The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2901 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

I awoke the next morning remembering going and finding Daddy in a semiconscious state, possibly made worse by a surfeit of single malt but clearly displaying signs of a CVA or cerebro vascular accident, otherwise known as a stroke. I gave him healing and thankfully, he seemed none the worse for it. But I felt guilty, had my aggression caused it?

I showered and dressed roused the girls and went down. It was only just seven though I felt quite good despite just four hours sleep. Daddy was returning from walking the dog and he seemed to be in good spirits.

“Morning, Daddy,” I offered as he came into the kitchen.

“Aye, it’s guid one,” he said indicating the shiny ball thing in the sky which seemed to have been somewhat lacking of late.

“You seem as bright as the weather,” I said trying to feel him out without asking directly.

“Aye, silly headache I’ve haed fa days has cleared.”

Ah, so it wasn’t just me then. I almost breathed a sigh of relief but the fact that I might have provided the final factor that set off his stroke made me feel ashamed.

“I’m sorry I was so bitchy yesterday.”

“Aye, ye did rather shoot thae messenger.”

“I just felt upset by it all.”

“Aye, I ken, sae wid I hae been, but we hae tae dae this stupid process of advertising an’ interviewing even though I ken the noo, ye’re thae best candidate. It’s crazy but it’s thae law.”

“I know, I just let it get to me and I’m really sorry.”

“It’s alricht, it showed me ye wanted tae keep thae job.”

“A year ago I didn’t, but the longer I’ve done it the more I’ve got to enjoy it, directing the objectives of the department, encouraging the staff and students alike and hoping what I’m doing is what’s best for them and the environment.”

“Aye ye’re a bossy cuss, alricht.”

Astonished by this I glared at him but the twinkle in his eye showed me he was simply winding me up.

Then more seriously he looked at me and asked, “Jest whit did ye dae last nicht?”

“Woke you up from your drunken sleep.”

“I think ye did mair than that.”

“Can’t remember, it was three in the morning, Daddy, I was tired, I just don’t remember.”

“I wisnae deid then?”

“If you had been, I’d hardly be having this conversation now, would I? Except perhaps through a very good medium.”

“Sae ye didnae dae onything, then?”

“I can’t remember—oh I wiped you down where you’d dribbled.”

“I think ye did dae mair.”

“Look, Daddy, we’ve only just made up from yesterday’s squabble, can’t you at least wait a couple more days before initiating the next one?”

He shrugged and went to pour himself a cup of coffee. He’d obviously put the coffee machine on earlier. Sometimes Simon does it if he has time for one in the mornings by which time it looks like treacle but tastes like coffee flavoured treacle. They add boiling water and drink it—imagine coffee like Bovril and you wouldn’t be far off.

The girls started to appear and I shoved the first four slices of bread in the toaster. Sometimes I think we could do with a larger one like they have in some cafes or restaurants which can do six or eight slices. As they ate their cereal I buttered some toast and shoved another four slices in the toaster. More bodies arrived and I did a third lot of toast, and kept two slices which I ate with mashed banana—one of my staples—perhaps it absorbs the mercury from the tuna?

It was Friday and James would do his last school run. Ingrid had gone to ground and the police failed to locate her as they wanted to speak with her regarding the attack on my car. They’d not found the men either and although they claimed they’d worked quite hard, I wasn’t sure that they had because our various encounters had tended to leave them in a bad light. So I received a strong feeling that anyone who got one over on me deserved a pat on the back rather than arrest. I was just a rich bitch trouble maker. I’d also sued them twice and won quite substantial settlements which I’d given to charities. I therefore became a rich bitch troublemaker with a good team of lawyers. I suspect Gotham City police have a similar relationship with Batman.

I’d just eaten my toast and ’nana when James arrived. I noticed Julie and Phoebe went off a little later than before he started coming each day. I gave him some toast and he ladled on honey and peanut butter. I had to turn away or I’d have shared a still warm banana and toast mix. Tom offered him some of his ‘Bovril’ coffee and I went up to change into my cycling clothes.

“You have a lovely arse, Cathy,” observed my overpaid bodyguard, “especially in that outfit. Have you really ridden for Britain.”

“Don’t be daft,” answered Julie, “she hardly rides at all, hence her whopping backside.”

“Thank you, dear. I’ll remember that come your birthday or Christmas.”

“She’s only wearing it because you’re here,” Julie added as a stage whisper.

“You’re going to be late,” I warned Julie.

“Nah, we’re not starting ‘til nine an’ the apprentice can open up and get the kettle on.”

“Well I have to go, I’m teaching at nine and I want to glance through my notes.” I recalled my laptop was in my office along with my rucksack. I also had a change of clothing so I’d be okay.

After a multitude of hugs, even one from Julie and James, I pedalled off towards the university, my eyes watering despite having sunglasses on through the cool wind. Fifteen minutes later I was walking through the corridor to our department. My bike safely stowed, I undid my hair band and began combing it out. A bit of makeup and I went to find my skirt and top. They were nowhere to be seen.

Diane arrived as I was poking about in her office and the toilet. She thought I had taken my clothes home last night. I couldn’t think how, then realised I had taken my rucksack home and left my laptop bag. Oh well, they’ll have to put up with me clomping around in lycra and cycling shoes.

It’s interesting that the lecture I did on evolution and adaptation was attended by a few more men than I expected. I assumed they’d seen my wandering around in my team GB replica kit. I started the lecture by apologising for my attire and also stating that it was a replica kit which I’d received as a present and that I hadn’t actually ridden for Great Britain.

When Tom called by a little later he wasn’t too impressed with my outfit. “Didnae ye bring ony change of clathes?”

“Obviously not,” I said defensively.

“I think she looks good in that,” said Diane coming to my rescue or trying to.

“Aye, sae dae I, but not in a lecture theatre.”

“I wore my gown and mortar board with it,” I said which had Diane rushing off to the loo as she giggled.

“Ye scunner,” said Tom as he walked away. “I wis gang ta tak’ ye tae lunch, but no like that.”

“Take Diane instead, I’ll grab a roll from the refec, I’ve got some things to do anyway.” So that’s what he did.

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2902 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

Instead of eating I grabbed the bike and dashed home, got David, who was talking to James, to make me a sandwich while I rushed upstairs, washed and did my hair then dressed in a suit and heels, slapped on some makeup and went down to have my sandwich.

“What’s with the bike business?”

“It got me to work.”

“And the suit?”

“I have meetings this afternoon.”

“Want a lift in?”

“No, I’ll take the Mondeo.”

“Amanda has it, she’s doing some shopping and going to see her mum,” David informed me. I had told her she could use the car so could hardly complain. James was smiling waiting for me now to ask him. Instead I left my lunch and walked through to the study and after a phone call, walked back finished my lunch and drank the tea which David had topped up with hot and after collecting my handbag and laptop bag, bid them goodbye and walked out to the garage. It took a few moments to pull off the dust sheets but she started first time and I reversed Mr Whitehouse’s old jaguar out of the garage and then drove slowly down the drive so James would get a good look at it. According to David, his tongue was hanging out—all I’d done was make sure it was insured. It was old enough to have a tax exemption and it had been MOT’d a few months ago.

I did break one law, I drove in stockinged feet, I wasn’t going to risk the backs of my shoes—driving in heels marks them. I had the permit from my use of the Porsche earlier on so used that, informing the girls in reception as I went through. Despite all of that I was back in my office before Diane was returned by Tom. I just happened to need something from her office as they arrived and his eyes nearly came out on stalks. “Ye’ve changed ye scunner.”

“No, I’m still the same—why, what did you think I’d done?”

“Ye haed cycling stuff on afore.”

“Did I? Are you sure?”

“I mebbe auld but I’m no senile yet.”

I shrugged and went back to my office stifling a smirk.

“You went home?” Diane came in on the pretext of bringing me some tea.

“Hardly rocket science, is it?”

“The first year boys will be disappointed, you’ve got them for an hour and a half in twenty minutes.”

“You didn’t mention it earlier,” I felt a little irritated by all this covering for Dr Freeman.

“I left you a note except you’ve probably put your computer on top of it.” I had—oops. I just had time to pick up the file on, ‘The principles of ecology,’ something I should be able to do in my sleep. I yawned as if practicing for the event.

Had I realised I was going to standing for hours, I’d have worn trousers and flat shoes. Instead I clip clopped up and down the front of the room as I wrote on the whiteboard or showed them slides. The stuff we wrote on the board were things about ecology they already knew—or thought they did. Diane arrived with handouts for the assembled throng, she’d been photocopying them while I bored them rigid. Then to get my own back, having run through the stuff they were supposed to have read already and obviously hadn’t, I set them an assignment. Write ten things in your life that could be changed to lower your carbon footprint. How would you change them and how much impact would it have on your life? How much benefit would this have on the environment?

Hardly rocket science but it brings home the fact that we can all reduce our energy use and emissions and that has an impact on the environment if we maintain it. The fact that I was going to be driving home in a gas guzzling car afterwards, was an anomaly. My usual car was more economical and had fewer emissions but it was a much younger car and had a smaller but more efficient engine.

Thankfully, no one noticed the car I was driving, unless you count James. He almost demanded a chance to drive it, Danni was up for accompanying him. I warned him that if he got booked for speeding it would be on his licence not mine. I don’t think he took a blind bit of notice. I knew they’d be gone for a while so I changed into jeans and trainers and taking Trish with me drove the minibus thing round to Ingrid’s place.

“She’s not here is she? I mean the police came didn’t they?” I almost told Trish to shut up as I was trying to get a lead from the place as to where she was now. If only we had her mobile number its whereabouts could be traced. I bemoaned this to Trish who ten minutes or less later, came up with a number. Then ten minutes after that and lots of fingers on the iPad screen and she identified where it was—the phone that is. I didn’t ask her how she did it, I wasn’t sure i wanted to know, though I suspect I was probably an accessory after the fact.

When we used Google maps to show us exactly where, it turned out to be a house just around the corner from where we were. “Why didn’t you do this before?”

“You never asked me. Sammi showed me how to do it.”

No wonder they say, ‘Ignorance is bliss,’ though apparently it’s no defence under the law. She’s a minor so I’d get done. I started up the VW and we drove slowly past the address we’d been given. It was in one of two houses, they were both quite expensive looking properties in a terrace of Victorian houses the Luftwaffe hadn’t managed to flatten—Portsmouth was heavily bombed during WWII as it was the main naval base and also had a naval dockyard.

“Now which one is she in?” I asked out loud.

“That one,” pointed Trish, “and she’s seen us.”

“Call the police.” I said pulling up across the road.

“What 999?”

“No, their headquarters number, here use my phone.” I dumped the bag in her lap and she scrolled through the numbers.

“How many people have their local police number on their mobile?” she chuckled but dialled. When it started ringing she handed it to me. It took a few minutes to speak to someone who knew what I was talking about and they called the chief inspector who was concerned with the case. He was sending someone immediately and I was to do nothing but keep out of the way.

An unmarked Skoda Octavia came down the road but it was obvious it was the plod and just as they were about fifty yards from the house a mini came screaming out of the garage and almost flew down the road. It was Ingrid and somehow the police put two and two together and shot off after her with blue lights flashing.

“How about some ice cream?” I asked my accomplice.

Is the pope a catholic?

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2903 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

We set off to the supermarket and by the time we got there, I’d talked Trish into getting a tub of ice cream and sharing with everyone. She insisted that she pick the flavour and I agreed providing she didn’t get something outlandish like curried kippers flavour. We finally compromised on butterscotch with chocolate chips. It didn’t appeal to me but had to be better than cherry and coconut

Having got the ice cream and one or two bits and pieces I turned the car for home only to see a mini come screaming past with two police cars in pursuit. “That was Ingrid,” said Trish.

“Yes I know,” I answered and continued driving towards home.

“Aren’t you going to follow to see what happens?”

“Nope, what happens is up to them, I’m going home,” so saying we headed in the opposite direction.

“I thinks she must be ill,” suggested Trish, “She never does what the coppers say.”

“The ice cream would have gone all sludgy,” suggested Danielle who was now back from her travels with James. At this point I abandoned the girls discussion on me and went to help David do dinner.

“Is your lord and master going to be back for dinner?”

“Who’s that then?”

“The clue was in the word, ‘lord.’ Or weren’t you listening?”

“Don’t do religion, you should know that by now.

“I wasn’t thinking of religion, more the guy whose name you bear.”

“I’m not named after a man,” I said with all the indignation I could muster. I must get some more the next time I’m in Tesco, it’s usually near to disingenuousness.

“Your surname is.”

“What my father’s name, or grandfather come to think of it.”

“No, your husband’s name.”

“I’m not called Simon,” I said trying to act obtuse.

“Not Simon, but Cameron.”

“What about it?”

“Oh forget it,” he said throwing his hands up in despair, so I did and returned to my study until called for dinner.

I did about twenty minutes of dealing with emails concerning the survey most of which I’m sure Lizzie could have answered. Considering these came from people at universities, it didn’t say much about our level of education unless it referred to the lack of it. Still perhaps the bright ones are all like Richard Branson eschewing higher education to make themselves millionaire entrepreneurs and only the thickos come to university. Sometimes it seemed to sum me up.

Dinner was served and I went up to help but David had done it all and left Julie and Phoebe to pass it round the table presumably to avoid more verbal games with me. Can’t say I blame him, some days I think I try to avoid me too.

The next day was Saturday and Simon was planning on a day of Six Nations Rugby, when to his disgust England were chasing the grandslam and Scotland were trying to avoid the wooden spoon. It was more likely that Italy would receive that accolade unless they could beat Wales at Cardiff.

We, that is Simon and I, went to watch Trish and then Danielle play soccer for the school. Each scored a hat-trick, Danielle netting five goals. I suspect she found school football lacking in challenge, but on Sunday she’d be playing for Portsmouth ladies against Southampton, about as close to a local derby as you’ll get round here. Her biggest worry was picking up an injury but so far she had escaped any.

St Claire’s was top of the local school’s league at both age groups in which the Cameron sisters played and both were top scorers in their respective age groups. Danni having scored twice as many as the next in the list and Trish was six clear of her next challenger.

When we got home David had prepared a good lunch of salads with new potatoes and a choice of cooked meats or fish or quiches. Danni groaned but ate more than her share.

Then the sporting brigade went off to watch Wales beat Italy by a cricket score, Ireland beat Scotland and finally England take the grandslam. If they’d beaten all the other sides, they must be the best team but Simon argued that Wales were the best side if only they could get themselves started earlier and that they would have beaten England if they’d put things together more quickly.

As I’d been crunching numbers with Sammi’s program for the survey and writing a report on said figures, I missed all the action on the rugby pitches. Danielle was quite happy her team won while Daddy went off to drown his sorrows after Scotland, after showing promise, succumbed to the Irish. As for Si, he felt vindicated that Wales total demolition of Italy, showed what they were capable of when they got going.

During the England game, Sergeant Andy Bond called by to report that Ingrid had somehow eluded the pursuing squad cars when it all got embroiled in heavy rush hour traffic. Why that didn’t surprise me, I’m unable to say, however, Andy apologised on behalf of his colleagues and I accepted graciously as behoves an aristocrat’s wife, while thinking that next time I’ll go and get her rather than call the plod. The only consolation is that as far as we knew, Ingrid nor the police knew how we’d found her, so hopefully that meant we could try it again and as it was Sunday the next day, we could rise and strike early because we knew she didn’t get up very early.

I asked Trish to locate her via her mobile and that suggested she was still in Portsmouth. I got Sammi to confirm it, which she did. Now I could send in the police to get her or go and do it myself perhaps helped by James. I spoke to him and he agreed to come with me tomorrow morning.

When I got to bed, Simon decided he’d missed me rather a lot so I had to feign enthusiasm for something I was too busy to be bothered with, but it certainly helped him sleep but then it wasn’t him who had to go and wash themselves before they could attempt to follow suit. Thankfully, I followed suit shortly after my return to warmth of the bed.

“Where’re you going?” asked Simon sleepily as I dressed.

“Church,” I threw back at him though even in his semi-comatose state he should have seen I wasn’t wearing the clothing of a churchgoer unless she were attending a ninja church. Dark trousers and polo-neck top with a soft dark fleece jacket and training shoes. My hair was tied back in a ponytail and I wore no makeup.

James arrived at seven thirty and after a light breakfast we set off in his Porsche to apprehend Ingrid. If she made a run for it, at least we had some speed behind us for the chase and James was a trained driver—no not a train driver, a trained—look he’d been educated by the police in pursuit driving, that make it clearer?

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2904 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

We parked the Porsche down the road from the two houses that the phone was in. It wasn’t eight o’clock yet—I tell a lie, the church a couple of streets away, chimed eight. I counted them, next week the clocks go forward so altering that one should be more challenging than any we have at home. My computer alters the time itself, so why can’t my bloody phone—no, I have to alter it by hand and the clock in the car, yet you can buy watches that adjust themselves—just typical.

Instead of futile internal dialogues I should have been trying to tune into Ingrid, but neither house seemed wanting to cooperate. I suppose there is one way to find out if she’s in there, knock the door and ask. Had I been tidier dressed I could have pretended I was some Christian canvasser reminding people about it being Easter next weekend, unless you’re Eastern Orthodox—don’t ask me why, because I thought it was all due to phases of the moon or some such thing, but then I don’t believe in it anyway, but I probably know enough to bullshit my way on a doorstep.

“We could always set fire to both of them and see who comes out,” suggested James.

“What if the program which locates the phone got it wrong?”

“The police would probably evacuate houses either side so we’d have checked four of them.”

“How would you propose setting fire to them?”

“Petrol on a bit of rag through the letter box.”

“Go on then,” I said yawning thinking I should have stayed in bed.

“I was joking,” he said.

“You think I wasn’t?”

He shrugged.

“Gee thanks, James, what d’you think I am, some sort of monster driven by goal achievement?”

“Uh...”

I shook my head, “Look, I know there are women who are monsters, the Nazi death camps employed a few of them. But I’m not one of them, okay?”

“I know—you’re too young for starters.”

“You what?” He was about to run away when we saw a curtain twitch and we knew which house.

We walked back to the car and waited. I called the police and reported what we’d seen. They logged it. While we were waiting the mini shot out of the garage and flew down a lane behind the houses. It was barely wide enough for the Porsche and at least one dustbin or black bag got squished against the wall. At the end of the lane we came to a T junction and we hadn’t seen which way she’d gone, but there was a transit van coming down towards us at speed, knocking bins flying.

