Although the forecast for the rest of the day was good, it had been a chilly start to the morning for Luke Grennan. He was working on a site in Edith Weston that week — as he had been the week before — and he knew he’d spend most of it looking forward to the weekend.
As well as it meaning he wouldn’t have to go to work, he and Sophie were going to a wedding fair at the NEC in Birmingham. It had been Sophie’s idea, of course, but he was very much looking forward to it. He wouldn’t tell any of the guys at work that, though. Not in a million years.
He took another long swig from his drink bottle before getting out of his car at the last possible moment whilst still being on time, and headed onto site. He’d been trying to take in a lot more water recently, in an attempt to feel better, look better and improve his mental health. He couldn’t stand drinking water itself, though. Too boring. Initially, he’d taken on most of his liquid through tea and coffee at work, but that stopped when he found a butt plug at the bottom of his cup of darjeeling. It’d been bad enough that they’d taken the piss out of his choice of drink in the first place, but using a buttplug to hammer home Luke wanting milk in it? Too much.
For now, it would have to be squashes, fruit juices and whatever else he’d managed to get hold of. After yesterday’s disaster at the supermarket, he’d had to grab a couple of bottles out of the fridge — some organic, artisan fruit juices Sophie had bought at a boutique health foods shop, no doubt hand-squeezed by a Rwandan mountain gorilla before being sieved through the underpants of a small orphan child. Still, if it made her feel better.
She’d been very clear she wanted to lose weight for the wedding, which was a concept that struck Luke as odd. He could well understand anyone wanting to lose weight in general, or even so their partner would find them more attractive, but he couldn’t quite get his head around her wanting to lose weight specifically for the one day everyone else had to see her. Still, he was sure he was probably looking at this in the wrong way, as he tended to do, and as Sophie tended to tell him he did.
‘Morning gay boy,’ Jonesy said as Luke got out of his car. He’d been working with Jonesy for over a year, and he still had no idea what his first name was. There was a good chance Jonesy didn’t, either.
‘Morning,’ Luke replied, his headache already starting to build, as it had been all morning. Stress, he told himself. Stress and anxiety.
Jonesy pointed to his drink bottle. ‘What you got in there? Spunk?’
‘Juice.’
‘Cock juice?’
‘No, just juice.’
‘Suit yourself. Gaz is upstairs. He wants to see you in private, apparently. He’s got a girlfriend, though, so don’t get too excited.’
‘I know. So have I.’
‘Yeah alright then.’
Luke put his drink bottle down on a table, then made his way towards the stairs and up to find Gaz. As he took the first few steps, he noticed his balance starting to wobble and his vision blurring slightly. His anxiety sometimes gave him odd symptoms, but nothing quite like this. Still, after yesterday’s panic attack and the pressure of coming in this morning, he knew he had to give himself a bit of leeway on that front.
He reached the top of the stairs and walked over to his boss. Gaz was one of the reasons he’d stuck with the job. Even though he was a bit of a pillock when he was with the rest of the boys on site, he knew when to tone it down and was professional enough on a one-to-one basis.
‘You alright?’ Gaz asked as Luke walked over. ‘You’re looking a bit pale.’
‘Yeah, I just feel a bit off this morning.’
‘Off?’
‘Yeah. Kinda sick.’
‘Late night?’
‘I wish. Probably just coming down with something.’
‘Do you need to go home? Might not be safe for you to be here if you’re feeling that bad.’
‘I’m alright. I’ll be fine.’
‘Mate, you’re sweating like a paedo in a playground. Don’t worry about the other lads. I’ll tell them I’ve sent you off to size up a new job or something. I won’t tell them you’ve gone off ill.’
Luke wished he could believe that. ‘Honestly, I’ll be alright in a minute. Jonesy said you wanted to see me about something. Seemed important.’
Gaz shook his head and chuckled. ‘He’s an absolute wind-up merchant. I didn’t say anything of the sort. I had a word with him yesterday about keeping his crap to a minimum when we’ve got other contractors and suits and stuff walking about, so he’s probably just getting it all out of his system now before they turn up.’
Luke felt his heart hammering in his chest as his vision began to narrow. Strange, he thought. It didn’t feel quite like the usual panic attack. In any case, this wouldn’t be the sort of thing to set one off. If anything, finding out Jonesy had wound him up again would usually make him angry or annoyed, but this time he felt… He didn’t know how he felt.
The only way he could have described it was that it felt like the world was turning in on him. His body felt like it was giving up. As he tried to make sense of it all, he heard the sound of steel-toe-capped boots jogging up the stairs, accompanied by Jonesy’s familiar snicker.
Before he’d even realised what was happening, Luke’s legs gave way and he fell forward.
Gaz’s reactions were quick, and he put out his arms to take Luke’s weight, lowering him slowly to the ground, before leaning across and putting him in the recovery position.
‘Christ alive, I didn’t know you were both at it!’ Jonesy said, his laugh becoming a bellow. ‘I leave you two alone for ten seconds…’
‘Will you pack it in?’ Gaz yelled back at him. ‘Make yourself useful for once, will you, and call an ambulance.’