Love You Dead

36 Sunday 1 March

Shelby had stayed in bed all Saturday, vomiting regularly, and with an intermittent nosebleed. He’d vomited several times more during the night. He awoke, groggily, to see a concerned-looking Angi standing over him, dressed and holding a glass with a dark brown liquid in it.

‘How are you feeling, my love?’ she asked.

His head was swimming and he felt as if he was going to be sick again. His throat hurt from the acidic bile, which was all he had to puke up the last time, some hours earlier. ‘What’s the time?’

‘Ten thirty. It’s Mum’s sixtieth birthday today, remember?’

‘Urrr.’

‘How do you feel? Do you want to come?’

Her parents lived in Watford. It was a good two to two and a half hours’ drive away. No way could he face that. Nor her deadly dull mother who didn’t like him anyway. He shook his head slowly from side to side, feeling the roundabouts.

‘I have to leave in a minute. Try to drink some of this.’ She handed him the glass.

‘What is it?’

‘Coca-Cola. I’ve been stirring it to get the fizz out. The sugar in it’ll do you good. You’ve got to get something down you, you need electrolytes. You didn’t eat anything last night. This will make you feel better.’

She helped him sit up and stared strangely at his face.

‘What?’ he asked.

‘Where you cut yourself shaving — on Friday. It’s bleeding again.’

‘It can’t be.’

‘You must have knocked it and opened it up. I’ll get a fresh plaster in a minute. First drink this.’ She guided the glass into his hands and tilted it up towards his lips.

He sipped a little and screwed up his face. ‘Yeccchhh.’

‘Trust me,’ she said. ‘This will make you feel better. You’ve got a tummy bug — there’s a lot of it going around at the moment.’

‘I hope I haven’t given it to you.’

‘I feel fine,’ she said. ‘I’ve prepared two more glasses of this. Try to drink one every few hours, it really will make you feel better.’

‘Coke?’ he said.

‘Trust me. Coke was originally created for stomach ailments.’

‘You’re kidding.’

She shook her head. ‘It was a medicine originally, then people started to like the taste. I always drink it if I’m ill.’

He sipped some more, dubiously, unsure if he would be able to hold it down, and after a few moments, he realized it was actually making him feel a little less nauseous.

‘Come on, get some more down — for me.’

He took a larger sip. Then another. ‘Thank you, nurse.’

She kissed him on the forehead. ‘Don’t go to work tonight. If you give me their number, I’ll phone them and tell them you’re still ill.’

He shook his head. ‘No — I–I’ll see how I feel. I’ll stay in bed and see how I feel later. I can’t skip work again.’

‘I’ll speak to them, explain you’re too ill.’

He sipped some more Coke. ‘This is making me feel better. If I’m not right this afternoon, I’ll ring the emergency doctor.’

‘Phone me if you’re not feeling better and I’ll leave early and come back to you.’

‘You’re an angel.’

She grinned and kissed him again. ‘I know.’

‘Bitch!’

‘You are feeling better, aren’t you?’

‘Come home as soon as you can. I’ve a feeling I might be really randy.’

‘Keep the feeling!’ She waved him goodbye and slipped out of the bedroom. Moments later she rushed back in with a plaster and handed it to him. ‘Sorry, nearly forgot!’

As soon as she was gone he pushed back the duvet. He’d kept a bandage round his ankle, intending to tell Angi he’d cut it tripping over some boxes at work, if she asked.

Gingerly he swung his legs over the side of the bed, leaned down and removed the bandage.

And stared in shock.

The skin around the bite was swollen, black and yellow and weeping blood.

Was it this that was making him feel so ill? A reaction to the snake bite? What had that thing been?

He dabbed the wound with a tissue, found some antiseptic cream in the bathroom cabinet, applied some and put on a fresh bandage. When he had finished he opened his laptop and started searching snakes. All he could remember was that the snake was brown and had a black marking on it. There were dozens and dozens of different species and types. He stared at the images without recognition. He’d only seen it fleetingly, in the beam of his phone torch.

If it was truly poisonous, surely he’d be dead by now, he reasoned. Didn’t poisonous snakes kill you within hours? It was five days now. Maybe the bite was infected and he was suffering a reaction from that?

He’d see how he felt later.