The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2736 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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I felt tired the next morning, then remembered that Simon and I had a rather pointless and inane conversation about winkies. I shuddered before getting out of the bed and lumbering into the bathroom where I walked into the doorpost before making it to the loo.

After a shower, I got the girls up and while they were doing their ablutions, I finished dressing, including some makeup. “Ooh, where are you going, Mummy dear?” asked Livvie, “Looking so smart?”

“Just to work, why, sweetheart?”

“You look very smart this morning, that’s all?”

“Thank you, I’m glad someone noticed.”

“Huh? I seen it too, just didn’t say nuffin’.” Trish chuckled at her impression of some sort of ruffian—least, I hope that was what it was.

“You wook woverwy, Mummy,” I smiled back at Meems and thanked her for what I hope I understood she’d said. She chuckled too. I felt like I was surrounded by wicked pixies, especially when Cate got in on the act.

“So why the smart outfit?” asked Stella at breakfast but before I could reply she answered her own question. “Your new secretary starts today—that’s it, isn’t it?”

“Am I not allowed to wear something simply because I want to?”

“No, you’d be in jeans and tee shirts most of the time, knowing you—so spill the beans, Watts.”

“My mummy’s name is Camewon, Auntie Stewwa.”

“I think, Auntie Stella knows that, Meems, she’s just teasing me.”

“She still goes by Watts in the university, and as she’s supposed to be going there after dropping you lot off at the prison camp, I used her professional name, Mima.”

“Oh, awwight.”

I dropped them off and went to the university where Delia had a day off, so I was left to the tender mercies of my new secretary. So why do I feel probably more nervous than she does? I haven’t been in for a few days, so Delia had been emailing me work. I handed over a pile of papers to Diane and went to my office where I sat at the computer and powered it up. Two minutes later my door was knocked and Diane walked in with a cuppa and placed it on my desk. I told her I’d dumped a lot of stuff on her desk which included signed letters and some drafts for other letters.

In some ways I wrote a better letter when it wasn’t going to typed and regaled with officialdom, when the scratching of my Waterman on paper provided the only noise in my room save the ticking of the clock. I used to enjoy writing letters by hand, these days, except the odd personal note, I don’t have time to write letters that way, though I do try to sign them all in pen and where possible, when they’re going to people I know well, I like to write their name in pen at the top of the letter. It adds a personal touch which I think most people like.

With Diane being new she was naturally slower than Delia and I had to show her where one or two things were kept, if I knew that myself. Usually I left it to Delia or Pippa before her. Once we had to call Pippa because we couldn’t find a series of file and she explained where they were. I had no idea. The initial rush over, we had time for a cuppa and I produced a slightly battered packet of Welsh cakes from my computer bag and offered one to Diane.

She thanked me then said, “You look awfully familiar to me, professor.”

“I’ve made two films which have been shown several times on the BBC.”

“No it’s not them or the Youtube clip. I can’t think of where it was.”

“I did a summer school a year or two ago at UWE, perhaps you saw me then.”

“Perhaps—it was just the one wasn’t it?”

“Yeah, became too busy when the survey started to produce lots of data.”

“They still talk about it, you know?”

“What the survey?”

“No, Watts the summer school teacher.”

“Why?”

“Because it was so far out of the ordinary for most of them, way outside their comfort zone, that they enjoyed it.”

“Shouldn’t it have been the other way round?”

“No, you stirred them from their lethargy, into which your predecessor had allowed them to sink.”

“That’s a bit of an exaggeration, I’m sure.”

“It isn’t, professor, every year they’d ask if you were coming back or did you run summer courses anywhere else?”

“Why?”

“I was told that you were the most inspirational teacher any of them had ever met, it was you with the dormouse, wasn’t it?”

“Who else?”

“It was you at Bristol Grammar as well, wasn’t it?”

“I did a talk there a couple or so years ago, so probably.” I felt a trickle of sweat run down the back of my blouse.

“No, as a school kid there, it was you, wasn’t it?”

“I went there, yes, but I don’t remember you I’m afraid.”

“No but I remember you—I think—you were that girl who played Lady Macbeth, weren’t you?”

“Um—did you manage to find that file afterwards—the badger cull stuff?”

“You used to hang around with that strange Welsh girl, I’m sure it was you. Used to dress up like a boy sometimes—but you’re not gay are you—not with all those kids you have?”

“Diane, we’re not here to discuss my private life however confused you appear to have it, so please let’s get back to our work and perhaps we’ll get finished in time to have some lunch.” I spoke quite sharply because I felt she was intruding and these days no one has the right to do so. If she twigs completely, the next thing she’ll be asking if I’ve had surgery and can I have sex with a man.

She went bright red, “I’m sorry, got a bit carried away. It’s just I’ve been trying to work out where I saw you because I know I have. I’ll get back to that file.”

“Thank you.” She left my room and I knew it was only a matter of time before she either found stuff on the internet or spoke to someone, but I found it intrusive and no longer relative. It would be bad enough if she kept on about my maiden name before I was married, but with my sort of history, it’s bound to surface but now she knows what I think about it and it’s not up for discussion. That won’t stop her asking others and sooner or later she’d have her information it would be what she did with it that mattered.

It seems that badgers and transgender people never have a close season, there’s always some bar steward wanting to take a pop at us. Both of us should be protected but we never are.