A Proper Family Holiday (11 page)

She looked at Mark’s profile, silhouetted by the light coming in from the pool outside. Even when his snoring was as loud as a Jumbo coming in to land, he seemed so utterly at peace. In sleep, he looked somehow younger too, as though the cares of the past few years had fallen away and he was once again the cheeky teenage apprentice she had fallen so deeply in love with. Ronnie felt a sudden stab of affection for him. She remembered the young man – still a teenager himself – who had thrown himself into parenthood so fully and so lovingly when Ronnie herself was finding it such a struggle. Just then he gave a snort and rolled over, taking the whole of the thin cotton sheet with him so that Ronnie was left naked but for the enormous jersey nightshirt she always wore to bed these days. Her mum-wear. Her camouflage. Ronnie shook her head. This was not the life she had signed up for. She wanted her life to be like Chelsea’s.

But what was a life like Chelsea’s really like? Alone in her room, Chelsea knelt over the toilet that wouldn’t take toilet paper and flushed away that disgustingly carb-heavy dinner at last.

Chapter Fourteen

Ronnie

Monday

As it happened, Chelsea was not the only member of the Benson family who would spend part of that night at the Hotel Volcan throwing up. Having finally managed to drop off, Ronnie woke again just half an hour later with tremendous stomach cramps. They were almost as bad as being in labour. Each violent contraction of her bowels knocked the breath right out of her body. Something was obviously going very badly wrong.

Ronnie hauled herself out of bed in a panic. Her stomach hurt so much she could hardly see straight. It could only be appendicitis. When she blundered to the bathroom, however, she discovered that Mark was already in there, kneeling on the floor in front of the toilet, groaning like a wounded bull elephant. He refused to give up his position for his wife.

‘I can’t,’ he said. ‘I just can’t.’

‘But I need to …’

Mark waved her away.

Ronnie had no choice but to throw up in the basin. She was both impressed and frightened by the amount that came out in one go. Had she really eaten that much? What was going on? Mark was having a similarly awful time of it. Whenever he tried to get up from the cold white floor tiles, he had to sit straight back down again.

‘At least it isn’t coming from both ends,’ he managed to joke during a brief moment of respite.

And then it was …

‘For heaven’s sake, Mark,’ Ronnie begged him as he went from kneeling in front of the toilet to sitting on it, eyes scrunched tightly shut as his intestines rebelled. ‘I need to use that thing too.’

‘Use the basin,’ Mark instructed her.

‘I can’t … You’ve got to—’

‘I’m not moving.’

Ronnie sank down on the bidet in defeat.

‘You utter, utter—’

Worse was to come. It wasn’t long before Ronnie heard a faint knocking on the door.

‘You get it,’ she said.

‘I can’t move,’ said Mark.

‘I can’t move either!’

‘Mummy!’ a child’s voice called in the corridor. ‘Mummy! Mummm-eeeeeee!’ Compelled by motherly instinct, Ronnie had no choice but to answer.

Half sobbing, she staggered to the door and opened it to find Jack, looking terribly grave.

‘Mummy, Sophie won’t stop being sick,’ he said.

Though she herself was drenched in cold sweat and could barely stand, Ronnie had to follow Jack into the children’s bedroom next door. Sophie was sitting on the very end of the double bed she’d been sharing with her brother, crying like it was the end of the world. She hadn’t even managed to get as far as the bathroom. What little she had eaten of her all-inclusive dinner was splattered across the green tiled floor.

‘Mum,’ she whispered, ‘I think I’m dying.’

‘You’re not dying,’ Ronnie promised her, as she tried not to heave at the sight of so much more sick.

‘It’s like
28 Days Later
,’ said Mark, when he felt well enough to stand and join his wife in surveying the carnage in the children’s room.

‘We must have eaten something funny,’ Sophie suggested when she heard she wasn’t the only one evacuating dinner.

‘Too right. I’m going to sue this bloody hotel,’ was Ronnie’s response. ‘I bet they’ve been reheating that buffet all week.’ Then she covered her mouth and made a dash for the bathroom again.

Jack perched on the wide windowsill, with his legs well clear of his sister’s vomit. He had his arms wrapped tightly round himself to make up for the fact that everyone else was too covered in puke to give him the hug he really needed.

‘I’m frightened,’ he said to his father. ‘What’s wrong with you and Mummy?’

‘It’s just a little tummy upset,’ said Mark with a queasy smile. ‘We’re all going to be perfectly fine.’

