Chapter Text
“Somebody moved into the Berrybog Cottage!”
In Edenderry, this sort of thing was the news of the month. Last time the village was so excited was when Connolly's youngest daughter came home from college with a baby bump.
Perhaps, if it was any other house, people wouldn’t be so excited, but the Berrybog Cottage was quite infamous. Its last inhabitant was a grouchy man called Mr. Stanton, who moved away in 1995, soon after his wife died. Although he left the house, he refused to sell it for over a dozen years, leaving it for his inheritors in absolute disrepair. What was once a picturesque cottage, a perfect fit for the Irish hills it was built on, became not much more than a safety hazard.
After Staton’s death, his grandchildren tried to sell the house, but not many people were interested in a falling apart building in the middle of nowhere. And so the house stood empty for years, only occasionally visited by one of the young Statons, when a sudden influx of unfounded optimism or a new debt led them to take more photos and post them on real estate websites.
Until yesterday.
Bernadette barely opened the door to Sinead’s store, before shouting these news to the older woman, “Someone moved in, for real! Fionn mentioned seeing lights there in the evening, so this morning I decided to drive next to it. To make sure it wasn’t vandals or robbers, of course.”
Knowing Bernadette’s love for rumors, Sinead highly doubted that statement, but she just raised one eyebrow at her.
“Of course.”
“At first I thought it might be, you know? There was a car in front and it was, like, real beat up, but it sounded like somebody was drilling inside, so either there’s an actual person living there now, or somebody broke in and was so outraged that they decided to fix it.”
Bernadette laughed at her own joke. Sinead didn’t find it that funny, but she was polite enough to give her a light chuckle. “Unless they are using a sledgehammer, I doubt they could make it any worse.”
“Exactly! Anyway, who do you think was stupd enough to buy that place?”
***
Nils let out a long string of curse words, trying to pick this goddamn piece of cobweb out of his goddamn hair. He started to suspect he might have made a horrible mistake.
Was he lured in by the eerie vibe of an old, overgrown cottage?
Yes.
Was he aware that outside of the aesthetic, it would be a huge pain in the ass?
Absolutely.
Did he expect a colony of spiders to fall out of a cabinet as soon as he opened it?
Hell no.
Looking at the condition of the house, perhaps he shouldn’t have been surprised. Determined to not make the same mistake again, Nils would only barely open any containers, and then immediately jump back. So far, the only thing it got him was a bruised elbow, but he was not about to stop. Fool him once and so on.
After all, there was nobody here to witness this humiliating display. Which was good, when it came to not having to choose between being embarrassed and spiders , but also bad, when it came to actually dealing with this whole mess. It’s going to take him forever just to clean the main building! And then there’s other parts of the estate! And the garden! Not to mention the lack of usable furniture, which seemed like a fun little challenge - he always wanted to try building some - but it’s going to take him days or weeks to even get to that part!
Nils groaned loudly and leaned his head on the mirror. Then he remembered how dirty it was, abruptly pulled himself back, bumped into a shelf, hit his elbow again and toppled over a bunch of cleaning supplies.
He looked at the mess scattered around the floor and on his own tired face in the mirror. At that point, he was just as dusty and miserable as the house itself.
He had to get out of there.
***
It seemed like every person in Edenderry already had a theory, or at least a fantasy, about the new inhabitant of the Berrybog Cottage. It was early afternoon and Sinead already heard it all, as every customer that entered her store started with a ‘ Did you hear? ’ or was greeted by Bernadette’s ‘Guess what!’ , if they didn’t.
The young girl was especially invested in this mystery, always finding the time to chat with the customers from behind the counter. It wasn’t a particularly busy day, so Sinead allowed it.
Bernadette was currently in the middle of telling Mrs. Staton her own theory - she hoped it was a young and handsome man, probably an eccentric heir of a small fortune, who moved here with a broken heart, hoping to find a beautiful girl to heal it, and…
At that point, Sinead was pretty sure that her employee was just reciting a Jane Austen novel. There were horses involved.
