Page 38 of Her Fixer Upper

‘Freya,’ hissed Charlie. ‘Do you mind?’

‘I’m sorry, I didn’t realise I was getting in the way,’ I said, although I guiltily acknowledged to myself that was exactly what I had knowingly been doing. ‘Don’t mind me, I’ll work around you.’

‘Would you mind giving us some privacy?’ asked Charlie, finally going for the direct approach.

He couldn’t have made it clearer that I was an unwanted third wheel. Suddenly everything turned even more awkward and I felt childish about the silly game I’d been playing.

‘Sorry, I’ll leave you to it,’ I apologised hastily, and practically ran out of the room, my face flaming with embarrassment. I was confused by my own actions. Why had I made such a fuss about Charlie entertaining a female guest when he had every right to do what he wanted? I knew the way I had acted would have made me look strange or, worse, jealous. I wasn’t that, was I? Had I got so used to how we’d evolved from Hutch and Humph, the Terrible Twosome, to Freya and Charlie, partners in house ownership, that I was scared of what might happen when he moved on from it?

I didn’t want to examine that thought more closely. I put on my headphones and turned the volume up high so I couldn’t hear anything of what was going on in the dining room, although Charlie and Serena wouldn’t be able to escape the soundtrack from the DIY that I then went on to carry out. But what did they expect if they chose to cosy up together at what was essentially a building site? I spent the rest of the afternoon dismantling the plywood units in the kitchen, prising apart the frames and working out my frustration with myself by stamping on the longer sheets of wood until they snapped.

When finally my stomach told me it was dinnertime, I decided it was also time to be a better person and apologise to Charlie for my earlier odd behaviour, ashamed of myself for acting up like that. I hesitated on the threshold of the dining room, practising what I would say. I knocked loudly and waited, giving them plenty of time. When there was no answer, I knocked again, then eventually I pushed the door open and went in. There was something different about the room, something I couldn’t quite put my finger on, and that wasn’t only because there was no sign of either of them in it. I hurried over to the window and saw that Charlie’s Land Rover and Serena’s swish vehicle had both gone. I felt hurt all over again. Normally when Charlie went out, he told me he was leaving, not because he had to, but because he wanted to. Things were clearly changing, and I didn’t like it.

I didn’t know what time he got back after Serena’s visit, whether it was later that night or perhaps not even until the next morning, because I’d once again put my headphones on and kept on listening to music in bed until I finally drifted off to a sleep full of weird stressy dreams. But I did know that, after that visit, things were different between us.

I found myself overthinking every comment, worried about inadvertently exposing something that I wasn’t even sure of myself. I knew it was making me act stiff and standoffish, but I couldn’t work out how to stop myself. I missed the relaxed bantering fun we used to have, the way we would tease each other and laugh together. Now, on the rare occasion when I attempted to banter with Charlie, it came out wrong, like I was sniping at him, which he reacted to by becoming careful around me, almost distant. It was like living with a stranger. Even though the house was becoming slowly more habitable, I was feeling more uncomfortable than when we first moved in. I wanted things to go back to how they had been.

It got so bad that I volunteered to help Leila out at the school’s holiday club, just to get out of the house again for a few hours. It proved to be a welcome escape. We spent a lot of time hanging around by the bike sheds, ostensibly to catch any holiday club participants who were planning to slope off there and get up to no good, but really because it was the place with the best chance of privacy in the grounds.

‘How’s life in the funhouse?’ Leila asked, opening a packet of crisps and settling in for a good gossip. She always felt she couldn’t eat junk food in front of the pupils because she had to maintain the illusion of the fit and healthy PE teacher whose body was a temple. I leaned over and helped myself to a couple while I thought about my answer.

‘It’s fine,’ I said, although I knew there wasn’t much conviction behind my words. Leila raised an eyebrow. ‘Okay, so maybe it’s not exactly fine. It’s…different. I can’t really explain it. Instead of getting on with things and being relaxed around each other, we’re just being super polite.’

‘Polite. Sounds ideal. Better than killing each other, which you’ll recall is one of two big dangers I warned you about before you embarked on this house-buying malarkey. And remind me why this isn’t a good thing?’ asked Leila in a tone of voice that suggested she had a whole lot of ideas about what the answer really was.

‘Because it feels so strange. So unnatural. Charlie and I have never been polite to each other because we’re old friends. Old friends who don’t need to worry about skirting around the important stuff, who can laugh and joke and say whatever comes into our heads without worrying about what the other one thinks, because we know that they’re probably of the same mind. I’m not saying that we’re rude to each other, don’t get me wrong. But we are at ease, relaxed in each other’s company. Or at least, we were. Now I’m worried that whatever I say will come out wrong and Charlie is acting like I’m a client he needs to be scrupulously formal with. It’s weird. And I still don’t really understand why things have changed.’

