It had been a busy forty-eight hours. Patsy had left on Friday afternoon, safe in the knowledge she would probably never hear from Deirdre again after her conversation with Karen. Before she left, Laura set up an email address for her, and accompanied her to the Vodaphone shop to buy a mobile phone and set up a contract. That meant Patsy could not only call if she had any more problems, but access the internet until she organised Wi-Fi at her new apartment in Bristol.

     After the raucous party eventually spilled out of the dining room on Saturday night, and the fifteen guests who weren’t staying in the hotel said their goodbyes, Laura let out a sigh of relief. Their first big function since taking over the hotel, it had all gone incredibly smoothly.

     'Didn't we do well!' Karen declared when she and Michelle came through to the reception area before going home.

    They certainly did. The buffet for thirty-seven people had been a great success, as had the sit-down meal for twenty the night before. The bar takings were spectacular as well. All in all, it had been a very profitable weekend, and one Laura hoped would be repeated on a regular basis.

     After Karen and Michelle left, Carl, the guy who booked the Bedford for his birthday celebration, came over and asked Laura if she would care to join him and his remaining friends for a drink. Under normal circumstances, she would have declined, not being one to fraternise with the guests, but the idea of going up to her flat on the top floor and drinking a lonely glass of wine held no appeal, especially when Carl’s guests seemed to be such a friendly crowd. Why not? The front doors were locked, and Dominic, the barman, was perfectly capable of running things from here on in.

     ‘I’d love to…’ she told him. ‘I’ll just clear the reception desk, and then I’ll be over.’

     After Carl asked her what she wanted to drink, Laura took the phone and registration book through to the office. It had been a long day, and chilling-out was just what the doctor ordered...


   
    
Laura felt most peculiar. In fact, she could honestly say she had never felt more peculiar in her life. The two draws on the joint Carl had offered her had rendered the bottom part of her body useless. As everyone chatted and laughed around her, Laura felt her world deteriorate into uncontrollable chaos.

     How did this come about? Well, it all made perfect sense at the time. After Carl was given a box containing several 'special' reefers as a birthday present, he asked Laura if he could light one. Of course, under normal circumstances that wouldn’t be possible because smoking in a public place was banned, but as Carl pointed out, the residents’ lounge was no longer a public place because it contained only him and his friends, and the front doors were locked. In a moment of madness, Laura agreed. The way she saw it, his £3,000 deposit for the weekend entitled him to ask for a few favours beyond the norm.

     After he lit it, and took a long draw, he offered the joint to Laura. Naturally, she refused, but after she watched the effect it had on him and his friends, she decided to give it a go. Surely one puff wouldn’t do any harm? As she understood it, marijuana made people unwind. Was that such a bad thing? Laura could do with relaxing for a change, especially after all the stress of the last few weeks. After deciding that the first draw didn't have any effect, she succumbed to another. Big mistake. The problem she had now was the fact that she didn’t feel relaxed at all. Having never smoked marijuana in her life, her limbs, along with her speech, had taken on a life of their own.

     ‘I really must get to bed,’ is what she meant to say, but it came out as ‘I weely must wet the bed,’ instead. Not that anyone seemed to notice. Carl’s guests, who had consumed copious amounts of alcohol all evening, seemed to be having a problem getting their words out as well, especially after a fifth joint was lit and passed around.

    ‘This is really good shit, man,’ the blond, weightlifter type to the left of Carl drawled after he’d taken a couple of draws and settled back in his chair with a Cheshire-cat grin. Laura tried to imitate his stance, but only ended up sliding down the chair until her shoulders were nearly where her arse had been two seconds before. Now she was down there, she couldn’t work out for the life of her how she could slide back up to her original position.

     ‘Help!’ she mouthed to Igor when he came through from the kitchen to get a cold beer from the bar before going to bed. He stopped in his tracks for a second and, after twitching his nostrils at the smell of marijuana, assumed Laura was a willing participant. What he couldn’t understand was what she wanted help with. Did she require an excuse to leave the party?

     ‘I need you in the kitchen, Boss,’ he called out after he decided he’d worked it out correctly.

     Good try. If Laura could make her legs work, she would have been there in a flash. By this time she was physically trying to lift one of her legs with her hands in the hope she could activate it sufficiently to push herself back up to a sitting position. It was only then that Igor realised what the problem was, so shot over to Laura's side.

     ‘You need help, Boss?’ he asked when he bent down beside her.

     Laura looked up at him and tried to focus. ‘My bloody legs don't work,’ she slurred. 

     It was at this point Igor was pleased he not only swam every day when he went for a shower, but had taken advantage of the gym at the swimming baths as well. Before she knew what was happening, Igor put a hand under each armpit, raised Laura to a standing position, and looped her left arm around his shoulder. With his right arm grasped firmly around her waist, he lifted her off the ground, her dangling legs offering no impediment to the journey through to the dining room. Once there, he lowered her onto one of the chairs. Unfortunately, Laura ended up sliding off it and landing in an ungainly heap on the floor.

     ‘Oh, God,’ she moaned as she looked up at him with glazed eyes. ‘I feel horrible…’

     Igor scratched his head as he tried to work out what to do next. There was no way he could carry Laura up the three flights of stairs to her flat, whatever weight she was. He knew from his own experience, when he first tried marijuana in his younger days, that a good sleep was probably all she needed.

      ‘I be back in minute!’ he told her, before running to the dry store and pulling out his secreted mattress from behind the stack of chairs in the corner. Laura’s need was greater than his, and if he had to sleep on the floor for one night, then so be it.

     As soon as he positioned the mattress on the floor beside her, Laura rolled onto it, curled up in a fetal position, and fell fast asleep…