Page 6 of Her Fixer Upper

‘Ah, Miss Hutchinson, lovely to see you,’ he said, making an excellent show of sounding convincing.

‘Not at all, Mr Humphries. I’m very much looking forward to our tour of The Glades. In fact, I’m eager to set off now. If you wouldn’t mind?’

I’d happily sacrifice the nice coffee if it meant being able to put my plan to Charlie without any further delay.

Charlie glanced at his boss quickly, seeking his permission.

‘Go, go,’ he responded, nearly falling over himself in his eagerness for me to be given the guided tour. He was going to be disappointed when Charlie returned without an offer being presented.

‘Let me get a brochure,’ said Charlie, ‘and then we’ll be on our way.’

We left the shop and walked all the way down the road together keeping up the pretence of estate agent and client until we were safely around the corner and out of sight. And then Charlie loosened his tie and leaned against the wall, fixing me with a quizzical expression.

‘We don’t see each other in years, and then it’s twice in two days. To what do I owe the honour?’ he asked.

Now that the moment had come, I felt quite sick, suddenly very aware of the utterly ludicrous nature of my plan. I realised how presumptuous I was being, reappearing in his life after a gap of so many years and asking him to team up with me, essentially a stranger, for one of the biggest rites of passage there was. Sure, he’d joked about it in the pub, but that was all it had been. A joke.

‘Maybe I do want to see The Glades,’ I prevaricated.

Charlie pursed his lips. ‘It’s well worth a look, especially if gold-plated toilets are your thing. But unless you’ve won the lottery since we were chatting last night, I’m afraid it’s rather out of your league. If you wanted to meet up again, you only had to ask, no need to go to all this effort at subterfuge.’

‘There was a particular reason I wanted to see you again. Not that I need a particular reason, of course…unless I do?’ I was digging myself deeper into a hole. I firmly told myself to get my act together and speak to him as I’d rehearsed in my head. ‘I’ve been having a think since we met, and I’d like to suggest an idea to you. It’s probably best that you hear me out in full, and then once you know exactly what I’m talking about, I’d love to know what you think about it.’

‘You’re talking in riddles, Freya,’ said Charlie. ‘If you’re after an agreement that I won’t interrupt you, that’s fine, you say what you need to and I’ll keep quiet.’

I steeled myself for the inevitable rejection and set about explaining my idea – well, Leila’s drunken idea – and how I saw it working in practical terms. ‘It’s the perfect solution for both of us. We get on the property ladder together, and if we work hard, in eighteen months or so, we could be looking for our own places by ourselves. And so you know that I’m taking this very seriously, I’ve written a set of guidelines for both of us to follow as house co-owners. If you agree to this document,’ I waved The Rules at him, ‘then we’ll both know exactly where we stand, what our obligations are towards each other, and we’ll have the perfect house partnership.’

Charlie stared at me, apparently stupefied by my plan. I dropped my gaze, unable to bear seeing his expression when he rejected the idea out of hand. Perhaps, I wondered, I should have told him what had happened with Steve to help convince him why it was such a good idea, then I reminded myself why I had decided not to go down that route. It wouldn’t be fair to the guy to use emotional blackmail to get him to agree. If he said no, fine, that was absolutely his right. I’d always have Leila’s sofa bed, so I wouldn’t be homeless. But it would be the death of my dreams and I didn’t have a clue what I would do next.

‘I think it’s a great idea,’ said Charlie suddenly. Only I was so startled by his positive response that I had to get him to repeat what he’d said.

‘Really? I mean, you don’t think it’s totally unworkable and stupid?’ I said, then mentally berated myself for challenging him when he was obviously in agreement. The last thing I needed was for me to talk him out of it.

Charlie shrugged. ‘What’s the worst that can happen?’ he said. ‘I believe most things happen for a reason. We were obviously meant to bump into each other last night. We have a shared goal, and this can help us achieve it. It’s a good solution for both of us.’

‘And what about The Rules?’ I pushed, still not believing my luck.

He grinned. ‘Despite you being one half of the Terrible Twosome, you were always a secret stickler for rules. I prefer to live life on my own terms, if you don’t mind. Let’s just say that I accept the principle that we should be respectful of each other’s space and we’ll go from there.’

‘But there’s so much more to The Rules than that. I’d really prefer it if you read them for yourself,’ I said, thrusting the piece of paper towards him.

‘If it matters so much to you, why don’t you read them to me?’ he said. ‘Can I suggest you do it while we’re in the car? It’s freezing out here, and I’m not going to be much use on the home renovation front if I lose my limbs to frostbite.’

‘Sure,’ I said, automatically following him as he started striding down the street again. ‘Hold on, why are we getting in the car?’

‘Because I think I know the perfect property for us, and I’d like to show it to you,’ he called back over his shoulder.

ChapterFour

Charlie’s car turned out to be a battered old Land Rover, apparently held together by rust, complete with bits of straw all over the seats.

‘Apologies, the old girl could do with a wash,’ he said, casually swiping the worst of the countryside detritus off the passenger seat and moving a guitar into the boot. ‘I’ve been helping my dad out on the farm in return for my bed and board.’

I tried to surreptitiously wind the window down, figuring that the sub-zero temperatures of outside were a better option than the aroma ofeau defarmyard. But the whistling of the wind combined with the rattling din of the engine meant that it was impossible to hear what Charlie was saying, so I settled for trying to breathe through the fabric of my scarf instead.

‘So let me read The Rules to you,’ I said. But Charlie had other ideas.

‘Yes, yes, all in good time. First I’d like to tell you about where we’re going. I think it would be the perfect property for us.’

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