Free This Way to Paradise by Cathy Hopkins

decided to put my phone on recharge, then began to put away the things I had brought for the trip.
    Just as I’d finished, Kate burst in.
Phew,
I thought as she dumped her bag on the end of one of the beds.
Company.
She may not have liked the idea of sharing a room, but I was secretly pleased that I wasn’t going to be alone.
Maybe she’s got some idea of what we can do,
I thought as I lolled on my bed and watched her empty the contents of her suitcase on to hers, change her T-shirt, comb her hair back and don her shades.
    Then she got up.
    â€˜See yus later,’ she said and she picked up her straw bag and headed for the door.
    â€˜Later? Why? Where are you going? Can I come?’ I asked. ‘And are you going to leave all your stuff on the bed?’
    Kate’s expression registered irritation. ‘India. We might be cousins. We might have to share a room, but we’re not joined at the hip. OK?’
    I felt as if someone had poured cold water over me and Kate must have seen my face fall because she let out a slow breath.
    â€˜Look,’ she said with a sigh. ‘I just need some space for a while. OK? Like, this is not my ideal summer and I need to readjust my head. Maybe you can come next time, OK?’
    And then her phone went. She didn’t even wait for my reaction. She was on her mobile and out the door.
    Not my ideal summer either,
I thought after she’d gone.
Not that anyone has asked what is.
I flicked through the two novels on the shelf, then put them back. One was a murder story and the other was a caring sharing self-help book. I wasn’t in the moodfor caring sharing, nor was I in the mood for reading.
    I decided to go and have a wander around the site, so I donned my shades and set off back up towards the reception area where most of the classes seemed to be based.
    There were the classes that I’d seen earlier, but all sorts of other stuff was going on too. There was a hut where a couple of people were learning massage, another where they seemed to be learning how to make jewellery, another where a group of five were singing or doing some sort of voice work (actually they sounded like they were being strangled). I passed a drumming class, a fencing group, a writing group and another hut where I think people were doing some kind of healing or therapy as a few people were crying on mats and others hugging them. In an adjacent hut, a couple of people were doing mad hippie dancing to some kind of droning groaning sound.
Not for me,
I thought as I moved quickly on. I passed a kitchen area which was busy with a group of people chopping and cutting vegetables. One of them waved but I darted out of her eye line in case I got roped in. Not that I minded helping out in the kitchen but didn’t want to just yet. There were a couple of open huts on a terrace area where it looked like people could get drinks and snacks and there were a few people at a long table in the middle, talking and laughing. They seemed so at home, like they knew each other and they belonged there. There was no sign of Kate, Lottie or Aunt Sarah. Or Joe.
    I got a bottle of water from the bar area and made my wayback down the slope to our bungalow. I let myself back into our room, lay on my bed and stared at the skylight in the sloped roof. There was the beginning of a cobweb up in the righthand corner.
    It felt
so
quiet.
    Somewhere in the distance a dog barked. A fly buzzed at the window.
    It was so quiet that you could almost
hear
the silence, but I guess that was the point. That was what people paid to come here for, but to me, after the hussle and bustle of London, it felt . . .
boring.
    How on earth am I going to get through four whole weeks here?
I asked myself. I was in a place full of people, sixty of them, according to Anisha.
It’s not like I’m alone,
I told myself.
So why do I feel so lonely?
    No one cares about me,
I thought as I wondered what Mum and the boys were doing back in