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Dance like nobody’s watching
The boxes are going to break me – I can see that, now.
Up until this point, everything was about filling them, closing the house sale and making sure the movers got every single item, every single box, from our old house installed in their truck.
But at this moment, exhausted from being up since half five rushing round tidying and stuffing everything left into boxes, I have a sudden, horrible realisation:I will now have to unpack it all.
It’s a Fridaymid-afternoon in May: Dan and I and fourhouse-movers, who had been looking singularly underwhelmed with the uncool and inexpensive contents of our old house, are staring at our new one.
They’ve stopped arguing about sports, so I think they might be mildly impressed.
Number Nine, Rowan Gardens was a tall, narrow house withon-street parking and the garden, such as it was, consisted of two olive trees in pots outside the front door.
Kellinch House – Iknow, a name and not a number! – is set in its own eighth of an acre, boasts several trees and is in a whole different league for myself and Dan.
Our new home, I think, looking up at it from the drive which is half gravel/half weeds.
It’s a slightlyrun-down Edwardianred-brick that needs more than a lick of paint to dolly it up.
In fact, it probably needs alive-in handyman who works for free to fix all the wonky doors,fallen-off skirting boards and the gap between the bottom of the kitchen door and the garden which must be heaven if you’re a mouse.
But – this is the important bit – it’s a structurally sound, detached house with it’s very own gate and, really importantly,high walls.
We will be safe in this new house with the big wall.
Safe.
Dan puts his arm around me and I lean in to him, determined not to let unpacking anxiety – I’m sure it’s a disease – get the better of me.
‘Freya, you’re right. Buying this is a sound economic decision,’ he says in his ‘are we mad?’ voice, and I laugh because Dan always makes me laugh, even when I know he’s saying this to convince both of us that we haven’t put ourselves into unmanageable debt for a detached house with issues.
‘I don’t know why they say economists aren’t sexy,’ I tease, to change the subject, ‘because they so are.’
Dan slides one large hand up under mynow-dirtyT-shirt and encounters bare skin. ‘We need to christen this house,’ he murmurs.
‘Can we wait till the movers are gone?’ I deadpan back. ‘Or do you want an audience, because the gravel will be uncomfortable and phone footage of the whole thing could ruin my career ...’
He laughs out loud and we stand there, entwined, enjoying the warmth of the slanting afternoon sun, with the scent of flowers driving the bumblebees mad.
‘Dan, are we starting to unload or are you going to stand there all day?’ demands one of said movers, Big Brian, to distinguish him from Young Brian, who is blithely hauling boxes of china out of the van as if he was about to fill a skip.
Big Brian defers all questions to Dan because he is The Man and knows all things.
I packed the boxes and allegedlyIknow all thingsbox-wise but Brian and his crew will be gone soon enough, so I ignore this rampant misogyny.
Dan looks at me, understanding instantly that I get irritated by men who assume women are idiots, but I wave him off.
‘It’s falling apart: you know that, right?’ says Martin (Gaelic football all the way and driver of the second truck).
‘Martin, how else would we be able to buy it?’ says Dan reasonably, and he strides towards the truck. ‘We haven’t won the lottery yet.’
As the movers and Dan all laugh, I watch him walk towards them.
Dan is dark and sexy, with olive skin that tans, ruffled dark hair that looks as if he never brushes it, even when he has,conker-brown eyes and enough charisma for at least four normal people. I swear, women’s eyes follow him on the street, watching those long legs and broad shoulders.
We’ve been married blissfully for ten years, together for thirteen, and adore each other but somewhere deep inside (a residue of my horribly uncomfortable teenage years and something that would make a Jungian analyst suggest years of therapy) I feel that physically, I do not measure up to his hotness.