That last bit was a lie. Because I had a fairly good idea that I was the reason why things were so different between us.

‘But surely polite formality is better than yelling at each other and falling out all the time?’ said Leila.

I scratched my heel in the dirt, sketching out a serious of wobbly lines while I thought about my answer.

‘Obviously shouting at each other would be horrible. But this coldness in our communication, it’s not like us. It’s as if we’re strangers. Only it’s worse than that because I know how things were before. I might as well be back in a house share, the way things are now.’

Leila chomped another handful of crisps before she replied. When she did, I wished she’d carried on eating. ‘But when you boil things down, isn’t a house share exactly what your arrangement is? Yes, you have some history as friends, and living together while doing the renovation work is obviously creating a more intense environment, but ultimately you clubbed together to buy a house for purely practical, financial reasons. It was essentially a cold-hearted business decision. However you act towards each other while you’re doing it up, it’s not going to change the outcome; that you’re going to sell up, hopefully make a nice tidy profit apiece, and then go your separate ways, to live your own lives, and probably gradually fall back into the state of your friendship before you bumped into each other in the pub. Which was that you were pretty much just acquaintances. Unless…’ Leila tailed off and fixed me with her stern teacher look. ‘Unless there’s something else going through your mind that you’ve not confessed to me?’

‘What do you mean? There’s nothing else going through my mind, absolutely nothing at all,’ I said, knowing that I was protesting too much at what she was obviously implying, but not able to stop myself. ‘I’m merely frustrated by the situation, and wondering how to resolve it. But you’re absolutely right. The state of our relationship doesn’t really matter one way or the other. What does matter is that we finish the renovation and get to move on with our lives.’

‘Yes indeed,’ said Leila, ‘and say it once more, but this time with conviction behind the words. I find it interesting that you said “relationship” rather than “friendship”, by the way. Freud would have a field day.’

I shot her a warning look.

‘Okay, okay, so you’re not ready to talk about it yet,’ she said, holding her hands up in mock surrender. ‘But when you do feel like sharing with your Aunty Leila, remember I’m here for you, day or night.’

ChapterNineteen

Determined to prove to Leila that I wasn’t turning into someone who spent all her time doing building work and overanalysing the state of play with my housemate, I took up her invitation to go out for a few drinks after our shift at the holiday club ended. I knew it was a mistake as soon as we walked into The Taps and she turned to me with a faux misty-eyed expression and asked whether they should install a plaque to commemorate it as the location where Charlie and I were reunited. I realised that protesting any further was just going to encourage the teasing so I changed tactics to ignoring it completely, which in reality meant she indulged even more.

Thankfully Nim turned up shortly afterwards and succeeded in distracting her from tormenting me, while I enjoyed the novelty of being in a civilised environment where I could walk around on a carpeted surface and not have to breathe in clouds of dust. Doing the house renovation was like living in a bubble, everything within it amplified to huge importance, making me forget that there was a real world out here where most people’s lives carried on as usual. Maybe Charlie had the right idea, getting out and about a couple of times a week. Maybe I should do the same. That way I might be able to keep everything in perspective, both the state of the house and the state of my dealings with the person I shared it with. I pushed that thought away, still unwilling to examine my emotions towards Charlie more closely. Instead, I threw myself into socialising, enjoying the novelty of being out. And although I only nursed one drink for the whole of the evening, when last orders were called I found myself reluctant to return to the awkwardness – both atmospheric and physical – of Oak Tree Cottage.

‘Are you sure you don’t want to come and camp out on my sofa for a bit, have a break from life on a building site?’ said Leila, as she and Nim waited with me at the stop for my bus back to the village.

‘Thanks, but I don’t want to get in your way. I’ve made my camping bed, and so I will lie in it, however uncomfortable it is.’

‘You know you don’t have to put yourself through all this overthinking and second-guessing what’s happening,’ said Leila. ‘I know I was teasing you earlier, but I’m going to be serious now. I think you should talk to Charlie about what’s going through your head.’ She held up her hand to stop the interruption I was going to make. ‘Yes, I know you’re not sure yourself how you feel and what’s going on here. But he’s not stupid. If you think things have changed between you, he’ll have recognised that too and would probably welcome the opportunity to get stuff out in the open. It’s better to talk about it than live in uncertainty. Just my opinion, of course.’

The arrival of the bus spared me from answering her. But when she gave me a hug goodbye, she whispered ‘Good luck’ in my ear.

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