should be quieter and we should all go back to sleep,’ Sumi answered in a monotonous tone I recognized all too well. ‘Ugh, what was that?’
‘The roof is leaking,’ I wailed as another giant droplet landed on my face. ‘I knew it!’
But the roof wasn’t just leaking, water was pouring in. At first, the drops turned into a trickle which turned into a steady stream, the gaps in the roof widening from minor cracks to gaping chasms until it was raining as hard inside as it was outside.
‘This isn’t good,’ I said, eyes on the ceiling as I felt around on the floor for my trainers. ‘We should get inside.’
‘But we are inside,’ Adrian protested, wiping a raindrop from his face.
‘Inside the house,’ I clarified, helping Lucy to her feet and shuffling a pair of flip-flops onto her feet. ‘Come on! We need to go before—’
A huge chunk of my white plastic ceiling crashed to the floor, right beside Sumi’s head.
‘I’m up, I’m up!’ she shrieked, rolling off the settee and onto the floor. Draping Lucy’s arm over my shoulder, I propped up my pregnant friend, Adrian waiting with my cagoule held over his head as another piece of ceiling tile cracked loudly and fell onto the bed, the heavens opening onto my mattress.
‘Grab the phones!’ Adrian screamed as Sumi unplugged her own from the wall charger. ‘No man left behind!’
‘I’ve got them, I’ve got them,’ she yelled, holding four black phones aloft and hoisting her enormous tote bag onto her shoulder.
We rushed across the garden as quickly as we could given the size of Lucy, the protection of the cagoule doing absolutely nothing for anyone. I half expected to see an ark sailing down the neighbour’s driveway at any minute.
‘For what it’s worth, I thought the shed was quite cute,’ Lucy said, looking back sadly as the rest of the roof gave up the ghost, and water rushed out the front door.
‘Was being the operative word in that sentence,’ Sumi replied, hammering down on the locked back door as loudly as she could. ‘Let us in!’
‘I’m coming, I’m coming,’ I heard Dad trill as he strolled through the kitchen with a steaming mug in his hand. ‘What’s the emergency?’
‘The emergency is the death trap you built for me just collapsed,’ I said, falling through the door, more puddle than person. I scraped my soaking hair back from my face to see Mum peering at us from the hallway, the cordless phone up to her ear.
‘My beautiful shed,’ Dad gasped, fingertips pressing lightly against the kitchen window. ‘My poor, beautiful shed.’
‘Your poor, wet-through daughter and her nearly concussed sodden friends,’ I corrected. Sumi began filling the kettle while Adrian sat Lucy at the kitchen table. I pulled four mugs out of the cupboard and popped a teabag in each. A proper brew, the answer to all of life’s crises. ‘We could have died, Dad. The roof collapsed onto the bed.’
‘It wouldn’t have killed you,’ he said sadly, watching as my waterlogged copy of Starting Over sailed downstream towards his alpine rockery. ‘Wasn’t heavy enough. Worst-case scenario would have been a broken leg.’
‘Thank goodness for that,’ I replied loudly, glaring at the back of his head as Mum walked into the kitchen, phone pressed to her chest, knuckles white around the handset. ‘I’m sure Lucy and her unborn child are relieved.’
‘Morning, Mrs Reynolds,’ Adrian said, pulling out a chair. She sank into it wordlessly. ‘We nearly died but everything’s fine now. You look radiant this morning …’
‘Nearly died,’ Dad scoffed under his breath before narrowing his eyes at my friend. ‘Adrian, did you fiddle with the roof?’
‘That was the tennis club on the phone,’ Mum said before Adrian could reply. Her face was ashen. ‘They’re completely flooded. They say there’s no way they can have it up and running again by this afternoon.’
I bit my lip as the kettle whistled.
‘That was fast,’ Adrian commented as Sumi poured out the water.
‘It’s a fast-boil kettle,’ Mum said, breaking into heaving sobs. ‘Alan got it last month.’
‘It’s OK.’ I rushed to my mum’s side, hugging her into my damp pyjamas and looking to everyone else in the room for reassurance. ‘It’s going to be OK. We’ll fix it somehow.’
‘But the ceremony is supposed to start at one,’ she choked. ‘Your Aunt Annette and Uncle David are already checked in at the Premier Travel Lodge. They’ll be furious if they’ve had a wasted trip.’
‘And our Kevin has set off to get Mum from the home,’