Fact or Fiction? - 9

I have no idea where the stories come from. The images in my head arrive there unbidden.

Sometimes I can sit, gazing off into space, trying to make something appear and it will not. It absolutely refuses to help me out and I get stuck. I suppose it’s what’s known as ‘Writer’s Block’. Fortunately, I don’t suffer with it too much.

Where the stories come from is a complete unknown to me. For example, Ash’s Story Ash and the Favour-man arrived on cue every morning (thankfully).

That story was a mixture of my real experiences as a child and fiction, utterly made-up. I’m not going to tell you which parts were true. I’ll leave that for you to decide.

My stories in this ‘series’ Fact or Fiction? are the same and yesterday’s story Here was entirely made-up… or rather, the story was made-up, the locations were real.

Sorry… I know I’m a bit of a ‘Liar, liar, pants on fire,’ but that’s what being a writer of fiction is all about… telling lies for other people’s entertainment (and my own, of course).

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Here's todays's tale. What do you think, fact or fiction?

When I was 20 years old, Trev and I decided we were going to buy a house. We looked all over the place, within a 10-mile radius of our parents’ homes.

We saw two houses we quite liked the look of and made appointments to see them both within a few days of each other.

One in South Normanton, the village where Trev lived, and one close to Pinxton, the next village along.

The house in South Normanton was a detached house on the main road. 3 bedrooms, garden front and back, within our price-range, no obvious work needed, and it seemed to be exactly what we were looking for.

The other property was a bungalow, next to a wooded area, EXTREMELY run-down, in need of repair and would be a massive task. It too was well-within our price-range, 3 bedrooms etc.

The day we went to view the house, the day was bright and sunny. The house looked inviting and welcoming and we met with the estate agent who let us in.

Bungalow

Sunlight streamed through the front door and the set-up was similar to houses I’d lived in, or friends and relatives had lived in- it was familiar if that makes sense.

I walked into the front hallway and froze. The estate agent looked at me as though there was something wrong with me (there was, I was terrified).

“I can’t…” I said. “I just can’t go in there. I don’t like it.”

I went back to the car and Trev wandered around, looking at everything he needed to see, knowing that there was no way we’d be buying that house to live in.

“I think it’s a ‘no’ on that one,” I said.

To give him his due, Trev never criticised me for being so melodramatic. He took it that I didn’t like the house and we moved on to the next…

A few days later, we went to see the next property, the run-down bungalow.

The sun was going down as we arrived and a neighbour let us into the property. She came with us because there were so many places that we just couldn’t go.

The floors were mostly rotted away, there was no electricity, the old man that had owned it had actually died in his bedroom and the woods next to the property threw dark shadows.

The kitchen was the only place we could see in safety because it was a solid floor. The sink was an old-fashioned ‘Belfast sink’ – an original one, not a reproduction.

The house had not been decorated since 1937 when the man moved in. Wallpaper hung from the walls in strips and you could see up into the roof-space in places because the ceilings had collapsed.

And I could have moved right in.

The house seemed so friendly and inviting to me. There was no uneasy feeling, not even in the rooms where you could take two steps into because the rest of the floor had fallen in or was about to.

I had a distinct feeling that we could have a happy family if we moved in there, but the renovations were just too much. We wanted a place to move right into and this needed so much work.

I was deeply disappointed but had to face facts (eventually).

30 or so years later, we’re still in the house we eventually bought (neither of those two properties) and we still pass the other two properties on occasion.

The bungalow did make someone a lovely family home. The repairs were done, a chalet-style bedroom was fitted in the roof-space and I pass it occasionally. I always look to see how it’s going.

The house we saw in the bright sunlight is no longer there. Around 20 years ago, it was demolished and another house built on the land.

House

I don’t know why it was demolished… maybe the owners got the same feelings I did?

Pictures from Google maps and Google free to use search