Jack could be forgiven for thinking it didn’t look that way. In the corner by the door, Sophie had rolled herself into a ball round the wastepaper basket, which was unfortunately made of raffia and, as such, was far from being the ideal barf receptacle.

‘For heaven’s sake, use this carrier bag,’ Mark suggested, handing her the Hollister carrier that had formed part of Sophie’s luggage.

‘No way,’ said Sophie. That bag was a totem for her. It was proof that she owned something cool, even if it had been bought in the sale. She wasn’t going to waste it. She wasn’t
that
ill.

‘But–’ Just as Mark was about to point out the obvious folly of a barf bucket with great big holes in it, Sophie discovered its limitations for herself, getting sick all over her favourite pyjamas. Seeing it happen, Jack jumped down from the windowsill and started to have a proper freak-out, skipping from one foot to the other as though the whole room was swimming in vomit.

‘For God’s sake, Mark, take him to Mum’s room,’ Ronnie called from her place on the bathroom floor. The echo chamber of the toilet bowl made her voice sound subterranean.

Mark, who had managed to stay remarkably clean, picked Jack up and carried him down the corridor. Alas, the scene in Dave and Jacqui’s room was not an awful lot better. Dave was curled up on the bed in the foetal position. Jacqui was next door, trying desperately hard to make sure that Bill stayed in his en-suite bathroom until the danger had passed. All three of them were also afflicted.

‘We must all have food poisoning,’ Jacqui groaned. ‘Did you have the prawn cocktail, Mark? I bet it was the prawns.’

‘I didn’t have the prawns,’ said Jack. That seemed to confirm it. He was the only one who wasn’t ill.

‘Ronnie says can you take him?’ Mark asked.

He held Jack out in Jacqui’s direction.

‘Do I look like I can take him? You’ll have to take him down to Chelsea,’ Jacqui said. ‘She might still be OK. She won’t have touched the prawn cocktail. She hardly ate a thing.’

‘God, please let her be all right,’ said Mark, who felt another wave of horror coming on. ‘Which is her room?’

‘She’s near the lift.’

Jack, thankfully, knew the way, and further cause for thanks, Chelsea was unafflicted. Having vomited to order for her own reasons before the bugs in the hotel food started to act, she had escaped the very worst of the sickness that was bringing everyone else down. She felt no more ill than she would have expected to feel after four glasses of the hotel’s non-specific house red. Still, she took a little while to open her door, having to find a place to hide
From Booty Call to Bride
first.

‘Hurry up!’ Mark hammered on the door.

‘What’s happening?’ asked Chelsea as she observed Mark’s grey face. ‘You don’t look very well.’

‘I’m not. None of us is. You’ve got to take him.’

‘Who?’ For a moment, Chelsea was confused.

‘Me.’

Mark pushed Jack ahead of him. Jack gazed up at his aunt with his big blue eyes as though he were a Victorian orphan and she his last chance of staying out of the workhouse. Chelsea looked down upon him as if he were an urchin covered in coal dust and snot and she had no intention of letting him and his dirty feet into the manor.

‘What?’

‘He’s going to have to sleep in here with you,’ Mark persisted.

‘Won’t he be happier with his sister?’

‘He can’t. Please, Chels. We’re all ill. Me. Ronnie. Bill. Your mum and dad. His sister’s ill too. There’s puke all over their bedroom floor. He needs to sleep in here while we get everything cleaned up.’

‘It’s true,’ said Jack. ‘Sophie’s puking, and Mum’s got the shits.’

‘Jack,’ Mark and Chelsea said in unison.

‘Please,’ begged Mark. ‘I need to get back and help Ronnie. Sophie’s in a right state, but Jack’s all right. Being with you is his best chance of staying that way. You’ve got to take him. He’ll be good.’

‘I
will
be good,’ Jack confirmed.

Chelsea looked unconvinced.

‘Please, Chelsea …’

With his pallid face and quavering voice, Mark endowed the moment with near-apocalyptic portent. Meanwhile, Jack was wavering between seeming suitably upset at his parents’ sickness and being extraordinarily excited at the thought of getting to stay with his aunt as a result. He had been trying to get her attention all evening, telling her his best jokes, explaining
Doctor Who
, asking her about her favourite animals. Nothing seemed to interest her. Was she softening now? It seemed she might be. Jack piled on the pressure by making his eyes big and round like a puppy’s. He waggled the teddy bear she had bought for him in her direction.

