Easy As Falling Off A Bike,
by Angharad
part 242.

"Cathy can you help me with this?" Lesley approached me with an open A4 binder.

"She's supposed to be on sick leave," shouted someone else.

"It's okay," I said. The problem was of biological distribution of a species and the pressures upon it. Stella went off to talk with Pippa. It took me about half an hour to help her sort out her difficulties.

"Where is Stella?" I asked returning to Pippa's office.

"She's gone."

"Gone! Gone where?"

"I don't know, what is this the Spanish Inquisition?"

Tempted to go into a Monty Python sketch, I hesitated before deciding it probably wouldn't be a good idea to go on about Cardinal Biggles.

"No, it's an English enquiry. She is my lift home."

"Doesn't Tom live there anymore then?"

"Stella's car is more comfy, remember I am still a bit tender in the nether regions."

"Oh yeah, I forgot," she smirked.

I gave her a hard Paddington stare, but she ignored it. I obviously need to practice it, Stella has it off to a tee.

"I take it you won't be riding your bike for a week or two then?"

"No I won't, but did I tell you Simon bought me a rather nice new one, a Specialized Ruby."

"I haven't seen you since Christmas, have I?"

"I suppose not. Yeah, he gave me a bike stand as well."

"What a stand to park your bike in, or one that you kick down when you leave it outside the Co-op?"

"No, my mistake, a workshop stand and loads of tools. You know one that means you can lift the bike off the ground to play with the gears and things, with a clamp on it."

"Oh I know, so you can turn the pedals without having to lift it yourself."

"That's the sort of thing."

"I suppose for a hardened bikie like yourself it's a nice prezzie, but I'd have killed him if he'd given it to me. Hardly, Calvin Klein is it?"

"No it's Park tools."

"Oh well that's okay then." She shook her head and I was well aware she had no idea who Park were.

"They make some of the best workshop equipment for bikes, there is."

"Well duh! As if I didn't already know that."

"Did you?"

"Course I didn't, I was being ironic or something."

"Something," I muttered under my breath.

"What?"

My phone gave the beep of a text message.

'Pic U up in 10.
Stella.'

Saved by the beep, I thought. I quickly texted back, 'Ok.' Sometimes I'm quite inspired in my communication skills. However, today wasn't one of them. My doodah was beginning to hurt from perching on the stools in the lab while I explained what Lesley had to do to complete her assignment. Thank God she wasn't stuck on the mathematics of biochem. I'm better at finding Talpa europaea than mini mols.

I wished Pippa a good afternoon and went to wait outside. It was cold standing around but I certainly wasn't going to sit down on the hard pavement.

Stella pulled up a few moments later. "You look tired."

"I am," I replied, then yawned. It was as if I only needed someone's permission to feel exhausted, which I did. I was nodding off before we got home.

"Cathy, we're there."

"Wwwwwwwhat?" I said trying to rouse myself.

"I think you need a little nap, girl."

"Affirmative," I said trudging to the door. I went straight up the stairs and to my bed. It felt very different to when Simon was there to cuddle with me. I need to get my Elvis, I thought to myself then giggled at my recollection of the conversation earlier.

It was dark when I awoke and I could smell cooking. I wondered if I'd gone to sleep in the wrong house, but I looked around my bedroom and it was the one I usually slept in. I sniffed again and could definitely smell the aroma of cooking food. Not only that, but it smelt good too. Surely Tom wasn't home yet because Stella is rather limited in her culinary abilities, at least as far as I know.

I dressed and went downstairs, Stella was in the kitchen singing to herself and pottering.

"Fancy a cuppa?" I said quite loudly and right behind her.

She jumped and shrieked, then turned around blushing and frowned at me. "I could have had a heart attack, sneaking up on me like that!"

"You have to have a heart first, and I didn't sneak up on you. You were making so much noise you didn't hear me. Wotcha doin'?"

"Making a casserole, from this." She pushed a slip of paper she'd cut out of a newspaper of magazine.

"Hmm, looks good and smells brilliant."

"Oh does it?"

"You know me Stella, I could make George Washington look like a habitual liar."

"He won't be president for much longer."

"George Washington not George Dubya."

"Yes."

"Stella, George Washington has been dead for two hundred years."

She looked at me as if she wasn't computing it.

"Oh, well who was I thinking of, then?"

"George Bush?"

"Oh yes, that's the one." She went back to her recipe and I went off to the conservatory and let Kiki out to the garden.

Tom came home and smelling the aroma said, "Hmm that smells good, Cathy."

"Doesn't it, but tell Stella she cooked it."

"Under your supervision?"

"No, I didn't know anything about it, I went for a nap and woke up to these lovely smells of lamb casserole."

"Amazing, so what has made Stella suddenly want to cook?"

"Some recipe she found in a magazine. At least I think that's what it was, you'll have to ask her. But if it tastes as good as it smells, I can't wait to eat some."

Tom declared his interest in her cooking project and Stella was suitably flattered. She'd seen the picture in a magazine, looked at the recipe and decided she could do it herself. She did and it tasted wonderful.

Now if only Simon can develop an interest in the laundry.....