And then, the bell over the door rang.
All three women looked at the entrance and froze when they saw an unfamiliar face. Sinead’s first thought was that Bernadette was right. Her second thought was to mentally scold herself for how silly that was.
The person that entered was indeed a young and… possibly handsome man? He was short and lean, with blond hair that had- were those cobwebs stuck in it? His face might have been pleasant, but it was smudged with dust and dirt - as were his clothes. His most striking feature would have been his bright blue eyes, if it weren’t for their slight redness and the dark circles underneath them.
Sinead immediately felt a maternal urge to send him to sleep.
The man also paused, faced with this peculiar welcoming committee, and said, “Hello?”
“Hi! How can we help you?” Bernadette was the first person to break the silence, already writing wedding vows in her head.
“I’m looking for… cleaning supplies?” He sounded like he wasn’t sure what he was looking for either. Maybe he was just spooked by all this attention? Mrs. Staton was staring at him as if she was trying to memorise every detail of his person, probably to immediately tell her neighbours.
“Sure, let me show you!” Bernadette chirped, going out from behind the counter and leading the poor man further into the store. “You have a lot of cleaning to do?”
Subtle, Bernadette. Subtle.
The man looked like he was having a war flashback as he said, “That’s… putting it mildly.”
Not deterred by the man paying more attention to the shelves than her, Bernadette continued her interrogation. “So, are you new around here?”
He nodded. “Came to Ireland on Tuesday. I bought the old house in the hills.”
By that point Bernadette probably finished the wedding vows and was now at the stage of choreographing their first dance. Not only was he really from the Berrybog Cottage, but she managed to make him talk to her! In semi-complete sentences!
“We’ll definitely be seeing each other a lot then!” she almost purred, “Do you have a name?”
“Nils. Um, Nils Cavendish.”
“Nils?”
“Yeah. It’s Norwegian.”
“Oh, fun! Are you from Norway?”
“No.”
“O… kay then. So where are you from?”
The man was looking miserable enough at that line of questioning, that Sinead decided to take pity and help him out. “Stop pestering the customer.” She said to the younger woman and shook her head. “I’m Sinead, this is Bernadette. We’re the general store around here.”
Moving the focus away from Nils calmed him a little, although he still seemed quite gruff. He left a few pleasantries and two bags of questionable detergents and snacks later, leaving Sinead with a Bernadette that was almost jumping with excitement.
It was going to be a long day.
***
In front of his cottage, Nils turned the car engine off. He put his hands on the steering wheel and laid his head down on them. Wanting to stretch the time before going back to work, he took a moment to just look at the house.
Despite everything, it was quite beautiful.
Both the cottage and the stone fence surrounding it were overgrown with ivy and wild flowers, making it look like something out of a fairy tale. Like a place full of fey and fauns and nymphs. Perhaps a domain of a friendly but mischievous witch? Although that would make him either the witch or a trespasser, so he was more onboard with the fey scenario.
The house itself was spacious and bright, with tall windows bathing it in sunlight. At this point all it did was empathise the dust filling the air, but Nils could imagine sitting there, on a clean wooden floor, drinking a coffee. Perhaps a person would come over, humming something and wrapping hands around him and-
Nope, he was not going there. Back to daydreaming about house renovation. A much more realistic goal to accomplish.
There was also a greenhouse, which Nils found to be just the most beautiful place. It was actually the thing that made him decide to buy this piece of garbage property.
Part of the glass wall was broken by a falling branch, blending the garden and the greenhouse into one. Weeds mixed with flowers, birds and lizards moved in. Amongst them, he found some metal furniture, unmoved for over twenty years. It was beautiful, eerie and thrilling, all at once.
Still draped over the steering wheel, Nils slowly closed his eyes.
The Berrybog Cottage was his second chance at life
With this thought, he drifted away to sleep. Because for now, it was also an exhausting piece of work.