Page 63 of Her Fixer Upper

He might change his mind when he’d heard my confession.

‘I did try to call you,’ I said, ‘but it was earlier in the evening, and Serena picked up instead. When everything kicked off, it was all I could do to get Ted and I out of there safely. By the time we’d made it up the road, I was so exhausted, I virtually collapsed into bed. But it’s no excuse. I should have rung you then. I’m sorry I didn’t.’

‘That’s okay. It’s understandable. But I wonder why Serena didn’t mention your call.’

‘Because I asked her not to. I had a pang of conscience that I was ruining your date night.’

Charlie laughed, a strange sound to hear given the scene in front of us. ‘It wasn’t a date night.’

While my heart wanted to explore that answer further and its ramifications, my head told me that I needed to focus on the task in hand, confessing to Charlie.

‘That’s beside the point. What I really needed to say was—’

‘Why do you think I’m dating Serena?’ he asked, not letting me even get started.

‘Charlie, now really isn’t the time. It’s not important.’

He fixed me with that penetrating gaze of his, seeming to look right into my soul, seeing all the confusion and doubt and pain lurking in there.

‘It’s pretty important to me. And I’d like to hope it’s important to you too. It feels like something we should clear up,’ he continued. ‘I didn’t spend the night with Serena. After my—’

‘Charlie, I didn’t sort the insurance out properly so we’re royally screwed,’ I interrupted him, coming out with it quickly so I could get the dreaded moment over and done with. Unfortunately, I said it so quickly that judging by the look of confusion on my face, he didn’t take in a word of what I’d said.

I took a deep breath and explained the situation in full to him and how it was my lack of attention to detail that had caused it.

‘But I’ve thought of a solution,’ I concluded. ‘I’ve got a plan to sort this out.’

The idea had come to me as we were walking down the lane, a way of making things better for Charlie. It didn’t matter about the price that I would pay. This was about doing what was right.

‘And what plan might that be?’ asked Charlie. I couldn’t work out from his tone how he was feeling about the situation. If he was angry with me, he was doing a very good job of keeping it contained.

‘As you know, yesterday I had the house valued. Obviously, in light of what happened overnight, that valuation is going to be meaningless. But I am sure the estate agent can give me a fresh figure. We’ll sell the house as a fixer upper, just like when we bought it, and then whatever it makes, you can take. All of it. I don’t want a penny. And if it ends up that we still owe the bank money after it’s sold, I will take responsibility for making sure that that money is paid off.’

‘But we bought it fifty-fifty,’ said Charlie. ‘Both our names are on the mortgage, and both of us are responsible for paying it.’

‘I know that. But I was the one who took responsibility for sorting out the insurance, and I was the one who failed to arrange it. It’s my fault that this has happened, my fault that we’re in this mess. You shouldn’t have to pay the price for my mistake. I’m not going to let that happen.’

It was an offer that would destroy my dreams of house ownership, potentially for ever, condemning me to going back to where I had been, or perhaps to somewhere even worse. Being able to afford to live in a dodgy place with a landlord like Evil Stevil would probably seem like a distant dream. But I didn’t care about the consequences. What mattered most to me was looking out for Charlie, making sure that he was going to be all right, that he didn’t have to pay the price for my wrongs.

Charlie scratched his head slowly. ‘Always the one with the plan, eh, Freya. But if you ask me, this plan is of the same calibre as The Rules, so if it’s all the same to you, I’m going to turn it down.’

I blinked in astonishment. ‘What are you saying? I’m offering you the house, Charlie. It’s yours.’

‘I don’t want it if you’re not going to be there too,’ he said, his body language plainly telling me that he would not be moved on this point.

I shook my head, trying to get it clear. I was full of hope, but also terrified in case I had misunderstood what he was getting at. And so I fixed on perhaps the least important part of what he’d just said.

‘I thought you liked The Rules?’ I said tentatively.

Charlie laughed. ‘I only ever saw them as a bit of fun, Freya. They only mattered to me to the extent that they mattered to you. I notionally agreed to them because it seemed important to you, but the reality is that I don’t need a bit of paper to tell me how to act towards you or how to feel about you.’

My heart started beating faster as the hope built in my chest. ‘But the frame? You had them framed. Why, if they were so meaningless?’

‘Because I am at heart a sentimental beast, and I wanted to preserve them for posterity as they had played such a key part in bringing us back together again. They’re meaningless in terms of the contents, but they mean everything as a symbol of the journey we’ve embarked on together. It’s a bit like saving that empty champagne bottle from the first night we moved in. Ultimately, it’s an empty bottle, but seeing it reminds me of us laughing together as we drank from it, stumbling around in the dark as we tried to settle ourselves into our new adventure, wondering what on earth we’d let ourselves in for.’

‘But I thought you were making a point, that you feared I was going to break The Rules, or rather one of them, and wanted to warn me off before it was too late,’ I said.

‘If there’s one thing that has become clear while living with you, Freya, it’s that you’re not one for rule-breaking,’ said Charlie, a note of disappointment in his voice.

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