Catherine Miller - Christmas at the Gin Shack

‘That sounds like a plan then,’ Tony said. ‘Only question is what kind of trial weekend are you going to run?’

It didn’t take long for Olive to decide what she’d like to do. However much she fancied the idea of running a hen weekend, the chance of getting a group with the right number of people just before the end of the year was slim. ‘How about a Christmas Sparkle weekend? We could tie it in with the search for the perfect cocktail.’

‘That sounds like a great idea,’ Esme said, and there were several nodding heads agreeing with her. ‘It’ll be a Christmas gin-inspired weekend.’

‘That doesn’t exactly roll off the tongue though, does it?’ Randy said. ‘You need something catchier.’ Randy’s bushy eyebrows folded in thought.

‘Any ideas?’ Esme said.

‘How about a Jingle Bell retreat? But not Jingle, I mean Gingle,’ Veronica offered.

‘Gingle,’ Tony repeated, having his own proper laugh-out-loud moment. ‘GIN-gle, get it? That’s brilliant.’

Olive found herself laughing at the silly play on words and was delighted to be able to combine her favourite time of year with her favourite drink. She just hoped there wouldn’t be any more arsing around. Because, however funny the bum on the sign had been, it seemed more like a threat than someone larking about, and she didn’t like it one bit.

Chapter Three

Weeks went by too quickly in Olive’s opinion. With so much going on in her life these days, she wanted to be able to slow down time. There wasn’t much chance of that happening, though. She hadn’t even had time to start trying out recipes for the Christmas cocktail competition and they were going to start previewing them on the weekly menu soon.

It was rather exciting because it meant that, this Sunday, Olive wouldn’t be the only one turning up with a thermos flask. Tony was also bringing one to showcase the first Christmas cocktail they’d be featuring at the Gin Shack. It was nice not to be the only one having to do homework during the week.

‘What is it then?’ Olive asked when they were all gathered. She was impatient to know, especially as she had agreed to come up with one of the recipes. Several other members of the Gin Shack crew had also volunteered, but rather than share their ideas with each other, they were all being very secretive over the matter. Anyone would think they were in competition with each other, which Olive wondered if, really, they were. Even if just a little.

Olive was worried that, by not confiding in each other, they would all end up coming up with pretty much the same ideas. Her own light-bulb moment was hopefully something a bit different, but she would need to carry out some experiments to check it wasn’t completely rank.

‘This is Paul’s recipe. Don’t tell him I’ve let you have a preview. He’ll think there’s cheating going on.’

‘You do know there’s no competition going on between us?’ Olive needed the point clarified.

‘Not officially, but the customers are going to be choosing a winning cocktail, so I think whoever creates the winning recipe that ends up representing the Gin Shack will win gloating rights for a long time to come,’ Tony said.

‘What’s your recipe, Richard?’ Surely Olive’s son wouldn’t be keeping his concept a secret.

‘That would be telling. No trying to get ahead of the game, Mum.’

Olive definitely wasn’t ahead of the game. If anything, she was behind it if the others already had their cocktail creations in hand.

‘This is the chocolate-orange cocktail,’ Tony said. ‘Paul said the flavour always reminds him of Christmas as he always cracks one open as a treat.’

The drink did taste like the classic segmented chocolate and, for Olive, it worked. The annoying thing was that Tony wasn’t letting on about what all the ingredients were, or how it would be presented. She was sure there was chocolate Baileys, but she wasn’t quite able to identify the flavour of gin or what the other ingredients were. She was sure she’d be able to with more chance to taste the drink, but Tony was restricting her intake and they needed to pack up, ready to head down for their weekly picnic.

‘Orange-blossom gin?’ Olive put in another guess.

‘My lips are sealed.’

It was frustrating, but at least the idea she had wasn’t in any way similar.

‘I’m going to go ahead if that’s okay with you two? It’s been such a busy week, Esme and I haven’t had much chance to touch base.’

‘You go ahead. I’ll walk with Mum,’ Richard said.

It made Olive sound like a dotty old dear who wasn’t able to manage by herself. She was a gazillion times slower than these young sprats, though, especially when Tony jogged off, demonstrating how practically the whole world was younger and fitter than her. Aging really was a bugger at times.

‘What’s going to be in your cocktail then, Mum?’

‘Like I’m going to tell you.’ Olive found herself grinning. This cocktail competition was going to be fun.

Rather than a standoff silence as they ambled along the promenade, they both took to playing a game of guess the ingredients for the sample they’d just tried.

This was one of the best things to have emerged from the opening of the Gin Shack: the renewed relationship Olive had with her son. They’d spent far too many years treading on eggshells around each other and it was nice to have a new sense of being comfortable in each other’s presence.

Before, Richard had always been too busy for her. His London-based lawyer business took up most of his time and she’d become an inconvenience in his life. But the opening of the Gin Shack had made both of them realise that family time was important, however fractured the past may have caused the present to be. They could never bring the rest of the family back, but they had each other – mother and son – and it was important to hang on to that in whatever way possible.

These days Richard no longer worked like a dog and actually took his weekends off like any normal person would. He ventured down on a Friday and was helping Tony out at the Gin Shack on the busier Friday and Saturday evenings. Olive would get to see him when they weren’t too busy and then, on a Sunday, they had their gin-tasting ritual followed by all of the beach-hut residents getting together for a Sunday picnic feast.

The beach-hut neighbours took it in turns to cook a meal, with each of them contributing something in terms of sustenance. Today it was pulled pork on the menu. Esme had perfected the recipe and it was one of Olive’s favourite meals.

There was a mishmash of tables from each of the huts gathered together to provide a dining area, and the troops were gathering with pasta, salads and all sorts of treats to go with the main dish. Olive and Richard had the easy task of providing bread rolls this week. On the whole they were offered the easier-to supply ingredients, which, given that neither of them had access to a kitchen locally, was probably for the best.

Olive greedily filled her plate with everything that was on offer. There was something so special about these Sunday afternoons. Since the opening of the Gin Shack, she didn’t see her neighbours here in the leisurely coming-and-going way of old. Most of the time she would see them at the bar rather than down on the sands. So it was nice that they kept this up, keeping their sense of community spirit strong. Along with Richard and Olive, there was Skylar and her seven-year-old son, Lucas, in the next-door hut, and Richard would often spend time with Lucas, making extravagant castles in the sand. There was Paul the fisherman, who still said very little in the way of conversation, but when he did, it was always worth hearing. Tony and Esme were basking in deckchairs, although there wasn’t much sun about to be basking in. Their three boys, TJ and the twins, were playing a game of cricket as they so often did, and Mark and Lily, the lovely couple on the end of the row, were being a bit gooey-eyed and romantic with each other. Next to them (although not with their own beach hut to boast of) were Randy and Veronica who always tagged along, giving fair competition in the most gooey-eyed couple category. Along with Olive, Randy and Veronica completed the Oakley West trio made famous by the media when the Gin Shack had opened. They had hit the headlines for escaping from their rest home at every given opportunity to form the secret club that soon became public news. Nowadays, Olive occasionally felt like a bit of a gooseberry since the pair had become a couple. But they were all pretty good at finding a middle ground between spending time together as friends and allowing the couple all the alone time they might require.