The Weekly Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 3306 by Angharad Copyright© 2021 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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David's lamb casserole was delicious verging on heavenly, but that wouldn't prevent a second helping as verging on gluttony. Stella did but I had things to do for the office and it was easier if I stayed awake, which more food would have endangered. So with more resolve than my sister in law, I thanked David for a splendid repast and took a cuppa with me to my study.

I needed to look up when we had a meeting next week and casually flicked open my diary, it opened at the middle of July and my eye alighted on the sixteenth of that month, around which I had circle with the number 14 inside it. It was fourteen years on that day since I first met Stella and after her, Simon. When I think about what happened that afternoon and what was happening now, it felt like a lifetime ago. I suppose it is nearly, given that they count a generation as being about twenty years, unless you're a bacteria, then it's about twenty minutes. A virus can be even less than that.

I sat there in my reverie thinking about how life had changed and mine in particular and how a small group of people, friends and relatives had supported me through what had been a rather abrupt change of direction for me. I'd gone from a geek post grad student who tended to wear loose-fitting, if not almost shapeless clothing to disguise the changing shape of my body underneath it. Half the university thought I was a girl, I had long hair and a feminine face and voice, who was a bit strange or an even stranger boy who was either gay or really weird. I suppose it was bit of the girl in the feminised boy's body and that was happening before they gave me hormones.

I certainly saw myself as a girl and female but legally I was regarded as a man and male, that I was androgen insensitive meant I would never mature as a male because the dreaded T or testosterone, didn't affect or influence my body except in a very small way, probably about as much as a healthy, prepubescent female. It had caused me problems all my life but in many senses, those troubles were behind me and seeing as they were simply replaced by ever more complex ones, I wasn't sorry.

I glanced at the photo of Simon and I together at our wedding with all the girls surrounding us, all dressed up like the bridesmaids they all so badly wanted to be and which at their age, so did I, sadly I am now too old and I think I can probably cope with my disappointment these days. I have also decided that I no longer want to become a ballerina or a top model, the latter especially so when I learned most of them smoke and eat tissue paper to try and stop hunger pangs. After the meal I'd just eaten, I'd have lost any modelling contracts I had, unless it was for maternity wear.

I looked at the photo and I felt this warmth spread through me from my heart. Here captured on a piece of card were the most important people in my world, the man I fell in love with and who I still adore and all these young women who make me want to get up in the morning, sometimes to escape them, but mostly to be with them as their mother, a role I never thought I'd ever play and which had been both heartbreaking and heart-warming. Isn't that what happens when we give love to others, we take risks and make ourselves vulnerable and if we get it wrong it can be devastating, but when we get it right, it's the most wonderful thing in the world. We are emotional beings and that is what makes us human, not cleverness and skill, it's being able to love and be loved or sadly also to hate or be hated. At times I feel there may be more of the latter two than the former.

Being irrational is also something which is usually down to emotions, people who don't want the Covid vaccine, either deliberately or wilfully ignore the scientific evidence or prefer to believe a load of bunk that is proliferating on social media. Sometimes I think we'd be better off without the various sorts we have, although we all use Whatsapp amongst the family, except Daddy, who, "I've lived this lang wi'oot it, mebbe I can fa wee bittie langer." I admit I was reluctant to use it but all the older girls were and I had to to make sure I knew what they were up to, at least part of the time. I'm sure they use something else now for the stuff they don't want me to know about. Most of the girls older than about seven probably know more about phone apps than I do anyway. I mean, they do Zoom over their phones, I struggle with my laptop, though I have run some meetings via it and the world didn't disappear in a puff of smoke - just Diane's computer, it caught fire, but that's another story.

Oh, okay, the fan on her tower system failed and the safety cut out didn't. Hence loads of awful smoke and we had to get Sammi to remove the hard disc and copy it to the new machine. It was quicker than asking our IT department who seem to have longer waiting lists than the Tavistock Clinic does for trans children. See, it wasn't a big story, except at the time when the smoke alarm went off and we had two fire engines outside within ten minutes. Mind you the smell and smoke was awful, we both had funny throats for a few days after that, all the plastic I expect.

I was musing over all these when I suddenly felt I wasn't alone, it made a shiver run down my spine though when I turned to look, Mima was standing just outside my door, "What y'doin', Mummy?"

"I was just thinking about Daddy." I blushed putting the photo down.

"In he comin' home tonight?" she asked and I began to wonder why we paid all that money in school fees.

I glanced at the carriage clock on top of the fireplace, "Any time now, so I believe," she came and sat next to me and I put my arm around her and squeezed her .

"That'll be nice, won't it?"

"It will, sweetheart." We sat together for an uncomfortable couple of minutes.

"Um, Mummy?"

"Yes darling?"

"Did I do wrong in writin' to Janice like I did?"

"Why do you ask?"

"I got the impression you weren't exactly happy with me."

"Why was that? I don't remember saying anything about your email. You're a big girl now and able to make some of your own decisions."

"I don't know if I did, that's all."

"You were entitled to tell her to keep off your case, if that was how you felt."

