Julia Williams - A Hope Christmas Love Story

Published by Avon

An imprint of HarperCollins Publishers Ltd

1 London Bridge Street

London SE1 9GF

www.harpercollins.co.uk

First published in Great Britain by HarperCollins Publishers 2014

Copyright © Julia Williams 2014

Cover illustration © XXXXX 2014

Cover design © XXXXX 2014

Julia Williams asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

A catalogue copy of this book is available from the British Library.

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.

Ebook Edition © December 2014 ISBN: 9780008131951

Version: 2014-12-19

Contents

Cover

Title Page A Hope Christmas Love Story Julia Williams

Copyright

Prologue

First Day

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Christmas Day

About the Author

By the same author

About the Publisher

First day of Year 13 and I feel faintly sick. By rights, I shouldn’t be here. I should be heading off to uni with all my friends. Instead I’m a year behind them, taking my A2s at Shrewsbury College where I know plenty of people, but no one really knows me. Or could possibly understand how different my life is from theirs. I probably should have come clean about Lou Lou from day one, but I can’t explain it, I just wanted a bit of my life to be like everyone else’s – to pretend that I was a normal teenager doing normal teenage things. And now it’s too late to tell anyone. No one here knows I’m a single mum, with a twenty-month daughter. Or how much pressure I’m under to get things right. Thanks Andy Pilsdon, for screwing up my life …

First day of 6 thform college, and I feel sick. By rights, I shouldn’t be here. I should be setting off to uni with all my mates. Instead I’m resitting Year 13 in a college in Shrewsbury where I know no one, and no one knows me. That last bit is a bonus.

But the rank feeling of failure follows me. It should have been so different. Predicted A*s and A’s after AS Levels, it all went to pot from day one. A whole year spent listening to Mum and Dad tearing themselves apart and ignoring Izzy and me in the meantime. A whole year spent of nights up until all hours searching for Izzy when she’d gone off god knows where. No wonder I didn’t get the grades.

So now I have to sit the damned things again. And I’m really feeling the pressure. Thanks Mum and Dad for spectacularly screwing up my life …

I’m queuing up to register for my English A Level class when I first see her. Like me, she was on her own, which seemed surprising. She was so lovely: pretty with long dark hair and gorgeous blue eyes. I couldn’t believe she didn’t have hordes of guys wandering after her. There was a slightly haunted air about her, she seemed kind of waif like and all I wanted to do was go and put my arms around her straight away. Which was ridiculous. I’d not even spoken to her.

“Welcome back, Melanie,” I heard our tutor say. “And well done again on those great results.”

Melanie. The name suited her.

She blushed at the compliment and scuttled away as fast as she could. I wanted to say hi, introduce myself, but something about her manner made me think she wasn’t too keen on casual conversation, as she raced away, head down towards the library.

I didn’t see her again for the rest of the day.

Second day of term and already the summer feels far away. I’m missing Lou Lou badly and wondering just how I’m going to cope next year when I’m at uni. If I get there of course.

All everyone is talking about is how important this year is, and how little time we’ve got. And I have less time than most. How many of my fellow students have to get home in time to pick their daughter up from nursery, feed her, bathe her, and put her to bed before starting their studying?

Over the summer she’s got into bad habits as well. I recently got rid of the cot, and she’s having far too much fun running around her bedroom to actually go to sleep. Why would she want to do that? I’m already fretting about how I’m going to get any work done. Mum and Dad are great but I can’t always impose on them. Lou Lou’s my responsibility. And much as I love her, sometimes it feels really unfair …

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