“I think they might be hostiles,” I said as James swung the car down the right hand part of the junction pulling out into the road we’d just come from. He quickly parked behind a four wheel drive car and the van was past us before they saw us. They stopped and began reversing back. James jumped out of his car and urged me to do the same. James ran to the driver’s door of the van and in one very fast movement, wrenched it open, punched the driver and dragged him out onto the road, where he hit him again and bloke went down like a sack of spuds. Obviously his friend tried to follow him out of the van and James kicked the door shut on him. His head shattered the window and he fell back into the cab of the van.

At the same time as this was happening the other thug got out the passenger door and went to attack James from behind obviously not seeing me. I ran up behind him, kicked him at the back of the knee and as he groaned and started to fall, James hit him and he fell face first onto the tarmac.

“These the three who wrecked your car?”

“I think it highly likely.”

Of course this was when the police arrived and we got a free ride in a police car—back to the main police station in Portsmouth. The three men were taken off by ambulance.

We both demanded to call our lawyers. When the desk sergeant took my name he groaned quietly something about being too young to lose his pension. I simply stood and smiled innocently at him. I was pleased that James wasn’t carrying a gun, because then it could have proved awkward.

We agreed to give a statement by which time Jason had arrived and approved it and we were free subject to a complaint by the three injured men. I explained that they were chasing us and we had taken defensive action, especially given the previous attack on my car when they frightened my kids to death, not to mention my own fright. Given that they’d all been battered, I felt more or less even on that count. However, Ingrid had escaped again.

Jason grumbled the whole time he drove us back to collect the Porsche until I reminded him he was paid for his assistance. “Double time on a Sunday,” he suggested and I told him to speak to Simon about it.

“Can I test a hunch?”

“But of course.”

“Take me round to her original address.”

When we got there a dark coloured mini was parked on the road a few doors away. It had one or two scratches on the sides which looked very recent. She’d gone home.

“Can we burn this one down?” joked James and I began to wonder if he was a bit crazier than I usually thought.

“No.”

“Spoilsport,” he whinged like a six year old.

Almost while we were still arguing Ingrid ran out of her house and towards the car carrying two cases. I was out of the car and after her in an instant. She didn’t see me until she turned to open the door of the car. I think she was surprised that her three little piggies hadn’t nobbled us, but then I had back up today in the shape of the big bad wolf.

She hurled a suitcase at me and I managed to catch it and throw it back at her, it caught her on the back just as she opened the car door pushing her between the door and the car, just as a car came down the road the other way and clipped the door of the car and the other case.

The door shut against her neck and... the blood was everywhere. The case shattered as the car hit it and twenty pound notes began swirling round the road. The driver of the car fainted in shock and it took me a moment to deal with the situation I’d just witnessed. James was on his phone for police and ambulance.

As no one had actually witnessed what had happened I explained that she’d try to board the car but had slipped and the rest was history. The street was quite narrow and the man driving the other car was going too fast but even so. He was still hysterical when they took him away.

“So how come you’re not?” asked the chief inspector.

“What good would it do if I were?”

“You’re a bit too cool at times, Lady Cameron.”

“Am I, well Chief Inspector, I now have to go home and explain to her daughter what happened.”

“I’d spare her the detail if I were you.”

I looked at James and he just rolled his eyes.

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2905 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

I hate giving adults bad news, to do so to children is a dread. We got home and realised I had blood spattered on me. So ignoring the calls from the girls and Simon I rushed upstairs stripped off and jumped in the shower. After drying and dressing in casual clothes I returned downstairs and threw all the clothes I’d been wearing in the washing machine. Then I made James and Simon a cup of coffee and tea for Stella and me.

“Have you told them?” I asked James quietly.

“Not a dicky bird.”

“What you gonna tell us, Mummy?” asked Trish.

“Just where have you been?” demanded Simon.

“Bringing something to a conclusion albeit a very unsatisfactory one.”

“Girls, go and play for moment will you?”

“You never tell us nuffin’,” complained Trish but led the others out of the kitchen. I looked for Danielle and then realised she was playing football later so was either getting ready for it or had already left to go to the stadium.

“Where’s Danni?” I asked.

“They were going to Oxford so I dropped her off at the stadium, now where did you two go?”

“We went to see Ingrid.”

“I thought she was in hiding?” queried Simon.

“We found her with Sammi’s computer program.”

“And?”

“We informed the plod who arrived just in time to miss her again.”

“Then what?”

“I had a hunch she’d gone back to her usual lair and bingo, there she was.”

“There’s a but coming, isn’t there?”

“Unfortunately, yes.”

“Go on...”

“She saw us made a run for it tripped getting into her car and was hit by a car coming the other way.”

“Is she badly hurt?” asked Stella.

“She died instantly.”

“That bad?”

I nodded.

“How are you going to tell Hannah?”

“Gently.”

“If you need any help...”

“Thanks, Stella.”

“I’ll go and distract the others,” offered Simon. I handed him a bag of mini chocolate eggs and suggested he hide them around the lounge and tell them there’s an egg hunt. He nodded and went off. Of course the girls all came into the kitchen following behind Trish.

“We want the truth—Mummy.”

“The truth eh? Okay, you’re a very demanding and occasionally rude little girl.”

“Nooo, not that...I’m not am I?” Her expression went from one of impertinent indignation to crestfallen in a second.

“Ready,” called Simon from the lounge.

“Daddy has just hidden some chocolate eggs in the lounge.”

Deciding that chocolate was the better part of valour, Trish reluctantly went off with the others. I called Hannah back and asked her to come with me to my study.

“Have I done something wrong, Mummy?” she asked.

“No sweetheart.”

“So why can’t I go on the egg hunt?”

“ I need to speak with you.”

“About her you mean?”

“Yes.”

“I haven’t heard nothin’.”

“I know, sweetheart.”

“Have the cops got her?”

“Uh no.”

“So why can’t I go and hunt eggs?”

“Hannah, I’m afraid Ingrid died this morning.”

“Yeah, so?”

“She was hit by a car getting into her car.”

“Can I go an’ hunt eggs now?”

“Are you listening to me, sweetheart? Your mother was killed this morning.”

“You didn’t do it, did you?”

“No but I was there.”

“Right, so you’re my mum now then. Can I go?”

I was so taken aback all I could do was nod and she dashed off before I changed my mind. Livvie was quite cold blooded about her parents’ deaths too. Have they already detached themselves from their parents beforehand? Or is there a reaction to come? I hate these situations where you have to wait for something to happen before you can react.

I went to make some more tea. “How’d it go?” asked James.

“She took it like I’d just told her the ice cream was finished.”

“Oh—does that mean it hasn’t sunk in?”

“I have no idea. Livvie was very matter of fact about the death of her parents.”

“What happened to them?”

“Her father killed her mother and then hanged himself in custody.”

“Right,” said his mouth but his expression said anything but.

“I’m going to speak to Stephanie,” I announced and went back to my study with a fresh cuppa.

“Cathy, it’s lovely to speak to you but it’s a Sunday morning and I’m willing to bet you weren’t just going to invite me over to lunch.”

“I was actually,” I lied.

“But while I’m there—who is it you want me to see?”

“Hannah.”

“What happened?”

“Her mother was killed this morning.”

“How d’you know?”

“I saw it happen.” I then went on to explain what happened—well the edited version—and Hannah’s response to it.

“What’s for lunch?” she sighed.

“What would you like?”

“Got any more of that Welsh lamb?”

“I might have, would you like that?”

“If you have I might just be available to eat some of it.”

“Done—what time?”

I wondered how this might affect the adoption plans. All I need is Social Services suggesting I killed her to expedite the adoption, which is nonsense. I didn’t want the woman dead, just out of the picture for a few years to give the kid a chance to grow up and get an education.

Simon came in to the study, “Here you are.”

“I always knew where I was, something to do with proprioceptor function.”

“Very funny.”

“I don’t feel at all amusing.”

“I suppose not. I just overheard Hannah tell Livvie that the adoption should go ahead now as Ingrid had been killed.”

“Our prayers worked then?” replied Livvie.

“Looks like,” said Hannah.

“Oh good,” said Livvie.

“They were actually praying for this to happen?”

“That’s what it sounded like.”

“That’s disgraceful.”

“That’s what I thought,” said Simon.

“Yes, everyone knows there’s no god so how’s praying going to facilitate anything?”

“There are people who might disagree, Cathy.”

“There always are, especially where religion is concerned.”

“What if you’re wrong?”

“What if they are, they perpetuate far more damage than I do.”

“I’m not going to argue with you, but I thought you ought to know.”

“There is no argument. For that you’d need to suggest facts, of which there are none, which support the existence of a deity.”

“I think I’ll see if my washing is dry?” so saying he decamped.

‘More double standards, Catherine? We hoped you’d moved beyond such things.’

The voice echoed in my head. It has to be just internal dialogue, there is nothing out there just space and lots more of the same. Why do people need gods? Is it just cultural or is it some sort of character flaw—needing reassurance or protection from the loneliness of responsibility? Yet some cleverer minds than mine believe, which perhaps just demonstrates cognitive ability is irrelevant because faith is an emotional decision.

I went to see if David was in yet and that there was to be a change of plan for dinner.

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2906 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

Having reset the menu much to David’s annoyance, I told him that Ingrid had died that morning. “How d’you know?”

“I saw it happen.”

“What?” he gasped.

“She was hit by a car getting into her own car.”

“Jesus Christ, does Hannah know?”

“Yes.”

“How’s she taking it?”

“Very calmly.”

“She understands what it means?”

I shrugged. “I tried to talk to her about it but she didn’t seem very interested or concerned.”

“But it’s her mother who died.”

“I know, I did make that point to her.”

“Perhaps she’s in denial.”

“I don’t care if she’s in de Amazon, I’ve asked Stephanie to check her out.”

“Hence the change of menu.”

“Yes.”

“Look, if I can help in anyway...”

“Thanks, David, I appreciate that and I’m sure Hannah does as well.”

I went to see what the girls were doing, they were sat in the dining room on one of the sofa’s. “It’s not like she did anything for you is it?” queried Livvie.

“No, not like Mummy Cathy.”

“She’s amazin’ if a bit bossy,” Livvie continued. “When my parents died, I didn’t feel anything much ’cos they didn’t care much for me.”

“Yeah,” agreed Hannah, “she didn’t do much for anyone ’cept herself.”

“My mother even kidnapped me and Mummy had to get me back. She, my birth mother, nearly freaked out when she saw I had no dangly bits.” Trish got into the conversation.

“She saved Mima’s life, she saved Auntie Stella’s and Gramps plus loads more.”

“Julie said Mummy saved her life ’cos her dad cut her throat an’ if Mummy hadn’t climbed in through the window, she said she’d a died.”

“She’s wike a angew.”

“I think she is an angel,” said Livvie. I turned and crept away. I felt ashamed. If I were an angel, it must have been the angel of death because I sort of precipitated the accident in throwing the case back at Ingrid and over which she subsequently tripped and... It was horrible and I knew instantly that my healing skills couldn’t have saved her.

The four of them were talking in so matter of fact a manner that it made me feel really strange. I know that recent research suggests when we deal with emotional issues we switch off the network that runs analytical or critical thinking and the reverse is also true. We apparently switch off emotion when we try to solve problems or think logically about things. But when something as fundamental as your mother dying suddenly, surely the usual reaction is an emotional one, which in lots of people also hangs around until the reading of the will. So to be faced by this unflinching, almost disinterested response fazes me somewhat, more so than it seems the bad news does the children. I’m fascinated to learn what Stephanie makes of it. All that makes any sense for me is that the trauma is so awful they can’t take it on board.

Stephanie arrived with Emily and I immediately grabbed a cuddle with her. She’s such a nice little girl and so dainty. I soon had her chuckling and she played with some of Mima’s dolls while I talked with her mother.

I explained what had happened and my astonishment. She’s ten years old not a very small child, so she should understand the concept of death, even if it only applies to pets or roadkill. Stephanie agreed with me but also suggested she may be in denial, having compartmentalised her relationship with Ingrid as on hold or even over. That made some degree of sense. I asked for outcomes.

“I don’t know, Cathy. It would be pure speculation and ranges from PTSD to a period of mourning, with all suggestions in between. She might develop the screaming abdabs or go very quiet—neither sounded enjoyable.

University had finished for three weeks for the Easter recess which meant we’d start back on exams within a couple of weeks of returning. Most of the staff would be running revision classes for people who turned up—many don’t but those who do usually find it rewarding and we often find ourselves teaching bits and pieces we weren’t expecting but have been requested by individual students.

I’d have about a week off, the rest of the time I’d be checking exam papers—the questions and marking schemes, not the marking—although while that skiver, Freeman, keeps sending in medical certificates, we have to cope. I’m seriously thinking that I might let John our technician do some first year courses on a temporary or ad hoc basis. He’s got an MSc so is entitled to teach adults, which most of our students consider themselves to be, though not sure if I always agree with them. Some seem very juvenile and of course for many of them it’s the first time they’ve lived away from home, hence the party atmosphere of the first term. Usually by Christmas we manage to get through to them they have work to do or we’ll red card them.

I called Hannah to go and speak with Stephanie. She wasn’t very keen to go and I had to go and sit with her while Stephanie spoke with her. I actually sat behind her trying not to listen to what they were actually talking about. At the end Hannah thanked Stephanie and asked me if she could go and play with the others. I nodded and off she went.

Stephanie was writing copious notes and I made to leave her and she looked at me then pointed at the chair in front of her. I sat down feeling like a second former about to be interviewed by the headmistress about some misdemeanour like talking too much or wearing too much makeup to school.

Stephanie put down her pen. She interlocked her fingers turning the palms outwards she stretched her arms and hands making her knuckles crack. “How much of that did you hear?”

“Not much, why?”

“Your Hannah is a fascinating case. She claims her mother loaned her out for sex acts...”

I lurched for the waste paper bin and threw up my breakfast.

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2907 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

“Better now?” asked Stephanie handing me a glass of water.

“No, I feel totally...I don’t know how I feel.”

“Upset probably covers it.”

“But she went out so calmly?” I said feeling more than a little confused.

“It wasn’t news for her and you made her feel safe.”

“How do I deal with it?”

“When she needs to tell you about it, she will. Don’t go probing, she’s coped with it all this time so anything else may disturb that equilibrium.”

“How can she stay so calm?”

“Because she’s surrounded by people who love and protect her.”

“Is that it, then?”

“I don’t know, Cathy. For the moment it is. Possibly she doesn’t quite understand what happened to her.”

“What about when she’s older?”

“And realises fully the implications? I don’t know. I’m a doctor, Cathy, not a fortune teller. She may have problems she may not.”

“I mean has she been physically damaged, do I need her to see someone to check her out?”

“From what she was saying I suspect she wasn’t penetrated, rather that she was made to watch whatever those perverts were doing.”

“I feel like finding out who they were and eliminating them from humanity.”

“And who are you to judge people?”

“I’m her legal guardian and foster parent, a very pissed off one.”

“Cathy, I share your distaste for these people and I see a great deal more of it than you. She’s stable for the moment so leave well alone. She’s a very self contained young woman and I believe she will talk to you if she needs to. Also if you go all gung-ho after these clients of her mother, what effect will that have on her—dealing with the police either because they want to charge them as paedophiles or because you’re under investigation for killing or hurting them directly or indirectly. How will she feel then?”

“Okay, I won’t start anything, but if in the future she has problems I might reconsider this matter.”

“Cathy, you’ve as good as told me you were involved in the accident this morning, please don’t get involved in anything further with this business. She needs you to be there for her not awaiting trial.”

“All right, I heard you.”

“Promise me you won’t do anything.”

“I’ll think about it.”

“Not good enough.”

“Tough.”

“Cathy, you want to adopt this child?”

“She desperately wants me to and yes I’d like her to have the same status as all the other children, not that I treat her any differently. So yes, I would like to adopt her.”

“Right, well if you promise me not to get involved in this business of her abuse except in protecting and supporting her as her adoptive mother, so no more vigilante stuff and I’ll be happy to act as a medical/psychiatric referee for you.”

“And if I don’t.”

“You’ll have to find another psychiatrist. I can’t put her at risk, she’s too vulnerable.”

“I thought you said she was stable.”

“She is but if you stir things up or get arrested for being involved with vendettas I can’t guarantee what will happen.”

“Okay, for Hannah’s sake, I give you my word.”

We shook hands. “You’ve a kiddie shrink as long as you need one.”

Dinner was delicious, the meat tasted wonderful and simply fell apart in my mouth, it was so tender. I tried not to think that it was the flesh of some poor sheep who had the misfortune to be born male and was therefore sentenced to a short life. At least humans who have the misfortune to be born male can do something about it—assuming they want to. There is nothing wrong with being born...you know what I mean.

Stephanie stayed for about an hour after dinner and then went home with her fast growing toddler. Mind you, our little Lizzie isn’t little any longer and we have to be so careful she doesn’t get out on the road.

I’d forgotten the girls were officially on holiday, they have longer holidays than the state schools which used to irk Danny but funnily no longer does, can’t think why. I was dealing with some sewing in my study—repairing some opaque tights for Danielle when she phoned to say they’d be at the stadium in twenty minutes or so. In other words, come and get me. I asked if anyone wanted to come and collect her and only Hannah was seemingly interested.

“Enjoy your lunch, kiddo?” I asked trying to keep things light.

“Yes thank you.” She paused then asked, “Mummy, you didn’t kill my mother, did you?”

How I didn’t drive into the back of the car in front, I’ll never know but somehow I didn’t.”

“No, I told you she was getting into her car and another car hit her.”

“But you were there?”

“Yes I saw it and it was dreadful.”

“You couldn’t heal her up again?”

“She was very badly injured and died pretty well instantly.”

“Did you want her to die?”

“No of course not. I felt we’d win the case anyway and I’d be able to adopt you providing it was what you really wanted.”

“Oh it is, all right; I just wondered if you’d had her killed to make it easier.”

“I’m sorry, Hannah, but it’s not something I would do even if I felt we might lose.”

“Oh I would. She deserved all she got—I absolutely loath and detest her.”

“Well you won’t have to, will you?”

“No, but I’m glad she’s dead.”