"When I saw the email, I just felt angry. I mean she abandoned me, didn't she?"

"In some ways yes, but I don't think she did it lightly and considering how little time she had, she did quite well for you."

"Yeah, but she still dumped me, didn't she?"

"Yes, I'm afraid she did."

"An' I was lucky she dumped me on you and Daddy and Gramps."

"I like to think so, but I also feel very lucky that she did."

"Yeah, I suppose, so if she dumped me, why did she have to stir everything up now?" she climbed on to my lap and sobbed onto my shoulder, "Why did she have to come back?"

"Perhaps this was the first opportunity she had, to speak to you, or any of us."

"Why couldn't she stay dead?"

"But she isn't dead," I protested gently understanding of her anger.

"As bloody well good as, for all she's done for me, she might as well be." She burst into tears and I held her while she wept. "I'm a wicked girl, aren't I, Mummy? Will I go to hell?"

"Why is that?" I tried to keep it lighter, last thing I needed was a philosophical discussion on the nonsense of heavens and hells.

"Cause I'm a bad girl."

"I always thought you were a very nice girl."

"You know, when I drowned and you saved me, I saw myself in a very strange place, it felt light and dark at the same time and I saw you looking for me, you were with this angel lady and she helped you find me."

"You were very ill, Mima, when you're that ill your mind plays all sorts of tricks as if it's trying to work out what is happening to it. All sorts of chemicals are released and they can make you see and feel all sorts of weird things."

"I saw you, Mummy, you and this other lady, you were both like angels and you found me and held me and I felt you bringing me back to you, to life. I was dead, wasn't I, Mummy."

"I don't think so, darling, you were close, but you hadn't died and the blue light helped you, well helped me to help you."

"That comes from God, doesn't it?" she sniffed and I passed her a tissue.

"I don't know, sweetheart, all I know is it can sometimes help people get better and I'm eternally grateful that it helped you."

"So am I, Mummy, I'd hate to lose you."

"You're not going to, sweetheart., I promise."

"If I did, I'd die, I know I would." She began weeping again.

"I'm not going anywhere, I promise."

"Don't leave me, Mummy."

"I won't, sweetheart, neither you nor I are going anywhere, understand, I'm not going anywhere and neither are you."

"Okay, Mummy."

A moment later Simon popped his head round the door and I smiled at him, but he understood in a second blew me a kiss and went off to have his dinner. That's why I love that man, he is so understanding.

Mima eventually fell asleep and Simon came and lifted her off me and took her up to her bed, he talked quietly to her all the time and left me to undress her and tuck her in, she was exhausted and barely woke as I changed her into her pyjamas. We both kissed her and she sighed and smiled but turned over and went off to a deeper sleep. I'd have to warn the others not to disturb her when they came up.

"So the dreaded Janice emailed her?" he said when we got back downstairs.

"No she emailed me, I showed the email to Meems to ask her how she wanted me to respond to it."

"And?"

"She told me she would write back and effectively told her to take a running jump."

"That's my Meems," he chuckled pouring us each a glass of Merlot.

"Except now she thinks she might go to hell for doing so."

"Should we move them from the convent?"

"I think that sort of abomination is placed in them very young, I couldn't see Sister Maria saying such a thing, could you?"

"Now you point it out, no, but what about some of the old crones who used to teach there, Sister Vagina or whatever Trish calls her?"

I nearly snorted red wine everywhere, "Sister Virginia, I think you mean?"

"Trish's pronunciation is better," he said and chuckled again.

"I think we may have some separation issues to deal with, again."

"I think that's an understatement," he replied, "but I'll leave that to you, you're better at these things than I am."

"She loves you very much too, and I feel you need to be involved to show her that we won't abandon her, neither of us."

"Okay, okay, I'll do what I can, all right?"

"Thank you, darling, you are so good to us all," I said while snuggling up against him hoping he didn't see through my extra affection.

"Yes, I am, aren't I, what's in it for me?"

"You have a wife and a dozen daughters who love you to bits, what else could you want?"

"An hour alone with my wife and you know..."

Sometimes keeping all of them happy is like juggling plates, but so far I've managed it, well, most of the time. He got what he wanted last night, not that I was exactly averse to it, just that I was the one sore afterwards. Then again, the next day he made a special fuss of her and it was her who went off in his F-type when he had some paperwork to deliver to the local branch.

Oh, the others grumbled but I explained how Mima was hurting and they all agreed not to say anything but to be supportive of her, even the little ones who also know they're adopted, but that doesn't mean anything to them yet and I heard Danni explaining it to them a while back, "Look most kids just happen and they have to cope with the parents they get, our parents chose us, they actually wanted us to be their kids, and that is better than many of the girls I know in school who hate their parent's guts."

"You don't hate Mummy or Daddy, do you Danni?" asked Cate.

"No, dopy, I love them both loads, they're great parents, I couldn't have had better if I'd chosen them."

"I thought you did, Danni?" said Cate. At this point I left Danni to talk her way out of it and went and did some ironing.