The Summer of Second Chances: The laugh-out-loud romantic comedy. Maddie Please

much would it be?’

      Greg opened his mouth to speak but Jess interrupted him.

      ‘Nothing. All you need to do is give it a clean up, do the clever stuff you do with curtains and wallpaper and have a good flick around with a paintbrush. You’re ever so good with the interior décor sort of thing. Much better than me, that’s for sure. I know I need to spend a bit of money on the place. You’d be doing me a huge favour.’

      ‘Oh, Jess!’

      ‘No really, you would, wouldn’t she, Greg?’

      Greg made some non-committal noises and looked back at his phone. I could tell he wasn’t very happy about this.

      ‘That’s settled then,’ she said, pleased.

      ‘It’s not settled at all,’ I said. ‘I can’t just use your house for nothing. I can’t accept, it’s too much.’

      ‘It’s not too much. You really would be helping me out. We’ve been friends for ages, and you were so lovely to us when we moved here. I know you can do this sort of thing in your sleep. Picking out colours and stuff. You could do it for a living, you know.’

      ‘I don’t know about that,’ I said, trying to look modest.

      I’d spent such a long time doing Ian’s house, picking fabrics, sourcing furniture, choosing colours, and I’d loved every minute.

      ‘Yes, you could, like that programme on TV where people have to upgrade rooms and paint crappy old furniture to make it look nice again. You could do that. We both said you should apply, remember?’

      ‘Yes, I know—’

      ‘Then stop arguing with me. Look, it can’t be rented out as it is.’ For the first time she looked serious. ‘Greg’s brother lives down there. We don’t have an awful lot of contact with him but he does have a key in case of emergencies and he sent me an email last week. About the Websters. They did a moonlight flit and left the cottage in a bit of a state. I was going to pay someone to get it cleaned up and put some of Greg’s men in there to decorate it but if you do it, it’s a win-win situation, isn’t it? This is just so “meant to be”.’

      Jess gave me an artless smile, one that I bet never failed to succeed. I gave her a hug.

      ‘Well – thank you, Jess.’

      I felt quite tearful and we stood and looked at each other for a moment, both of us a bit emotional.

      Greg glanced up from his iPhone. He looked less jovial than usual.

      ‘I’ll tell Bryn to expect you any time this week, shall I?’ Jess continued. ‘And if he’s not in I’ll leave a message on his answerphone. He always picks those up.’

      I began to panic. I was being either helped or pushed, I wasn’t sure which.

      ‘Who’s Bryn?’

      ‘My little brother, God help me,’ Greg muttered. ‘I’ve got to go and check my emails.’

      ‘Don’t be like that, Gregsy,’ Jess said, twirling her blonde hair between slender fingers. She watched as Greg went off to his office and turned back to me. ‘They fell out a few years ago but Bryn’s really nice once you get to know him. Just big, tall and a bit scary. Like a bear. But I know he’s not half as bad as he seems.’

      This was far from reassuring.

      ‘Maybe this isn’t such a good idea after all…’ I said.

      Jess patted my hand. ‘Course it is. Think about it. It’s an adventure. A change of scenery. A bit of excitement. Just what you need.’

      ‘Don’t tell anyone where I am,’ I blurted out. ‘I don’t want anyone to know.’

      My head was aching. So was my heart. I had loved the house I had shared with Ian so much. I had been proud, but we all know pride comes before a fall. And what a fall.

      I had decorated and planned every room in the years I had lived there. I had chosen things. The colour of the walls, the flooring, the towels, the lighting. Everything was perfect. Or it had been. It wasn’t now, was it? And it wasn’t mine either.

      I stood outside Holly Cottage, lost in thought. Just about everything I had taken for granted had gone wrong. Now I had to take this chance and focus on the future because I certainly couldn’t change the past.

      I got out, locking the car behind me although, to be honest, it didn’t feel as though there was a living soul for miles. I wandered around to the back of the house, my heels catching between the broken paving slabs. I wondered if the ‘huge and bear-like’ Bryn was around to watch the homeless idiot arriving. Might he be lurking in the shadows under the trees down the lane? For some reason I pictured him standing, shoulders hunched like Lurch from The Addams Family, knuckles dragging on the ground. Fortunately there was no sign of him. But he had left the back door key under an upturned bucket in the porch as Jess had assured me he would. The key stuck for a heart-stopping few moments and then turned in the lock with an unwilling squeak. I let myself in to the hall.

      The stale scent of wet dog, mingled with something even more unpleasant, hit me. The smell of damp carpet, neglect and, unmistakably, fish.

      I left the door open and made my way into the sitting room, one hand over my nose. The room was flagstoned with a large rug over the top, which was soaking. Someone had flung a plastic bucket plus water into the middle and my shoes squelched as I took a hesitant step into the room. They had also enhanced the décor by chucking around a few shovelfuls of ash from the fire. The walls were pale and marked with squares of grime where pictures had been removed. Underneath one windowsill the paper had been pulled off altogether and someone had drawn stars in pink and purple felt tip pen on the wall.

      The smell was stronger here, pungent and eye watering. Trying not to gag, I pushed back the curtains and opened both the sash windows. The crispness of the evening air was welcome. I hurried back outside for a moment to refresh my lungs and then went upstairs to explore further, finding a small bathroom and two bedrooms.

      There was evidence in the expensive wallpaper and the sisal carpet that this place had once been very pretty, but now it was neglected and extremely dirty. There were stains on the floor and muddy fingerprints around the china light switches, and someone had been free with wax crayons on the walls of the landing.

      In the corner of the bathroom was a huge web, the spider still busy in the middle with a struggling bluebottle. I shuddered. On the mirror, in coral lipstick, was scrawled Bitch. It neatly crossed over the reflection of my cold, pale, frightened face.

      Jess had wanted me to clean and decorate, that was the deal, but it was obvious this place wasn’t just in need of a flick round with the antiseptic wipes and a lick of paint; it needed pressure washing. The stink from downstairs was curling up the stairs so I opened all the windows and re-buttoned my coat.

      In the larger of the two bedrooms was a mahogany wardrobe that had once been highly polished and beautiful, but was now scratched, covered with globs of Blu-Tack and propped up with a brick at one corner where one of the feet had been lost. There was a sink in the corner filled with scummy water and dead flies.

      ‘Bloody hell!’ I said.

      My words echoed around the room.

      ‘What on earth’s been going on here?’ asked a voice from behind me.

      I spun round, squeaking with shock. There was a silhouette of a man in the doorway, his shoulders almost filling the space. I yelped again.

      ‘Well, if you don’t want people to walk in you shouldn’t leave all the doors open,’ he said, unapologetic.

      ‘And you shouldn’t just wander in to someone else’s house uninvited,’ I said, my voice shrill with fright. I flapped my hands at him to shoo him back down the stairs.

      He turned and went, his movements unhurried and careful in the confined space of the