From: Hearth&HometheEstateAgentswithHeart@firstonline.co.uk
To: ThereseWebster@alwaysonline.com
Subject: Rockwood HouseDear Therese
I do hope I might call you Therese without appearing too personal. I wanted to stop by this morning with this email to say thank you so much for viewing Rockwood House with me yesterday. It was a great pleasure to meet you and show you that wonderful home. You were to discuss it with your husband, and I wondered if you had, and whether you and he might care to have a second viewing? (First in your husband’s case of course.) I shall be available at your convenience.
Warmest regards
Dominic Fitzgibbon
Hearth & Home – Estate Agents of Choice
From: ThereseWebster@alwaysonline.com
To: Hearth&HometheEstateAgentswithHeart@firstonline.co.uk
Subject: Rockwood HouseDear Dominic
I prefer, Dominic, that you call me Mrs. Webster.
I did discuss the house with my husband, but I’m afraid it is not one I wish to view again, although I did find certain of its features, shall we say ‘fascinating.’ However, given what I told my husband, he does not feel a first viewing on his part, would be useful. Thank you for your time yesterday.
Regards
Therese Webster
From: Hearth&HometheEstateAgentswithHeart@firstonline.co.uk
To: ThereseWebster@alwaysonline.com
Subject: Rockwood HouseDear Mrs. Webster
Thank you for your email. I do value candour and with that in mind, I wonder if you might indulge me. If you could spare me a few minutes of your valuable time, I would be most grateful and very interested to know what it was you found fascinating about the house?
Warmest regards
Dominic Fitzgibbon
Hearth & Home – Estate Agents of Choice
From: ThereseWebster@alwaysonline.com
To: Hearth&HometheEstateAgentswithHeart@firstonline.co.uk
Subject: Rockwood HouseDear Dominic
Certainly, I would be more than delighted to tell you what I found fascinating about the house. The first thing was the breakfast room – I never actually found it. Perhaps it had been temporarily misplaced?
Second, the kitchen, which I concede was of a very good size, seemed not to have plumbing. I don’t even recall seeing taps, let alone a sink. Permit me to say this is unusual because in my long experience, most kitchens do have even a rudimentary system for bringing in and letting out water etc.
Third, Rockwood House, as your ‘blurb’ correctly indicated, was indeed the manor house in the village – and built in the early part of the 17th century. (I looked it up.) What was not made clear however, was that only half of the house is for sale and, as it turned out, the smaller ‘half.’ A ‘mathematical misnomer’ my husband called it. Finally, the misnomer, was said to have 5 bedrooms and here I wish to be entirely frank Dominic. My wardrobe here at home is at least twice the size of that 5th bedroom.
Regards
Therese Webster
From: Hearth&HometheEstateAgentswithHeart@firstonline.co.uk
To: ThereseWebster@alwaysonline.com
Subject: Rockwood HouseDear Mrs. Webster
Thank you for your email, your candour and your continued interest. If I may I would like to address some of the points you raised. The breakfast room: it is just off the passageway which goes from the kitchen to the sitting and dining rooms. You did peek inside and possibly because the vendors are storing boxes in there, it may have appeared a tad small. But it is most definitely a breakfast room, the vendors always used it as such. With someone of your excellent taste, I feel sure it would look marvellous with a coat of fresh paint.
The kitchen, as you noticed, does not have an entire plumbing system. It was removed in order that new purchasers would have a clean slate to create a modern kitchen.
The smaller of the 5 bedrooms does house a single bed – more than adequate perhaps for an overnight guest. Might I encourage you to visit again with this new perspective in mind?
Warmest regards
Dominic Fitzgibbon
Hearth & Home – Estate Agents of Choice
From: ThereseWebster@alwaysonline.com
To: Hearth&HometheEstateAgentswithHeart@firstonline.co.uk
Subject: Rockwood HouseDear Dominic
I must confess I have found in my lifetime that looking at things from an alternate perspective is often useful. You certainly seem to have that knack. Now that you’ve reminded me, I had noticed that cupboard off the passageway – the one with 3 small boxes in it. I have tried therefore, in my mind’s eye, to imagine it as a breakfast room, and with a fresh coat of paint. And I could, (just), imagine a small dining table in there. There wouldn’t be room for chairs but then one can’t have everything. I also tried to imagine my four sons, all over 6’ tall, trying to eat breakfast in there, along with my husband and myself of course. The word sardine came to mind, perhaps those like the ones we eat on toast for breakfast from time to time. Normally, we are a family which prefers sitting at mealtimes, it’s easier, we’ve always found, to more easily access the plates on the table. And, we wouldn’t usually consider dining chairs as an ‘optional extra.’
Then, dear boy, there is the question of the 5th bedroom versus my wardrobe. Naturally there is no obvious comparison, but here is my thinking on that subject. The ceilings in Rockwood House are high – quite wonderfully high actually, (apart from the ceiling in the master bedroom which barely existed at all). That aside, I have tried to imagine a bed in that 5th bedroom. I couldn’t quite see an entire bed, but I could just envisage a mattress. Not the frame, or the drawers underneath the mattress, but of course it’s the mattress, which is the essential component of a bed, not the accessories as it were.
Lo, and behold, in my mind’s eye, there was a single mattress, but one only standing against a wall, not lying horizontally as mattresses normally are laid. There would be a considerable distance between the top of a mattress standing thus and the unusually high ceilings. I’m unsure as to what one might do with that space, but I’m convinced one couldn’t hoist a dresser up there. That leaves me to wonder where I might conceivably place a dresser, or even a tiny bedside table, let alone an entire wardrobe.
I shall need to think all of that over, but here’s an idea: perhaps, when my sons visit, three of them, together with their wives, would occupy three bedrooms, myself and my husband the master suite, which would leave the 5th bedroom free. Now, my youngest son (away at university), does come home from time to time, and when he does, he could occupy that room. There, he might, I suppose, stand upright to sleep against that mattress? He might think it novel. You know what young people these days are.
I imagine dear boy, that you will have understood that Rockwood House is not, nor ever will be, a house we would purchase, nor ever consider purchasing. Not, Dominic, in your wildest dreams.
Regards
Therese Webster
Norma is a UK‑based writer whose fiction and essays focus on the quiet dramas and comic misalignments of ordinary lives. Her work has appeared in several journals, and she is currently finishing a book about her father/not‑her‑father, exploring memory, identity, and the reckonings which follow.
Featured photo by Pavel Danilyuk (Pexels)
