The Mini Break (4 page)

She’s come straight from work and is in heels, a suit and is carrying her ‘statement bag’ (which I’ve now learned simply means psychotically expensive).

‘I can think of nothing more enjoyable, except perhaps plucking out my own armpit hair,’ I say.

‘It’ll be worth it if it’s
The One
. And I’ve got high hopes. I don’t know how I missed this place. It’s been on and off the market for a while,
apparently. And look at the view, Dan.’

I can’t argue with the view, which stretches across rooftops, fields and trees, right down to the river and across to the Welsh hills.

We look up to see the estate agent marching towards the house, his phone at his ear. ‘There’s one and a half per cent at stake here. I don’t care if she’s a little old
lady – so was the Witch of the West.’ He sees us and straightens up. ‘Gotta go.’ He slams shut the phone.

‘
Hiyyy
.’ He grabs me by the hand and pumps it up and down. Like Gemma, he’s wearing pinstripes, though his are crooked at the top as his trousers stretch violently over
a pronounced belly. ‘Rich Cummins. FAB to meet you both. Day off, is it?’

‘No, I . . .’ I glance down at my jeans and long-sleeved T-shirt, which might breach the dress code in some workplaces, but not mine.

‘Pah. Five years ago you’d have been sacked for not wearing a tie, and now look. Standards, eh?’ Gemma stifles a smile. ‘KIDDING! Right. This . . . is Pebble
Cottage.’ He presents the house to us with a flourish of his arm, like a magician’s assistant after sawing someone in half. Then he opens up.

The hall is small but bright and overwhelmed by the kind of junk only women buy: candle-holders, key hooks, picture frames that are battered (deliberately).

We enter a living room that’s been decorated by someone who knows what they’re doing. It has a cast-iron fireplace, lots of books, pale walls, a faintly ethnic rug. On the
mantelpiece, there’s a single picture – of three women in their late twenties in front of the Sydney Opera House – and gaps where it looks as though others once were.

It’s a nice gaff. At least, I think so.

I glance at Gemma as she runs a finger along the window-frame with her Bad Cop face on. She’s worn this expression at every viewing since her friend Allie confided that she had paid more
than necessary for her house because she failed to hide how keen she was.

The estate agent claps his hands together. ‘I should warn you that this property is
blindingly
popular.’

‘Um . . . why’s it still for sale then?’ Gemma asks. He responds with an odd little laugh, as if she’s told a joke he doesn’t quite get.

‘There’s no chain in this sale – the owners are moving out this weekend. The schools here are UH-MAZ-ING . . .’

‘We don’t have kids,’ Gemma tells him.

‘The bars and restaurants in Heswall are pumping.’

‘Potential for noise and drunks then?’

‘It’s fabulously convenient for the station . . . a commuter’s paradise.’

‘Thought I’d heard the clatter of trains.’

He does the laugh again and shows us into the kitchen. It’s another nice room. Very nice. As are the two bedrooms, with an old-fashioned radiator and antique rocking horse in the window
bay, which I presume is some sort of ‘feature’ as there are no other signs of children living here.

More nonsense spills from Rich’s mouth all the way round, while Gemma steadfastly maintains a look that says she couldn’t be less impressed if he’d paused to piss on the
carpet.

By the time we reach the end, he’s still banging on about ‘original features’ as he points to a rusty door hinge, and effervescing about the ‘access arrangements’,
while highlighting the single front step.

‘We’d like to have a look round by ourselves now, if that’s okay?’ Gemma asks.

‘Sure. I’ll step outside – take as long as you want. Well, not too long:
Robocop
’s on tonight.’ He winks at her and grins. I decide I don’t like him
very much.

We head up the stairs as Gemma takes more photos on her phone, resisting discussion of whether she likes the place until after the viewing. When we reach the room with the rocking horse, she
wanders over, runs her hand along its mane.

‘I had one of these when I was a little girl,’ she tells me wistfully. ‘Mum used to sit on it and hold me on her lap.’

‘Go on, no one’s looking. I dare you.’ I suggest this in the full knowledge that it’s never going to happen.

‘What – have a go? Don’t be ridiculous,’ she tuts. Then she bites her lip. ‘What if it breaks?’

‘You’ve just said yours used to take the weight of both you and your mum. Although . . .’ I register how old it looks . . . ‘maybe you’re right. It might not hold
you.’

