Wuthering Dormice (aka Bike) Part 718 by Angharad

“I’ll see you back up in the room,” Stella waved to the girls and left to go and change.

“Mummeeeeeeee,” squealed three voices and the echoes and reverberations within the pool area were deafening. They all seemed to have a bell on each tooth. That was an expression my mother used to say, I thought of her for a moment and of myself filling out a swimming cozzie, I don’t know if she’d have been proud or ashamed of me.

The instructor withdrew discreetly and I helped the three little catfish out of the pool, then we all went to a cubicle to change. I towel dried them all, then dressed them and then they waited while I did the same myself. Back to our room and we all showered and I repeated the process of drying, this time using a hair drier on all our hair.

I explained that I had to go out to dinner this evening, and then had to deal with the complaints and tears. When I explained that it might help with any future intentions of adoption, they were less against my departure.

Stella appeared with a green silk creation, which fitted me perfectly. She was disgusted –“Fits you better than me, you bitch!” she said pretending to storm off much to the amusement of our audience. Then we all fell about laughing.

“That dress is really pretty, Mummy,” said Trish, “it feels so silky,” she stroked the dress, “umm it’s nice.”

“It feels silky because it is silk, Shantung silk,” said Stella.

“That looks lovely on you, Stella,” I said and meant it. She had on a beautiful turquoise mid calf length dress. Her eyes danced and she did a twirl to reveal it was scooped very low at the back.

“You both wook vewy pwetty,” said Mima and we both bobbed her a curtsey, which made her giggle.

I changed back into jeans and tee-shirt and Stella trimmed my hair and shoved a few rollers in it to hold the ends under when it was brushed out. We sent for some food for the girls: they wanted pizza and ice cream for pudding.

At seven, they sat around watching us get ready, doing our makeup and combing out our hair. Trish had a go at doing something with Mima’s hair and then Livvie had a go at putting rollers in Trish’s hair. Stella showed her how to do it, and she caught on more quickly than I would have done.

Finally, we pulled on the dresses and thankfully I had a small bag and some tidy black shoes with me. We rang for the baby-sitter and while she was on her way, we got them all into their pyjamas.

We left after the girl had arrived, and after making them promise to behave. We also told the girls and the baby-sitter, that they had to be in bed as soon as the DVD they were watching finished. They all grumbled – the girls that is – but agreed. Stella showed the young woman where Puddin’s bottle was and the warmer and we made our way to the lift.

“It feels quite good to be eating here again,” Stella said as we waited for the lift.

“I don’t know, I’ll be on tenterhooks until we get back. I don’t like leaving the girls with strangers.”

“Cathy, the girls they use have been trained, they know where you will be; you can be back up here in minutes, and they have all been vetted by the CRB.”

“CR–who?” I spluttered.

“The Criminal Records Bureau.”

“Of course, I’d forgotten.”

“Here’s our lift.” The doors opened and we stepped in to be taken down to the ground floor and the Green Dining Room. A short walk and we were into the room and being escorted to the appropriate table by a waiter in smart white shirt and black trousers and waistcoat.

“Ah, Cathy and Lady Stella, was that you at the pool earlier?” Our host welcomed us, we received pecks on the cheek and then were introduced to Lady Rowena.

“We met before, I remember thinking how attractive you were then, young lady, you’ve blossomed even more since then.” Lady Rowena made me blush. “And Lady Stella, beautiful as always, nice to see you again.” We embraced in turn and air kissed.

“This is my son in law, Robert, and his wife our daughter, Ellen.” We shook hands and took our seats at the table. The evening was rather good after Stella insisted we stop the titles bit and just use first names. Everyone agreed and it made conversation much easier. The food was excellent, although I felt too nervous to have much appetite which possibly wasn’t a bad thing, I felt I could do with losing some weight.

It turned out that Robert was into the TdF so we spent some time discussing it and he told me he’d just heard that one of the stage winners had failed a doping test. He couldn’t remember who it was, except it was some Spanish rider and they’d found EPO in his sample from a test before the tour. I grumbled that most of the dopers seemed to be Spanish or Italian and he agreed. As we were sat opposite each other, the others had to humour us at times, especially when we got a trifle excited in our discussion and people from an adjacent table seemed to be listening, much to Rowena’s discomfort.

After finishing the food part, we were relaxing with a glass of wine and coffee was being poured, when Reg raised the subject of my children. Robert listened politely before telling his father in law he couldn’t get involved. However, he did explain what I had to do with the two local children, in applying for an adoption order. He wasn’t sure about the situation with Livvie, because of the Scottish element of the case. Stella seemed to think that Henry would be able to find out for us.

On the way back up in the lift, Stella seemed to think it was all very positive.

“How can you say that, Stella? The man wasn’t able to help, which I understand, it would be unprofessional.”

“He won’t get involved, but he also won’t be an obstacle. He as good as said he thought you were a very brave woman and probably would make an excellent mother. The court stuff too, seemed to impress him.”

“I don’t know, Stella, we’ll have to wait and see. Anyway, thanks for the loan of the dress, I’ll get it cleaned for you.”

“Why? What have you spilt down it?”

“Oh, um beetroot, red wine, egg, gravy, more red wine–can’t remember anything else.”

“Cathy, you're a liar, I can see the dress which looks so much better on you, so you’d better keep it.”

“I can’t, it’s a Stella McCartney dress.”

“So? It looks better on you than it would on her.”

“But it cost a fortune?”

“That was last week. It’s second hand now, so only worth a few pence. Just don’t tell anyone you got it from me or from a charity shop.”

We relieved the baby-sitter, who was sitting reading some book in what looked like Polish. I tipped her, but she refused it. “Take it, you’ve earned it.” I pushed the tenner into her hand.

“Please, just tell manager, I do good job, okay.”

“I won’t unless you take this, I pushed it back into her hand.”

“I not supposed to take tips or gratuities.”

“I’m not supposed to leave my children with complete strangers.”

“Thank you so much,” she said and pocketed the money.

“Thank you,” I said and saw her out of the room.

I kissed Stella goodnight, went to my own bedroom and took off the dress and my undies and slipped into my own jammies, then took off my makeup and cleaned my teeth. In two minutes I was in bed, just in time for Simon to call.

The phone made me jump about a foot off the mattress and I grabbed it to stop it waking the girls.

“Hi, Babes, sorry I couldn’t get there; still Tom and I had a curry delivered from that new Indian restaurant, it was good stuff.”

“Has anyone been from the press?”

“Not yet, but the grapevine tells me they were prowling around the university.”

“Why?”

“You tell me.” We chatted a bit longer and then I yawned and told him I needed my beauty sleep. He laughed and we said goodnight. It was after midnight when I eventually put down the Guardian crossword and switched off the light.

The Killer Kitten would like to know what you thought of his latest effort, his Returning Officer would like to count your votes.