I was touched that Alex and Ginnie, my flatmates at the time, didn’t ask me to move out when I lost my job. With no savings to speak of, and the pair not convinced my collection of Happy Meal toys from 1994 was worth thousands, there were no guarantees I’d make next month’s rent. Instead, we hatched a plan to bring down everyone’s rent by letting the living room.
“Living rooms are so 2006,” Ginnie said. “These days, everyone is doing versatile, multipurpose spaces. I’m sure I read that in Vogue. Or maybe I saw it on Panorama.”
I offered to take the living room, and agreed the housemates should still get some use of the only room large enough for a TV and sofas. But the communal utopia – where no one ate alone, cried alone, or swiped right alone – didn’t last long.
There were Ginnie’s friends who always stayed too late; or Alex’s football-watching pals whose beer-spilling made the floor sticky. And then there was Alex’s early morning Saturday Kitchen habit. It was clear the situation had to give.
If only we’d known about this three-bed cottage, with jaw-dropping views of the Yorkshire fells, the sort that render television useless. You could easily lose your guests in the three reception rooms, or the vitamin D-filled oasis of the sunroom. The force is strong with this one, a place so blissful not even the complete Sky bundle could disturb it.