She produces a familiar look of indignation. ‘Are you saying I’ve put weight on?’

I love this kind of logic. ‘Of course not, there’s nothing of you.’ She looks the horse up and down and clearly decides that proving the weight issue – the one that never
was
an issue – is of vital importance. She defiantly hoists up her skirt and climbs on.

I wince as it creaks loudly in protest, but decide not to point this out to her.

‘I know what you’re thinking: I look like that Khaleesi in
Game of Thrones
,’ she grins, rocking backwards and forwards.

‘The resemblance is uncanny, particularly with your steed’s glass eye and wooden legs.’

‘Oh, Dan, this brings back memories,’ she sighs, gooey-eyed, as she increases in force and speed until the horse is virtually galloping through the window. ‘I have no idea what
happened to mine.’

She appears entirely oblivious to the cracking sound vibrating through the floorboards, the sharp pops farting themselves from the arse end of the horse.

‘Erm, Gemma . . .’

‘I hope my mum didn’t throw it away – these things are worth a fortune.’

The horse now makes a sound I can only compare to a 300-foot redwood tree falling on a shed. Gemma’s eyes inflate.

‘Shit!’ she shrieks, but it’s too late to rein in and dismount. The horse sinks to one side, throwing her off as if she’s just insulted the braid in its mane.

I help her up as she scrambles to a standing position, hoists her skirt over her knickers and stands gaping at an angry break in one of the rocking horse’s legs. It’s hard to avoid
the conclusion that the horse has a glittering career as firewood ahead of it.

‘Oh my GOD,’ she hisses, hysteria wobbling in her voice. ‘Don’t suppose you’ve got any Blu Tack on you?’

Ten minutes later, Rich drives off in his snot-green Seat Ibiza with a ‘
Laters!
’ hanging in the air.

Gemma turns to me. ‘I’m going to have to phone and offer to pay for the horse,’ she says, rubbing her brow. It is true that our restoration job, which involved precariously
balancing the top half of the horse on the broken leg, then hurrying away – would not win either of us a job on
The Antiques Roadshow
.

‘Why didn’t you just confess to it there and then, like you said you were going to? I’d have said it was me if you were that worried.’

‘I know,’ she cringes. ‘Anyway, look: what did you think of the house?’

It took a few attempts before I worked out the right answer to this question.
Small. No character. Not my cup of tea
. But she doesn’t give me a chance to say anything.

‘Dan, it’s absolutely gorgeous. Did you see the cornices in the bedroom? And the distressed tiles in the kitchen? There’s even somewhere for my shoes – that little closet
in the main bedroom. Oh my God, I love
everything
about it. This one’s not just perfect on paper, it’s perfect in every conceivable way.’

She throws her arms around me as one word springs to my lips.
Hallebloodylujah
.

Gemma

I feel like shouting it from the hilltops: I AM IN LOVE!

I am completely and utterly smitten with a two-bedroom period home boasting Edwardian-style geometric tiled splashbacks, dogtooth oak flooring, restored cast-iron radiators and a
fully-functioning feature fireplace.

‘Where do I sign?’ Dan asks, as he threads his fingers through mine and we walk towards the beach. ‘I want to get this done before you change your mind.’

‘I’m not changing my mind. I want that house. I’d sell a kidney for it.’

Although I’m a southerner – I grew up just outside Brighton – I’ve lived in Liverpool long enough to get to know Heswall. It’s small but bursting with character,
and midway between my work in Cheshire, and Dan’s, a hop across the River Mersey in Liverpool.

As we stroll along Thurstaston beach, I mentally replay the tour of each room in the house, trying to stop myself from breaking into song like in the opening scene of
The Sound of
Music.

I picture my beautiful Turkish kilim in front of the fire, the contrasting throws we could drape over the sofa. I imagine the wall art we could hang, the roman blinds we’d install in the
kitchen, the vintage wallpaper we could choose for the hall.

‘So shall we phone and make an offer?’ Dan suggests.

‘I thought you’d never ask!’ I say. ‘Right, what figure should we try? The asking price is over our budget, but in today’s market, you can knock £15k off of
virtually anything. We could just about do that and still have a little left over to decorate.’

‘Would they accept that, when it’s so
blindingly
popular?’

