Next chapter in their lives
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True to his word, Steve and his crew finished the kitchen and master bath in nine days and a day later received the Certificate of Occupancy. The CO meant they could now legally move into the house, despite having one and a half baths yet to remodel.
"Hon, would you call your realtor friend and see if she's interested in listing the cabin?" Tim said.
"So you've decided to sell?" she replied.
"Yes. I don't want it to be vandalized or worse after we move to Dahlonega. Better some other family enjoy it. Besides, I love Dahlonega and have been going there often for years. I don't have the same attraction to this place in terms of coming for a weekend or so. And I'll clear enough to pay for the new garage there."
"Wait, you're going to pay for the garage at MY house? That doesn't make sense. I'd assumed I would be paying for it. I can afford it."
"I've done some checking and now is the right time for us to discuss it. There are three options. One, you could sell me the parcel of land it will sit on, which we can easily carve out as it already sits on one property line. But when I pass away it will be a challenge for you to bring that parcel back together with the farmhouse. Two, you could give me a ground lease and I could rent the parcel for like one dollar a year. Then you still have the entire three acres together. Three, you could sell me a half interest in the entire property, with the cost of building the garage counting towards what I would owe you. The lawyer I spoke with suggested three is best, two is okay, and one we should probably avoid."
"Okay, that all makes sense. I vote for number three. I like the idea of the farmhouse truly being 'our' home, not my house you just live in."
"Okay, but I want us to get a sort of pre-nup even though we aren't getting married. Let's have a contract that spells out what happens if one of us decides they want out of our relationship. And before you say anything," he'd noticed she was about to object,"no, I have no intention of ever living without you. I just don't want any issues for you."
"Alright, we'll talk about it. Let me call Carol about the cabin."
"Once we move the furniture out I want to have someone refinish the floors. Before Tess passed away her nails really scratched them up. And we'll have to go through everything and maybe have a yard sale, although I don't know how well that will work being so far outside of town," Tim said.
"Let's do a walk-through and make final decisions on the furniture. We'll take all the kitchen stuff, pictures, knick knacks, and so on. But some of the furniture won't work."
They spent a half hour deciding on each piece, with Becky making a list as her handwriting was far neater than Tim's. The sofa and matching recliner, dining room table and chairs, two small end tables, and the log bed-frame weren't going to make the trip.
"I'll have to go through the stuff in the garage attic. I may take all the hardware and so on, just in case I have little projects that need to be done there. And the library has all those great bookshelves, so I'll take all the books. I whittled them down when I moved here since I had no place for all the ones I had, but I kept my favorites."
"Are we going to hire a moving company or get a rental truck?" Becky asked.
"Either a truck or maybe a trailer. I'll ask my trainer, Marty, to come help me bring the freezer and futon down from the loft. You and I should be able to handle everything else."
"We might be able to get those, too," she said. "I'm pretty strong."
"Yes you are. We'll see. I'm going to take some pics and post the sofa and recliner on Marketplace. Say $200?" Tim asked.
"That should sell quickly at that price. There's just a little wear damage on the one arm of the sofa and the rest looks brand new."
They discussed asking prices on the remaining items they planned to sell and decided to go to Dahlonega in the morning to do some more furniture shopping. They'd take his truck and as much furniture as they could fit in it and drop them off at the farmhouse, now that they had keys.
Later that night they went to bed and, as was their practice, made love and then spooned all night. When they woke the next morning Tim went down on Becky, bringing her to a sweet, satisfying orgasm and then showered together. After breakfast they headed to Dahlonega and sought out the largest furniture store after moving the furniture they'd hauled into the farmhouse.
Becky had taken pictures of Tim's many Persian carpets, several of which he'd inherited from his parents. They knew which room they thought each would go into, and used the pictures to guide their choices for fabric and finish colors. It took only an hour to select the reclining sofa and matching rocker/recliner they both thought would work well with the carpet and farmhouse style.
They also found a bed-frame they both liked. It had a very 'old farmhouse' look, but was new as anything antique would be too small for the new king size mattress set he had ordered. Unfortunately it would have to be ordered and it would take at least six weeks to arrive.
"Should we put the foundation on the floor and sell the log bed-frame, or bring it and then sell it once we get the new bed," Becky asked.
"Let's bring it and sell it later. There are as many cabin style and rental places in Dahlonega as in Clarkesville so it should be just as easy to sell there. That way we don't have to sleep on the floor," he replied.
As they were ordering lunch Tim's phone pinged and he saw a message from Marketplace. Fearing it was one of the meaningless "Is this still available?" ones he was tempted to ignore it, but opened it up anyway.
'Hi. We're very interested in this sofa set. When can we come see it?'
After discussing it with Becky he messaged back, 'We'll be home about 4. I'll send the address just before that. Thanks.'