Free A Proper Family Holiday by Chrissie Manby Page B

himself round her legs and looked up at her in adoration. Chelsea closed her eyes and sighed inwardly as he buried his pool-damp head in her skirt. Blackcurrant juice and now wet hair. Perfect. Just perfect. Why didn’t people keep children on leads?
    ‘I’m really happy you’re here, Auntie Chelsea,’ Jack told her with great sincerity. ‘Now that you’re here, I’ve got someone to play with.’
    Not if I can help it, thought Chelsea, as she peeled Jack off her thighs. After the plane ride over, she had resolved to steer well clear of the under-tens. ‘Better catch up with your mum,’ was what she said out loud.
    At last, twenty-four hours later than planned, Chelsea pushed open the door to her hotel room. First impression: bad. It was small, cheaply furnished and smelly. The ensuite bathroom was a former cupboard that had been hastily converted into a ‘wet room’. The toilet roll had unravelled and was soaking up the dampness greedily. Whoever invented wet rooms should be shot, Chelsea observed. In a wet room.
    Next, Chelsea examined a painting of a sad-eyed donkey on the wall between the twin beds. Less ‘Conran’ than ‘car-boot sale’. There was no balcony. No proper view.
    She opened the wardrobe. There were just three coat hangers, left behind by previous guests. Chelsea had to hang her favourite summer dress – a white smocked affair by Chloé – from a plastic hanger that bore the legend ‘6–7 years’. She opened a drawer to find a space for her underwear, but quickly thought better of it as a musty aroma billowed out. Even if she wasn’t going to be getting any action, she didn’t want her lingerie to smell as though it belonged in a museum.
    Having given up on unpacking her case, Chelsea observed the twin beds with their thin, well-worn sheets and scratchy-looking blankets. Bed bugs, was the first thought that sprang to mind here. There were already faint firework splatters of red on the walls where several dozen mosquitoes must have met their deaths in seasons past. Chelsea pulled back the covers of the bed that looked less lumpy. She moved quickly, dreading what might lie beneath.
    Oh, it was awful. The pillow had the look of the Turin Shroud about it, stained by the sweat and dribble of heaven only knew how many hotel guests over the years. The thought of having to put her head on it made Chelsea shiver with misery. What was she doing here? Why hadn’t she just said she was too busy at work to spare a week? God knows she really was too busy at work. Oh well. There was not much she could do about it now.
    At the very least, Chelsea had consoled herself when she bowed to the inevitable and agreed to this trip, she could get a bit of a suntan. Though she had embraced the fashion for alabaster-pale skin over the winter months – it was rare for Chelsea to feel naturally fashionable – she could not quite bring herself to stay deathly white for the whole summer. Not when she was still carrying six pounds more than she thought she ought to be.
    Though her packing had been somewhat rushed, Chelsea had managed to bring six bikinis. Earlier that month, Society had run an article that said that the ideal summer wardrobe should contain a bikini for every day of the week. Preferably two a day, so you could change into a new, dry bikini after swimming. The readers of Society didn’t go to lunch with wet bottoms.
    In her horrible room, Chelsea changed into a pale blue bikini by Eres. Like the dress, this bikini was ‘borrowed’ from the fashion cupboard. It had been too big for the model in the bikini spread it was picked out for, but on Chelsea it was just right. She felt a little surge of happiness as she checked her reflection and noted that not having eaten anything but a burger without the bun since the previous day, her stomach was pretty well perfectly flat.
    Unfortunately, Chelsea knew the second she stepped out through the double doors that packing her fabulous bikini wardrobe had been