The Landlady has a dithering lodger
About a month ago, one of my long-term French lodgers sent me a text saying she needed to speak to me. Whenever someone ‘needs to speak to me’, I can assume that it is generally to deliver bad news in person, rather than via a text message or other form of electronic missive.
On this occasion, I was correct with my anticipation of bad news, as the girl had decided to rent a flat on her own. Or rather, her parents had agreed to pay for her to rent a flat on her own. I wonder how these parents afford to pay for their offspring to rent a room in my house, let alone rent a whole flat by themselves. Although I was slightly disappointed – this girl has been a perfect house guest – I wasn’t surprised that Landlady Towers was not for her, as she’s quite a reclusive and quiet girl and relations between her and my other lodger seem to be quite tense at the best of times. I have noticed that they tend to eat their dinner in a relay style to avoid each other, which is quite observant for someone who’s spent half of this year so far in Africa…
“March is not a good time to have an empty room…”
The girl went on to explain that she had already found a flat and was due to move in a month’s time. March is not a good time to have an empty room, as most Uni students are already settled and foreign students thin on the ground. Although the lack of students cluttering up the pavements around Churchill Square is probably quite a positive thing, I was duly concerned about how I was going to re-let the room at such short notice.
I needn’t have worried, as the recession seems to have had an adverse effect on the influx of foreign students who seem to be falling over each other for the chance to learn English, although many of them seem to come in order to improve their English, then end up working here. Who can blame them with the economy in Europe being in its current state? Within two days, I’d re-let the room to a Turkish man, who intends to stay for one year. Two weeks later, just a week before she was due to leave, the French girl sent me a text saying she ‘needed to talk to me’ again.
What more bad news could there possibly be? Had she destroyed her bed? Razed her wardrobe to the ground? Burnt a hole in the carpet? (Not an unusual occurrence.) No, she wanted to let me know that her flat had fallen through and she was staying for at least another month, which means I’ve put the cart very much before the horse. So, yet again I find myself sharing a bedroom with the charming, yet noisy Small Daughter. Deep joy…
