Easy As Falling In A Lake.
by: Bonzi translated from the Miaowish by Angharad.
part:313

Over the next few days, Stella, made a good recovery. Henry, took things in hand and as soon as she was physically strong enough, she was going to go to an exclusive clinic in the countryside near Hastings.

As you can imagine, Stella, was not best pleased but given that it was her father who was making the arrangements, she agreed to accept them. However, she bent my ear at every opportunity.

"I can't believe I have to go to this nut house in Hastings."

"It isn't a nut house, it's a private clinic."

"That's just a euphemism for a place they send druggie pop stars, anorexic models and alcoholic actors and politicians."

"You should be well entertained then."

"Nah, I won't. It's all private room stuff, so as to preserve anonymity."

"You mean like solitary confinement?" I asked aghast.

"Yeah, maybe I can invoke the Geneva convention."

"I think that only applies to the military, I also think they would permit some of it, but then I'm not a human rights lawyer."

"Pity, you might have been able to get a reduction of sentence," she said frowning.

"Stella, the length of time you'll be there will depend upon how quickly you recover from your traumatic stress thingy."

"Post Traumatic Stress Disorder or PTSD, you mean?"

"That's the one. As far as I know, dormice aren't particularly prone to it."

"Thank you, Doctor Dormouse."

I shrugged, "You're welcome." A moment later she hit me on the forehead with a grape.

"I thought they'd stopped using grapeshot," I quipped.

"Next time it'll be grapefruit shot," she laughed juggling with an orange.

"Eek, 'cannons to the right of them, cannons to the left of them volleyed and thundered' Ooph!" She lobbed the orange and hit me right in the middle of me Tennyson.

"I don't remember the 'Ooph' in the poem," she said laughing.

"Did you know that the Victoria Cross is made from metal taken from Russian guns captured in the Crimean War?"

"No, I didn't. What happens when they run out?"

"I don't know, I'm a scientist, I count dormice, how should I know anything?"

"I thought scientists knew everything, you know that Dawkins bloke seems to."

"Ah well he's a professor at Oxford, I'm a thicko at Portsmouth."

"Tom's a professor," said Stella as if I needed reminding.

"Goodness, I didn't realise that," I said with sarcasm and got hit by another grape.

"I could have gone for a ride on my bike instead of having you throw fruit at me as if I were in the pillory."

"You did get a ride, you rode here didn't you?"

The fact that I was wearing cycling gear and carrying a helmet suggested she may have noticed. I put the helmet on to protect me from falling fruit.

"The nurses are not going to like you," I said.

"Why's that?"

"Because there's fruit all over the floor."

"I'll tell them you were throwing it at me."

"That would be lying, Stella, a deliberate deception."

"Absolutely," she said as another grape pinged off my helmet. She laughed and said, "If I get one to jam in the airholes in the helmet do I get double points?"

"Your father must have had great influence over Millfield," I said profoundly.

"He did, why?"

"Well I can get an impression of why they wanted to expel you twice a week."

"Nah, we used to make stink bombs in chemistry and throw those, not fruit."

"I suspect you're only throwing fruit because you don't have access to hydrogen sulphide, these days."

"Am I that transparent?" she asked innocently.

"Only to a know-it-all scientist," I said and we both laughed. "I shall miss you," I offered.

"Yeah, and with a sentence of being detained at Her Majesty's pleasure, I could be there for years."

"I doubt it, I can't see Henry spending that much, even for his precious daughter."

"So it's Broadmoor* then," Stella shrugged.

"Yeah, but not for a week or two," I pretended to reassure her.

"Oh well that's alright then," she said and threw another grape at my helmet.

"I have to go," I said at last, the last being the final grape thrown at me.

"You don't, do you?"

"Stella, if I didn't mean it I wouldn't have said it."

"Why, other people do, all the time."

"I'm not other people," I said and rose to pull on my jacket.

"No Tom keeps saying you're special."

"Tom can be mistaken."

"Nah, he's a professor."

"Of mammalian biology, not philosophy."

"Trust you to bring it down to the mundane again."

"I'm a scientist, remember?"

I ran out of the room as an orange thudded against the wall.

* Broadmoor, is a secure psychiatric unit run jointly by the Dept of Health and the Home Office, it houses several 'criminally insane' inmates.