I bought a nine-foot frosted Christmas tree for a person who had been here for four months.

He had not asked for a tree.

He had not asked for anything on the shopping list, which was becoming quite long for someone with so few opinions about presents.

It was his first Christmas. This seemed to me an entirely reasonable explanation for almost everything.

I wanted to spoil him.

I wanted the tree, the presents, the little clothes. I wanted his cousins to have things to open too. Once I began imagining everyone together, there was always one more person to buy for and one more small thing that would be lovely.

I was not especially interested in being talked out of lovely.

The tree came from Amazon. Nine feet tall, frosted, and apparently determined to share that frosting with the rest of the house.

Glitter everywhere.

There is a version of a first Christmas that happens in your head before it happens in your home.

In mine, everything was ready. The presents looked beautiful. The tree stayed on the tree.

I knelt to straighten something near the bottom of the tree, then stood up with a glittering knee. I brushed it with my hand. Now both were festive.

Across the room, there was another gift waiting to be wrapped. I pulled the tape towards me and lost the end.

For a while, that was the whole of Christmas: my thumbnail travelling round a roll of tape while a nine-foot tree watched.

At least his clothes were cute.

That part I had got right.

I sat with him for a moment, one of his small hands resting against my sleeve. From there, the tree lights softened into little blurred circles.

I tried to imagine him standing beside the tree next Christmas. Reaching for something. The Christmas after that, telling me where it ought to go.

His fingers closed around a fold of fabric.

I stopped looking ahead.

A little cream outfit folded on a burgundy throw beside the Christmas tree.
My visual diaryEverything could wait

The unwrapped present could wait. So could the tape.

I had spent weeks thinking about what to give him. Now I couldn’t get up without disturbing his hand.

He was the only gift I wanted.

I still liked the tree.

I just wished it would keep more of itself to itself.