The Make

She tried to speak, to tell whoever was hurting her ankles and seemingly dragging her backwards through something very cold and wet and unpleasant, to stop doing it. But she couldn’t get the words out. She frowned. Definitely a dream.

Ow. But her head hurt.

Ah, she’d just go back to sleep. She was aware of voices, angry shouting just a little way above her head, but she was out of it, nice and warm, and now she couldn’t really even feel all that cold unpleasant stuff on her front, she was just really warm, really comfortable, really . . .

‘Gracie!’

Hmm? Ah, shaddup. Wanna sleep . . .

‘Gracie! Come on! Gracie!’

It was a familiar voice. She ignored it. Hoped they’d just go away, drift away out of her dreams, because she was so comfy, she wanted to sleep now, just to sleep . . .

‘Fuck it, Gracie, will you bloody well wake up?’

She knew that voice. Her eyes flickered open, now he was seriously getting on her tits, what the hell was he doing here in her dream?

‘That’s it! Come on! Wakey-wakey!’ said Lorcan, and she felt herself being not so much lifted as hauled – pretty bloody painfully – to her feet.

‘Oh shit,’ she moaned, feeling the world start to spin, feeling – in fact – extremely strange.

Gracie felt a biting wind on her face, on her sore forehead. What was she doing out here, outside in the cold and the wind and the . . . the front of her clothes were wet, icy.

It was just a nightmare. He was a bloody nightmare, always had been, that was for sure.

‘You’re a bloody nightmare,’ she slurred out. ‘Leave me ’lone.’

‘Come on, Gracie. One foot in front of the other, that’s the way.’ She was being propelled somewhere, and now someone was yanking at her bag, and what was she doing with a bag if this was a dream? ‘Jesus, you couldn’t be a dainty little woman, could you?’ he was complaining loudly right by her ear. ‘Six feet of flaming trouble, that’s you. Where the fuck’s the key . . .?’

Gracie could hear him pillaging her bag, finding . . . oh yes, now they were half walking, half falling through the outer door into the hall. No wind now. All gone. She closed her eyes, started to crumple again.

‘Hold up, Gracie. Come on.’ And something hard was hitting her mid-section. She groaned, thought for a moment she was going to throw up, but it was a dream, you didn’t hurl in dreams. And then – and this was horrible – she could still feel that hideous pressure on her guts and she could see the stairs swaying beneath her.

Gracie closed her eyes. Oh she was going to be sick, no doubt about it.

What the hell was going on?

Somehow they were on the top landing. She could hear the key scraping against the lock, could hear Lorcan swearing his head off as he tried to get the thing in there. He got it in. He was carrying her somehow. Fireman’s lift? And now they fell forward into the hallway, both of them, just tumbled on to the hall floor, Gracie feeling like rubber, like soft floating swansdown, and maybe now he would just let her go back to sleep . . .

‘Let’s have a look at you,’ he was saying.

What the hell for?

Something touched her forehead. She yelped. Opened her eyes and saw Lorcan leaning over her. ‘You prick,’ she said with feeling.

‘Sore, uh?’ He held up a finger and Gracie thought that if she’d had the strength she’d have bitten it right off. ‘Can you see this? How many fingers am I holding up?’

‘Ten,’ groaned Gracie, wishing he’d fuck off.

‘Gracie . . .’

‘One.’

Now he was moving his finger back and forth. ‘Just follow it with your eyes, how does that feel, do you feel okay?’

Gracie traced the finger’s progress with her eyes. ‘Oh, I feel just great,’ she moaned.

‘You’re freezing cold. Gotta get you warmed up,’ he said, and there he went again, pulling her to her feet like she was a sack of spuds.

‘No, no! Just let me lie here, I’ll be fine,’ complained Gracie.

‘You heard about hypothermia, Gracie? You lie down in the snow and you go to sleep, and then you die. You are terribly, terribly cold. Now come on.’

He was pushing her through into the bathroom, turning on the walk-in shower. Holding his hand under it. Tweaking up the heat. Oh. No. He wasn’t going to. Was he? No. Not even he would be that crazy. She was fully dressed. She felt her eyes closing again, in the steamy heat of the room. She just wanted to sleep, couldn’t he get that through his thick head?

And then she felt him pushing her, pulling her.

‘Jesus, Gracie, I’ve felt blocks of concrete more movable than you,’ he gasped out, and then she gasped, because she was getting soaked, the shower, she was in the shower, she was getting wet through, what the fuck was he playing at now?

‘Argh!’ she shouted. ‘Oh you fucker.’

She’d been so comfy. So warm, just drifting . . . and now she was getting wet. Soaking wet. Her eyes flicked open and there he was. Fucking Lorcan Connolly.

And now . . . now she was aware that her skin was cold. Very, very cold. The hot water was hitting her face, but she could only feel the moisture, not the heat. And now . . . now he was unbuttoning her coat, pulling the sleeves down her arms, throwing it on to the bathroom floor.

‘Ohhh,’ moaned Gracie. What was he torturing her for? All right, she might be a hyper-ambitious cow, but that didn’t warrant this sort of treatment, did it?

He was pulling her polo-neck jumper over her head now, that was going to be ruined – then he was kneeling, the water raining down on his head and slicking his hair into a sheen of black. He was pulling at her ankle boots, then he got busy at her waist, unbuttoning and unzipping her jeans, holding her upright with one hand while yanking them off with the other. Her socks followed.

‘Ow,’ yelled Gracie, because she was starting to feel the heat of the water. She looked down. Her skin – oh fuck – it was turning bright lobster-red, and the circulation that had been so deadened by the icy cold outside was coming back to life and it was agony.

‘Feeling that, huh? That’s good,’ he said. He straightened up and started rubbing his hands over the cringing skin of her arms.

‘Ow! Don’t do that!’

‘How’s your head?’

‘Absolutely. Bloody. Great. You arse.’

‘Think you need to go to A & E?’

‘No I fucking-well don’t. But trust me, you keep doing that, you will.’

‘Not feeling sleepy now?’

Sleepy? How the hell could anyone sleep under these con ditions? Pins and needles were crawling all over her body, like an army of ants was under there, their little legs dancing around. It was horrible.

‘Uh. Hurts,’ she groaned.

‘That’s good. It’s meant to. If it didn’t, you might be losing fingers or toes to frostbite . . . How are your fingers and toes?’ he said, and now he was rubbing her fingers – oh, the pain.

‘You sadistic bastard, will you stop that?’

She was gritting her teeth but they were still chattering. She could hardly get the words out. But . . . the pins and needles were a little less painful now. She was starting to feel . . . warm. Her head was throbbing horribly but,