At ten past one on Christmas morning, Patrick stole into his house. He had delivered the Rodgers' baby an hour before, leaving them to debate what to name their Christmas baby, but had been detained driving home by the checking on the wellbeing of two good-humoured and cheerful limping drunks, reeling with beer and bonhomie. The house smelt of frost and tobacco and a drifting trail of something sweet and singed, lingering remains of Shelagh and Timothy's afternoon in the kitchen, making mince pies and gingerbread men while listening to the carol service from King's College, Cambridge. It was not the prettiest baking ever created in that kitchen, Timothy's ambitious holly leaf pie decorations more convincing as uncooked pastry shapes on the kitchen table than the indeterminate lumps which emerged from the oven, while some of the gingerbread men sported burnt digits, but the pie she stuffed in his mouth on his way out of the door had tasted so wholesomely of Christmas that the temptation to slip down to the kitchen and forage for another was irresistible.

He was wiping his crumbs from his face, hoping they weren't on his jacket, when he returned to the hall, detouring into the study to bring the new bicycle into the sitting room. Though she had been stuffing a knobbly, half-filled stocking for Timothy when the phone went, he suspected correctly that she would not have collected the main gift. He spoke of 'the', not 'my', study now, but she was quaintly protective of his privacy, never entering the room alone. This had benefits, he reflected, extracting from his desk a second knobbly, filled stocking. They had agreed not to buy one another presents: they had spent so much on the wedding and were hardly well off. But in the last few weeks he had broken their deal endlessly, every time dismissing it as only a trinket, until those one or two trinkets bought as signs of his affection had grown and multiplied into a little heap. They were inconsequential things: ink cartridges, a pair of hair slides, a tiny bar of scented soap. Only the bottle of L'air de Temps, well-padded by a pocket handkerchief, an orange and a slim Penguin paperback, had been of any significant cost. Still it was with a mild sense of guilt that he took it through to the sitting room along with the bicycle, anticipating her look of reproof in the morning.

Wheeling the bicycle through the door, he manoeuvred it to a spot where it could lean against the settee without falling. Giving Timothy a new bicycle had been last minute inspiration, although in retrospect he had been too tall for the old one for some time. It was only after Shelagh reported Jamie's enthusiasm for the bicycle repair kit, hinting to Patrick that things he had loved as a boy might still be valued in these fast moving, modern days, that he had started to look for it. Having met his nephew now, Patrick suspected Jamie's enthusiasm was more indicative of Jamie's character than the gift, but, dusting down the frame, still he hoped Timothy would similarly like his present. Even if he did not, it would be useful come the autumn for cycling to school; and there were plenty of other presents, albeit most homemade or second hand, the mound in the corner of the room far larger than usual, both he and Shelagh hopelessly indulgent in making much of this Christmas for him. Whether it was to make up for the sad restraint of previous years or to reassure the child of his irreplaceable importance in their lives, Patrick was not sure. Possibly, probably, it was both. Then there had been the swelling in numbers of those giving him gifts, his relatives and adopted aunts and uncles augmented by the Sutherlands, while they would all share in presents from Nonnatus House. He had observed jokily to Shelagh that maybe they should try for children earlier than intended simply to ensure Timothy was kept in his place as he was in danger of becoming thoroughly, horribly spoilt, trying to ignore the sudden flash of joy in her eye when he said it.

Scrutinising the pile of parcels, it appeared to Patrick to have grown even in the three hours he had been absent. Some he did not recognise. Kneeling down, he found two of them directed to himself in copperplate handwriting. One was clearly a book, another soft and cushiony, possibly a jumper. He shook his head, realising he was not the only transgressor against the Christmas pact; and by the fireplace was a second filled stocking. But how could he criticise her for breaking the promise, when he held a third in his hand? Another gift he thought was in the wrong place, it being addressed to him but identical to the framed photograph he had helped Timothy to wrap for Shelagh: it was by some way the best picture taken of them for years, captured by a smiling charmer he presumed was Jenny Lee's boyfriend. He hadn't wanted to ask. He wondered if Timothy had misdirected it, although that seemed staggeringly unlikely, and looked more closely. Half hidden underneath was another parcel, the same paper, the same shape and weight, and when he checked the label, from Timothy to Shelagh. Later he would deduce what it was and that the boy had been cleverer than he imagined. Immediately, however, he was only struck by one thing, both sweet and bitter: that the name Timothy used in the direction, easier to write than to say perhaps, was not 'Shelagh'.

