Free The Love Shack by Jane Costello Page B

in the feel of sunshine against my skin. My eyes dance in and out of focus onto a wisp of white clouds – until I realise that the sensation is making me feel queasy. I close my lids, but that only exacerbates the feeling. My stomach lurches and saliva gathers at the sides of my mouth.
    ‘GEMMA!’ Dan shouts.
    I push myself up and shade my eyes from the sun. ‘Yeah?’
    ‘How are your guts?’
    A wave of nausea washes over me. ‘A bit . . . unsettled, if I’m honest.’
    I watch as he wades towards me, his expression shifting from mild concern to panic. ‘What’s up?’ I ask.
    ‘Oh God . . .’ he replies, hobbling out of the lake. Dan’s complexion has drained of colour and he’s staggering towards me like a dying Gladiator in a bad B-movie.
    We link arms and stumble – him near-naked, me fully-clothed but in increasing discomfort – towards the main house. He pauses halfway and looks around in desperation. ‘God, I think I’m going to be sick.’
    By the time we reach the house, my insides feel as though they’re about to explode, and Dan is clutching his stomach.
    ‘Take the downstairs loo,’ I splutter, deciding that he looks the most desperate. ‘I’ll go upstairs.’
    We prepare to sprint Marine-style, to our respective targets, when Belinda twirls into the hall as if she’s hosting a cocktail party.
    ‘There you are! Dan, Gemma – I’d like you to meet James Shuttlemore, our new neighbour.’ She ushers him forward, apparently oblivious of my knotted brow, and the fact that Dan is doubled up and dripping wet.
    ‘James moved into The Stables several weeks ago, but this is the first time we’ve met. He’s an architect.’
    James looks to be in his early sixties, but with all his own hair and only a slightly rounded belly he is, as my mum would say, well preserved – like a good piccalilli. He stretches out his arm to shake hands. ‘Lovely to meet you.’
    I can virtually hear the contents of my boyfriend’s stomach climbing up his foodpipe as he turns and darts to the downstairs bathroom, almost concussing himself against the banister. I stand, swaying, as Belinda seems determined to act as though nothing untoward is happening.
    ‘Gemma works for a big advertising agency. She writes all the scripts. That’s right, isn’t it?’
    I nod frantically.
    ‘I considered a career in advertising myself after I’d left the Army,’ he replies. ‘But I decided to make life hard for myself and train to be an architect instead.’
    A conversation ensues that would be perfectly engaging were it not for the soundtrack emanating from the lavatory.
    ‘Were you familiar with Buddington before you moved here?’ asks Belinda coolly, as an explosion of coughing reverberates through the house.
    James’s eyes shift to the bathroom door, then he refocuses. ‘I’d grown up in Cheshire as a boy, but it was only when my company relocated from Manchester that I decided to move back.’
    Belinda smiles. Dan sounds like he’s slaughtering a warthog with a plastic picnic knife.
    Every time I think I’ll make a getaway, Belinda yanks me back by asking about my earrings, my mother, my job, or any other number of subjects to which I’m unable to respond with anything other than a grunt. We run out of conversation at the exact moment that Dan’s latrine emergency draws to a close and the door opens.
    ‘Chuck my trousers in will you, Gemma?’ he groans and I hand them over silently as another hideous crunch hits my stomach.
    Belinda claps her hands together. ‘How about a snack, everyone? I made some prune turnovers yesterday.’ At this, the only reaction I’m capable of is turning and stumbling up the stairs on all fours as Belinda cries after me: ‘I’ll save you one, shall I, Gemma?’

Chapter 9
    Dan
    After three and a half weeks, Mum has driven me to near distraction. I barely know where to start, but I’ll focus on last Saturday, just for the hell of it.
    She’s taken to responding with quiet