“I’m sorry you feel that way, Hannah, she was your mother, even she wasn’t a very good one.”

“She was fucking useless, you’re much better.”

“Please don’t swear, Hannah, it isn’t very nice in young ladies.”

“Well she made so cross, she was such a rubbish mother.”

“I think she had some difficulties in that area, perhaps a lack of role models and instruction in being a parent. There are quite a few people in that category these days, who through no fault of their own, have never been shown how to look after children.”

“She couldn’t look after herself, let alone me and she wasn’t that interested. She didn’t mean to get pregnant and blamed me for it. She didn’t want me and kept telling me so, all she wanted was to do her own things but she didn’t want anyone else to have me.”

“And then I came along and spoilt her plans.”

“She hated you because you were the sort who if you wanted could take me off her permanently. I wanted it too but she didn’t, she thought she owned me but you beat her, now I belong to you and Daddy.”

I pulled into the stadium car park and the coach hadn’t arrived. “Hannah, You don’t belong to anyone, we’re a family of people not possessions. You belong with us not to us and we all love you. I’m sorry that you had a bad time with Ingrid but we need to put that behind us now and look to the future.”

“Can I change my name to Cameron?”

“Assuming you still want to be adopted, yes we can do it soon afterwards.”

“Oh good, an’ even if you did kill her, I don’t care—good riddance to bad rubbish—you’re my mummy now.”

“Please believe me, I did not kill her or ask anyone else to do so. It was a tragic accident.”

“Here’s Danni’s bus, wonder if she scored any goals?” said my newest daughter but some of her ideas concerned me, especially the one that she thought I killed her mother to adopt her. Is that what she really thinks of me—ruthless to the point of stupidity? A bit worrying to say the least, more conversations with Stephanie, I think.

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2908 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

We stood by the car while the women disembarked from the coach. Danielle seemed somewhat disconsolate and she was limping as she came towards us. She waved to one or two of the others and then got to us. Hannah took her bag and I held the door as Danielle climbed into the people carrier.

“What happened?” I asked after sitting in the car.

“I got targeted.”

“’Cos you’re the best player,” piped Hannah from behind.

“The third time I got taken down, my ankle twisted under me. She got sent off and I got substituted.”

“Did you score?” asked Hannah.

“Only twice today.”

“Twice?,” Shrieked Hannah doing further damage to my hearing.

“Yeah, the last one shoulda been number three.”

“How was that?” I asked reversing the car out of its parking space.

“I usually take the penalties, but I couldn’t stand.”

“The other two weren’t, like penalties, were they?”

“They all count,” Danni reminded Hannah.

“Yeah, but it’s not as difficult as dribbling past defenders is it?”

“You seem to know a lot about soccer,” I suggested.

“I used to play in my other school.”

“Why don’t you now?” I asked unaware of this.

“Nobody asked me an’ I’m not as good as Danni an’ Trish.”

“How d’you know?”

“I seen ’em play, Mummy.”

“Well I think you should try and see if you can get into the team eventually.”

“I dunno, Mummy, I’ll think about it.”

“How’s the ankle, kiddo?”

“Easing, thanks,” she smiled at me.

“Why do referees allow targeting to happen?” I asked as I drove homewards.

“It’s quite legit and if they have three on me, we have a two overlap.”

“How many did you score?”

“Two, I told you already.”

“No all together.”

“Oh six, I think.”

“Six?” shrieked Hannah even louder than before and probably waking dormice from their hibernation for twenty miles around.

“Yeah, I scored two and made two of the others, the last two were scored after I went off, one from the penalty I shoulda taken.”

“I glad to learn you didn’t retaliate to those who fouled you.”

“Too busy rollin’ about on the ground. It bloody ’urt.”

“Why do they have to play dirty? They’re supposed to be young ladies.”

Hannah and Danielle nearly fell of their seats laughing.

“Some of them would make Neanderthals looked civilised.”

“They were.”

“What?” said Danni.

“Yes, there’s evidence to suggest they were quite a bit more sophisticated than we gave credit, for instance, they buried their dead with funerary goods.”

“What are they?” Danni looked bemused.

“They buried their dead with bits of their possessions and with flowers. Sadly the technology was minimalist.”

I pulled into the drive and Danielle pipped the remote so the gates opened. So far Daddy hadn’t rammed them this time, but give him long enough and he’ll forget. We’d kept a conversation about primitive peoples with the two girls feeling it was legitimate to refer to some of their contemporaries as Neanderthals or cave men. They didn’t quite get to Cro-Magnon which would have surprised and delighted me. These were the forerunners of modern Europeans and if I remember correctly had pretty well the same DNA as we do.

It was a little concerning that Danni was being targeted by the bully girls but she is a phenomenal footballer and good players are often stopped only by fouls because their skills are so much greater than anyone else on the field. At least Danni seems able to deal with it and her ankle is far less swollen since getting in the car. We’ve kept the blue stuff a bit quieter until Hannah becomes more aware of it and the consequences of blabbing in the wrong quarter.

The weather had been reasonable for a couple of days and we’d even managed to line dry a couple of loads of washing but the forecast for Easter, was pretty awful, only Good Friday looking to be fine. So far we’ve had about ten or eleven storms this year and it’s only just week twelve. The weather is as bizarre as the times all of which is supporting the belief amongst the scientific community that climate change is happening and coming to a place near you. I mean that means a storm every bloody week, no wonder I can’t get out on my frigging bike.

I carried Danni’s bag into the house while she walked awkwardly rather than limped. Of course Trish spotted it and wanted to heal it. Danielle was more aware and said she could try and rub it better later, for now all she wanted was the roast lamb dinner David had saved her.

I sat and drank a cuppa while she tucked into her food and the rate it was going down, she appeared to be enjoying it. “That was great, Dave,” she called to him as he was about to leave to go back to his cottage.

“Glad you enjoyed it, kiddo,” he called then left.

“Did you close the gates?” I asked Danni.

“Yeah, I think so.”

“Trish can you check please.”

“Yeah, okay.” She ambled out of the kitchen with Hannah walking alongside her.

I left Danni to finish her meal and went to the study where Simon came in behind me, hugged me and gave me a kiss. “Missed you, Babes,” he said.

“I’ve missed you too,” I replied, then added, “Hannah seems to think I killed her mother.”

“How d’you know?”

“She as good as told me.”

“Oh, so what do we do about that—tell her what happened?”

“I have in outline, that she was killed by another car as she went to get into her car. But, probably because I was there, she assumes I was involved.”

“You were trying to apprehend her, weren’t you?”

“Yes but not actually with her or trying to grab her or anything, I was probably twenty or thirty yards away.”

“There’ll be an inquest?”

“Yeah, I’ve given a statement but the police told me I may need to attend.”

“I’ll come with you.”

“Thanks, darling.”

“Hannah won’t need to attend?”

“God, I hope not—no, she wasn’t there so, no. Besides I’d hate for her to hear the details.”

“You haven’t exactly described them to me.”

“It was horrible. She stumbled and fell forwards between the door and the car and the car coming the other way came round the corner too quickly and hit the door.”

“While she was still...ugh, that is horrible, babes.”

“I know, I saw it.”

He hugged me.

“I’ll be okay, it was awful but—one of those things, I guess, but the bloke in the car that hit her was going too fast.”

“What was that about a bag of money that James was on about?”

“Oh she was carrying a flight bag with her and the car hit it ripping it open and the road was filled with twenty pound notes.”

“Will Hannah get those?”

“I hope so, though I suspect the Inland Revenue will want to see what tax she paid for the past year.”

“That could take years.”

“I just hope she made a will or we’ll have to fight for Hannah’s share of the estate.”

“If we have to, we will,” Simon declared supporting me.

“C’mon let’s see what they’re all up to.”

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2909 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

Trish returned chatting to Hannah. “Were they closed?” I asked.

“Yeah.”

“What took so long then?”

“Uh...”

“She made them open then closed them again,” giggled Hannah dropping her sister in it.

I shook my head in a mildly disapproving way. “They are shut properly now, I hope?”

“I’ll go an’ check again,” offered Trish.

“Uh, no you won’t, young lady and put the bleeper thing back where it’s kept.”

“Spoilsport,” she said before skipping off to do as I asked.

The rest of the week was taken up by trying to amuse my children, deal with emails or phone calls from Diane and run the household. Amanda had a couple of days off while I was home to go and see her mother. Simon agreed she could borrow the Mondeo, although technically Tom’s car, we tended to use it most so we paid the tax and insurance and fuel. He also rang the garage and I was to expect my car sometime on Wednesday. I could hardly wait. The people carrier thing was fine for the school run but otherwise my Jag was far better.

Not being in school we’d had no problem from any further attacks mind you, the way that happened and the sense of helplessness I felt, still has some ramifications. I’ve had flashbacks and nasty dreams. I hope the guys we thumped were the ones responsible and hopefully they’ll leave us in peace from now on. Hopefully, Ingrid was the instigator and as she is no longer with us, they’ll go and bother someone else.

I asked Danni and Trish to play some football type game and include Hannah in it. She was astonished how quickly Danni’s ankle seemed to mend, helped by Trish giving it a massage and my distance healing. It all comes from me, but they are seemingly able to plug into my system and direct it themselves, which apparently boosts it somewhat. So I suspect the blue energy system is training them for the longer term. I tried looking back to when I first realised it was happening and it was quite gradual until Mima nearly drowned. Then it seemed my insistence it save her seemed to escalate things a little. Now I try to use it sparingly.

“She’s got potential,” was Danni’s opinion of Hannah’s soccer skills, so I asked her to coach Hannah until she was improving—sort of bend it like Cameron. I also had those who wanted to ride, out on bikes. Trish was a disappointment so Hannah borrowed her bike and together with her big sister and soccer coach, Danni, we rode several times.

Danielle is a natural athlete with great balance and coordination, Hannah is a plodder, but one with attitude. Tell her she won’t do something and she’ll do her best to prove you wrong. Portsdown hill nearly killed her but she drove herself to get to the top long after she should have stopped. With little bodyweight and a better muscle to bodyweight ratio than I have, she got there. This kid was full of surprises and winning my respect by the day. As I hadn’t ridden much for a few weeks, I found it a struggle and I have the advantage of experience and knowledge. Riding a bike is almost as much about head stuff as physical strength. Okay, you have to have enough strength to turn the pedals and enough stamina to complete your journey, but you also have to have belief—if you don’t you won’t conquer your demons and the bigger hills. It can come in many forms, in Hannah’s case it was cast as determination, she wouldn’t give in so I helped talk her up the hill and that included Danielle too. She hadn’t ridden it for a long time and needed some distraction, which was my job.

Me, I talk myself up them, hills and some people’s noses, on my own I distract myself by trying to think of something like how am I going to do a certain task, or give a particular lecture. What can I do to involve my audience/students? I also try to remember it wasn’t that long ago that I was a student myself and what did it feel like? What could I do to improve the bits I didn’t enjoy apart from use novelty and the unexpected? I learnt a bit of NLP and the techniques of making students remember things even though they weren’t aware they were doing it. I also use the same techniques for climbing my own mountains, building up the chunks until I can get over the whole thing. It still gives me a buzz.

When Tom asked me to act as a professor, just for a few months until they got a new dean, he knew he wouldn’t be returning to his chair and he also knew he wanted me to replace him but without experience, I’d have no chance. He guided me in the beginning and I suppose still does from time to time. I know he desperately wants me to win his chair and run his department until perhaps one of the choice positions has an opening, like Sussex or London or possibly Oxbridge, which would be the icing on the cake of any academic career. Would I want to go abroad? Not really, I’ve got Made in Britain stamped on every cell in my body, it’s probably part of the code of my DNA, so although California or Boston might be warmer in summer and the salaries probably better, I’ll stay here and watch the rain while trying to improve the place for our indigenous wildlife and in doing so also for future generations.

I hope Joni Mitchell’s They paved Paradise, doesn’t happen on my shift or those of the people I teach to replace me. I hope to continue making films, preferably with Alan as we work well together, but for now, I’ve got to get these two home on their bikes and then find something for all of us to do tomorrow—I know, we’ll go swimming at the hotel.

We did. It was good fun and they all enjoyed it. Then my Jaguar returned and it was like meeting an old friend. Unknown to me, Simon had instructed them to fit armoured glass, which is effectively bulletproof—it’s a bit like the sort the PM uses, only mine’s an estate car. Apparently now it can produce a very loud noise outside the car and the external handles become electrically charged to administer a shock to anyone trying to open them. In the car we’re safe, standing outside it, you’re earthed and thus shocked. There’s a button to press for this defence mechanism. It feels like something out of James Bond—I’d still like the DB10, Aston Martin built for the film, complete with machine guns and ballistic missile system.

Good Friday was a lovely day with sunshine all day and we spent all of it outdoors. We went for a picnic and walked around some of Langstone harbour, where I managed to see Brent geese and spoonbills before some twit frightened them all.

A tired group of youngsters tucked into the stew David had made and I admit, I was both tired and hungry, so I enjoyed it too. I keep waiting for Hannah to react to her mother’s death, but she doesn’t. Just anything to give her a chance to grieve a little but she doesn’t.

The funeral is set for after Easter, the crematorium is apparently very busy. I haven’t yet asked her if she wants to go to the funeral but sooner or later I will, I don’t have a choice. I have a duty to offer to take her and it’s something I hate to think about let alone do. Let’s get Easter over first and the storm that’s due to coincide with it. Wonderful.

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2910 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

After the relatively delightful weather of Good Friday, Easter Saturday was a mixture of blustery showers and the odd sunny period. This gave rise to the main act of the storm. On Easter Sunday, the primeval forces of nature decided that having bank holidays was some sort of offence that required punishment, the sentence—wet and windy. The rain and hail smashed against the windows waking me several times, then as the day dawned, a fleeting sunny period and more blasts of gale force showers and hail.

David actually trotted across from his cottage and flung himself in through the kitchen door just as the next precipitation precipitated, but sort of sideways—so is that precipitation? I suppose ultimately big blobs of water are heavier than air and thus precipitate, so that’s what it was. At one point I went out to retrieve our bird feeder thing: a plastic and metal hopper device in which I put seeds which only the pigeons seem to eat partly because they scare off the sparrows and other smaller birds, simply by their size. I don’t think pigeons are aggressive, except perhaps to other pigeons, compared to most other birds. I’ve seen blackbirds going at it hell for leather, sparrows squabbling on the ground and robins attempting to knock seven bells out of each other. It must be spring. Thankfully humans don’t act in this way, or we’d all be born in December—like I was—oops.

Of course being a big religious festival, some psychopath blew themselves up in a park in Lahore killing seventy innocents and apparently Isis or whatever these demons call themselves crucified some catholic priest they’d kidnapped earlier in Yemen. These were the same minded people who blew themselves up in Brussels a few days earlier and whose unspeakable acts leave me doubting their sanity.

Sure, we can all get angry enough to want to kill specific individuals. If a god existed, I’d have killed him when Billie died, then healed him and killed him again until I got fed up. That Christians celebrate their god king’s death and resurrection at Easter, to my mind, demonstrates the power of myth over fact. The stories are written by people who never met the unfortunate Jesus and who never even set foot in Judea or Galilee and about fifty years after the event they claim to describe.

According to Biblical scholars, Jesus expected the Kingdom of God to happen with the end of days and so on, within a short time of his death. Paul, probably the most contemporary of the bible writers, expected the second coming in his life time. They’re still waiting, but facts have never got in the way of a good myth, so they move the goal posts and carry on.

If one looks more spiritually at the message of Jesus, as we have it reported, perhaps his Kingdom did arrive but nobody saw it. If everyone had adopted his message of loving their neighbour—a long held tenet of Judaism, though rarely practised—we could have had paradise on earth for two thousand years. Instead we killed the messenger and continue to kill and abuse each other with monotonous regularity, often claiming authority from on high—despite the Commandment, ‘Thou shalt not kill.’ Which part of that short statement do we not understand?

Perhaps one day the earth will be populated by intelligent and compassionate life forms—until then, we have to make do with the most monstrous of all evolutionary forms, mankind, as holding the top place through his ruthlessness and technology.

I watched Jim Al Kalili, a physicist explaining how the universe originated. They still talk about the Big Bang Theory, but the evidence tends to suggest it actually happened. How in less than billionths of a second, the universe went from being a minute, extremely hot nothingness to formations of quarks and gluons and finally to nuclear particles and atoms themselves.

He mentioned how a young Cambridge student described the composition of atoms in the universe, but because she was female she wasn’t even given a degree. Even then her discovery, which was rubbished at first was only accepted after the man who rubbished her discovered she was correct. But then Einstein, him of the brain nearly as big as Trish’s, dismissed an Begian priest cum theoretical physicist and then had to accept he was wrong. This was the man who first suggested the Big Bang though it was called something else and whose theory suggested the universe was expanding but it was only when Hubble demonstrated red shift that Einstein admitted he was wrong. Hubble was weird too, apparently he came from Missouri but affected an English aristocrat’s accent—obviously, what happens when you spend hours looking through telescopes—sort of sky madness.

After a relatively subdued Easter Sunday, watching the heavy showers being driven by the gales, we went to bed and I found it difficult to sleep because of the wind howling in the chimneys or screaming through the telephone wires. Of course Simon goes off as soon as his head touches the pillow. He reckons he learnt to sleep with any sort of noise around him after being in dormitories at school. Whereas I find it difficult with any extraneous sound, so howling gales and driving rain wakes me up or stops me sleeping.

At one point I was doing the crossword on my iPad, which meant I didn’t need to switch on the bedside light and disturb sleeping beauty. It was one in the morning before I felt sufficiently tired to sleep through anything. Then as if to prove me wrong I heard an unearthly groaning noise which went on for a few moments and brought me back to full wakefulness and was followed by a further loud groan and a loud crashing noise.

My immediate reaction was to sit up in bed and think, ‘Oh shit we’ve got a tree down.’ Crashing noise—bugger it’s hit something. I rushed out of bed and looked through the window. We have loads of trees in the garden and along the driveway.

“Wossup?” asked a sleepy Simon who must have felt me get out of bed.

“We’ve got a tree down.”

“Yeah, yeah,” he said before closing his eyes again, then sitting bolt upright and asking, “It hasn’t hit the car has it?”

“I can’t see what it’s hit.” I slipped into the girl’s room and saw that an elderly ash tree had dropped a huge branch on David’s cottage. I sped back into our room and started dressing. “C’mon, sleepy head, David’s house has been hit.”