‘I’ll be so good you won’t even notice me,’ he promised.

‘Oh,’ said Chelsea. ‘All right.’

She opened her door wide enough for Jack to step inside.

And that is how Jack ended up spending the night with his auntie Chelsea. He crawled into the spare twin bed, which Chelsea had been using as a makeshift open wardrobe, and pulled the scratchy sheet up to his neck. Mark tucked the new teddy in beside him before making a swift exit.

‘I can’t stay in my room, because it smells of sick,’ Jack explained. ‘Sick isn’t very nice, is it?’

Chelsea had to agree with him.

‘Well, there’s no sick in here. Now, you’d better get some sleep,’ she said.

‘I think I’d prefer it if you talked to me for a bit,’ Jack told her. ‘I’ve been having a very worrying time tonight.’

Where did he get a phrase like that from? Chelsea wondered.

‘It’s two o’clock in the morning,’ she said.

It was one thing having to share her room with a child. Having to entertain him was out of the question.

‘Two o’clock is early,’ said Jack.

‘No,’ said Chelsea, ‘it’s late.’

‘I’m not usually allowed to stay up past two o’clock in the morning.’

‘And you’re not going to start tonight,’ Chelsea assured him.

She lay down on her bed and switched out the light to draw a line under the conversation that Jack seemed determined to have. It didn’t work.

‘But tonight is different, isn’t it? Tonight there’s an emergency.’

‘The emergency is being sorted out by the grown-ups. You can go to sleep.’

There was a half-minute of silence.

‘Do you watch
Doctor Who
?’ Jack asked.

‘Lights are out, Jack. That means it’s time to sleep.’

‘Do you prefer Doctor Who or Captain Jack?’

‘It’s the middle of the night. If you’re staying here with me, then you’re going to have to be quiet.’

‘Just tell me which one is better.’

‘I don’t know which one is better.’

‘You must do.’

‘No, really, I don’t,’ Chelsea snapped. ‘I don’t even know who Captain Jack is. In fact, I really don’t have an opinion on any form of children’s television at all, as I told you over dinner.’

‘Shall I tell you which one is better?’ Jack asked regardless.

‘Please don’t,’ said Chelsea. ‘Just go to blinking sleep.’

Chelsea’s prayer as she fell asleep that night was that her sister would be well enough to resume parental duties
first
thing in the morning.

Chapter Fifteen

Chelsea

Jack was up bright and early the following morning, much to Chelsea’s chagrin. It was confusing enough to wake in a room she didn’t immediately recognise. To wake to find a small boy standing right over her, his button nose just an inch away from her own as he stared into her sleep-filled eyes, was something else again. It was borderline terrifying.

‘What on earth are you doing?’ Chelsea scrambled into a seated position.

‘I was just checking you’re alive,’ said Jack.

‘Well, I am,’ said Chelsea, attempting to gather herself. ‘But how come you’re in here?’

‘Don’t you remember, Auntie Chelsea? Daddy brought me in the night.’

Ah yes. It was all coming back to her now. Mark, grey-faced and desperate, dumping Jack on the spare bed before making a dash for the nearest suitable loo. Thank goodness he’d been clever enough not to use Chelsea’s en suite for fear of passing on whatever was ailing him to the only adult in the Benson family still in any kind of fit state to take care of his son. How bad a mess must they all have been in?

‘Do you think everyone else is dead?’ Jack asked.

‘Someone would have come to tell us–’

‘Not if they’re
all
dead,’ said Jack.

‘Good point,’ said Chelsea. ‘Then maybe they are all dead. Yes, that’s probably what’s happened.’

Jack paled at the thought.

‘What’s the matter? You’re not feeling ill too?’ Chelsea asked Jack then. She didn’t want to have to deal with small-boy sick first thing. It didn’t occur to her that her comment might have drained the colour from his face. ‘If you’re going to be sick, you need to go to the bathroom.’

‘I’m OK,’ said Jack. His bottom lip quivered.

‘Then why don’t you get back into bed and have a nice lie-in?’

‘I don’t want to lie in. I want to see Mummy and Grandma. You’ve got to get up and help me.’

Jack climbed onto his bed. He pulled the flimsy orange curtains apart so that the room was suddenly flooded with sunshine. Chelsea screwed her eyes tightly shut.

‘Heaven’s sake, Jack. What are you doing?’