The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2150 by Angharad Copyright © 2013 Angharad All Rights Reserved.

The children made a huge fuss of us and immediately noticed Danni’s downbeat mood. Trish followed her up to her room. I gave them some space had a cuppa and a chat with all of them after handing over Lizzie to Jacquie to look after for a while–I was a bit tired of being treated like a cow by her as she tried several times to suck my breasts inside out–more suction than a Dyson.

On the pretext of taking my case up to my room, I nipped along to Danni’s room where she and Trish were in deep conversation. “But you could come to our school, and they play football.”

“How many times do I have to tell you, I’m finished with being a girl. Alice and Billie both as good as told me I was going to play football for England.”

“What, England women?” snapped back Trish.

“Don’t be daft.”

“Did they say England men’s team?”

“No of course they didn’t, they wouldn’t have to, would they?”

“Why, there’s an England women’s team as well–they beat Ukraine six nil. Of course had I been playing it would have been ten.”

“Of course,” teased Danni.

“An’ if you’d been playin’ it woulda been twelve.” Trish seemed to know how to play Danni.

“Yeah, well, natch,” replied the teen totally sucked in by Trish’s flattery.

I knocked and entered the room, “Could we have a little chat?” I spoke to Danni and Trish took the hint and left. I closed the door.

“At least you’ve calmed down a little.”

“Yeah, well–yeah.” Danni was having one of her more articulate sessions.

“What would you like to do after the incident at the airport?”

“Dunno.”

“Who was the boy?”

“Robert Clanton.”

“Pity Wyatt Earp’s dead,” I mused to myself and by the expression on her face of total confusion, I realised she’d heard it too. “Um–the gunfight at the OK corral?”

She shook her head, no.

“Three cowboys were shot by the Earps and Doc Holliday.”

“I thought people got shot all the time in the wild west.”

“Things were pretty lawless especially in Tombstone, which is where it happened. It apparently unleashed a sort of vendetta because one of the Earps was badly wounded in his arm and it became disabled, and another of them was shot in the back playing billiards or something. The other guys also ended up dead one way or another. Life was pretty cheap in those days and all sorts of people carried guns which apparently hit more bystanders than duelling gunmen.”

“Wow, you always know so much, Mummy.”

“Nah, I watched a documentary about it years ago–I think the general finding was that both lots were as bad as one another, though the Earps were lawmen at the time.”

“What sheriffs an’ things?”

“Yeah, sheriffs or marshals–never sure what was which, except they all carried guns which they justified as being necessary as protection against marauding Indians. Seeing as they’ve killed most of those off, I’m not sure what the excuse is to still carry guns, but loads of Americans do.”

“You don’t like guns, do you?”

“I hate them, they have one purpose, killing things. It’s bad enough when the military have them in the hands of civilians, it’s not good.”

“But you fired one.”

“In self defence and I’m not proud of it.”

“Yeah, but you saved Trish and Gramps and some policemen.”

“Yeah, look let’s discuss your future not my past. The future is malleable, the past is fixed.”

“What does that mean, Mummy?”

“It means we can influence the future, you can’t change the past just how you remember it. Now, about this boy at the airport...”

“I dunno what to do.”

“If it hadn’t happened, what would you like to do?”

“Go back to being me.”

“Aren’t you yourself now?”

“Not really, it’s been fun but I’m a boy.”

“So what do we do with your girl’s stuff, get rid of it?”

“Can we keep it a bit longer–in case I want to wear it again?”

“If you want, just be careful where you wear it and with whom.”

“Of course, Mummy, I will be careful.”

“Good, so are you changing back tonight or what?”

“Um–no, I’ll do it tomorrow.”

“Don’t forget to cut your nails, not many boys have finger nails like Rhianna.”

She laughed, “Okay, I’ll do it tomorrow.”

“Okay, tidy yourself up then and we’ll have some dinner.”

I went down and Trish got me to one side. “Is Danni gonna stay a girl?”

“I don’t think so, darling; why?”

“Because I think being a girl is better than a hairy arsed bloke.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“Well that’s what Daddy called some bloke.”

“I don’t care what Daddy did, I don’t want to hear you saying it again–or there’ll be trouble.”

She blushed and dashed off, I let her go as pursuing the matter would only give her a stick to beat me. Usually I pretended to ignore swearing, as if I hadn’t heard it. If it happened twice I cautioned them or tried to show that it merely demonstrated a poor vocabulary.

Once when asked to put my money where my mouth was, I’d heard Danny call someone a bastard, I suggested he could have implied his parents weren’t married as it wasn’t yet legal for pigs to become betrothed, let alone wed.

They thought it was funny but too long winded. I tried to explain that witticisms were sometimes short and sometimes long, but telling someone he had a face like a cockroach’s scrotum was likely to be more effective than calling him shitface, another of Danny’s insults. They agreed and for the next few days they showed some inventiveness in insults to each other. One of the better ones being when Livvie asked Trish if she’d born ugly or had it thrust upon her. Trish replied that she wasn’t ugly, she was quite attractive, but only to humans not to a talking gate post. Livvie is quite thin.

I was quite happy that instead of swearing they stopped and tried to outdo each other because it meant real conflicts didn’t arise so often. Danny wasn’t very good at it, he’d preferred to hit someone, so his period in dresses might be interesting to analyse in terms of his behaviour, it certainly seemed less boisterous than when he was in boy mode. I wondered how much would carry over.

Simon was happy that Danny our son was due to return the next day, although it proved not to be the case. Danni arrived for breakfast, still with painted nails and wearing makeup and girl’s clothing.

“I thought you were going to give all that up?” challenged Si–who else?

“Yeah, okay, I will.”

“When?”

“I’m seeing Cindy later, and she likes me in girl mode.”

Simon shook his head but thankfully didn’t say anything disparaging although I have no doubt it was what went through his mind. I asked him not to put the boy under any extra pressure and to let him come to a decision to revert back to being a boy when he was ready. He reluctantly agreed.

I could see that there was little chance of him going back to school on Monday, so I decided that early next week I’d find someone to educate him at home, or perhaps it will be educating her rather than him.