“What?” he gasped and sat up again. He paused as if to process what I’d said before scrambling out of bed. “Wait for me,” he called as I rushed down the stairs. I wasn’t going anywhere without him despite my concerns that David could be injured. It was safer with two, if only to have someone who could call for help.

Tom came down yawning, in dressing gown and slippers. “Whit’s goin’ on?” he asked.

“There’s a tree down on David’s cottage.”

“I’ll go an’ dress,” he said rushing up the stairs moments before Simon came down them. We pulled on coats and opening the door prepared to venture out into the storm.

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2911 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

The problem with gusting wind is simply not knowing when the next gust will occur. It happened while we were half way to David’s cottage and flung me into Simon, who caught off balance, fell over, fortunately onto some grass albeit of the muddy variety. I of course remained upright and clean.

“D’you mind warning me the next time you’re going to jump on me,” he said as I helped pull him back to his feet.

“It wasn’t me, it was the wind,” so saying the same happened only this time I fell on top of him and neither of us could move for laughing.

“If I recall correctly, this happened once before with a glass of red.”

Thankfully he couldn’t see me blushing in the darkness, but I was getting wet so rose back to my feet and then helped my long suffering husband to his.

“It’s your turn to act as a cushion next time,” he said as we approached the cottage.

By this time Tom had arrived, obviously throwing his clothes on over his pyjamas. “Ye’ll need thae fire brigade tae help get a tarpaulin over thae roof.”

“Can you go and call them while Simon and I see if David is all right?”

“Why don’t ye go an’ Simon and I will rescue David?”

“Because I’m able to get into spaces no one else can, please go and call for help, Daddy.” He frowned but went off back to the house.

“Is the door locked?” I asked Simon. A gust of wind caught the bough of the tree embedded in the roof and we both jumped as some bits of tile fell down around us, one or two big enough to cause serious injury if they’d hit us.

He tried the door and it was locked.

I moved the flower pot by the door and the spare key was there. I picked it up but it wouldn’t fit the keyhole, obviously the key was in the other side of the lock. There being no back entrance, we had to either break in through the door or a window.

Si threw himself at the door and bounced off it. “It’s a mortise lock.”

“So?” he said stepped back and flung himself at the door, this time crashing into the house as the door gave way.

I followed him in and found him lying in the hallway. “Are you all right?” I asked when it was quite obvious he wasn’t.

“Hurt my wrist,” he said as I helped him up. It looked broken to me.

“Okay, wait here, I’ll go up and see if David’s okay.”

“Pretty obvious he isn’t, isn’t it or he’d be shouting at us for waking him up.”

“If he had a few drinks he might just be zonked.”

“He’d also be zonked if a tree hit him,” countered Simon.

“I think I’ll be able to tell the difference.” Without waiting for a reply I scampered up the stairs only to be met by a large piece of tree which was blocking my entrance to the bedroom. I called to him but got no reply. I could feel rain coming in through the hole in the roof. The only way we’d be able to get into him is with chain saws.

Stepping back I could see a gap under our uninvited timber guest and decided I’d see if I could wriggle under it and get to David. I lay on my back and moved headfirst under the large lump of tree. In the dark I couldn’t see very much and banged my head on the leg of a small table in the bedroom.

It took several minutes to work my way under the fallen bough and finally I was able to roll and pull myself upright. I eventually found the light switch and to my horror saw that the tree had crashed right across his bed. If he was still alive with a ton of kindling lying on top of him, it would be something verging on miraculous. Flashing blue lights, visible through the curtains showed the cavalry had arrived. I struggled to get to David and found an arm, he had a pulse in his wrist. He was still alive, but for how much longer? Damn, I’d have to cook dinner tomorrow—that means we’ll have to save him.

I heard heavy footsteps thump up the stairs. “Fuck me,” was exclaimed.

“No thank you,” I called back.

“Sorry, Missus. How’d you get in there?”

“I crawled under the tree.”

“I don’t think any of us lot will get through there.”

“We have a casualty, he has a pulse but is unconscious.”

“We’re going to need a crane to get this out.” I heard him talking on his radio. “Could we get to him through the window?” he called to me.

“No, the tree is blocking the way from there as well.”

“Okay, a crane is on its way, I’ve asked them to hurry but you know how slow they are.”

It took an hour for the heavy lifting crane to arrive and another twenty minutes for it to get into position, partly because they had to move David’s car, the keys for which were in his pocket, under the tree. In the end they picked it up with the crane and moved it down the drive but close enough to the wall to enable the crane to depart afterwards.

Eventually, someone was lowered in with a set of heavy duty chains. This was now two hours since the tree crashed on the cottage. I helped him secure them around the tree, they were really heavy and it was as much as I could do to hold them let alone wrap them round anything.

It took another twenty minutes to move the bough, care being taken not to hurt David any more than was unavoidable. Paramedics dashed in and he was in A&E some fifteen minutes later, the two paramedics and two burly firemen carrying him down on a stretcher. He was badly injured, with severe crush injuries. He could still die. It was now that I could recognise the severity of his injuries and I felt really shocked.

I left Tom directing the rescuers in placing a large tarpaulin over the hole in the roof and securing it there. Simon escorted me, cold and wet, back to the house and sat me down while he got Stella, who’d been woken by the flashing lights and big diesel engines of the crane and fire tender, to make some tea.

I drank the tea, then rushed upstairs, changed and before Simon could stop me jumped in the car and drove off to the hospital, where apparently, bedlam was ensuing because of a shortage of nurses.

It was very fortunate that Ken Nicholls had been called in because he saw me in the waiting area and asked the receptionist what I was doing there? She told him I was the employer of one the victims of the storm. On asking which one, he went to examine him and then told them to get me in there quickly.

The junior doctor was out of her depth and aware that David’s vitals were spiralling downwards but could very little to assist him. Ken was being requested to go and operate and the other theatre was already in use with victims of a car crash.

I was shown in and could see immediately that David was in dire straits. “Do what you can, Cathy, if you can stabilise him, I’ll have him down in theatre next.”

I nodded my eyes filling with tears.

“If she needs anything, get it for her, okay?” he instructed the young woman doctor who remained with me.

“What are you going to do?” she asked.

“Try and keep him alive until Ken can take him down for theatre.”

“Are you a doctor then?”

“Yes of biology.”

“So how are you going to help him?” She looked askance at me.

“Watch and you may see.”

“Watch what?”

“Just shut your mouth but keep your eyes open.”

“David, it’s me, Cathy, I’ve come to help you. Just concentrate on my voice and watch for the blue star to make itself visible to you...”

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2912 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

I was aware that I’d saved David’s life before but surely this was just a random accident, so shouldn’t be held against him. I’d give it my best shot and if he didn’t make it, I’d do my best not to cooperate in what the so called goddess wanted me to do.

Although I could feel my body sitting there with blue energy pouring into David’s broken body and the young doctor standing with her mouth wide open even though I’d asked her to close it; my being was elsewhere. I was in the building of light and I knelt. “We do not bargain and we are tempted to allow your friend to die to demonstrate this miscalculation on your part, Catherine.”

“I’m here to ask that you spare the life of my friend.”

“By suggesting you won’t cooperate in future.”

“I’d prefer to cooperate...”

“We do not bargain. Good day, Catherine.”

“I am disappointed, Milady.”

“You think we are concerned by your disappointments?”

“Of course not, but it affects my morale.”

“As if that was of concern to us.”

“No of course not, morale is only something that affects humans, causing them to function less well or being unable to function at all. Losing my friend could do that to me.”

“That is your choice, Catherine.”

“I’m afraid it isn’t, Milady, it’s part of being human and possibly why you’re a goddess and I’m a mere human, whose existence is by comparison, ephemeral.”

“We are unable to offer you immortality.”

“I think that would be the last thing I would desire.”

“We are pleased to hear it.”

“I shall go and make ready my mourning for my friend and try to deal with my grief and my loss of morale. I shall apologise in advance if I am unable to carry out your instructions because of it.”

“Catherine you tread a fine line between audacity and impertinence. Go and save your friend but do not think we are stupid. Next time you try to bargain we may exact a very high price.”

I felt myself back in my body and looking ahead I watched the young doctor gasp and then collapse in a faint, knowing that she’d seen the winged healer standing over us. She might also have noticed that it bore my visage, it was an aspect of me, when I’m not negotiating with goddesses.

I felt David’s hand grasp mine tightly. I knew then he would make it and so did he. I let him go and went to tend the young houseman—stupid term for a woman, intern might be better. I helped her to a sitting position. “What happened?” she said looking very pale.

“I think you simply fainted, probably working too many hours.”

“I had this weird dream—thought I saw an angel.”

“Most people would think that was something to be treasured.”

“It looked like you.”

“Now I do know you were dreaming—I am certainly no angel, far from it.”

“How is your friend?”

“A bit more relaxed, I suspect. I learnt a sort of hypno-meditation years ago and find it can help promote healing.”

“I suspect he’s going to need more than a bit of hypnosis or placebos which is all it is.”

“Absolutely, isn’t that so, David?”

With that he sat up in bed and she fainted again. “What did I do?” he asked.

“Nothing, she’s just easily shocked.”

“I saw the star and clung on to it and you brought me home. Thank you, Cathy.”

“That’s okay.”

“I also heard you arguing with someone you kept calling, ‘milady’. What was all that about?”

“That was just about a feminist issue, nothing for you to worry about.”

“Oh,” he scowled at me.

I sat the doctor up again and she seemed to be quite unsteady. “Here, if David gets off the plinth, you can lie on it. I’m sure it’s just tiredness.” She was well out of it and complied with my coaxing lying down on the plinth and closing her eyes. I told her to sleep for five minutes and wake refreshed as if she’d had a night’s sleep. I surrounded her in blue light and David and I walked out of the cubicle.

“And just where are you going?” asked a familiar voice.

“Home, how did the surgery go?”

“A bit iffy,” he said rotating his hand back and fore.

I closed my eyes, “The bleed has stopped in his lung—he should make it now.”

He shook his head. “What about this one?”

“I’m fine, Doc,” offered David.

“Any problems get straight back here.”

“I will don’t worry.”

“Where’s Amy—my houseman?”

“She felt a bit unwell so I let her rest for a few minutes, she’ll be okay in a couple or so.”

“You realise anyone but me would sack her?”

“Ken you are just plain wonderful.” I pulled him towards me and pecked him on the cheek. To my delight he blushed.

“Wait, I’ll do you a discharge form. I presume the X-rays and scan we did will show nothing?”

I shrugged.

I took David home, it was nearly light when we got there. He looked up at his cottage with the tarpaulins over the roof and the lumps of sawn wood in front of it. I suddenly remembered Simon’s broken wrist and after asking David to make some teas, rushed upstairs to check on Simon. He heard me enter the room.

“Where did you go?”

“To see David.”

“How is he?”

“He’s downstairs making tea, want some?”

“Yeah, why not?”

“How’s the wrist?”

“About two hours ago it was hurting like hell and i thought I’d have to go to hospital when this searing pain occurred in it and then stopped and it’s felt fine ever since. Nothing to do with you, was it?”

I shrugged and then leant over and kissed him. “I need a cuppa, I’m parched.” I then went downstairs and David passed me a steaming mug. It was bliss in a cup.

Simon appeared bedecked in a dressing gown. “How are you?” he asked David.

“Fine, thanks for trying to rescue me, I could just about hear some of what went on, including Cathy shouting at the fireman.”

“Your place is a mess, you’d better come over here to stay for the moment.”

“I’ll stay downstairs, kip on the couch, I’ll be all right, honestly.”

“What about next door, did the roof there get damaged?” asked Simon.

“We’ll see later, now I need a few hours sleep.”

“Me too,” said David and sloped off to his cottage.

“Was he as sick as he looked?”

“Probably worse, why?”

“No wonder you feel tired, he’s taken all your energy.”

“No he hasn’t, I’m just short of hours of ZZZZ.” I pecked him on the lips and rushed up to bed, pulling the curtains closed I stripped off and got into bed hoping I didn’t dream of a certain goddess.

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2913 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

I slept for about three hours being woken by a very worried looking Trish holding a cup of tea. “I had a horrible dream, Mummy.”

“Did you?” I asked yawning.

“Yes, you were pleading with the golden lady to spare David’s life and when I woke up I saw his house was damaged and he was in hospital...an’ I hoped you was all right.”

“Better than your grammar,” I quipped wondering why we were paying three thousand a term—Jeez, the same as tuition fees at most universities. Perhaps we could send all of them to university instead and cut out the middleman?

“Eh? I don’t have a grandma.”

Some days you just know you should stay in bed and not talk to anyone because they either speak a different language or don’t understand yours.

“Never mind, sweetheart, David is fine and so am I. Is that tea for me?” I asked as she was in danger of spilling most of it on the carpet.

“Oh yes, I’m glad you’re okay, Mummy,” and she went to hug me still holding the tea—I think it was probably the quickest I have ever got out of and stripped a bed.

While the bedding was laundering I showered accompanied by Trish who’d also got drenched in the tea. Once we were dried and dressed we went down and I finally got my cup of tea. I was astonished that David was there preparing lunch.

“What are you doing here?” I said loudly.

“I work here, Lady Cameron, what are you doing here, in my kitchen?”

“Trying to get a fresh cup of tea.”

“Permit me,” he said and made me one immediately—recognition at last—don’t make me laugh.

“Thank you? Maureen is coming over after lunch to see what’s needed on your cottage as soon as we know, we’ll have someone start to do the work as soon as possible.”

He nodded and continued with his food preparations. I left and went to my study to drink my tea and try and get my brain into working mode. Trish came and sat with me. “I was really worried, Mummy.”

“It was just a bad dream sweetheart.” I put my arm around her after placing my cup on the coffee table.

“I thought you were being cheeky to the lady and she was going to be cross and let David die or do something to you.”

“It was just a dream, sweetheart.”

“I’m glad, Mummy.” She snuggled into me and we had a nice cuddle.

The lunch was soup with fresh made bread and was delicious, but then I tend to believe any meal I don’t have to make is delicious. We’d just finished when Maureen arrived to view the damage.

The wind was cold and there was showery rain in the gusting wind though it was far better than it had been. Her opinion was depressing, the roof would need almost complete rebuilding and some of the walls had been damaged. It was in a bad state, then with interior ceilings and decoration it would take at least a couple of months. We explored the other cottage adjacent to it and the roof had been damaged but not as badly and she reckoned that could be sorted in a week but as they would be insurance jobs we had to await the assessor for an official report and costings.

Amanda had the cottage next to David’s though she was away when the tree fell, however, she was due back tomorrow and we still had to find David some accommodation. Maureen suggested hiring a caravan, she could organise water and mains electricity, even a phone line and David nodded. As always, she had contacts and three hours later a four wheel drive vehicle appeared in the drive towing a large six berth caravan which we had parked up by the garage where my vintage jaguar was kept.

In a further hour we had electricity and mains water linked to it and even mains drainage from the shower and loo which went down through an inspection cover into the house sewerage. David was close enough to pick up from our routers so could use his computer or television. Danni and the younger girls helped him move his clothes and other personal items he would need for the next couple of months. There was central heating provided with bottles of propane gas and they supplied a large cylinder which they reckoned would last for at least a month if not more. I suppose it depends upon how much you use it.

I ended up cooking the dinner while David and half a dozen assistants helped him set up his temporary home. It was pork chops and as I placed two large trays of meat into the oven I wondered if the slices of apple I spread on top of them were a good idea or not or the cider they’d been doused in. Too late now, and while they were warming I started the potatoes and other veg. We eat the skins on the spuds unless they’re disgusting, so it’s just a question of taking off any nasty looking bits and boiling up what’s left. I did carrots, broccoli and peas, the latter a whole bag of frozen garden peas.

Half an hour later I added more cider to the chops and some single cream which of course curdled, then shoved them back in the oven to finish. David ate with us and made encouraging noises about my effort—he didn’t leave anything on his plate or otherwise. The girls helped me clear up and we left David to go and settle into his temporary home.

Later I sat in the kitchen looking at the Guardian when Simon emerged. He’d been about during the day but was doing things with a chain saw to the half a tree which had fallen and he also took down two trees which looked threatening to the main house. He’d apparently enjoyed himself playing lumberjacks and it was hard for me to refrain from singing the Monty Python song forever associated with hairdressers who really wanted to be lumberjacks. However, I knew if I started singing it at him, he’d run through the whole sketch and I’d be saddled with it for the next twenty minutes.

We were it seemed well supplied with logs for the next so many months. Seeing as we hadn’t had a fire since Christmas, we could be talking years not months. Danny helped him stack them in the woodshed and also against the wall of the woodshed, which was then covered in a tarpaulin.

By nine o’ clock I was sinking fast and after sending the younger girls to bed, retired myself with Simon only minutes behind me. I was asleep seconds after touching the pillow, hoping for no dreams about a certain OT goddess and as far as I know, I didn’t have any.

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2914 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

The next day Amanda returned and was horrified to see the damage to the cottage next to her. “David could have used my cottage,” she exclaimed when she saw the caravan. About an hour after she arrived, a large lorry with scaffolding pulled up in the drive and by lunch time the three men erecting the poles had finished that part of the job. They took a break for lunch and we made them hot drinks. Half an hour later we watched as they fixed heavy plastic sheeting all over the scaffolding enclosing the damaged roof and the gable end that had been damaged.

Maureen came after they’d finished and inspected it, she seemed quite pleased with the job and her builder colleagues would be able to get started the next day. There was an external tap on the side of the cottage and she ran an outdoor extension socket to stand beside it.

“What’s that for?” asked our resident genius.

“So they can boil a kettle while they work.”

“Really?” she asked unsure of the older woman’s answer.

“No, it’s so they can run a cement mixer.”

“Ah,” said Einstein and went off curiosity sated—for the moment.

“Do we know the builders?” I asked unsure of having too many strangers on the property.

“Yes, it’s Ed Mutton and his brother, they did much of your extension.”

“Oh I remember, big chap with a beard, his brother’s bald as a coot.”

“Yep, seen more hair on a billiard ball,” was Maureen’s reply. They were quite good workers. A heavy shower sent us all scuttling for cover. “Make sure the kids stay away from the scaffolding, it’s dangerous if you don’t know what you’re doing.”

