The Renovation Season

Lucy Webb signs her divorce papers, leaves the family home, and spends her first child-free night on a mattress in the ugly 1970s semi she bought because it was all she could afford near the children’s school. Then rain starts coming through the ceiling. Enter Aaron Blake: forty-one, divorced, dryly funny, and far too perceptive for a carpenter Lucy only meant to hire. He can fix warped doors and rotten timber, but he also notices when she is pretending everything is fine. Between disastrous DIY, her children’s outrageous paint choices, and the dangerous relief of laughing again, Lucy starts to wonder whether wanting someone new is allowed to feel this good. Then the house reveals damage she cannot afford, just as her ex-husband begins talking about the family they used to be. Suddenly every decision: money, children, home, desire feels tied to the question she has been avoiding. Lucy thought the hard part was leaving. Now she has to decide whether she misses her marriage… or only the life she once believed it promised.