Wuthering Dormice (aka Bike) Part 763 by Angharad

“You must have driven like a demon,” I cussed under my breath, but there it was, my dad’s Mondeo was parked in the drive. The engine was still warm and ‘ticking’ as the metalwork cooled down. I hadn’t even seen her, she must have gone by another route.

I put the bike away and went into the house. “Well look who it is, baby Puddin’, it’s your Auntie Cathy, looking all hot and bothered, I wonder why. She looks as if she’s been rushing…” Puddin’ gurgled and laughed at Stella’s expression rather than what she’d said. I couldn’t stay cross looking at the smiling baby.

I know Stella is a significant road hazard, but even she would have been pushed to do it, I as good as asked her, but she wasn’t going to tell me. I went up to shower and change. Then it was down to sort out the dinner, talk to Simon and the girls on the phone and go to bed – alone. I decided my spirit of adventure wasn’t needing to have its horizons expanded just at the moment. I was really still coming to terms with being heterosexual, rather than asexual, so jumping to gay or bi – just wasn’t for me.

I shut my bedroom door when I went to bed although when I woke up I had another body with me. I peeked open one eye – I knew who it was, so quite why I was peeking, I don’t know.

“Hello, dearest sis-in-law.”

“What is wrong with your bed?”

“I got lonely, li’l sis.”

“It’s your turn to make the tea.”

“Why don’t we just lie here and have some fun?”

“I could do that on a bike while you fed Puddin’.”

“Where’s your sense of adventure?”

“I find cycling adventurous enough for me.”

“Cathy, you are so repressed.”

“Am I? I think I can live with it.” I jumped out of bed and after the loo, washed and dressed in my cycling kit. “See you in an hour,” I called to Stella who was muttering imprecations from the bed.

Once on the bike and out of the immediate heavy traffic, I had a moment to think. Was it a wind up? With Stella, you never knew, she was so good at it. If it wasn’t, was she being objectionable to keep on about it? Why was I so scared of it? It’s not as if I could get pregnant anyway, let alone with another woman – so what was the problem?

My fidelity to Simon was much of the reason, that and the fact that I didn’t think I really wanted to be intimate with her beyond a little cuddle. Perhaps I was wrong, but I knew I felt safe with cuddling her, girls do such things whereas boys don’t unless they are that way inclined. Somehow that didn’t seem fair – Queen Victoria had set back the cause of equality for centuries – for men at any rate.

Why was I complaining, it was no skin off my nose? Then again having suffered what would be broadly construed as homophobic attacks – even though I wasn’t gay, per se – that was how some people perceived me, or in those days. It makes me smile that some of the boys who would have happily killed me, would now fancy me – sadly, I’d still find them repulsive, so there’d be no payback except as a ball-breaker or prick-tease or whatever they call that sort of woman these days.

I was so lost in my thoughts that I only just managed to miss a driver’s door opened out into the carriageway as someone was getting out of their car. “Oi, watch what you’re doing,” I shouted – it could have been a lot worse.

“Who’s gonna make me?” said a beefy looking individual, who resembled a mobile block of flats. I said nothing but gave him the finger – well I was moving and he wasn’t. In the distance I heard an engine start up and tyres squealed. Oh poo.

I stepped on it, I was still riding away from home, climbing and in the middle of nowhere. What do I do? I was probably still in sight of the moron – correction, angry moron, so diving into a field or hedge wouldn’t do any good any more than pointing out he was technically at fault. Somehow, he didn’t seem the type to consider legal niceties before he pulped someone.

If I was still on the bike, he’d probably knock me off or capture me against the hedge. I spotted a gateway to a field, pulled in and dismounted. Sure enough, a moment later the car pulled up trapping me inside the gateway, although I had put the bike over the gate I hadn’t had time to follow it, and his dog looked a nasty piece of work. I doffed my helmet and sunglasses. If he hadn’t noticed from body shape, hopefully he’d notice I was female from my hair and face – because that’s what most people see. He could just be so mad that he’d only recognise a face after he’d belted it.

As he alighted the car, I did wonder if I’d get over the gate and run far enough away before he set the dog after me. I froze to the spot in front of the gate.

“You cheeky cow, nearly took my door off.”

“You’re supposed to look before you open a car door.”

“You wanna argue about it?”

“What you mean here or in court?”

“Wassat supposed t’mean?”

“If you lay one finger on me or threaten me, I’ll call the police.”

“I am really frightened, just ‘cos you talk posh don’t mean you’re important.”

“I think you’ll find out the hard way if you persist in menacing me.”

“Oh yeah, what you somefink on the telly, then?”

“Yes actually.”

“Ooh, now I’m really scared.”

“So you should be, but if you get back in your car and go there’ll be nothing more said about it.”

“Ooh, so ‘ow you gonna talk wiv no teef?”

He was still the other side of the bonnet of the car, inside which his huge hound was going bananas. The engine was still running, and the dog was bouncing about – then something very funny happened. The dog ran his master over.

One minute I’m in fear and trembling for my life – the next, the excitable, blood thirsty hound fell off the seat and must have hit the handbrake, because the car jerked forwards and drove the thug into the hedge, which was mixed with hawthorn and sloe. I stood in stunned silence as he yelled and screamed as the car continued a slow crawl into the hedge, its paintwork protected by the large lout trapped in front of it and apparently driven by his dog. I’m sure that was illegal – unless the dog had a provisional licence and even then, matey should have been inside supervising or accidents happen.

“Get it off me,” he was screaming, but there was no way I was putting my hand inside that car – not with the Hound of the Baskervilles running about inside. I could only stand and watch in bemused horror. I didn’t even have my mobile with me.

Just then a tractor came along and I flagged it down. He called the police and between us we tried to work out how to stop the car’s persistent crawl over its owner’s body. He was still alive by the sounds of agony coming from the front of the car under the gently running engine.

We, that is, the farmer and I, decided neither of us wanted to incur the wrath of the incensed canine, who was still barking madly inside the slow moving car. Sirens were heard in the distance and a couple of minutes later a police car arrived. He called for a dog handler. By now the car had come to a stop against thicker branches of the hedge. The man was still alive, although he was complaining about a branch sticking up his bum – the farmer and I had to look away.

Eventually, the fire brigade arrived with moments later a dog handler. By that time, the young copper had thrown a blanket over the dog and I’d slipped in and switched off the engine, shutting the door very quickly after me. The pincer movement had worked and while the dog had attacked the blanket, I’d killed the engine.

We then stood around watching the fire brigade raise the car off its unfortunate owner and he was taken off to hospital. One of the firemen laughed as they lowered the car down again.

“What’s so funny?” asked the first copper.

“The dog’s eaten half the driver’s seat.”

I gave a statement as best I could recall it, and the copper sniggered as he took it down. “So he was gonna beat you up, you reckon?”

“I think he was making like he was going to.”

“Do you want to press charges?”

“Not really, not any more than I’d offer to look after his dog while he’s in hospital. I think he’s got enough troubles, don’t you?”

“Yeah, he’s got an out-of-date tax disc, his insurance is iffy and that tyre looks suspiciously thin for tread.”

I nodded and went to leave. The farmer approached me, “I know you, don’t I?”

“Not that I’m aware of,” I offered putting my helmet on.

“I’m sure I’ve seen you on telly – didn’t you do a nature film?”

“Yeah, dormice. You’ve got a good memory.”

“For a pretty girl, always – hey, could you come and talk to our Young Farmers group about making your film, I’m sure they’d enjoy it.”

“Give me a shout via the university, I’ll see what I can do. I have to go.” I hopped back on the bike and my legs complained at the stiffness in my thigh muscles.