“I’ll tell them at dinner, unless you wish to do so.”

“Nah, you can do it.”

“They may take it better from you I urged, or why don’t you stay for dinner and you can tell them then?”

“Okay, what time?”

I told her about six and she said she’d be back. I knew that Julie would be pleased to see her again.

“We have another for dinner,” I announced to David.

“If you’re thinking of calling me trailer trash, don’t bother.”

“What?” It hadn’t entered my consciousness let alone my mouth.

“You heard.”

“I wouldn’t dream of it.”

“Good,” he retorted doing something in the sink, “Now, out of my kitchen.”

One of these days I shall remind him it was my kitchen long before he came. I asked Amanda if she wanted to amuse the girls or do some ironing. Having been caught before, she opted for the ironing. I therefore got to amuse Danni and those younger. We still had the minibus thing and I suddenly asked, who wants to go swimming? I was nearly killed in the stampede. So while David cooked and Amanda ironed, I took the hooligans to the hotel swimming pool.

I half expected Danielle to wear her bikini, it looks really nice on her but she opted for a conventional bathing suit, which still showed her developing shape but was probably safer for some serious swimming. As soon as we got there she was goggles on, swim cap on and she swam continuously for an hour. I messed about with the younger ones in the shallow end. I did eventually get a swim when Trish and Hannah watched the little ones and Livvie and I did a few lengths. I’m not a good swimmer and Livvie was soon well ahead of me, finishing half a length up when we finished. My shoulders felt stiff and I knew I’d regret it the next day but the girls enjoyed it.

On speaking with Danielle, she explained that she needed to do the exercise because she felt generally unfit. She had training that night, so I warned her not to overdo it. She total ignored me relying on her youthful body to meet whatever demands she placed upon it. I thought she might struggle in another twenty years when you first begin to realise you’re not nineteen any more.

The journey back was verging on nightmarish as we caught some of the rush hour not help by road works and a minor shunt, where two cars managed to bump each other and spent ten minutes assessing the damage before moving them. Camera phones came out and pictures were taken from every perspective. The person in front of me beeped at them and then we had an argument and finally some fisticuffs. The girls thought it more entertaining than television. I just hoped no one got hurt.

Then the fight seemed to roll back to our car and they bumped into the side of it. I’d had enough and wound down the window and told them to grow up. Lots of cars were beeping their horns at them.

“Shut it, bitch,” was the response I got from first one.

“Did he call you a lady dog, Mummy?” asked Hannah.

“Yes, he did,” said Danni and as the scuffle revisited us, Danni pulled her wet swimming cozzie out of the bag and slapped him across the face with it. “Don’t you call my mother names,” she shouted at him. He swore at her and used the C word I was out of the minibus and shouting at him.

“You tell him girl,” shouted some woman egged on by several others, so he took a swing at me calling me horrid names. I ducked out of the way and told him to stop it before he got hurt. Some people never learn. He took another swing and I let him come past before I kicked behind his knee and pushed him over. Those in the cars behind cheered loudly.

I went to get back into my car as the traffic was now ready to move again and our aggressive nuisance charged at me. I sidestepped and opened the door on him as he flew at me. He bounced backwards and stayed on the road rolling about holding his face. I didn’t know what to do, whether to leave him there or go and see how hurt he was. Moments later the police arrived and when they went to help him he attacked them, we left them to deal with him and drove home.

Trish had filmed it all and I wondered how many others had as well. Thinking about it, I shouldn’t get involved. I’m a professor and bank director, I should be more circumspect about this sort of thing. The girls enjoyed it and were full of it when we got home. Simon was less effusive in his praise—“I thought women tended to avoid physical violence at all costs unlike men.”

“I didn’t start it,” I protested.

“You never do,” he sighed.

“He should be glad it was me he had a go at and not Maureen, she’d have killed him.”

“I suspect Maureen would have the sense not to get involved in a public brawl.”

“He kicked the side of the minibus.”

“It’s a people carrier.”

“Yeah, a minibus.”

He shook his head and Maureen appeared, not as a consequence of him shaking his head—goodness that would sound as if she was stuck in his ear or something. In actual fact, her car pulled into the drive while we were talking and as he shook his head she entered the building. Am I wasting my breath here?

The Daily Dormouse (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2915 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

I was trembling, the girls were screaming and shards of glass were all over me and the car. I didn’t know what to do, one of them stopped me getting out of the car. One of them tried to grab Hannah and Danielle, my precious Danielle, managed to turn around and kicked him in the face pushing him backwards from the car.

Then they got really nasty and tried to grab us all. I could feel one grab my arm and I screamed and punched at him as hard as I could. I heard him yell, “Wake up, Cathy, for god’s sake, wake up, you silly cow and stop hitting me.” I felt someone shaking me, “Wake up, you’re having a bad dream.”

I opened my eyes, I was in bed, Simon was standing over me with a bleeding lip and scratches on his face. “What happened to you?” I asked, though I think I already knew the answer.

“You did.”

Oh shit. “I am so sorry, darling.”

“Yeah, yeah, I’m going to the bathroom.” He sloped off to the bathroom and I heard him gasp as he put antiseptic on his war wounds—yeah, acquired in the battle of the sexes. I looked at my wrists, his finger marks were fading, obviously where he’d tried to restrain me.

I followed into the bathroom. It was two in the morning and we were both standing staring into the mirror; him at his bruises, me watching him. “I am really sorry, darling. I was back in the car with those three thugs smashing the windows.”

“It was a dream.”

“I know that now.”

“How many times have you had it?”

I shook my head, “I don’t know.”

“Will you please go and see someone about it.”

I nodded, “Okay.”

“I mean it, or we’re going to have to get separate beds. I might not survive your next attack on me.”

“I’m really sorry, I wouldn’t hurt you for the world, you know that—don’t you?”

“Of course you do—when you’re awake. It’s when you’re asleep I’m worried.”

“I’m sorry, I’m spoiling your sleep, I’ll go down on the sofa.” I turned to leave the bedroom.

“Cathy, go back to bed. Now it’s happened I should be safe until tomorrow.” I felt tears well up inside me. The man I loved most on earth and I kept hurting him. He got back into bed and was a little distant, my efforts to apologise were politely rejected and he turned over and went back to sleep. I lay there silently weeping until I cried myself to sleep. When I awoke he’d gone to work, at least the blue energy helped him by reducing the bruises and scratches or was it helping me, removing the evidence of my sleeping attacks upon him.

I showered and dried my hair, put some makeup on to hide the rings under my eyes and dressed, waking the girls as I went downstairs to start breakfast.

After dropping them off to school, I called Anne Thomas from my mobile. She answered the phone herself, her receptionist wasn’t in yet. I apologised for calling so early but I asked her to see me urgently, privately if necessary.

“Come straight over, Cathy, I’ve just put the coffee on.”

Of course when I got there, there was no note on the computer so I had a row with reception and she went off in a huff to complain to Dr Thomas. She came back looking a little more contrite. “She’ll see you now.”

“Thank you.” I said sweetly as I passed her and knocked on Anne’s door.

“I was beginning to think you’d had a better offer.”

“Uh no, I was trying to get past the bouncers on the gate, your coffee must be better than I remembered if they’re trying to gatecrash for it.”

“It probably is, Waitrose have got some new ones in recently and they really are good, but as an aristocrat, your opinion would be appreciated.”

I looked behind me and she asked what I was doing. “Looking for this ’ere aristowotsit.”

She laughed, “If ever they put a value on self-deprecating humour you’ll be as wealthy as Croesus, maybe even as rich as Simon or his dad.”

“I believe Croesus got special terms from Simon’s grandfather, Henry wouldn’t have allowed them.”

“Really, you do surprise me.”

“Henry makes it a point not to lend to foreign nobility—their fortunes can change overnight.”

“That makes sense. Now what can I do for you Lady Cameron and why were you calling me before the stars had gone to bed?”

“It was light when I called and had been for about two or three hours.”

“I was waxing lyrical...no matter. What troubles you so?”

“Sorry to spoil your dramatic moment but for the past few nights...”

“And you hurt him because in your dream he becomes one of the gang who attacked you and the girls in the car?”

“Basically, yes.”

We talked some more and I explained that honour had been restored with some help from James.

“So what is the likelihood of them attacking you again?”

“Very small, probably more chance of winning the lottery.”

“So why the continued bad dream—and it’s always the same?”

“More or less yes.”

“And you always feel this sense of powerlessness?”

“That’s how I felt at the time.”

“That’s the problem isn’t it?”

“What is?”

“The feeling of powerlessness.”

“Is it?” I wasn’t as convinced and I suspect my face showed it.

“It was designed to make you feel vulnerable and to give you nightmares.”

“In which case it worked.”

“It’s like terrorism, you only need to make sporadic attacks but the fear in its victims either real or imagined goes on developing its own momentum. They only need to threaten a further attack and the targets run round in circles like headless chickens.”

“How does that apply to me?” I really hadn’t seen the comparison.

“Unconsciously, you fear their return because they took away any defences you had and that both frightens and angers you. You keep replaying it until you can find some answer, like Danielle did. Perhaps she did because she’s more of a tomboy than you, or more recently converted to the cause, so hasn’t forgotten how to be a boy occasionally. Your response was much more girly than hers.”

“I know. They might have got Hannah had Danielle not intervened.”

“That sounds like you’re a bit ashamed of your response?”

“More than a bit, I’m mortified by it. I was paralysed by fear, I can feel myself sweating now, simply talking about it.”

We spoke for about half an hour and I found myself waking up. “Sorry, I fell asleep.”

“Only because I told you to.”

“Excuse me?”

“I hypnotised you and I’ve reframed the experience, you shouldn’t dream of it again at least, not in the original form and any other form will be less frightening. You’ll also realise it’s a dream and wake yourself up almost immediately.”

“Is that guaranteed?”

“Nothing in psychiatry is guaranteed, but we have less than perfect subjects to work with.”

I was still grumpy about last night, deprived of sleep and almost challenged her on who was less than perfect? Then I saw it was a metaphor—or hoped it was. I was too chicken to ask.

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2916 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

243 dozen for dodecaphiles

Diane was typing something when I returned to the office, “Good break?”

“All right,” I responded. I opened up my own computer and saw a long string of emails—just what I needed. I sighed and started dealing with them.

Diane came in a while later with a cuppa.

“So what happened that wasn’t good?”

“The weather for starters. Apart from Good Friday, the rest was pants and that bloody storm Katie or whatever they called it blew down a tree and destroyed half of David’s cottage. We’ve now got builders in.”

“Oh joy, what fun eh—still take the number of weeks they gave you to finish the job and convert that into months and you won’t be far out.”

“Do I get the impression that you’ve had bad experiences with builders?”

“Only with every house I’ve ever owned.”

“I’ve only ever owned my parents old one—oh and a Victorian villa in Southsea and house in Portsmouth and one at Aust. I suppose I actually own the one we all live in but I consider that is only when Tom dies.”

“You’ve owned five houses?”

“No, I own five houses, six if you include Neal and Gloria’s place.”

“Who’s Neal and Gloria?”

“Lizzie’s parents, they both died and asked me to look after Lizzie.”

“Lizzie sounds as if she was a very lucky little girl.”

“If you consider losing your parents is fortunate, then yes she is.”

“I meant to have you as what, foster mother?”

“I adopted her.”

“She’s even luckier then.”

“I think she might have been happier with her natural parents.”

“Yet you went to great lengths to take Hannah under your wing because you felt her mother was neglecting her. Sometimes these things appear to be meant to happen.”

“Appear yes, but it’s pure coincidence.”

“Oh a Dr Thomas phoned or her secretary, could you ring her back—it’s about your appointment.”

“I only saw her this morning, what’s all that about, I wonder?”

“Pass, here’s the number.” She handed me a post-it that I stuck on the side of my computer.

Of course I got so involved with my work that I completely forgot all about it. Then reflecting on having what we desire wasn’t sure if my life was anything like I wanted. I suppose we all have moments like I was experiencing when life appears to be what happens instead of what you planned.

Back before Stella hit me off my bike, I dreamt of just being me—a woman with somewhere to live and a job to pay for it. I had no thoughts about having a partner let alone a husband and as for children and a professorship—that would have been like winning the lottery. Then not only am I married but it’s to an aristocrat so I have a title and he’s got more money than Croesus or his dad has.

Life has provided me with ten times as much as I’d hoped for and I know I should be really happy, so why aren’t I?” The honest answer is I don’t know. I have the most wonderful family and a lovely husband not to mention the most amazing adopted dad I could wish for. I’ve got a super house and a brilliant car, nice bicycles and an important and well paid job, so what’s missing? I don’t know—I have no idea, but something is niggling me.

At lunch I went for a walk, I now keep some flat shoes in the car so I changed out of my heels and went for my stroll. I wondered if it would help me sort my head out and grabbed a roll from a shop about half a mile away, eating it as I wandered. The day stayed dry but the wind had a bit of a chill, so was glad of the jacket I had on.

I wandered as far as the dock at Spice town or Goose port as it was called. It’s not an area I usually frequent, simply because I rarely need to come this way although it was near where I found Julie. I wondered if she was happy or did she find life as empty as I was at that moment. My head was in a very strange place and it worried me.

I sat looking at the water drinking a coffee, ideas spinning round my brain like the hadron collider. Why was I feeling so dissatisfied with life and myself? For a moment I wondered if it was because I felt trapped in both my domestic and professional lives, in both spheres I had people depending or relying on me. That was how I liked it, being the hub of things, making things happen, solving other people’s problems and ignoring my own because my needs were just those things I’d just considered. By myself, I was actually nothing. Without the others, I barely existed except perhaps as a faint glow from some distant nebula, certainly not a star. I only could see myself as reflections from others.

So who was Catherine Watts or Cameron for that matter? A mother and wife and teacher but was she? Did she only exist because of others, did it need two or three hundred students for me to exist as Cathy the teacher/professor, did I need dormice to be Cathy the ecologist? Was I a mother only because I had adopted children who needed me or a wife because my husband made me so and did I only live because those people needed me. Would I simply fade out like a dying light if they ceased to need me or to sustain me?

I’d never seen myself as an existentialist always believing that a tree falling in a forest far from the nearest human still made a noise because noise is simply sound waves and they happen whether or not anyone actually hears them. Stars explode in space and no one sees them but they still happen and it might be millions of years later that we see the light from the event as a supernova because it takes so long to get to us. Even at 186,000 miles a second it takes millions of light years for some of these things to get anywhere near enough for us to see them—it’s mind boggling and my mind feels boggled enough, so I went back to my seemingly pointless existence and job and did some more futile paperwork.

At about half past two, Diane brought me in some mail with a cuppa and a biscuit. “Diane, are you happy?” I asked.

She gave me a funny look and said, “If you asked if I were contented, I’d say yes immediately. Happy, that’s more ephemeral, harder to quantify, why?”

“I just wondered.”

“Why?”

“Okay, I just thought about myself. I’ve got everything I could possibly want from life but it all seems rather empty.”

“Oh dear, you’re a bit young to have a midlife crisis aren’t you? You’re not going to run away and wander round Tibet in just a pair of flip flops and a teddy, are you?”

“Certainly not, it would put the Dalai Lama off his breakfast.”

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2917 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

“Have you thought of taking a holiday?” asked my secretary.

“We’ve just had one.”

“And how much time did you have to chill out and refresh yourself?”

“A bit here and there, you know what it’s like with children and husbands. The tree coming down didn’t help, though it did enable Simon to play with a chainsaw.”

“So none, then?”

“Uh—probably.”

“Still I suppose they’ll put flowers on your grave occasionally.”

“Haven’t they got to wait until I’m dead—I think there are rules about burying people alive, unless you’re in Syria.”

Diane shuddered, “Oh don’t, those poor people no wonder they want out, I would too in their place.” She paused for a moment, “I suppose the Americans could always drop Donald Trump on them, maybe he can sort out the troubles.”

“I’m sure the Daesh would be delighted to meet him.”

“D’you think he’s going to be president?”

“Let’s face it, the system is bent even in democracies, so anything could happen but he seems to be running out of steam and the Republican hierarchy are starting to get a bit more organised though of course it’s about as organised as the European Union what with all the states doing their own thing. Mind you the other guy, Cruz is almost as bad so it could help Hillary into the White House, if we don’t burn it down for them again.”

“What? We burnt it down?”

“In their War of Independence, we burnt it down twice, by that I mean the Brits, that’s why it’s called the White House, they had to paint the walls to disguise the soot marks.”

“Gosh you are a fund of information, aren’t you, no wonder you’re a professor and I’m typing your letters.”

“I suspect you’re better at it than I am, my knowledge on a number of things is somewhat limited, especially computers and to some extent, word processing or tripewiping.”

She roared, “Tripe wiping?”

“Yeah my keyboard is dyslexic.”

“Is this a case of a bad workman blames his tools?”

“Her tools, please.”

“Yeah, her tools—well is it?”

“Look I’m a professor, you can’t expect me to know anything as well as carry this huge brain about.” I mimed walking about with a huge head.

“You walk like that all the time,” was her riposte.

“When does your contract expire?”

“Same time as yours.”

“So it does, oh well we’ll be unemployed together.”

“I hope not, I’ve just had a new kitchen—it’ll take me years to pay off.”

“Still it means you’ll look after it.”

“True—how new is your kitchen?”

“Hmm late seventeenth century I think, why?”

“Aren’t you going to get a new one some time?”

“Some time, some being the operative word, apart from the fact the kitchen was designed by Tom’s wife and if I mess it about too much...you know...”

“Oh she’s dead, is she?”

“Goodness years ago, she had MS and died soon after his daughter did.”

“So how come he adopted you?”

“We both had needs. My parents were dead and he had no family and now they’re coming out of his ears.”

“Coming out of his ears?” Diane looked askance at me.

“Yeah, little white hairs, haven’t you ever seen them?”

“No but I think I’ll pass on them if that’s okay with you.”

“I thought it was his white matter escaping at first.”

“Is that like dark matter only—whiter?”

I laughed and shook my head, “It’s part of the brain.”

“I thought that was grey matter.”

“Nah, that’s just part of it.”

“What’s white matter for then?”

“The grey stuff is on the outside, the white stuff is underneath it and acts like a sort of switchgear for the grey matter.”

“Oh,” she said obviously not understanding it one bit. Then looking at the clock she said, “Aren’t you supposed to go and collect the girls?”

