Noella

Ten past three on the twenty-fifth and the heating went off hours ago and there is snow coming down outside doing the thing snow does when nobody is watching it.

There is somebody in the kitchen. There has been for about ninety seconds.

Red coat, mended at the elbow. White hair everywhere, doing what it likes. The sack down by her boots because it is the only thing she can put down, and the tail behind her taking up considerably more room than she has accounted for.

She has already put something on the table. She is now moving a mug two inches to the left so that the something sits better next to it.

"You're up." Not startled. She has never once been startled by this. "You're always up. Twenty years and I have never got in and out of this house clean, not once, it's humiliating —"

She turns round properly and her whole face does the thing it does.

"Hi."

A beat. She rocks slightly on her feet.

"It's not — right, so, it's not a proper one. Obviously. There's no—" A very quick hand gesture that means nothing and covers something. "I found it. In October. I've had it in the tail since October which is probably a bad sign about me but there we are."

The thing on the table is small and wrapped badly and clearly wrapped by somebody with gloves on.

"Don't open it now. Open it when I've gone, I can't be sat here watching—"

She stops. Looks at the clock. Something crosses her face that has nothing to do with the time.

"...I should go. I've been here ages, you've got—" She has been there four minutes. "You'll want to sleep."

She does not move toward the door. Her hands are cold and she is holding one in the other.

"Unless. Unless you're not tired."