Job done. Well, nearly done

Once we had bought the underlay it took no time at all to put it down and we were very soon ready to start on the laminate. We quickly got the hang of clicking the pieces together and even managed to cut the last pieces in each row to the right size and shape, so by the time we finished work that day, half the floor was in place. I was able to put a bed back together and sleep off the floor that night.

When we went back to work, Chris was looking worried. When I asked him what was bothering him, he said that he didn’t think we had enough laminate. When I calculated how many packs we had used and how many we had left to cover the rest of the floor, I saw his point. And the shop had no more of this pattern, which was even more worrying. I decided to adopt a confident attitude, even though I was far from confident, and reassured him.

At the end of the next row Chris expressed his concern once again. I recalculated and, feeling a little less worried now, reassured him once again. By the time we had laid four rows and I had reassured Chris four times, I didn’t know whether I was worried or not. Whichever, I was becoming a little tetchy and snapped at him.

‘Look,’ I said, ‘there really is no point worrying about it until we reach the end. Let’s just press on and hope for the best.’

When we reached the end we had one third of a piece left, together with a few oddly shaped off-cuts. But our nerves were a little frayed, so we packed up early and watched a film on Chris’s laptop.