Brick by Brick

Part Thirty One

Chapter Thirty One

"Moving Day!" Sammy shouted as she opened the curtains the following morning. She'd been desperate for this day and now it was here. She had two weeks to settle in before Christmas. It was exhausting if you thought about it, but a great kind of exhausting for Sammy. Corinne was due any minute to take Eleanor to her new day care, then the van she'd hired for the day was arriving after that. The bulk of her things were coming from London by lunchtime, so she had a few hours to work out what she wanted and where first. Whilst she'd seen the inside of the cottage a few times, void of any furniture and a blank canvas for her own home was a different concept entirely.

She hadn't seen her mother since their confrontation, and she was going to see her good on her promise. With distance she could keep a relationship with her, if she stayed a week longer she feared any bond would be damaged irreparably. It was a pity that Monica couldn't see that.

An hour later she stood in the centre of the bare room and smiled. Though equally she could cry. The common entrance to the house was via the kitchen door which opened from the side garden. The front door was further along the road and she didn't envisage using it. The farmhouse kitchen was small and bijou, but it had a huge oil powered Aga that the previous owner told her warmed the whole house. There was a small lean-to conservatory along the coast side of the kitchen, the lounge was the road side, then stairs led up to the two bedrooms, a third was the space created between the beams and the eaves of the attic.

It was perfect, quirky, quaint...everything she'd always dreamed of in a house, and a million miles from the modern apartment she'd lived in with Marcus. And that was the source of her tears, not the house, but the fact that she was doing this alone, that she'd not share this moment, not create this new home with anyone made her sad. She'd been alone for almost two years, and after the recent debacle with Joel she wondered whether she'd ever be able to get past that, the ghost of Marcus and her own fears.

The only things she had to set up from her mother's house encompassed kitchen ware and Eleanor's bedroom. She'd checked the room out first and whilst the decor wasn't perfect, it didn't need to be decorated. Sammy figured she'd take time over the interior, painting or wallpapering when she was ready. Christmas was the first thing she wanted to be ready for.

It was eleven am by the time she'd emptied the half dozen boxes of crockery and pans into the cupboards, so she took the opportunity to make a pot of coffee, she deserved it. As she filled the machine she heard a honk outside. She wasn't expecting the delivery truck until much later, but as she glanced out of the kitchen window she spotted the removal sign on the side of a huge truck that pulled up outside. As she opened the back door, the passenger door also swung open and Joel hopped out with a wave.

She almost fell over. He hadn't answered a call; he'd only shared a few neutral text conversations in the last two weeks.

"I wasn't expecting you..." she offered as he strode towards her.

With a grin he pulled her into a hug then whispered, "I've been a tool, will you forgive me?"

She nodded, she was glad to see him, she couldn't deny that, and it felt so perfect to be in his arms. That was obvious. As he rubbed his hand up and down her spine, she thought of Corinne's words, that she should pursue something with Joel, but she still wasn't sure she was ready for that. But his arms did feel great around her.

But before she had time to enjoy that, he stepped back, "now we have a truck FULL of furniture. You need to direct the guys, ok?"

Nodding she watched as he backed up and returned to the men who were unloading the truck. Sammy realised that it wasn't just what she wanted that counted, but what he wanted too. She had to work that out as well.