right, though I do most of it, wouldn’t you say, Gillian?’
    Gillian gave a guilty smile. ‘I like to read a book while I’m ironing or doing the washing,’ she admitted. ‘But Joy will manage really well. She’s much more practical than I am.’
    ‘How true!’ Joy said fervently. ‘But actually, I rather enjoy cleaning and I’d like to learn to cook. As Gillian says, I’m not brainy, but I am practical.’
    ‘That’s so, and after all it’s not a big house,’ Gillian said firmly. ‘We hardly ever go into the parlour and you do your own bedroom, Daddy, which only leaves us the kitchen, the bathroom and our room.’ She turned to her sister. ‘We can manage easy-peasy, can’t we, Joy?’
    ‘Course. And when we’re back in school we shan’t be here to make a mess,’ Joy observed. She had decided frankness was their best course. ‘I’d hate to have some old woman tellin’ me how to dust, or scrub floors, or clean the perishing bath.’
    Alex laughed. ‘Right you are. But remember, if you begin to let things slide …’
    ‘We shan’t, honest to God we shan’t,’ Gillian said quickly. ‘But if we do you can take away our pocket money and get paid help. All right?’
    Her father held out a large hand, first to Gillian and then to Joy. ‘Shake on it,’ he said. ‘We’re a good team; let’s hope we can keep it up!’
    It was a freezing cold day in December and the twins were helping their teacher to clear up, for the school holidays were almost upon them and the following day they would be engaged in a school production of the nativity play. However, this was not the only reason they had chosen to stay behind. They were avoiding Pat Seddon, a large and aggressive girl who had come top of the class until the advent of the Lawrence twins … and bitterly resented the ease with which Gillian in particular dealt with lessons.
    Ever since they had started at the school, Pat had made no secret of her dislike of the twins. Knowing that Gillian would be off to St Hilda’s at the start of the spring term, she had done her best to make their lives a misery, though whilst in class she contented herself with muttering insults too low for a teacher to hear. She, and sometimes a little gang of her cronies, would follow them home jeering and taunting, and if they caught them up it would be to call names, to give one of them a spiteful shove or a clack, or even to try to push them into the road.
    ‘Gillian, ’er gracious ladyship,’ Pat would shout in a would-be posh accent. ‘She thinks she’s too good for the likes of us so she’s goin’ to St Hilda’s, but they’ll soon cut her down to size. And miserable Joy’s as thick as two short planks, so she is! Oh aye, they gives theirselves airs and graces, but they ain’t nothin’ special, nothin’ special at all.’
    The twins did their best to ignore both Pat and her pals, but by and large it was easier to stay late at school – ‘gettin’ in wi’ the teachers’, Pat would call it – and walk home through the gathering dusk, provided they were back in time to get a meal together and start on their homework. Besides, the shops were bright with Christmas to come, and though the wartime shortages showed no hint of easing the windows at least looked colourful and jolly, and so the twins rather enjoyed the late walk home from school.
    ‘What’ll you do when I’m at St Hilda’s, though? You’ll be on your own then,’ Gillian said as the two of them left the school premises, wrapped their scarves round their mouths, and set off for home.