Soon after my last post, something unexpected happened: the Gentleman Friend was suddenly struck down by excruciating pain on his back, in the places where he had been sunburnt during the weekend’s surfing. It was clearly agonising. I looked it up online, and (it seems reasonable to diagnose this particular ailment on the internet) it appears to be a rare reaction to sunburn, occurring a couple of days after the original burn and feeling like one is one fire inside one’s own skin. The colloquial term for it is hell’s itching, and it seems nightmarish, with nothing to do but to wait the couple of days it normally takes to recover.
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