Fairy lights string between the market stalls cast everything in gold, and the air carries that perfect December blend of cinnamon, woodsmoke, and spilled mulled wine.
Queen Victoria watches from her pedestal, stoic and frost-kissed, while Lancaster goes about the serious business of Christmas.
“Mummy, can we get hot chocolate?” Ellie bounces on her toes, breath clouding in the cold.
“In a minute, love. Let’s find Dad and Ben first.”
This is my favourite tradition—has been since we moved here twelve years ago. Even through the pandemic, when the market ran with masks and sanitiser stations, it anchored me.
Something about the reliable chaos of it all, the same wooden chalets selling overpriced fudge, the same queue snaking from the German sausage stand.
After everything—redundancy, David, the rest—I need this continuity.
Mark stands by the carousel, checking his phone. No wedding ring again. Third time this week. He claims the cold makes his fingers swell, but it’s eight degrees, not exactly Arctic. I swallow the observation, file it with all the others.
“Found them,” I tell Ellie, steering her through a gap between pushchairs.
Ben slouches against the carousel fence, hood up, radiating teenage contempt for enforced family time. Sixteen and too cool for Christmas markets, but here anyway because I insisted. Small victories.
“Cheer up,” I say, nudging his shoulder. “You’re putting the shepherds off their stroke.”
He almost smiles—I catch it before he kills it. “This is tragic, Mum.”
“Gloriously tragic. Look, that woman’s wearing a Christmas pudding hat. With actual tinsel.”
“Stop.” But his mouth twitches.
The crowd presses closer. Someone’s elbow catches my ribs, and I pull Ellie against me.
Lancaster at Christmas—half the town crammed into one square, everyone determined to feel festive. A man in a Barbour jacket treads on my foot, doesn’t apologise. I recognise him from the school run. Typical.
That feeling creeps up my spine—someone watching. I scan the crowd, but it’s just faces blurring in the lights. Paranoid, Sarah. You’re being paranoid.
“Hot chocolate now?” Ellie asks.
“Hot chocolate now.”
The queue at the drinks stall stretches past three other chalets. Four pounds fifty for what’s essentially Cadbury powder and water, but Ellie’s face when she takes that first sip makes it worthwhile. I dab whipped cream from her nose while she giggles.
Mark hasn’t looked up from his phone.
I should care more. Would have, once. Now I just want to get through December without anyone mentioning David’s name. Five years dead, and still he sits between us at every meal, invisible but present.
The market saved me after redundancy. When the newsroom let me go—”restructuring,” they called it, though we all knew print was dying—I walked here straight from clearing my desk.
February, no market then, just an empty square where I stood with my cardboard box of desk crap and watched normal people doing normal things. When December came, the market returned, and somehow that meant life would continue.
These days I write “Ten Ways to Sparkle This Christmas” for women’s magazines. Not exactly the hard-hitting journalism I trained for, but it pays. Sometimes. Usually. When editors remember to process invoices.
Last week I wrote eight hundred words on sustainable gift wrapping. Used to cover Crown Court, now I’m an expert on ribbons made from recycled newspaper.
The joke I tell at parties is that I’m one lifestyle feature away from writing about scented candles. The truth is I already have. Twice.
What I really want is to write crime fiction. I’ve started six novels, finished none. There’s one on my laptop about a woman who murders her husband at a Christmas market. Too on the nose, probably. Another about buried secrets in a small northern town. That one’s twelve chapters in before I lost the thread.
“Can we see the reindeer?” Ellie tugs my coat.
“After the carousel, sweetheart.”
I pay the attendant while Ellie chooses her horse—has to be the white one with the golden saddle. She waves frantically each time she passes.
Ben takes a photo without being asked, and something loosens in my chest. We’re alright. Fractured maybe, but holding.
Mark pockets his phone, finally present. “Good turnout this year.”
“Same every year.” But I smile, try to keep things light. “Remember when Ben was small enough for the carousel?”
“I was never small enough,” Ben protests. “It’s for babies.”
“You loved the blue horse. Called him Neptune.”
“Mum.” The warning in his voice says stop, but there’s something else too. A flicker of the boy who named carousel horses.
Someone barges my shoulder. Hard. Not the accidental jostle of crowds but deliberate, forceful. I stumble, grab the carousel fence.
“Watch it,” I call after the figure disappearing into the mass of bodies.
They muttered something. Couldn’t catch it over the music and chatter, but the tone—sharp, meant for me. The words sounded like “you remember” or “you’d better,” but that makes no sense.
“You okay?” Mark asks.
“Fine. Just Christmas shoppers.”
But my hand finds my bag, checks the zip. Stupid, really. Who pickpockets at Lancaster Christmas market? This isn’t London. We barely get graffiti here. Still, I clutch it tighter.
The unease sits heavy in my stomach. That deliberate shoulder-check, the muttered words. Could be nothing. Could be someone I wrote about years ago, some court regular with a grudge. Hazard of local journalism—you make enemies just by reporting facts.
Ellie dismounts her horse, cheeks pink with cold and joy. We drift towards the food stalls, following the smell of roasting chestnuts and burnt sugar. The Welsh couple who’ve run the same stall since 2010 recognise me, ask after the family. Nice to be known for something other than my dwindling freelance credits.
“Sarah?” A woman touches my arm. Viv something from Ellie’s school. “Thought it was you. Lovely to see the family out.”
We make small talk about nativity plays and term dates. Normal parent stuff. Behind her, the crowd shifts and swirls. That watched feeling returns, stronger now. A figure by the jewellery stall, still while everyone else moves. Dark coat, hood up, face obscured.
I blink. They’re gone.
“Sorry, what?” Viv’s waiting for an answer.
“The Christmas fair. Yes, we’ll definitely try to come.”
She drifts away, and I’m left holding chestnuts I don’t want, seeing watchers who aren’t there. Get a grip, Sarah. It’s December in Lancaster. Everyone’s everywhere.
My bag feels heavier. Which makes no sense—I’ve bought nothing except drinks and carousel tickets. The leather strap digs into my shoulder. When I shift it, something crinkles inside. Paper.
“Mummy, look at the gingerbread house!” Ellie pulls me towards a stall display.
“Beautiful, love. Just a second.”
My fingers find the unfamiliar fold tucked between my wallet and diary. I draw out a piece of white paper, neat creases, not mine. My chest tightens before I even open it.
The noise of the market fades. Black biro, careful capitals:
I KNOW WHAT YOU DID.
What You Did is out now in paperback, and the Kindle/Kindle Unlimited edition releases on 21 November.
You can pre-order the Kindle version today for just 99p/99c.
