Remembering Christmases past, the grandparents laugh and say, “Christmas is about having enough duvets. And avoiding the motorway.”

“Plus love, hope and Quality Street.”

Over tea and mince pies, the friends compare 2023 highlights. A son’s wedding, some bowel surgery, seeing the Caravaggios in Rome. Ups and downs.

Therapist, Mags, sees her final client for 2023. Despite her work, everyone is still mad. She doesn’t predict a fall in demand for 2024.

On the shortest day, they walk in the park. The London Planes are bare; it’s dark by four. But think of Spring, they say.

“The choir of children sing their song

Ding dong, ding dong, ding dong”.

Yeah, but nothing says Christmas quite like “The World’s Strongest Man.”

Danny, on hold to HMRC, wonders what else he could do with this time. Stop a boat, cut a waiting list, punch a PM.   

Her mother has bad eyes, so Beverley writes her cards. Clemmie doesn’t use postcodes and strikes through names of friends lost since last Christmas.

“Says here, the Home Secretary’s parents would have struggled to be together under the new rules.

“Can he look his mother in the eye?”

She hasn’t bought any presents yet, but the shops are rammed. Instead, she sides with the Devil and, from the sofa, fires up Amazon.

“Come for a drink,” they say after the work Christmas lunch. In his paper-hat, Alfie agrees but in truth, he just wants to sleep.

A group of teenagers kick a football around the misty park. Two years ago, in Mariupol, they played in the snow with their fathers.

Getting everyone together on the 25^th is exhausting. Bless the family but secretly she misses Covid Christmas, when they all just stayed at home.  

Rishi cheers the passing of the Rwanda Bill. Meanwhile, in the Bibby Stockholm, they wonder how to trace the mother of the dead immigrant.

“You know you did these stories last year?” he says. “Everything is still bollocks, so what’s the point?”

She shrugs. “It’s all a puzzle.”

In the shadows of the candle-lit church, the soloists sings, “Once in Royal David’s City”. Beautiful but to us, no longer young, infinitely sad.

A bunch of old folk belt it out at the funeral. “Happy Christmas your arse, I pray God it’s our last”.

We’ll miss Shane.

She’s looking for a book for her elderly mother, something about the countryside.  Ronald Blythe perhaps.

“But did I buy her this last year?”

Terri is doing rosary Advent.

“I will say 70 prayers for you,” she says.

It’s been a rough year. Debs, a non-believer, is touched.

He’s playing five parts in a touring pantomime. The children love it, but at the social club, old people fall asleep. An actor’s life.

(For Arthur)

When they decorate the tree, Billy, 5, drops the glass ballerina.

“It’s fine,” says Granny. It belonged to her mother, but it’s only stuff.

Sam’s secret Santa is Diane from logistics. He barely knows her so buys some hand-cream. He pays more than £10 and feels a failure.

The priest reminds them, “Advent is the season of waiting.”

With no appointment for his hip replacement, Joe is only too familiar with waiting.

Two families panicking about baby formula. Becca, in Watford, because it’s unaffordable; Muhanad, in Gaza, because he can’t fine any for his motherless baby.

Maya, 22, opens December 1^st on her Advent calendar. It’s childish, but her mum always sends one. The first chocolate, the start of Christmas.