Wuthering Dormice (aka Bike) Part 673 by Angharad

Petunia’s greenfly turned out to be pig flu, so the school was closed by the local authority. There was total mayhem the next morning as we’d left before the school phoned. Some other mothers were also there and the discussions were heated. I stayed on the periphery and nodded to the head mistress as she approached the angry mothers, some of whom would now have to take time off work. In that regard I was lucky. However, I wasn’t sure how lucky we’d be about avoiding the newly classified pandemic.

I felt most worried about Stella and Puddin’ as they were likely to be most at risk. I decided I’d take the kids to Bristol for the interim. If they didn’t start sneezing or growing curly tails for a few days, we were probably okay.

I phoned Simon and told him what we were going to do, he wasn’t too pleased. Stella thought it was highly improbable that she’d caught the flu bug or that the children had either. Tom was in work and I thought I’d leave him a note.

I had decided, and packed as many clothes and toys as I could squeeze into my car. Even with the roof rack, I couldn’t take them all. I did manage the two girl’s bikes and Mima’s push chair. They were actually tied on to my bike rack—okay, I took the Specialized with me, though I couldn’t see how I’d be able to find time to ride it.

I packed the kids next. What was I doing? Three children on my own–I’d be a basket case in a couple of days, and they’d all be beaten to death. Maybe this wasn’t such a good idea after all? Too late now, they were all excited about seeing my house in Bristol. I packed even more stuff inside the car, soft stuff that would protect rather than ricochet around the car in the event of an impact. Then we left.

The journey was quicker than usual–perhaps I was meant to go home? The children rushed about the place as soon as I opened the door and then they were squabbling about whose bedroom was whose? We solved that problem. All the girls would sleep in the spare room, in sleeping bags. They thought it was going to be an adventure–it now seemed more like an ill thought out nightmare to me.

Once we’d unloaded the car–how did I get that much in in the first place?–I decided we’d get the shopping over. Three of them on my own in Asda? Not good policy. At one point I did think of buying three toddler harnesses and linking them to the front of the trolley, like a dog team. “Go to meat and poultry, mush!” It was certainly a happier scenario than the three of them running amok–“No you can’t have one, put it back,” and words to that effect.

I took them into the cafeteria and got them each a drink, while I had a cuppa. I read the riot act. “Now look, you three have done nothing but run about and generally misbehave ever since we got here. I know you don’t like shopping–neither do I–but we need to do some or we won’t have any food. I was going to buy you some treats, but frankly you don’t deserve any. I’m ashamed of the three of you. If you don’t behave, I shall take you home and you’ll all go to bed without any food until tomorrow. Is that clear?”

“Yes, Mummy,” was murmured back at me. The woman on the next table was killing herself laughing at my plight. I could almost feel her saying, “Stupid single parent, that’ll teach her to have three children, all by different fathers, no doubt.” In some ways I wished she had, then I could have told her she was correct, they are all by different fathers, oh and different mothers, too.

We moved on, paid for the groceries and the girls were much better behaved. We filled up with fuel, too, at the supermarket, it was slightly cheaper although the trend was upwards. Did they increase the fuel tax recently?

Back at my house, they helped me unload and finally, I allowed them to go and play. Because it’s a cul de sac, they were delighted to be able to ride their bikes on the pavement and even the road–Trish and Livvie were becoming a little too adventurous. I called at them to be careful, but it fell on stony ground–the problem was, so did Trish. She hit the kerb and fell off, grazing her hand, knee and elbow. She came wailing into the house.

It was going to be a long few days. I patched her up with Bandaids and Elastoplast and she went back out and seemed just as reckless as before. Livvie was no better and it only seemed a matter of time before she came a cropper too.

I made sandwiches for lunch, we’d have a Bolognese for supper, it was quick and easy, if a little messy for them to eat. I set up the breadmaker, it was still working, and at least later we’d have some new made bread. Meanwhile, we’d have to cope with the sliced loaf I’d bought earlier.

I made a temporary cot for Mima’s dolls out of a couple of shoe boxes, and she made a beeline for my Paddington Bear. He was about the only thing I managed to save from my car when it caught fire on the motorway.

“Can I pway wiv him, Mummy?”

“No, darling, he isn’t a toy.”

“He’s a teddy beaw, Mummy.”

“Daddy Simon bought him for me when we first went out together.”

“I want him,” she said angrily.

“I said, no. It means no, so you can want all you like, you won’t have it.” She sulked after that and I had some space for the rest of the afternoon. A bit later, I was carrying stuff up to my bedroom and Paddington was gone. I found him tucked into her bed, still wearing his sou’wester and wellies. I felt very cross but instead of fomenting the problem, I put the bear into my wardrobe and locked it.

At bedtime, Mima acted very strangely. She was trying to stop me noticing about my bear. Then she had a shock, it wasn’t in her bed. She went absolutely frantic searching the house for him before I realised what she was doing.

“What are you doing?” I asked Mima. She shrugged her arms and kept searching the house. When I grabbed her and demanded to know what she was doing she told me. I then informed her, Paddington wasn’t a toy and that I had put him safe. She cried and demanded I give him back to her.

“It wasn’t yours in the first place, you took it from me, that’s stealing, especially as I asked you not to.” She responded with a wobbly and I sent her to bed, checking on her ten minutes later–she was fast asleep. I began to wonder if she did have the flu.

She seemed to sleep through tea, even though I went up to wake her myself. She had no temperature and I couldn’t think what was wrong with her. I left her a bit longer and the next thing I knew, she was back down and bouncing around like Tigger. I had kept her some food in the oven, and she ate it like there was no tomorrow. I was so pleased that she hadn’t got any of the Bolognese sauce on her clothes when she managed to catch the plate as she left the table and it smeared all over her top and shorts.

The older girls decided to play with my mother’s old make up, even painting each other’s nails as well as the dressing-table top. When I found them, I could have murdered them. By the time I’d cleaned them up, Mima was missing.

We found her ten minutes later walking her dolly up and down the road in a pushchair. Despite wanting to terminate her existence, I realised how worried I’d been. Much more of this and I’d be taking them back to Portsmouth whether or not they had swine flu. Maybe they did, they were all behaving like little swines.

I slept badly, worrying about them. They all seemed to be asleep as soon as they got into their sleeping bags. I had horrible dreams of losing them and them all turning into pigs and while I tried to argue that they didn’t have pig flu. At the time it was awful, in the morning it seemed rather silly.

They breakfasted on cereal and toast, and I took them around Bristol. They seemed genuinely excited and I took them over Brunel’s bridge or the Clifton suspension bridge, to give it its full name. They seemed quite in awe of it and Mima was too frightened to walk across it without holding my hand.

That night seemed okay, then on Sunday, I took them to Bristol Zoo, hoping to trade them in for something less trouble, a baby gorilla would have been a decent swap, but they were fresh out of them.

I visited the polar bears, where years ago I’d watched a polar bear walk three paces forward and three back for half an hour. He did it so often, there were steps worn in the concrete of their enclosure. I remember suggesting that he was mentally ill, they are supposed to roam over hundreds of square miles hunting seals and anything else small enough to kill and eat. I learned later a vet agreed with my diagnosis and the poor creature was put down.

The girls enjoyed the zoo and I must admit, so did I. We all slept well that night.