Walking upstairs to the bathroom, the house became even colder. He wished he could have a bath, although he doubted there would be much hot water at that time of night. The water he splashed over his face as cursory ablutions was frigid and did not become less so as he began a more rigorous washing of his hands and lower arms. His shadow of stubble was lengthening, but he had known it worse. He would shave in the morning, he was too tired to do it now. Brushing his teeth was a hypnotising routine, preparing for him for sleep, rather than hygiene, although he was glad to feel the sticky fur on his tongue loosened and removed.

He switched on the landing light before going in to check on Timothy. He had been delivered back to them on Monday evening with a black eye, the consequence of an elbow in the face while playing with Alex and Oliver. Alex had been contrite, his apologies deeply penitent, while David and Louisa were mortified. Timothy, however, seemed remarkably unruffled, wearing it as something of a badge of honour; and although he let Shelagh fuss over it, Patrick suspected Timothy was secretly rather proud and one day would laugh over the memory with nostalgia, just as he and Michael did over the infamous broken nose. The violet-black smear looked appalling but by Boxing Day it would begin its fade to jaundice yellow and New Year would entirely gone. Timothy lay on his back, his arm flopped at his side and his head carelessly on one side, a position long familiar to Patrick as being when he had fallen asleep while reading. Instinctively he bent down to pick up the book from the floor and turn off the lamp, before he recollected that the only light in the room was spilling in from the landing and the book was sitting on the bedside table, bookmark more neatly in place than it had ever been. Smoothing back the messy fringe, Patrick took the liberty his son rarely allowed him when conscious and kissed him, closing the door behind him as he left.

Entering his own room, he wished he had not switched off the landing light as he crossed from Timothy's room to theirs. He was accustomed to padding through the house at night, easily able to navigate his way in the dark. But for two years there had been no need for stealth in his own room and he had brightly lit its loneliness at the end of the day. The new locations of the furniture resembled an obstacle course, while the curtains were drawn against the cold so not even city haze could illuminate his route. Nor could he tell from her undefined shape in bed what position Shelagh was sleeping in. Cautiously, he tipped the shade of his bedside lamp towards himself so what light it threw would shine in his direction, hoping it would not disturb his wife.

Shelagh lay on her side, the quilt and blankets pulled up to her neck, one hand curled under her head, the other stretching out towards the space which he would fill. She wriggled, turning marginally further towards him, and her eyelids spasmed when the light went on, but they did not open and she did not wake.

As quietly as he could, Patrick prepared for bed. A fresh set of clothes was laid out on the chair by his chest of drawers, ready if needed in the middle of the night or, he fervently hoped, for the morning. He spotted them while emptying loose change out of his trouser pocket. He knew she would not have intended it as such, but it chastened him, knowing his habit of several years had been dumping clothes in a crumpled heap on the chair, picking over them in the morning for anything wearable. Sitting on the end of the bed to remove his shoes, shock made him jerk up and stand again so abruptly he was certain he must have wakened her. Mystified, he gingerly laid a hand on the rippling lump he had sat on to discover a hot water bottle on his side of the bed, while she slept on, unaware he had returned. They were little things, nothings against the scenes of life and death in which they were frequently principal players, but they softened the buffetings of life and made it gentler. Collecting his pyjamas, he undressed and changed into them, leaving his tie and jumper on the chair, but folded over the back, and depositing the rest of his clothes into the laundry basket in the corner of the room.

He looked back at her again and again. He was growing used to seeing her without her glasses and no longer found the face as strange and vulnerable as he had at first, but it continued to intrigue him. She had fallen asleep in his arms each night since they had married, warm and bare and glowing, her breathing the tide which lulled him to sleep. But what he had seen as he held her was the long, fine hair and the curves of her smooth shoulders, one of which he had teasingly designated his when he kissed it for the first time, not her face. Seeing it as she slept was to see something close to transcendence laid out in a subtle structure of bones and translucent skin, like looking at a different woman. She was his entirely, he knew it, but still a mystery to him, elusive and tantalising.

Shivering as he climbed into bed, he had reason to be glad for the hot water bottle and wondered if she was warm enough. Tentatively touching her shoulder, his fingers met an embroidered cotton sleeve. He grinned: the nightie was pretty, attractive enough, but not the one she had worn the previous two nights and he suspected the reason was not only to ward off the chill. He was grateful for it. Was it credible that Timothy would not batter the door early next morning, bursting in to wish them Merry Christmas and demand to give his presents? Patrick doubted it; and preferred to think of that other, timidly worn nightgown as for the eyes of only one Turner man. He wondered where it was, dimly hoping it might reappear some time, smiling at the memory of when he first saw it.

