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Chapter One ~ Moving House

The day we moved to Christmas Cottage was one of the very best days of my life. I had not long started at secondary school. My friends couldn’t understand why I was so excited about moving house, especially as Christmas Cottage was in a village about eight miles away from our school. This meant I had to leave home very early every morning to catch two buses, to get to school on time. I used to be able to walk, it was so close!

“Zanna,” my best friend Phoebe said, “you must be mad not to change to a school nearer your new house. I would hate to get up so early every day, and then not get home until late. And you won’t be able to stay for any after school activities!”

“I know,” I told her, “but I still want to hang out with our group – after all, some of us have been besties since pre-school days. I don’t want to go to a new school where I don’t know anybody. But I’m glad we’ve moved house. I just love seeing my Nan every day.”

I really did. Gramps had died at the beginning of the summer holidays. That was terribly sad of course, but he’d been ill for a long time, with dementia. He no longer knew who any of us were, not even Nan. The memory books Mum had made for him, full of happy memories, had no longer made him smile or helped him remember things.

It was Dad’s idea that we move in with Nan. She didn’t want to leave Christmas Cottage, but she was lonely. So, we moved to the cottage to be with her!

As soon as it was decided, I started packing. I was thrilled! Not only did I love being with Nan, who even though she is now an old lady, is always fun to be with, but I just adore the village where she lives. It’s called Becton Poyntz – that’s an old English name, which means ‘a settlement with a fast stream which was once owned by a family called Poyntz’. It’s nestled in a valley surrounded by hills. It’s tiny; just a cluster of cottages, an old mill, a riding stables, and a farm. Several of the cottages have thatched roofs, including Christmas Cottage, which overlooks the millpond. Part of the pond has willow trees around it, which are beautiful, especially in the springtime.

Christmas Cottage has a large fir tree in the front garden, which is how the cottage got its name. It was probably someone’s Christmas tree a long time ago. Gramps fixed a swing on one of the large branches for my mum to swing on when she was a girl. It has been there ever since. My brother Seth and I used to take turns to swing on it whenever we went to visit. I still swing on it it sometimes. It helps me to sort things out in my head, especially if I feel worried or upset about something.

After we moved to live at the cottage, Mum started working full time, instead of just part time, because she knew that Nan would be there for me when I arrived home from school. If the bus is late, I text Nan, so nobody worries.

Nan’s really cool and loves using her smart phone and tablet. She has mugs of tea and cupcakes, cookies or other goodies ready for us both to enjoy as soon as I get home. Nan loves to have someone to fuss over and bake for – and I love her cooking!

Teatime is my favourite time of the day. I tell Nan everything about school and she always has time to listen and seems to really understand. One thing I should tell you about Nan, is that she had a very sad beginning to her life, because she was born in Poland in the Second World War. That’s one reason Mum loves to take photos of every family event we have. We laugh at her because she always has her camera or phone somewhere in her bag, but she told me once that she wants to make good memories for everyone to cheer them up through the bad times, which happen to everyone.

I am the only child in the village who goes to secondary school. A family with two boys live next door to us. Thomas is seven years old, and Jack is four and a half. They go to the primary school in the next village, which isn’t far from the edge of Weymouth, the seaside town on the Dorset coast where I was born and lived, until we moved to Becton Poyntz, of course!

Thomas sometimes comes into our garden because he loves the swing. He’s a chatterbox and always asking questions. “Why do you have such a funny name?” he asked me one day.

“It’s not funny,” I answered, a bit crossly. “It’s special. My mum and dad made it up. Dad wanted to call me Suzannah like my Mum, but Mum wanted to call me Anna, so they decided to call me Zanna. I like it – it’s different.”

“Oh,” Thomas replied, “I see,” but I could tell by his face he wasn’t impressed.

One reason why Phoebe is my best friend is that she loves my name and always tells me how cool it is to have a name especially invented for you. Phoebe sometimes comes for a sleepover at the weekend, and I love taking her for walks around the village and up the footpaths into the hills behind the cottage. I miss having my brother Seth to come exploring with me, but he started at university soon after we moved. He wants to be a doctor and has seven whole years of study ahead. I’ll have to get used to him living a long way away, because he is studying in Edinburgh*.

Let me tell you about my mum. I think she should be a full-time photographer because her photos are amazing, but in fact she is a teacher at a college about ten miles away. She teaches life skills to young people who have special needs.

My dad, whose name is Russell (but most people call him Russ), is a helicopter pilot and has a long drive to work, over the county border into Somerset. He gets up early and brings me a cup of tea to wake me up and usually starts my day with a joke. Sometimes his work takes him away for a week or two, if he has to go abroad, and then I miss both his jokes and the hot tea!

There’s one other thing I should tell you about my family before we go any further – both Mum and Dad are part of the Weymouth lifeboat crew*. I’m very proud of them risking their lives to help people in danger out on the sea. Sometimes their pagers* go off with a big bleep and they need to get to the lifeboat fast, so that was another reason they were glad that Nan was going to be around to be with me, when they had to rush off.