‘We’ve got nowhere to sell ourselves, so there’s no chain,’ I remind him. ‘We’ve already got an in-principle mortgage offer and only have to give a
month’s notice on our flat. Let’s start with £15k less. They’d be mad not to snap it up.’

I phone the number on Rich’s business card. It rings four times before someone answers.

‘MI5 Central Intelligence. What’s your ID code, please?’ I frown. ‘HA! Don’t worry, it’s only Rich! Ha, ha!’

When he finally composes himself, I take a deep breath, make our offer – and sit back and listen while he sucks his teeth. ‘Dunno if the sellers’ll go for that, to be
honest.’

I straighten my back. ‘Okay, but I’d appreciate it if you could just put it to them.’

‘Will do. I don’t hold out much hope though.’

‘That’s up to them, surely.’

‘Yeah, but it is blindingly popular, with the schools and the bars and the—’

‘Would you just tell them that we’ve made an offer, please?’ I interrupt.

‘You wouldn’t want to increase it?’

‘That’s as far as our budget stretches,’ I say firmly.

‘Ok-ay-eee,’ he replies, as if we’d have more of a chance bartering in chocolate coins.

As I end the call, Dan puts his arm around me and I relax into him, breathing in the faint aroma of his aftershave (which I love) and the clean, salty scent of his skin (which I love even
more).

When we first got together, I worried about Dan’s looks and the baggage I feared came with them. Without a hint of exaggeration, he is jaw-droppingly gorgeous. A big man, he’s
physically commanding and athletic, with a tiny scar on his cheek that does nothing to detract from an incandescent smile that makes him appear younger than twenty-nine. His hair is thick, treacle
brown, and short. Always short. Anything over three weeks’ growth irritates the hell out of him.

If the truth be told, I worried a lot about Dan when we first got together. About what the catch could be. In my early twenties, I’d gravitated towards men you’d describe as
‘bad news’, having developed a perverse assumption that to be interesting, men had to be flawed, the loopier the better.

I’m about to steal a kiss when my phone rings again. I hold my breath.

‘Gem? It’s Rich. M’lady . . . I bring news!’

‘Okay.’ I can hear my heart over the seagulls. Dan raises his eyebrows expectantly.

‘And . . . it’s . . .’ there’s clearly a drum roll happening in Rich’s head ‘. . . not good.’

‘Oh. They said no?’

‘Like I said, it’s
blindingly
popular. And what with the schools and the—’

‘Did they say what they would accept?’

‘Doesn’t work like that, hon. If you want to make another offer, feel free. Though, between you and me, you’ll have to do a
lot
better. So. Go and have a chat with
Hubbie . . .’

‘We’re not married.’

‘. . . and once you’ve crunched your numbers, reviewed your situation, re-evaluated and revised, come back to Rich and we’ll see what we can do.’

I end the call and Dan squeezes my hand for moral support as I fill him in despondently. ‘We could go another £2k higher, couldn’t we?’ he says. ‘At a
push.’

‘That’d leave us with no money to spend on decorating it how we want.’

‘Yeah, but it’s already lovely as it is. Obviously, I’d be devastated not to dust off my Black and Decker, but I’d cope,’ he smiles.

A thought tugs at my brain. ‘Dan, I think we need to go higher. I’m going to add my savings. It’s not much but the more we can edge it up, the better.’

‘I’ve got a little too – and there’s some Premium Bonds I could sell that Grandma bought me years ago.’

Over the next hour, we perform such a thorough scrape-around for cash, I’ve virtually organised a car-boot sale to flog my knickers.

Rich is not exactly bowled over. ‘You can’t do any better? I’m saying this because I
like
you guys and I think this house is made for you. But that’s not going to
cut the mustard. At best it’ll curdle the mustard. And this is blindingly popular mustard.’

He returns my call three and a half minutes later to say the answer is no.

‘I can sell my car, and downgrade it to something cheaper,’ I tell Dan, stifling the urge to weep.

‘You could downgrade to the bus like me.’

‘We need one car in the household, it wouldn’t be practical otherwise,’ I insist, attempting to conceal my alarm.

I phone Rich back to add five grand to our offer and wait for his return call as I drive us back to Liverpool, savouring the beautiful interior of my automobile while I can. The clock ticks
painfully towards 5 p.m.

‘I can’t bear this. He said he’d come back to me today and it’s now six minutes to five. They close then.’