“Look it up on the net, I’d better get ready and go.” I closed down my computer and shoved my memory sticks in the little plastic clip box I keep them in. As I left I could see her looking at white matter on wiki. “I’ll expect an essay on that by tomorrow morning.”

“Ha fat chance,” she yelled back.

I’d driven the VW because the kids have more room and they seem to prefer it to my Jaguar. They are a bit cramped in that and as the younger ones come up to school age, I think we’ll need a double-decker bus not a people carrier.

As I drove to collect them I was glad I’d asked Simon to extend the hire of it. He’d only driven it once and told me it felt like a campervan. He forgets that VW also own Bentley. Mind you, he told me about one Easter when he was still at Millfield he and friend borrowed an old VW camper and toured round Cornwall in it, said it was great fun until it broke down and they had to wait four hours for the RAC to come and tow it to a garage. Apparently, they slept in it on the forecourt of the garage that night. Glad it wasn’t me, mind you I was probably too timid to try anything like that though a friend and I did cycle to the Brecon Beacons and camp there for a couple of nights and then cycle back. I wonder what he’s doing now? Might see if I can find him on the internet—though what for, I don’t know. Nostalgia is wonderful but there’s no future in it.

I collected the gang and we set off home. Danielle reminded me that she had training that night so I said I’d take her. She usually travels in the front with me and when I told her I’d take her, she leant over and kissed me, “Thanks, Mummy, you’re a star.”

“Uh no, that’s your aunt.”

“What—Auntie Stella?”

“Yes, stellar means a star or to do with stars.”

“That’s got an R on it, Mummy,” complained the brain on the back seat.

“Not in Latin, it hasn’t.”

“So it’s stella in Latin, then?” she checked.

“Yes.”

“Funny, they must have copied it from us,” she said and Livvie nearly collapsed laughing.

“Wosso funny?” asked Trish.

“You are, dummy. The Romans were like two thousand years ago so we copied them.”

“Oh yeah,” I could feel the heat coming of Trish’s blush through the back of my seat, or it felt that way.

“Never mind, Trish, English has loads of words it could have taught the Romans.”

“Like what?” she sighed going rather quiet after Livvie trumped her.

“Like pyjamas.”

“Pyjamas—didn’t the Romans wear them?”

“If they did they didn’t call them that, pyjamas is an Indian word, so is bungalow.”

“So they like, wear pyjamas in their bungalows?” she asked rhetorically. Then they all burst out laughing, well on the back seat, they did.

Danielle looked at me and said, “They’re all bonkers.”

I just nodded my response.

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2918 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

The next morning I was confronted by my secretary. “The White House was only burnt down once and that was in 1814 not the war of independence.”

“Thank you for telling me that. Did you know one of my ancestors was there?”

“No,” she gasped.

“Neither did I. You making the tea?” She scowled at me and went off to boil the kettle. I mean, who cares when we did it—it was a long time ago and as long as they keep my namesake away from any matches when he goes to brown nose Obama, they should be safe for a while.

“You’re a lousy historian,” she said plonking my tea down on the desk so some spilt onto the papers underneath.

“I’m an ecologist/biologist, at least I knew it happened.”

She huffed and flounced out—yeah flounced, just like Trish when she can’t get her own way.

I drank my tea trying to wind down my irritation, I was still covering for that idiot who was claiming to be sick—oh apparently he was in Spain, he was so sick, so the acting Dean began to believe me that he was malingering. His phone call made the day seem brighter despite the showers that were forecast.

“You know you’re teaching in ten minutes?” said Diane poking her head round the door.

“Yes, what am I doing?”

“Ecology of woodland.”

I smiled, my bread and butter stuff—how many weeks have we got?

Everybody but the first years are doing exams, so I’ll have marking to do after next week. Could have done without that, still the advert goes in the various journals and online for a temporary replacement for our resident pain in the arse. I know there are plenty of graduates looking for jobs, I hope some have master’s or better and we can use them immediately. The problem is, most of the good ones are already in employment and require weeks of notice to be worked before they can come. I was tempted to quickly phone Professor Herbert.

In answer to my question he replied, “Actually, Cathy, we have someone you can borrow for a couple of weeks.”

“That sounds ominous,” I said quietly.

“Au contraire, she’s actually very good and in awe of you.”

“Me?” I squeaked.

“Yes, she loves your dormouse film and the harvest mouse one. I’ll send her over this afternoon if you’re free.”

“I am, well after one, I am.”

“Good, I’ll send her then, you can see if she makes the grade.”

“How come she’s free to transfer?”

“She’s covering maternity leave and Karen is back from yesterday, so she’s been doing tutorials just to keep busy.”

“What’s her name?”

“Debbie Matthews.” I hastily scribbled it down and dashed off to my two hours of torment with the first year.

Ninety spotty yoofs and bored ladettes can make two hours feel a very long time, thankfully, I didn’t have any of that and I enthralled them with tales of man eating dormice and cannibal squirrels—nah, I taught them the principles of the ecology of woodlands, about climax vegetation and insects and birds, shade loving plants and the mammals that dwell in our richest land environment.

I try to involve them—it keeps them awake longer—and they have to call out species that naturally occur in woodland in the UK. It’s easy at first, but after the first twenty they start umming and ahhing and I have to help them. Think of a woodland bird. And still she said, seagull.

“Look, kiddo, there is no such thing as a sea gull, they’re herring gulls, black headed gulls and so on, yes they do frequent the sea, but none of them are called sea gulls, except in Ibsen plays. So how about a bird with wood in its name?”

“Oh, sorry,” she blushed and somebody whispered something to her, “Oh yeah, spotty woodpecker.”

In order to move things on so I could torment the other seventy students, I accepted woodpecker and put it down as great spotted variety as they’d be very lucky to see a lesser spotted one round here.

“Why’s it called a woodpecker?” I asked her.

“It—um—pecks wood?” she blushed like a traffic light.

“Well done, though the clues in its name. Right next one, give me a plant or animal that lives in woodland.”

After we got ninety species on the board we looked at relationships between them and by the end of two hours they were starting to realise ecology is about relationships—perhaps I should try getting someone from Marriage Guidance to teach them?

“We have visitor arriving,” I said to Diane.

“No we don’t.”

“What? She hasn’t cancelled, has she?”

“No, she’s gone over to the refectory for a cuppa while she waits for you.”

“Couldn’t you have given her one—a cuppa, I mean.”

“No, we ran out of milk, I’ll get some more when I go for lunch.”

“Couldn’t we cadge some from catering?”

“Who’s going to get it?”

“Okay, I need to freshen up anyway,” I slipped to the loo and wiped my face and combed my hair as well as having a wee—not all at the same time I must add, I might be into multitasking but—you know what I mean—duh.

I’d reapplied some lipstick and combed my hair and just as I emerged from the loo, our visitor arrived back with some milk. “I asked if they could spare a pint, I hope semi is okay?”

“Absolutely, you’ve saved my life and grumpy’s here,” I nodded at Diane.

“Okay, Snow White, I’ll make you some tea.” Diane took the milk and went off to the little kitchen we have.

“Are you always so casual with colleagues?” asked our visitor who introduced herself as Debbie Matthews.
“Cathy Cameron,” we shook hands, “come along in.”

We chatted and I began to pick up one or two little things. Her hands and feet were larger than mine, not that means anything, she was taller than I am, but there were little things. Was she or wasn’t she and how do I find out? Then, what did it matter? We don’t discriminate anyway, but I’d like to know so if we do employ her, I can protect her—apart from that the uncertainty is killing me. I’ll shoot Esmond, if this is a wind up.

Debbie is a biologist which is fine, so am I as well as an ecologist, we often are. She told me she had a master’s in mammal ecology. Sounds even better and she really wanted to meet me.

“Why?” I asked.

“You did those two films about dormice and harvest mice—they were brilliant. I hope you show them to your students, they’re good enough to use as a teaching aid.” I only do when I run out of ideas and most of them are only here because they saw them and fancied cuddling dormice for a living.

Of course I took her to lunch at a local pub and when she went to the loo, I decided her hips weren’t as wide as they might be, but she looked the part and assuming she could do the work, I’d offer her a temporary contract. Now, did she know about me and is she or isn’t she? Dammit, this is ridiculous.

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2919 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

As I drove the bus to collect the girls I was in utter turmoil. Was Debbie a neo-woman like me or wasn’t she? Should it matter? Of course it didn’t on most levels but it was driving me crazy and I was feeling very difficult about it. Of course I was, the very things which I hated people asking me were bouncing round my brain like those super balls we had as kids, which bounce much higher than an ordinary ball.

I kept telling myself it was of no consequence either way, it didn’t matter, it wasn’t relevant—but yes it was. I wanted to know—shit, why? I don’t know, I really don’t.

Was it the competitive part of me? Possibly, I was probably five years older but still looking fairly trim and I thought I was at least as pretty if not more so. I was richer and had a doctorate, I was also married and had kids—so no contest there. Damn it there is no contest—how can there be a contest? That’s like Viet Nam challenging the United States—oh that’s really made me feel better. I could always withdraw the job offer and work myself to death instead. Damn Esmond Herbert to hell and back, what had he landed on me?

I’d offered the woman a job until the end of the year to cover some of the teaching. I’d gone through the timetable with her and we’d identified the areas she could do—bugger she was going to be doing the small mammal stuff, including the Rodentia, which covers dormeece and harvest ones too. I need to sort out my own stuff, keep the department running and find new sponsors for research.

Hampshire County Council and Portsmouth City Council had asked us to do some research on the brown rat. I called in two of my best recent graduates and asked them if they’d found a suitable subject for post grad study and neither had. The one wasn’t too worried what he studied as long as he got some help with costs, the other wanted to do something in the animal line.

When I mentioned rats they both pulled faces but that was where the money was, this time anyway. I could squeeze enough for both of them to study for a year and get a small stipend as well. Leptospirosis, not withstanding, they agreed to put together a project to explore and hopefully answer the questions the two councils were asking, which was mainly involved with population figures. If they planted cameras in a few sites and did counts of the animals walking past or put down some magic pads which enabled footprints to be analysed they could set bench marks and then compare them six months later.

“Why couldn’t it have been water voles instead?” asked one of them, “They’re cute compared to bloody rats.”

“They carry lepto as well,” I reminded them.

“Bugger, so they do.”

I sent them off to do me a draft of their proposal and gave them no more than a week to sort it or I’d offer it elsewhere. Sometimes things are tough in academia—like all the time.

All these things were buzzing round my head when I took Danni to training. I said I’d wait for her as it usually only lasts about ninety minutes and I had my iPad with me and plenty of work to do.

I must not do a search on Debbie Matthews I told myself, entering her name on google. Nothing much came up anyway, other than she’d put a notice on facebook when she got her master’s. I did one on me using both my surnames and loads came up but not the transgender stuff. Oh good, but the banking stuff did when I put in my usual surname and the title and so on came up. Had I told her to call me Cathy Cameron or Cathy Watts? It should have been the latter but I suspect I said the former. Does it matter? Not really, so why was I almost obsessive about the woman?

I did deal with some emails—I have a keypad thing for my iPad which works on Bluetooth, so proper typing is possible though there can be a minuscule delay between hitting the key and seeing it appear on screen which I believe happens with several tablets. In some ways I’m glad not to be knee deep in bits of paper I can’t find, yet somehow sending electronic bits doesn’t feel so comfortable and I’ve deleted those or couldn’t find them after reading them once. Plus of course power outages don’t affect bits of paper except it might be too dark to read them. However, the ecologist keeps saying it’s greener to send emails until I think how much in waste products there is in manufacturing computers and then when they die or are replaced by newer ones. How much is really recyclable, whereas in theory, pretty well all writing paper is.

My stomach began to grumble as I remembered I’d not had my dinner yet and hoped that Simon didn’t eat Danni’s and mine as well as his own. I also wondered how David was getting on in his caravan—does it feel like being on holiday or like being stuck in a large cardboard box.

The younger girls were asking about having a caravan which was something I always wanted when I was a kid, except my dad hated them especially when driving behind them. I remembered we had the villa on Menorca and if anything we should be going there more often. I must speak to Simon as it’s his really.

Sitting in the car and thinking nice thoughts of being on Menorca I was miles away when a face was pressed really close against the window of my car and when I looked it made me jump out of my skin. Danielle pulled away laughing. I’ll murder that brat.

“You were miles away, weren’t you?”

“Yes, and I could have had a heart attack.”

“Nah, too young for that.”

“Danielle, a professional cyclist had one the other week and he was only about twenty four.”

“Is he okay?”

“No he died.”

“Oh bad luck,” she said shrugging, “Let’s get dinner, I’m starved.”

Simon hadn’t found our plated dinners in the cool oven of the Aga so we did get something to eat and very good it was too. Homemade meat and vegetable pasties; David’s pastry is to die for—I suppose if you eat enough of it, it would be to die from especially the puff pastry such as these were. I just ate the pasty and Danielle ate hers with the potato and vegetables then ate my veg and spuds. I guess she was hungry after all.

“You won’t grow up to be a big girl if you don’t eat all your dinner,” she quipped after eating half of mine as well.

“I’d rather grow up to be a slightly smaller girl, especially sideways.”

“That’s all those biscuits you have stashed in your study.”

How did she know that? By the time I’d recovered from her statement she’d gone off to torment her sisters.

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2920 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

I had an appointment to see Dr Anne Thomas and remembered it just in time to get there and have a few moments to get my breath back. Debbie Matthews was going to be teaching a class and taking a tutorial for me this afternoon and agreed I would watch to make sure she was doing things the way we did them. Then she turned the tables on me and asked to watch me teach first. She was pretty quick because she’d remembered I was doing one later this morning.

I was tempted to under-dress in skinny jeans and tee shirt or go completely over the top and wear a suit. In the end I went as I normally do, in cord trousers with a long-sleeved top and matching scarf. I wore just enough makeup to enhance my eyes and some lipstick. Jewellery was simply, my gold bangle and drop earrings. The perfume was expensive.

As the air was nippy first thing I wore a loose jacket over my outfit. Anne Thomas was complimentary about my appearance and we shared a coffee as we spoke. “So let me get this right,” she said in answer to my outlining my current dilemma, “You’ve employed someone who may be transgender but you can’t ask them because it could be seen as intrusive.

“She’s taken away an application form but she’s not obliged to declare she’s transgender any more than she would if she was HIV. So tell me, why d’you need to know?”

“To see if my trannie-radar is working.”

“Explain please?”

“Most of us can recognise each other at four hundred feet in the dark.”

“As transsexual, you mean?”

“Or transvestite or whatever. It’s like gay men are supposed to be able to spot each other. I guess I’m always monitoring women just in case, I don’t do it with men unless their body language encourages me to, like for aggressive behaviour.”

“What difference would knowing make to you?”

“I could support her better.”

“I thought the university has policies to do that?”

“Moral support.”

She gave me an old fashioned look, “I see, so would you disclose your own status?”

“Not sure.”

“But if you know about her doesn’t she have a right to know about you?”

“This is my dilemma, I know I shouldn’t care if she can do the job.”

“So why do you?”

I shook my head, “I don’t know.”

“Is it competition, she’s younger or prettier—though I doubt the latter.”

“I did consider that. She’s a few years younger but then I’m a professor so seniority often means older.”

“I think I prefer experienced particularly with regard to academia or the professions.”

“I also have a doctorate.”

“You’re a professor, so naturally you do.”

“I’m also a better body shape, she’s more angular.”

“So is my goddaughter, who is cisgendered.”

“I’m beginning to wish I’d never met her.”

“But these days if you believe the likes of the Daily Mail, we’re overrun by men who want to become women, so wouldn’t it have happened at some point?”

“But they may have disclosed it or it be more obvious.”

“In which case would that enhance or detract from your own situation?”

“What remind people of my past, you mean?”

She nodded.

“I hadn’t thought of that. Perhaps I should get me to a nunnery?”

She laughed loudly. “You are so funny sometimes, Cathy. Look if it matters that much speak to her but be careful what and how you say, it isn’t worth going mad over, is it?”

“No, it’s just that if our positions were reversed or someone asked me if were transsexual...”

“You’d reply you were female and quite rightly too. She has the same right.”

“So I’m back to square one, aren’t I?”

“No you acknowledged you have a problem and we possibly have a cause—your need to be better than her. If it’s any consolation, it happens between bio-females as well and occasionally men. My advice would be, accept what and who you are without recourse to have to prove it with every female you employ. You’re a very lovely and very clever young woman with a marriage and children few of us could hope to have and a very responsible job. Just enjoy your life and your immense good fortune and stop comparing yourself to others, it will only lead to pain. That’s my advice.”

I nodded. She was absolutely right. I was married to one of the best men on the planet with the most wonderful children and an adopted father I loved to bits. I had a lovely home and a wonderful job and deserved everything I had. I was also fortunate in being a reasonably attractive woman despite my route to it. I shouldn’t envy or fear anyone for any of these things. I wanted to cry I felt so stupid instead I thanked her for her hospitality and good advice and went on to work.

I’d told Diane I had a personal appointment and would be in by ten. I was teaching at eleven, so time for a cuppa and one of those biscuits Danielle isn’t supposed to know about.

I was teaching ecology today which I hadn’t decided would be one of Debbie’s subjects because she had no direct qualification in it. This was a first year class and they’d done the basics and should be familiar with the terminology and principles of general ecology. They had an exam next month so this was a revision class which I shouldn’t have been taking at all but we were short and even if she were capable of taking it I wouldn’t allow it without knowing her capabilities, especially revision on her first day.

Was I buoyed up or feeling a bit down after Anne Thomas’ session? I didn’t know and decided to put it behind me because I was doing what I did best after counting dormice, teaching my favourite subject and they were going to remember their crazy professor as long as they lived as one of the best teachers they ever had.

Would I be guilty of showing off or giving a masterclass in teaching and ecology? I hoped it was the latter because that’s what I felt up to. I got my notes from a few years ago from my case. I kept these at home and spent quarter of an hour scanning them and trying to rekindle my enthusiasm and daring when I first did this lecture. I was going to use the ecology of student ecologists as my subject, so they should all be able to contribute. If that didn’t get them we’d do something boring like dormice. That usually got their attention, if it didn’t, I make them watch my bloody film again.

