The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2315 by Angharad Copyright© 2014 Angharad All Rights Reserved.

I won’t dwell on the details of who eventually had to clean up the mess. I wanted to make Julie do it as she’d been primarily responsible for Trish throwing up in the first place. However, she had to run off and chuck up her herself—fortunately, in the cloakroom toilet. In the end it was Tom, Stella and I who did it—perhaps we’re less squeamish. It certainly brought an end to the dinner except for Sammi and Si who arrived just after we’d finished cleaning up and I dished up the portions David had saved for them.

Despite Trish being sick, I enjoyed my risotto and would ask David to do it again. It was infinitely superior to the packet stuff I used to eat as a student, and I used to enjoy that.

The Friday arrived and the girls were all like bottles of pop. To start with, Danni had a football game for the school the next day, her first official one. We decided that as she had a female looking body, and was taking oestrogens we wouldn’t mention it and Sister Maria did the same.

The girls had a long service and seemingly longer sermon much of the morning, or so they told me all about the importance of Easter the crucifixion and resurrection and so on. As a long time disbeliever in all of it, I began to wish I’d let the girls stay home instead of inflicting such boredom upon them. This year Trish didn’t challenge the guy in the dog collar, which had to be an improvement. Apparently last year she was seated just under the pulpit and when he went on about the death by crucifixion she said in a loud voice that it usually took a few days to die from it. At this the preacher told her that he was stabbed with the spear if she remembered. She told him that wasn’t sufficient to kill him and that the stabbing was only because the next day was the Jewish Sabbath.

“But it did kill him,” insisted the priest.

“How d’you know, were you there, was he seen by a doctor?” she replied and the place was in uproar.

“Because it says so in the holy gospels.”

“Yeah, but they’ve been altered and half of them left out.” Either she’d heard me in action or read deeper than I first thought. I did however, agree with everything she said, and approved of her applying logic to the mythology which may or may not pass the test. In this case it didn’t.

They finished school for the term at lunch time and I went and picked them up after doing some extra tutorials during an equally boring morning. I did suss one or two students out about using the ‘Scopes Monkey trial film’ and they all responded in a positive way which made me wonder if my teaching had lost some of its magic. It hadn’t according to most of them. Three of them even suggested that I was the best teacher in the department, better even than the hallowed professor himself. I suspected they told that to any teacher who’d listen to their eyewash.

I collected the girls only to be told of the soccer tournament on the ride home. “Is your kit clean?”

“Yeah, I think so.”

“It had better be or you’ll spend this afternoon washing it all.”

“Huh,” she huffed by reply and I tried not to be seen smirking in the rear view mirror. But as soon as lunch was over we checked her kit only to discover her boots needed cleaning and so she set to with them. It took her half the afternoon, which was a pity because the weather was glorious, a touch of spring before winter swept over us again. Hopefully it was a temporary glitch and sunshine would be returned as soon as could be seen to be reasonable. For me that meant after no longer than two milleseconds. Had Simon been home he’d have been mowing lawns and grumbling.

I sent Si a text explaining that Danni was playing in the tournament and he sent back to say he hoped to be there. Danni was like a dog with two tails after that. It was still two weeks to Easter and I had awful problems trying to get Mima to accept that as the case. She thought I was trying to pull a fast one to save on Easter eggs. While Danni washed her boots the others were out in the garden helping Daddy spread manure before he dug it in. I didn’t stay out with them because the smell was something else.

I was busy trying to repair her school kit which had got torn at the football club on Tuesday evening and she’d forgotten to tell me about until I made her wash it. She was lucky, I almost made her mend it as well.

It rained on the Saturday which gave St Claire’s a slight advantage over the first placed team, St Margaret’s which was called Maggies and had a magpie as its motto. The magpies played on an all weather pitch which remained dry in all but the direst weather. Today the play was on a real grass pitch and Danni’s lot were much more used to playing on it than the uploaders.

The pace of the games was fast and furious and if you blinked you’d miss a move or even a goal. It was possibly just the goal keeper blinking which led to the first goal. It was crossed from the right wing into the centre of the penalty area and Danni burst through and smashed it on the volley into the top of the net. We barely saw it and we were watching our precious daughter play. After that they marked her closer than before and that meant another of the St Claire’s team was allowed to run through the gaps left by the defenders shadowing Danielle and goal number two happened.

The magpies got one back but a foul on Danni in the final moments just in front of the goal led to a penalty and as she got to take it, Claire’s won by two goals. Suddenly, they were favourites and Danni looking to be the player of the tournament. It meant she’d have defenders sticking to her like glue, so she forced gaps and errors and her team-mates made the best of it and scored goals quite freely.

The only downside was the rain, which meant she was wet through after game one and despite wearing a waterproof while she waited for her next game, she started to get cold. I hauled her into the car and made her drink a mug of soup to warm her up. I also helped her change some of her wet kit for dry ones.

The final happened after lunch. I left Simon in charge while I dashed into town and bought her more fresh shorts and a new shirt. I also called by the house and brought a large bath towel with me to wrap her in to bring her home.

Warmed and wearing dry kit she sparkled and showed why she’d get the ‘man of the tournament’ award. It was like an adult playing with children, she tormented and teased Gosport’s de la salle team, winning free kicks galore. Usually they came to naught as they were too far away from the goal mid way through the first half, she took a direct free kick and curved it round the wall of defenders who ducked rather than blocked the ball to open the scoring. The goalie had no chance and it became very obvious this kid had something special, very special. If she’d stayed as boy, she’d have likely turned professional and made a fortune, instead as a girl, nobody would remember her in a couple of year’s time.

“She’s like Beckham at his best,” declared Simon screaming his head off most of the time in support of his daughter. When she scored again, I thought he was going to have a coronary or a stroke he was making so much noise and his face went red. But it was goal number three which gave her top scorer and best player awards, which is like taking the yellow jersey and the king of the mountains shirt during a bike race. It does happen but not too often.

St Claire’s won four nil, the other goal being given as a home goal from Danni’s header. The goalie fumbled it and dropped it between her legs where it rolled over the line.

It was a good day for Danni except the constant wet and cold caused her to get a chill and the following Monday, our GP diagnosed pneumonia and she was taken into hospital as a precautionary measure. I sent a snotty email to the school and the football club weren’t too impressed either. Sometimes it never rains but it pours.