12 Days 'til Christmas ✓

chapter five

f i v e

*

The best, I save for last. It's probably a good thing that Casper's disappeared, because I doubt he'd appreciate the most extravagant, ridiculous stall at the far end of the high street. A plastic model of a reindeer stands on the wooden roof, the posts dripping with glittery candy canes and silver tinsel; miniature Christmas trees sit at the foot of the four posts, decorated with baubles in every colour, and the two women behind the table displays are decked out in full elf regalia, complete with pointy ears and shoes. They're identical twins, the only discernible difference being that Emmy's dressed in red and Ally's wearing green. I think, anyway.

"Beth!" Emmy cries out. "We were wondering when we'd see you!"

"I had a feeling it'd be today," Ally adds.

Her voice is slightly deeper, but it's the only easy difference I can tell, and I've known them for thirteen years. Even the patterns of their freckles look the same; they have the same chestnut-brown eyes and pale, pink-tinged skin, and I'm sure they're wearing the same lipstick. Of the three pairs of identical twins I knew at school, they were the only two who revelled in their striking similarities and now, as twenty-four-year-olds, they still seem to enjoy the novelty. For the first year or so of secondary school, they were teased for being different, the way eleven-year-olds tease each other, but the taunts stopped when everyone realised that the girls didn't care. Nobody's jokes about The Shining or The Parent Trap landed, especially when they dressed as the Grady twins for National Book Day.

"Here I am," I say, spreading my arms and doing jazz hands. "You know me and Christmas. If you're selling, I'm buying."

"That bodes well for us," Emmy says. "We just launched a new range today, and I know you like the traditional stuff."

A few years ago, I was shocked to see the twins I knew from school popping up at the Christmas market with their own stall, selling homemade gifts and decorations. I hadn't seen them for a while, since everyone had finished school and moved onto university or jobs or apprenticeships, and it had taken me a moment to register that yes, it really was my old school friends standing in front of me with a variety of Christmas angels and stars to rock the top of the tree.

That year, all they had was a small inventory of decorations they'd made themselves, trying to make a bit of extra cash before Christmas. Now, four years later, they've grown to be one of the most impressive stalls along the high street, if not the most impressive. Alongside their regular lives – Emmy's training to be a nurse, after two years of studying history and realising she was in the wrong field; Ally now owns the art studio she started working at when she left school – they work on their Christmas stock all year round, every single item handmade by them and their younger brother and sister, Perry and Pip. Also twins, it turns out.

Between the four of them, virtually every artistic discipline is covered. Perry's a talented ceramicist with a penchant for tiny clay nativities and Pip's a master of anything that involves a pencil or a paintbrush, from bold acrylics on canvases to beautiful watercolours in frames; she even decorates baubles, turning plain glass balls into gallery-worthy works of art. Emmy makes the most stunning paper crafts, which I didn't realise was a thing until I saw her first Christmas scene made up entirely of intricately interlocking and cut-out pieces of coloured paper and card. I now have several hanging on my walls, too incredible to take down out of season, and an entire box of Ally's speciality.

Every single year, I tell myself I'll only buy one of Ally's tree toppers, but every year, I can't decide between her creations. Her impressive range makes it impossible to choose between a delicate angel with raffia and feather wings, and a dorky reindeer with googly eyes and pipe cleaner legs; I always end up returning to the market, even if they're featuring in a different town thirty minutes away, to build on my collection.