The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2581 by Angharad Copyright© 2015 Angharad

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This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
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As nothing had happened in front of five or six thousand witnesses, I began to relax. I was also on a high, my daughter had not only managed to get herself selected for the highest levels of her sport—for her age group—but had excelled at her first attempt, showing a competence and maturity far beyond her years.

At the end of the game after all the players had shaken each others’ hands they all applauded Danielle off the pitch to much noise from the crowd who obviously agreed with them. It was an outstanding debut, and while it didn’t guarantee she’d ever perform like it again, it would draw attention to her in footballing circles and some of it would probably be less than welcome.

That she had scored with the overhead scissors—one of the most spectacular moves in soccer—which very few players use successfully, marked her out as something special. It did in her previous life. Loads of kids try it, very few have the balance and timing to pull it off. I’d seen her do it before three times and it still mesmerised me. On the negative side, because it’s quite an unusual move, it tends to mark its performers in the minds of observers. It was Danny Maiden’s trick. He no longer existed. It appeared to be that of Danielle Cameron, who does exist. I just hoped not too many people would put two and two together and make life difficult. We’ve done the story that she pretended to be a boy to get a game—anyone with half a functioning brain cell wouldn’t believe that for very long, unless they felt they were intruding on very personal details and thus backed off, which I respect.

Instead, we’re more likely to be pursued by tabloids once they have it dumped in their laps. Because we’re talking of a boy playing in a girl’s game, they might be interested. If it were a girl playing in a boy’s game, it would be a five minute wonder and everyone would praise her for her skills and so on. Because it’s the other way round, they could accuse her of cheating of being unable to compete at a boy’s level, so moving down to the girl’s one.

We all know it isn’t true, we also know that no one has the right to insist on knowing why she’s playing as a girl, that’s Danni’s business. She’s also a minor, so if details were leaked, I’d do everything I could to spike any story and sue anyone who tried or succeeded in going ahead with publishing it.

Finally, she changed over more than a year ago so meets the criteria adopted by the FA for transgender players to be accorded legal status, obviously to try and prevent any advantage a more powerful male body would have in playing against females. At her age, she wouldn’t have been that much more powerful and her injuries following Pia’s assault on her would reduce to negligible proportions the amount of testosterone her body now produced. I wouldn’t be surprised if some of the girls playing today had more T stuff than she did.

Theoretically, she should be more or less protected from all this, but only a fool believes in total security, there is always something that could have been better and somebody who smells money and is prepared to try anything for it. If they did, I would be prepared to spend large sums to make them regret it—but only as long as they lived.

It makes me sound a vindictive woman—I’m not—usually, only in defence of my children. In which case, threats which have been neutralised don’t return. All this was going through my head as I said I was going to collect Danielle and escort her to the bus for the trip home. Trish wanted to come with me but I managed to persuade her to go with the others. Escorting one was bad enough in the melee of bodies around the ground, especially as we didn’t know if there were hostiles present.

I set off towards the changing rooms, squeezing past people as they thronged the stair wells and corridors, generally clogging things up but in a very good natured way. Most had just seen their team win and they were suitably pleased.

I heard snippets of all sorts of conversations most of which were adoration for this new girl in the team and her awesome skills. In fact, I heard the word, ‘awsome’ used so many times, I lost count. Sadly, like so many other words it’s lost its true meaning. Like if I spill cereal all over the kitchen floor while getting breakfast, it’s catastrophic—duh! If we had an earthquake and half of Portsmouth was destroyed and hundreds of lives lost—that’s catastrophic. Because so many people are virtual illiterates, they don’t know what the real meanings of words are and so they’ve been cheapened, made worse by duplicitous advertisers, exaggerations by journalism, and general ignorance by the media. Like money today, words have little value to most people, so as they need huge sums to get by, they seem to need gross exaggeration to attract their interest—and they say people aren’t being dumbed down. They should take a look at the applications to universities for undergraduate courses—if you can’t express yourself adequately, and have no learning difficulty—you’re going to have problems getting a degree.

About ten minutes after leaving the others, I made it to the player’s area and was challenged by officials, which actually pleased me. I explained who I was and what I was there for. I was told to wait and someone went off to see about it. They came back a short time later. “The girls are being debriefed so she could be a little while yet.” I was actually surprised she was out of the showers yet, she takes ages at home and probably doubles the water rates.

I stood waiting while people wandered past and suddenly felt I was being watched. Bearing in mind I was wearing a jacket made from Union flag patterned material, I wasn’t exactly easy to miss, especially as the numbers of flag waving fans had now diminished more than a little.

The feeling was growing stronger and while I am sometimes wrong—don’t tell Simon—it doesn’t happen very often. I started trying to sneak glances in all directions, but no one I could see looked suspicious—except that wouldn’t mean they weren’t. Professional intelligence officers should blend into the background if they’re observing a target. Was that a Freudian slip--describing myself as a target? My phone buzzed and I answered it.

“Where are you, babes?”

“Waiting by the players’ area, the team is being debriefed apparently.”

“Sounds as if they all have cold bums afterwards,” Simon could always be relied upon to see the schoolboy joke in everything.

“I doubt it. I don’t know if it’s just me, but I feel like I’m being watched.”

“Want me to come over?”

“No, you stay with the others, Danni and I can run pretty fast if we need to.”

“Here, talk to Jim.” He passed the phone to James.

“Hi Cathy, everything okay?”

“I’ve got to wait for Danni. It feels as if I’m being watched but I can’t see anyone suspicious.”

“Be ready to run for it, I’ll get Chas to see if he can see anyone.”

“Thanks, Jim.”

“If there’s a problem try and make your way out to the car park and send us a panic call. Chas and I will try and get there as soon as we can.”

“I’m sure it’s just my imagination.”

“Mine has saved me a couple of times, never ignore it, be prepared to run at a moment’s notice.”

“I will.” I switched my phone back to standby and kept my finger on the panic button. Either I was paranoid or whatever was watching me was getting closer. I stood with my back to a wall with an overhanging cover and tried to act casual while surveying all around me as surreptitiously as I could.

For a moment I closed my eyes and scanned the area in my head using my mind’s eye. There was a mass of red to my left—either I was going crazy or the threat was getting closer. I saw two men in anoraks walking towards me trying to look unobtrusive. I stepped towards the players’ area said loudly, “There you are,” and walked inside, running down the corridor as soon as I got through the door. Just then Danielle appeared carrying her kitbag plus another bag.

“Hi Mum...”

“I grabbed one of the bags and her hand and said quietly, “Run for it,” as I heard footsteps behind us.