It had been at the end of their first full day of marriage, a day as happy as any he could remember. After all their anxiety, that first night had unfolded as naturally and instinctively as a dormant winter bulb finally flowering and when he woke it was with fuzzy recollections of all that had been magical the previous day: a symphony of friends' faces sliding in and out of focus; Timothy's earnest, funny speech; her voice as she made her vows; the words that she whispered and the way that she kissed him in the porch of the church as the others appeared; drinking wine which tasted of laughter; her giggle as he carried her over the threshold; her arm around his waist as they walked through their house together, relieved to be alone at last; and finally their shy and tender discovery of one another. He knew every corner of women's bodies and detachment from the physical had become his practice. It had taken all his will-power and twenty years of practice to find that detachment when she stood in front of him in August, a few inches of the habit unbuttoned to expose her skin, as it had been then, when her body was broken and riddled with illness, that he had fully realised how deeply he longed for it and loved the woman it housed. Now it was offered to him as freely as every other part of her. He felt better rested than he had done for months.

This, he discovered, was the case in fact as well as feeling, for Shelagh had switched off his alarm and simply let him sleep. Waking almost as early as she usually did, she had been content to lie in his arms, contemplating the strange reality of the ring upon her hand and trailing her fingers up and down his forearms while the sky brightened, eventually extricating herself to rummage for clothes, washing and dressing before going downstairs to read her Bible and joyfully pray. She had made tea and prepared breakfast, then tidied away their littering of clothes, bringing upstairs from the sitting room the oddments abandoned there – his jacket and tie, a button from her sleeve, his cuff links, her hair pins and her shoes – to sort them alongside those which had been removed with awe in their bedroom, reliving, as she touched them, moments which had been so precious to her. And then she had returned to him, quietly sitting on the bedspread next to where he lay, sporadically reading while she watched him sleep. The day unfolded with quiet pleasures. They talked and read, pottered around their home, cooked and ate together, listened to music, laughed and kissed frequently. In the afternoon they decided where to hang the painting they had been gifted by Sister Julienne, each remembering the discussion she had captured; then played Scrabble, joking that this was how their younger colleagues would doubtless have expected them to spend the previous night, perhaps while discussing some abstruse medical procedure.

As it drew deep into the evening however, he found himself bashful of suggesting a reprise of the previous night, as joyous as it had been, still shy of pushing her. During his bath he had washed his hair as he always did on Sunday, returning to their room with it still cold and damp to find her sitting at her dressing table brushing the shining veil of her own hair, dressing gown tightly around her. Diffidently she offered to towel it dry for him, at first vigorously purposeful as she sat him down, but just as she had been when she examined his shoulder, gradually slowing and gentling until finally he reached for her hand and drew her in front of him, where she stood simply running her fingers through his hair and cradling his face while his hands played lazily over her back. How the belt of her dressing gown became loose was hazy, but he remembered with absolute clarity the moment he saw the nightdress, how, even in its subtlety, its modesty, it allured him, how he saw the last fearful fragments of uncertainty dissolve from her face with his instinctive, appreciative mutter of 'Bloody hell'; and how then had followed a night even more exquisite than the first.

"Merry Christmas, sweetheart," he whispered, leaning over and kissing her on the temple so softly it was little more than resting his lips upon her, trying not to disturb her pillow as he pulled away. The noise she made in return was suspiciously close to a most unladylike grunt. Patrick snorted. He wondered if he could present her with that fact the next morning, although he suspected that such jokes would ultimately leave him hoist on his own petard. She had not mentioned it yet, but every person who had shared a room with him since his teens had eventually complained about his snoring. That teasing would come, just as he would tease her about this and in both cases, he would revel in it. Still smothering laughter, he took one last glance, unconsciously offered wordless thanks to the night for the blessing sleeping inches from him, then turned and switched off the lamp.

And [save a bit of editing and tweaking] that's it. Thank you to everyone who has kept reading this over the past few months, even when the chapters took ages to appear. In particular thank you to the people who've reviewed or messaged me, often again and again, for their incredible support. If you'll forgive a personal note here: this has been the first creative writing I've done for about fifteen years having lost my confidence and love of writing when I was a teenager. The support and encouragement of you helped me find that love again. I'm more grateful than I can possibly say. Thank you all. xx

Finally, just to reiterate, the errors are mine, the heart and inspiration are Heidi Thomas and Jennifer Worth.