Debbie arrived at eleven thirty and told me she’d booked into a travel lodge for the rest of the week. I told her we had some teacher accommodation but didn’t know if it was available or not—I asked Diane to sort that. Then we went off to my revision class and it went better than I’d hoped. At the end, I was absolutely buzzing as were many of the students—the energy in the room was phenomenal.

I collected Debbie and we went off to the refectory for lunch. “Wow, Cathy, if you’re expecting me to follow that, you’re going to be greatly disappointed. I’ve heard stories of when you came to talk to Sussex and I’ve seen your two films. You are one of the best teachers I’ve ever seen and I’ve seen a few, I can tell you. Even Esmond isn’t in your league and he’s pretty good. If any of those kids fail their exam it won’t be because of your efforts it’ll be because they still won’t have come down to earth. You are that good and I’d like you to teach me how to present like that, will you do that?”

Why don’t they ask easy questions? She’s as bad as Trish.

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2921 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

At lunch I tried to explain that I saw teaching as the original performance art unless you consider religion—I try not to, but there is even more theatre in it because you’re trying to con people into imagining all sorts of things. In teaching I’m trying to present facts but in a way that integrates them with theories. If they did the same with religion we’d all be atheist in a generation.

I told Debbie that if she considered herself to be a performer who was trying to educate rather than an educator who was trying to entertain, she might develop the right sort of mindset. Then think how you might perform something revolving round the facts you wanted to get across, then next time you do it you do the same but change the performance. What she had to bear in mind was that the educational bit had to be the core of it all or they’ll go out feeling good but not knowing anything extra to when they came in.

She said she’d have a think about it but I told her to stay with what she felt comfortable and change it gradually. Having come from a school and university background of here are the facts integrate and use them in which I’d at first floundered then got the point, I decided to try something completely different in which I tried to make teaching an audience participation exercise. So dropping bat poo everywhere was really one of those as they had to clear it up to analyse it.

I also gave the cleaner a tenner and she sorted out the rest of it with her Dyson.

“Goodness, I can remember sitting for an hour or two in lectures writing down reams of stuff and never looking at it again and I know none of it stuck because I couldn’t remember a single word of it. Now if you’d been teaching me, I’d have strong images of certain points which I could then recall more easily. Wow, that is really sneaky.”

“That’s me. So where did you go to school?” I enquired.

“Mainly in High Wycombe but we moved to Manchester just after I started high school and ended up in Manchester Grammar.”

“I went to Bristol Grammar.”

“What was it like, single sex or mixed?”

“Single then it’s changed since.”

“Manchester was mixed by the time I went there, so what was a girls’ school like?”

Oh boy, does she not know about me then? Or is she seeking to trip me up? “Not much fun, all jolly hockey sticks or netball and I was rubbish at both.” That was true, on the single occasion I tried either, having been sent over to the girls’ school, I was total rubbish. “I did quite well academically, so was forgiven eventually for being rubbish at games.” That was total fiction as Murray only left me alone when her saw me breastfeeding Cate. “What about you?”

“Only thing I wanted to do was play in the biology lab, so I volunteered to clean out the cupboards so I could look at all the specimens and they had hundreds. I’d spend most of my lunchtimes there—helped me to avoid the bullies as well.”

“Boys or girls?”

“Both—we were an equal opportunities school.”

“I learned to run quickly at the first sign of trouble.”

“Probably the best policy, though not one you necessarily espouse now, is it?”

I gave her an old fashioned look.

“Just going on the stuff I saw about you in the net.”

“What stuff?”

“Oh fighting Russian mafia to rescuing babies in cars and so on. Then of course the stuff about your films and the youtube clip with the dormouse.”

“I suppose there are worst epithets to have attached to you, mine is the woman who juggled dormice.”

“When will I get to see some of these gorgeous creatures?”

“We can go after we finish eating.”

I led her down to the labs. “They might still be hibernating but as soon as the temperature externally rises to double figures we have a small food supply available so there may be one or two around. The one that parachuted into my bra isn’t here any longer, she died.”

“Oh what a pity.”

“Yeah, my kids loved her so when she died we had a little service and buried her in the orchard.”

“You have an orchard?”

“My adopted dad does.”

“I thought you were married with loadsa kids—that’s what Esmond told me, married to some peer or other.”

“I am but we all live in my adopted father’s house, we had an extension built a few years ago so we have a library cum study and so on.”

“Wow—I’d love to see it sometime.”

“It’s an old farmhouse, hence the orchard.”

“Sounds nice.”

“I’ll speak to David see when he’s off.”

“Is that your hubby?”

“No, my cook—well chef, actually.”

“You have a chef? Wow, does he come with the butler?”

“No he’s a one off. I have a lady who helps round the house and some of my elder daughters help with the little ones.”

“How many kids have you got?”

I began counting on my fingers. “Eleven.”

“Eleven kids—how have you managed to have a career and eleven kids?”

I shrugged, “It was difficult at times.”

“Eleven kids,” she shook her head, “I mean you’d have to be pregnant every year since you graduated.”

“They’re adopted.”

“What all of them?”

“Yeah, as Simon said, we got to choose the pretty ones, if we’d made our own they might have been ugly.”

She roared with laughter. “He’s quite a catch by the sound of it.”

“I think so.”

“What does he do?”

“He’s in banking.”

“Cameron—banking—Simon. Bloody hell you’re married to Simon Cameron of High St Banks.”

“I was this morning, so I guess I probably still am—is that a problem?”

“You’re Lady Cameron?”

“Here I’m just Cathy Watts, or Dr Watts or even Professor Watts.”

“No wonder you have a chef, he’s a millionaire.”

“I’ve never asked him how much he earns.”

“Crikey, I’m almost amongst royalty here.”

The dormice were mainly still in hibernation but two were feeding and moving about in the compound we built for them.

“Oh my god, they are so cute,” she said almost melting when I placed a torpid one in her hand. She put it up to her ear, “Oh my, he’s snoring.”

“Some of them do.”

“How many have you got here?”

“At present about twenty, we’ll release four or five in May if it’s warm enough and the others we keep as breeding ones.”

“I’d love to be doing something like this.”

“Stick around long enough and you probably will as I don’t have time to direct it as much as it probably needs. At the moment, John our main technician does most of it and we pay him for his trouble.” As I spoke so John came out of his room and went out through the lab, nodding to us as he went.

“Wow. Is he like, married?”

“I don’t know.”

“He’s nice.”

“He’s a very good technician.”

“I’ll bet,” she said licking her lips.

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2922 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

I wondered if I should warn John that Debbie was fancying him. Whatever she was under the false eyelashes, she had a healthy libido or fantasy life. Have I not mentioned the false eyelashes before? They’re not the sort you see for sale in New Look, these are expensive ones which effectively make your own more noticeable by making them appear thicker. The alternative to those who want fuller lashes is to have the semi-permanent ones they glue to your eyelids with super glue, Sammi has them as do Julie and Phoebe. Danielle would if I allowed it which I haven’t at the moment. I told her she could have some done when she broke up for the summer holidays.

Julie stuck some false eyelashes on me and I found them so irritating I made her take them off, it was like looking through a hedge. Instead I asked her to dye my lashes so it always looks as if I have mascara on, even when I don’t. Last week she was trying to get me to use the latest brow pencil or sculptor or whatever they call it. My eyebrows are very blonde and only really show if I use eyebrow pencil on them which I do, but lightly. These days they all seem to have painted on brows like Cara Delwotsit. It’s not that long ago they were all thin lines plucked like a dead chicken.

Thankfully, I’m not that involved with fashion for myself, though I have plenty of arguments with a house full of girls. I tend to go for classic designs which might be expensive but happily I can afford them, so what I miss in fashionableness I make up for in quality.

Sammi is probably the most fashion conscious in terms of being able to afford good stuff regularly. The others fight over her cast offs, which are too small for me—I’m bigger in the hips and breasts than she is—that’s what AIS does for you. I also don’t like some of the real cutting edge stuff—perhaps I’m becoming an old fuddy-duddy compared to the days of my youth when I’d drool over the pictures in the colour supplements of the weekend papers about wanting to look like the models posing in the latest gear. Occasionally there’d be something about someone who’d changed sex and I’d do my best to acquire the article and hoard it in my stash.

My mother found it when she was cleaning my room and showed it to my dad. He went ballistic giving me the third degree. I remembered it quite vividly.

“D’you want to be like one of these freaks?” I’d stand there silently, tears running down my cheeks. “Charlie, I asked you a question—well do you?” I couldn’t answer because I didn’t know the answer. I didn’t want to be like the subjects of the articles, I wanted to be like an ordinary woman, have periods and children but I knew that was impossible.

After he’d ranted and raved at me for about half an hour, during which time I didn’t say a word in answer to his interrogation, he made me go outside to the garden incinerator—one of those metal dustbin thingies with a lid on it and holes in the side—and he made me tear everyone of them up and burn them. If he saw any stories in the papers about gender dysphoria, he’d rip them out and tear them up so I wouldn’t get ideas. I stopped looking at the papers at home and read them in the school library, where it was still possible to ‘collect’ articles—I had a pair of sewing scissors I kept in my pencil case and could do an article-ectomy quickly and quietly. He didn’t find my second stash, which was in a box file labelled ‘dissection techniques.’ He was even more squeamish than I was and to put him off the scent I had some diagrams and photos of dissections we did in school in the box and would pretend I wanted to show him what we were doing. He told me to keep them away from him. In the end, I had a couple of photos or diagrams on the top and the rest was my collection of sex-change clippings. Perhaps I’m a natural subversive.

“Your eyelashes need doing again, Mummy,” suggested Julie and seeing as we had competition in the office now, I accepted her advice. Sitting in my study chair which reclines she began wiping my eyes.

“How’s the new girl coming on?” she asked, “The one from Sussex.”

“Okay, I guess—did I mention she wears false eyelashes?”

“No, but you have criticised her a few times.”

“Have I?” I wasn’t aware I was doing it.

“Well she is younger.”

“Julie, I’m only thirty two.”

“I know, over the hill...”

“Hoy, wait till you get there—I’ll try and remember to remind you how old you are.”

“I know what could make you both younger and sexier.”

“Yeah, colouring my lashes, saves me time in the morning and on mascara.”

“Let me try something.”

“You’re not sticking those false eyelash things on me again.”

“No I won’t, they’re too clumsy for you anyway—okay for younger women like—what’s her name—Debbie?”

Somehow, I failed to understand what she was doing and ended up with the individual extra lashes like Sammi wore. They’re glued to your eyeball or something and are the same length as your own lashes, they just make them thicker. I had a dozen or so on each eyelid and then Julies dyed them all dark brown, she also used a special eyeliner which dyes the skin for a couple of weeks. As she does makeup better than I can, when she showed me my eyes looked quite attractive without being too obvious. If I was going out in the evening, just slap some more eyeliner over the top. The lashes would last about three or four weeks as would the lash dye.

The next morning I wore a skirt suit and boots. Spring was coming but it wasn’t that warm most of the time and to save energy, I have the radiator in my office turned off much of the time—I try to lead by example. The girls noticed my new look at breakfast. They knew Julie was dyeing my lashes and approved. “Dunno what she’s done, Mummy, but they look much thicker,” observed Danielle. “I’ll have to ask her to do mine.”

I just blushed and let them talk about something else. Of course Diane noticed my change of look—well the suit was a YSL original—okay from Stella, which I’d not worn to work before. It was mid blue with tiny gold flowers embroidered on it and I wore my white roll neck blouse with it. “My goodness, you look smart—competition getting to you, is it?” She ducked behind her computer before I could pretend to throw something at her.

Just then, Debbie came in wearing a pair of painted on jeans with over-knee stiletto boots, a long polo neck jumper which covered her bum—just, long knitted waistcoat and her hair was up. I wasn’t sure what I thought except I’d never have had the courage to go to work dressed like that and if I had Tom would have had words with me.

“Took your advice, Cathy, decided to make an impact—oh like the suit, yes very nice, middle age designer stuff, I’ll bet that cost a bit.” I was speechless.

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2923 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

“Not quite sure what sort of impact you want to make, Debbie.”

“Well get them to notice I’m there.”

“Really? Did you think they wouldn’t?”

“Well you did tell me to make them think I was entertaining them while slipping in bits of information.”

“I think you might find you’re too much of a distraction unless you do something on warning colours in biology.” Her top was red and the waistcoat black. She took a second to feel the barb before she blushed.

I went into my office and about ten minutes later Diane came in. “You realise she’s upset about your opinion of her dress.”

“If you flaunt it you have to be prepared to back it up, clearly she isn’t.”

“Where is she?”

“She’s gone back to her hotel to change.”

“Goodness, I hope it’s not into some form of fetish garment.”

“No, she feels you humiliated her.”

“Come again?”

“You told her, her dress would be a distraction.” She studied my face. “Are your eyelashes breeding?”

“Diane, is it a good idea to be having this conversation with someone who purports to be your employer?”

“I can type faster than you.”

“That’s beside the point...”

“I thought you’d be sympathetic to a transgendered woman?”

“I didn’t know you were—that’s a bit of a surprise.”

“Ha ha, very funny. Debbie is transgendered or whatever they call it, she had surgery last year.”

“How d’you know that?”

“She told me at lunch the other day.” I sat there blinking at her. “I noticed one or two things about her and admired her skinny hips which compared to my luxury size rear end. She told me she was born in the wrong body and had it corrected. I asked her if she’d told you and she said no in case you sacked her...”

“I can’t—not for that anyway.”

“That’s what I told her, the university would support her as an equal opportunities employer and that you’d dealt with the situation before and weren’t worried about it.”

“She hadn’t twigged?”

“No but then you hadn’t with her, had you?”

“I did, almost the moment I met her.”

“If gay men and women can identify each other how come she didn’t guess about you?”

“Perhaps because I got the luxury derrière and breasts too.”

She laughed. “Don’t be too hard on her, boss, she’s quite fragile under the shiny exterior.”

“Diane, I here to run a department which includes looking after my students and staff but they have to be honest with me too.”

“Are you being honest with her?”

“Diane, my birth certificate says female. I’m a married woman with a football team of kids who call me mother. I don’t think I need to explain or excuse my route to this status to anyone. I’ll help her to develop her potential as much I do my students but coming in dressed like she’s a fashion designer or going clubbing is in neither interest. She needs to relax and do what we pay her for.”

“She’s scared you’re not going to like what she does—compared to you.”

“I’m not paying her to imitate what I do, nobody can do that, she needs to acquire her own style of teaching and wearing what she did would have distracted from that. If she’d worn the outfit with ordinary boots or even flat shoes, I’d have said nothing, but four inch heels and over knee boots? C’mon. She’s supposed to be a scientist not a fashion designer.”

Diane shrugged and left. So I was right—whoopee doo, now what? I don’t feel obliged to tell anyone these days—if they have no absolute need to know, then I don’t feel obliged to tell them. As Simon kept telling me, I don’t have to apologise for being me. I took off my jacket and sat in my blouse and skirt dealing with paperwork thinking I should have worn jeans for sitting about in here. My door was knocked and I called out to enter. Debbie crept into my room.

“I’m sorry if I seemed a bit flippant earlier, I didn’t mean to insult you.” She was blushing and now wearing some ordinary jeans with a pair of flat moccasin shoes.

“No offence was taken.”

“Thank you.”

“Debbie, it’s my job to help you become a good teacher if that’s what you want to do. Sometimes my advice may feel critical, if it is, don’t take it negatively. I want you to succeed because it helps you, it helps the students and it enhances the reputation of this university. Then we’re all winners.”

“They say you’re one of the best communicators in the business and listening to Diane, your students, those privileged to have you teach them, confirm that. I saw you in action yesterday—I agree. What worries me is that I won’t come anywhere near your skills if I live to be a hundred.”

“Don’t try to copy me—you’ll end up as a poor imitation. Develop your own style and do what feels natural, they’ll soon tell you if you got it wrong. But listen to your body, it’ll tell you if you’re doing it well, you’ll feel the energy holding all of you, you’ll have this buzz inside you. It won’t happen every time even though they’ll be expecting it to, so you’ll have to deal with the odd flop, but experience will help you to deal with that and to minimise it. Be true to yourself first.”

“You sound like my mother.”

“Is that good or bad?”

“Good and I always listen to her.”

“Thank you, unfortunately you don’t sound like my daughters—they never listen.”

“Perhaps I’m a bit older than them.”

“Some of them, perhaps.”

She gave me a curious look the one that says you’re not old enough and so on. “I have some adopted children who needed a mother figure despite being only ten years younger than me.”

“You don’t have any vacancies, do you?”

“You already have a mother, I’m your boss and I hope mentor. I have to watch you teach at some point. Tell me when you want me to come.”

“I’m on stage in half an hour so you’re welcome then, just be prepared for amateur night. Perhaps you could give me some pointers on this stuff, I’m doing evolution.”

I didn’t know if she was buttering me up or being genuine. I suspected the latter but I don’t know her that well yet. She showed me the notes for the lecture she’d written last night and they were very different to the way I’d do it but they should work. I gave her a few more examples and told her we had slides of them. If she asked John, he’d pop them in the projector for her or do copies on a memory stick.

She went off looking much more authentic both as a teacher and a woman in my eyes. She still hadn’t told me about herself but then she wasn’t obliged to and I’d never tell her that Diane had leaked it to me. If she wants me to know officially, she has to tell me otherwise she’s one of my female staff and expected to act as such and deal with her issues mostly by herself unless she needs my help and then she only has to ask.

I’ll be her mother in spirit at work, but like all good parents will watch from a distance and only intervene if things go very wrong or look like they might or she asks me to. Sometimes it’s quite a hard place to be.

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2924 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

I watched Debbie teach and it was adequate, she made her points quite effectively and the students stayed awake—so hopefully learned something. She did have one person ask if Darwin was just a theory and she handled it well. It is a theory, but with so much evidence to support it only someone who was determined to ignore it, would consider it unproven as the way life evolved from simpler to more complex forms or more specialised forms.

If anything the theory gets more complicated if we consider it all on a tree diagram, because according to one school of thought, nearly all the branches belong to bacteria except one or two which account for everything else. There is some controversy about it because the researchers who postulate the hypothesis are doing partial DNA analyses of bacteria found in things like farmyards and swamps and suggesting the number of species is vast compared to conventional thought. It’s not my field, so I’ll wait until something more definite is agreed before I include it in any teaching I do, though if I see it in an essay or exam paper, I might give extra marks as it would demonstrate the student had been actively searching for information and material to use—providing they give references to the source.

