Always, in December(108)

The sky was turning orange—the sunsets here were like nothing else, surrounded by the African wildlife. She stayed there a moment longer, breathing in the warm air, tilted her tanned face to the sky, and smiled, just in case anyone was watching. Then she flipped her ponytail over her shoulder, and went back to the others to welcome in Christmas.

    Dear Mum and Dad,

I’m writing to you from Africa this year, would you believe it, and it’s Christmas again already. Things have been busy, hectic, and amazing. I know you’d have loved it here. Memo is doing well, and the doctor thinks she’ll be OK, thank God for that. I’ve promised to spend Christmas with them next year at home, no matter what I end up doing next, and I’m already looking forward to it.

     I still miss you both, and I always will, but I’m so proud of where I am now, and I know you would be too.

Merry Christmas and lots of love,

Josie

Dear Max,

Almost a year exactly since I last saw you and I feel both that so much time has passed and that none has passed at all. There’s a part of me that still expects you to just show up out here in Africa, in that way of yours, and I’m not sure if that will ever pass. Maybe that’s because you’re still with me, in a way that will never change.

I’ve been Skyping your sister from out here—she’s not much into letter writing, she says. After you died, she and Liam rearranged the wedding, and they’re due to get married next June. It’s going to be in the same castle as Laura and John’s wedding, because I told Chloe about that weekend, about how happy you’d been when you were there. She’s invited me and I’m going to go. I’m going to go, and I’m going to dance out under the stars there, and think of you.

I wish you would have told me what was happening to you, Max, but I understand why you didn’t—though that part has taken some time, I’ll admit. I know that you were just trying to protect me from it, but you should have known that would never have been possible. Because as much as you said that I made your life brighter, you were the light in mine when you were there, and so many times when you weren’t.

     I wish so many things. I wish you hadn’t felt you had to go through all that alone. I wish this hadn’t happened to you, because I know in my heart that had we had the chance, we would have been together forever. I wish I’d gotten to know you sooner, so that I could have known you for longer. But I’m learning that you can’t change what was, so instead of wishing, I’ll use this letter to thank you. These past two years have changed my life, and that all started with you.

You helped show me that I could do things I never dreamed I’d be brave enough to try, you showed me that it’s worth holding on until you meet that one person that makes you feel complete, but most importantly, meeting you meant I had the courage to be those things by myself. Part of me feels like I’ll never truly be complete without you, but this past year I’ve made a pretty good start. I’ve been bitten to death by mosquitos, I’ve been unable to sleep because of the heat, I’ve been scratched to death by bushes. I’ve slept out under the night sky, I’ve seen wild lions, giraffes, leopards. Best of all, I’ve captured it all on camera. I never would have done any of that if I hadn’t run into you, quite literally, on that cold, December day.

So I’ll say now what I wasn’t brave enough to say in person, and please know that if I’m ever lucky enough to feel this way again, I’ll make sure I’m brave enough to say it then.

     I love you, Max.

Now and always.

Josie





Acknowledgments


Any credit I deserve for writing this book should be equally split with my amazing, smart, and talented editor, Sherise Hobbs, without whom this book would quite literally not exist. From that very first conversation in a café, Sherise has been relentlessly brilliant and incredibly generous with her creative thoughts, encouragement, and attention to detail, and has helped me shape this book into something I’m truly proud of. So, Sherise, thank you.

Thanks too to Bea Grabowska for being on team #AlwaysinDecember (and thank you for telling me the book broke your heart, which I choose to take as a compliment, even though I’m not totally sure what kind of person that makes me). Thank you, Katie Green, for a brilliant copyedit. In the United States, thanks go to Hilary Teeman for some brilliant last editorial suggestions, which helped elevate the book further, and to Caroline Weishuhn.

Emma Rogers is to thank for the absolutely beautiful cover—a cover that I really hope everyone judges the book by. Thank you to Nathaniel Alcaraz-Stapleton and Rebecca Folland for your hard work and securing some truly champagne-worthy rights deals. Team Marketing & Publicity always have a special place in my heart, so thanks to Ellie Morley and Emily Patience (Emily gets extra credit for sharing my name).

    Outside the publishing force, Charlotte Levens deserves enormous thanks for coaching me through this book, for brainstorming ideas about Christmas dates (in the middle of July), for answering my research questions about hospitals, and for many forced coffee/wine chats about this book. Char, I’m pretty sure you know this book as well as I do by now, but look, now it’s published and it was worth it! I will thank you with more wine, preferably on a beach with some horses around.