If I Hadn't Seen It That Day
I couldn’t take my eyes off that house.
There were almost fifty houses listed on the website. I’d spent almost the last hour scrolling through every one of them, finding some excuse to reject each property. None of those reasons were real. I was simply making them up.
The truth was, every house looked perfect. They were all within my budget too.
Still, after I had gone through all the newly listed properties, I ended up clicking on the older advertisements just out of curiosity. Most of them had been posted seven or eight months ago. A few were even more than a year old.
That was when I found it.
Hidden among those forgotten listings was the house I couldn’t stop looking at now.
It looked like one of those little cottages people rented for a weekend getaway. A small front garden with a weathered wooden fence. It was a quiet little house sitting far back from the road.
I had never wanted a huge home anyway.It wasn’t like I had a big family. The only people who might visit once in a while were Bella and Janine. Other than that, there wasn’t anyone who would come over or stay the night.Two bedrooms were more than enough for me.
No one seemed to have lived there for a very long time.
The garden said it all.
Every tree, bush, and flower had been left to grow wild. The wooden fence was weathered, the gate barely clinging to its hinges, and nature had almost swallowed the entire property. Everything about the place looked as though it had been slowly fading away.
And yet...
The house itself didn’t.
Every time I looked at it, I felt something strange.It was as if the house was still breathing.As if it was still waiting for someone.The entire garden was overflowing with flowers.No one seemed to be caring for them, yet they bloomed in bright clusters as though they refused to be forgotten.
They made me wonder how beautiful the garden must have been years ago when someone had loved this place enough to care for it.
Without even noticing, I had already fallen in love with the house.
I zoomed into the only photograph again.One hundred percent. Then two hundred percent.Most people would probably say it was nothing special.Maybe even a place that wasn’t worth buying.But for some reason I couldn’t explain, I couldn’t stop staring at it.
Every other property had dozens of photos - front yard, backyard, kitchen, bedrooms, bathrooms, even views from the front door as though you were already stepping inside.
This one had only a single photograph. It had clearly been taken from the road.That alone made me wonder if anyone would even bother coming to see it.
The advertisement itself was just as simple.No fancy descriptions.No exaggerated promises.Only the basic information anyone needed.
Somehow, I felt that the people who would call about this house wouldn’t be the kind who spent every weekend visiting open homes.It would be someone who had fallen for this particular house.Just like I had.
The advertisement had been published about eight months ago.
By now, it was probably sold.
Find My Home was one of the most popular real estate websites in West bridge, along with several nearby suburbs. It wasn’t only for houses. People advertised supermarkets, salons, dental clinics, and all kinds of businesses there.
Any licensed real estate agent in West bridge could list a property or business on the website without paying a fee.
If you were planning to buy a house, this was always the first place you looked.
Which meant...
There was almost no chance this little cottage was still available.I sighed and scrolled back to the newest listings.Maybe I had missed something earlier. Maybe there was another house that deserved a second look.
But after only a few minutes, I realised I wasn’t really looking anymore.Every house blurred together.My mind kept drifting back to the old listing.Back to that forgotten cottage. I gave up pretending.I opened the search box and looked for the advertisement again.
Because somehow...
I already knew that no matter how many other houses I looked at,none of them would ever compare.That forgotten little cottage was the one I wanted. I just didn’t know yet why it had been waiting for me.