Debbie, Diane and I had lunch at the restaurant Tom uses most of the time. They do a good tuna salad and I felt in need of boosting my mercury levels. Of course, he appeared just after we did and blethered about me keeping secrets from him, viz., dining here without telling him. He’s met Diane but not Debbie so I introduced them. She nearly fell of her perch when I introduced him as, ‘my dad, the vice chancellor.’ After which she said very little seeming overawed, though I don’t know why as Tom is one of the most approachable men I’ve ever known.

Of course, he told her to go and see him any time she felt she needed advice from someone who’s been there, done it and survived the experience. He didn’t quite say it like that but my translation for Debbie and Diane, more or less did. He can speak in perfect English when the mood takes him but when I’m there he lapses into Lallans or Lowland Scots as opposed to Hie’land Scots which has more Gaelic in it. But then he does come from Edinburgh or near there so what can one expect. Yeah, okay, I come frae Dumfries—well, I was born there, so I’d better shut up.

I left Debbie to deal with her tutorial groups in the afternoon but invited her over for Sunday lunch having made sure that David was actually working that day. Home is rather noisy at present with builders on site repairing the cottages. It would probably have been cheaper to demolish them and start afresh but like everything in this area they’re grade two listed, so have to appear the same as before, at least on the outside. It’s a real pain and adds to the costs as well as the time involved as the builder had to find a couple of dozen of the roof tiles which are no longer made. A reclaim yard managed to get them for him at exorbitant cost.

On the Saturday, I did my inspection of the villa Mr Whitehead had left me. I let it to a chap teaching in the spy school up the road—no one is supposed to know about it but everyone does. It looked in good condition, so he and his girlfriend are taking care of it and we discussed the rental which we agreed was fair and reasonable. It’s another listed building and will need painting outside probably next year, which I’ll have to pay for.

Sunday arrived and I asked the girls to be on their best behaviour, a wasted plea when Lizzie tipped her cereal over the head of Puddin’ who was walking past her high chair at the time. World War three was averted just by Stella whipping her daughter upstairs and into the shower. I shouted at Lizzie which made Cate cry—don’t ask. Then Trish and Livvie had a stand up fight over who was going to load the washing machine or use the vacuum cleaner. Normally they either hide when I’m looking for volunteers or just do as I ask. The squabble got bigger as Hannah got involved so I determined who was going to do what and threatened to stop their pocket money for six months if they didn’t behave.

Finally, Danielle threw a wobbly when she couldn’t find one of her football boots. She’d had them in school the day before which was probably where it was and I phoned Sister Maria who agreed she could go and collect it.

Sensing my stress levels were reaching explosive level, daddy hid out in a greenhouse most of the morning pricking out seeds, I think, so why he took my Observer, I don’t quite understand. I did know that the greenhouse would be nice and warm in the sunshine, so apart from sending one of the girls out with a cup of coffee mid morning, I left him to it. I was surprised Simon wasn’t hiding in there with him, but he decided to saw some logs with Julie helping him—I suspect she’s after something, like a new car; Phoebe is down to get her Smart car when she moves on to something else. If Julie is setting her sights on a Jaguar, she may have to lower them a little as banking is having a difficult time at present, unlike their salon which is looking to expand into the shop next door which is vacant. I believe the landlord is happier to see a hairdresser rent it than a charity. So she might be after a loan for that.

Somehow, by the time Debbie arrived, things had calmed down. Danielle had both her boots and Simon hadn’t cut any limbs off with a saw. I made him go and change into something tidier for lunch and also checked the girls were clean and tidy too. They were all in jeans and various tops, including one which declared, ‘Someone I know went to Menorca and all I got was this lousy tee shirt.’ It was Trish and she bought it herself.

I was in jeans and a polo shirt with a cardigan—okay, the jeans were DK but the shirt came from Next or somewhere similar and my cardi was from M&S. So I don’t always wear designer gear, even when we have guests.

Debbie arrived wearing a nice zip up hoodie thing in soft leather which received immediate approval from Julie. Underneath she had a blue jumper and her painted on jeans but with flat shoes. She was overwhelmed at the house, which is quite large I suppose, I’ve seen smaller manor houses, Julie insisting on giving her the cook’s tour, of the downstairs rooms at least and when she saw the picture of the castle, Trish got involved. By the time I called everyone to eat, she looked completely boggled.

“They’ve got a castle,” she kept mumbling as she sat at the table, “they’ve got a friggin’ castle.”

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2925 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

For the first time I really saw Debbie completely lost, she was floundering in an ocean of life which was outside her experience. I wanted to intervene but if I did, if I rescued her, the girls would have no respect for her. She had to swim for shore by herself while sat there watching every painful stroke and feeling it every bit as much as she did. She knew I was Lady Catherine Cameron, the problem was she didn’t seem to know who Lady Catherine Cameron was—not really.

“If you wanna see it sometime, I’m sure we could take you,” offered Livvie.

“D’you know if Schrodinger’s cat is alive or dead?” asked Einstein—though in actual fact that would be an insult to Einstein or Schrodinger. Einstein couldn’t stand Quantum theory and declined to have anything to do with it. Perhaps I need to start nicknaming her Planck, but that would seem like an insult, like thick as two short Plancks—nah doesn’t work and Heisenberg is too long to play with. I’ll stick to Einstein and everyone will know who I mean.

“What?” gasped Debbie looking at Trish.

“Schrodinger’s cat, it’s a conceptualised illustration demonstrating the duality in Quantum Mechanics.”

“I know that.”

“You do?” Beamed Trish feeling she’d found a likeminded soul.

“I did a year of physics before switching to biology.”

“Why?” Trish seemed perplexed by her statement.

“I decided I wanted to work in the real world not one in my head.” Needless to say I enjoyed hearing that statement.

“What about Quantum biology?” asked Trish having watched a programme about it on television.

“What about it?”

“Well doesn’t it begin to explain lots of things which were never explained in biology, like how do birds learn to migrate along certain pathways?”

“It may do, or it may not,” said Debbie giving Trish back a Quantum answer but she was too young to appreciate it.

“It does, I watched this programme on it...” continued Trish, intellectually nonpareil,
but lacking in experience of argument.

“Just forget it sweetheart, go and build a fusion machine...” I teased her.

“You’d be surprised if I did.”

“A little but I’d be immensely proud of you as they presented you with your Nobel prize.”

“You think they would?”

“I’m certain but you might have to rewrite physics somewhat.”

“Oh I’ll probably have to do that sometime, anyhow.” Her modesty was overwhelming some days, but today wasn’t one of them.

“Is she for real?” asked Debbie as Trish and the others withdrew to watch some film on the television.

“She is and believe me she actually knows what she’s talking about.”

“How old is she?”

“Ten, nearly eleven going on twenty five.”

“I can’t say I’ve ever met a kid like her before.”

“She is very gifted though at times a little short of patience with ordinary mortals like me.”

“Go on, she must take after you, you’re her mother.”

“I’m afraid all my children are adopted.”

“All of them, even the little ones?”

“Cate or Catherine was almost willed on me when her mother died of a broken heart after her father and older sister died in a car accident. Lizzie, the youngest, I agreed to look after for her mother who hanged herself—she was one of our technicians, so was Neal, her father, he died after never recovering from his wife’s death. We think she had some sort of postnatal depression, he just went to pieces afterwards. I was supposed to be having her until he recovered enough to look after her but he never recovered. They were both lovely people, Phoebe is his sister, so Lizzie’s auntie.”

“How have you got Phoebe as well?”

“Her mum died from cancer and she came to stay with us and sort of grew into another daughter.”

“How come they’re all girls—don’t you adopt boys?”

Mima arrived and saved me having to answer Debbie’s question. “Mummy, the button’s come off my dowwy’s cardi, can you sew it back on?” She presented me with the garment and the button.

“How come you can’t do it?”

“You do it betta an’ quicka.”

I sent her off to find my repair kit inside my sewing box. She returned in moments rattling the box, which is actually an old highland shortbread tin, which was originally my mother’s. I threaded a needle with a small length of cotton and doubled it before knotting the end, then quickly sewed the button on before shipping off any excess cotton with my needlework scissors and handing the garment back to Mima.

“Thank you, Mummy,” she said before scurrying off back to her dollies which she was playing with Cate and occasionally when they tolerated her, Lizzie as well.

“You’ve obviously done that before,” said Debbie looking at me with a curious expression.

“More times than I can count. She pops them off for a pastime. It’s hardly rocket science.”

“I never learned to sew—not even a button.”

“Didn’t you learn in school?”

“No—they didn’t do it.”

“Your mother obviously didn’t show you then?”

“No. Is that where you learned, from your mum?”

“Mostly, I’ve acquired ideas and the odd lesson from other people. I’ve done a few things over the years, made or altered curtains, did some dressmaking with Danielle and the others, shortened trousers and so on.”

“Wow, can you show me how to shorten trousers? I bought some the other week and unless I wear stilt high heels they’re too long, though the fit everywhere else is perfect.”

“Bring them into work tomorrow and I’ll show you how to do it, I’ll bring my sewing kit in.”

“That would be absolutely brilliant.”

“It isn’t rocket science. It’s a skill and requires a bit of planning and practice. Come on through to the study and I show what you need to have for doing some easy repairs and alterations.” I called Danielle and asked her to bring Debbie and me a cuppa.

I was busy showing Debbie my sewing box when Danielle arrived with the tray of tea and biscuits—my Lotus ones—where did the little bugger find those? “Cindy’s on the phone, can she come over?”

“Yes, but I’m not promising to take her home afterwards?”

“Okay,” she dashed off before I could change my mind. She hadn’t been over for ages and she wasn’t a bad kid really.

“You were saying that Danielle is good at football?”

“Yes, she’s a school girl international and has also played for England Ladies.”

“Why doesn’t that surprise me? It seems they all have your superpowers—you don’t wear your knickers over your tights, do you?”

“Only when it’s very cold—don’t wear tights very often.”

“They can get a bit warm in certain areas.”

“Quite. So what colour are these trousers?”

“Actually, there’s two pairs—one pair is black and the others are grey.”

“I hope it’s bright tomorrow or we’re going to struggle—why don’t you go and get them now and we can use my machine to over-sew the cut ends.”

“Oversew?”

“Yes, an interlocking stitch to stop them fraying.”

“You sure about this—I mean I don’t like to impose.”

“Go and get them, I’ll set up the machine.”

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2926 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

Debbie arrived just after Cindy who disappeared up to Danielle’s room with her. I had some doubts about allowing this as Cindy was still technically male but I had to start trusting Danielle sometime, so now seemed as good as any. I did point out to her in a previous conversation that if she was discovered to have betrayed my trust, I would never allow her to have any other friend up her in room as long as she lived here unless she was married to them.

She was about to protest when I think Julie or Phoebe indicated she should quit while she was ahead. Actually, I quite liked Cindy in lots of ways she was more rounded in her girliness whereas Danielle, although very pretty and with an amazing figure—though she hadn’t recognised it yet—at times acted quite boyishly, but they got on well together and that was good for both of them. Danielle was also more outgoing bordering on extrovert but she could also seem quite shy at times—then again, most adolescents are a mass of contradictions.

Debbie brought her trousers into the study. I asked her which shoes she was likely to wear with them and she indicated the ones she had on. I told her to try them on with the shoes. She popped into the cloakroom and came back a couple of minutes later wearing the trousers which were obviously too long. I turned then up, simply folding them up her leg until we reached the length she wanted at this point I measured them and pinned them. I then had her take them off and we did the same with the other pair. Then I checked the lengths, her legs were pretty well the same length, which makes things easier. The turn up was the same back and front and after checking she was happy with that, I measured three quarters of an inch from the fold and ran a line of pins round it—tedious but ensures I cut it evenly. With her agreement, I then cut them at this point. The next stage was over-locking them with a machine stitch which I did removing part of the machine so I had the narrower stage for the material. Then I pinned up the three quarter inch hem and sewed it with a hemming stitch by hand. All in all, it took about an hour.

She tried them on again and pronounced them perfect.

“Right, your turn.”

“I can’t do that she whined.”

“You realise can’t prefixes a statement of belief?”

“What?”

“You are effectively saying, you do not believe you can do this.”

“That’s right, I don’t believe I can do it.”

“Even with me helping?”

“If you help me a lot—I um, will give it a try.”

“You’re an intelligent woman, or at least I think so. I didn’t do it to show off, I know I can do it, so don’t have anything to prove. What I want you to do, is to be able to do this yourself in future. When I was in my crummy room at the university as a pg student, I did this with no sewing machine, so I had to sew everything by hand, judging lengths with a mirror. It took me half the evening but I did it. If I can do it in those less than desirable conditions surely you can do it with me supervising you?”

“You had lessons from your mum when you were a girl, so it’s second nature to you. I didn’t—so all this domestic goddess stuff is alien to me. I can cook some basic stuff and can keep a place clean but colour coordinating everything—like this room, or the dining room or making curtains, baking cakes—I didn’t do anything like that when I was a kid...”

“Okay, stop there. I don’t want to hear your history unless you feel it’s relevant to what we’re doing now. Like your teaching, I’m going to help you develop your skills until they satisfy me as being up to standard. We’re not in competition, but I am happy to teach you some basic home-making skills or even life skills, seeing as you somehow slipped the educational net. Now, I am going to show you very carefully how I do this once again on one leg of these trousers and you are going to do the other if it takes us all night—okay?” It was a rhetorical question but she shrugged and agreed to it.

I did another leg even more slowly than the first pair and instead of finishing, stopped at how I measured and then pinned the cutting line. She followed my lead and I watched to make sure she didn’t mess it up—asymmetric trouser legs aren’t yet fashionable as far as I know.

It was after eleven when she finished the hemming stitch. I had the great good fortune to be shown how to do that with invisible stitching, simply by not pushing the needle through the material, but sewing to a thread of material on the inside of the leg—those of you who can sew will know what I mean. It is an acquired skill that takes practice but once you have the technique, is easy. Debbie struggled. Danielle brought Cindy down to say goodnight and once she saw we were sewing, grumbled and asked me if I could teach her some more stuff. Danielle shrugged when Cindy included her.

“Okay, how about we make a Friday evening our sewing bee night and you and Danielle and Debbie can come and do alterations or repairs and I’ll help you as best I can. Just remember that I’m a biologist, not a professional seamstress.” They all laughed.

The two girls went off to meet Cindy’s mum who’d just arrived in the driveway. “D’you mean that? You’d show me how to sew and stuff?”

“What does, ‘and stuff’ mean?”

“You know, sewing and doing repairs—that stuff.”

“I’ll try, you proved you could do it.”

“Yes I did, didn’t I? But only because you pushed me,” she said blushing. “I mean, what if I’d cut too much off?”

“We could have made them calf length or shorts if necessary. They need pressing, have you access to an iron at the hotel?”

“I don’t think so.”

She followed me out to the kitchen and chatted to me as I erected the ironing board and filled the iron with some filtered water—it’s very hard water here and clogs up kettles and irons. I bid her make some teas as I pressed her trousers with the steam iron, using a table napkin to stop the material becoming shiny—which I had to explain. It seems her mother didn’t teach her anything domestic at all. I almost asked her outright about it at one point then bit my tongue as I remembered she was almost certainly raised as a boy and probably wouldn’t have learned much of these skills.

I handed her the completed trousers and told her to hang them carefully so they didn’t crease. We finished our cuppas and just as she was about to leave, she said, “Thank you so much for showing me some really useful things tonight. I almost feel like you’ve been mothering me and at times it would have been so easy to call you that.”

“I’m glad you didn’t, I feel old enough now when Julie or Phoebe do it.”

She blushed, “Sorry, I don’t mean to embarrass you, Cathy, but you’re such a natural mother and teacher—you’ve mothered me since I arrived in Portsmouth and I’m grateful that you did. It really helps me and my confidence as a woman.”

“What else could you be? Teaching you a few tricks on a sewing machine isn’t going to make you a woman, that comes from within. C’mon, it’s late and I need my beauty sleep—see you tomorrow.”

“Gosh yes, It’s Monday again. Thanks for a lovely day, I’ve really enjoyed it and learned so much, Cathy.” We hugged and air kissed and she left.

“Got us another trannie have you, Mother?” asked Julie wandering out to the kitchen as I was putting the ironing board away.

“What d’you mean?”

“I spotted it at dinner, so I know you must have days ago.”

“Just keep it to yourself, all right?”

“Yeah, no big deal,” she shrugged.

“Might be useful to stay quiet and then if she asks if you’re one too, I can...”

“What? If she asks if I’m one?”

“Yes, why shouldn’t she have the same gaydar that you have?”

“Oh Christ, I didn’t think of that.”

I smiled and told her I was going to bed.

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2927 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

Gaydar seems a wrong term for being able to recognise another transgender person, T-dar, Julie informed me was the usual term, that sounded abysmal too, why not tradar? Oh well, no one listens to me anyway—I had a couple of hundred students who proved that most days.

I had to see the headmistress about something so was later getting to work than usual. When I wandered in at just after nine, Debbie and Diane were in deep conversation, “...and she made me take up the other pair,” said Debbie and Diane gasped and then laughed.

“Sounds like you’ve found either a sewing teacher or a mother substitute,” quipped Diane.

“Sewing teacher perhaps,” I said firmly and they both jumped not having heard or seen my approach. Debbie was wearing the trousers she’d helped to alter which pleased me. She looked like the cat who’d got the cream—what a stupid expression, cats can’t smile or even smirk, though they can look daggers at you as i discovered this morning when I accidentally stood on Bramble’s tail. If looks could kill I’d be well dead.

Inside my room was a bouquet of flowers with a thank you note attached from Debbie. I went out but she’d gone and Diane was busy making me some tea. When she brought it in to me, I was scribbling a quick note to say thank you to Debbie for the flora. Diane noticed me and said, “Debbie said she was looking at some properties to rent, would you likely let her go early? I said I’d ask you.”

“What’s she doing today?”

“She’s doing Darwin and the Voyage of the Beagle—just started and she has three tutorials after lunch. I thought if we brought those forward, she could take the afternoon off.”

“Aiding and abetting absenteeism now are we?”

“Go on—big, tough, nasty boss-lady who was teaching her how to take up her trousers half the night.”

“My credibility is going down the pan isn’t it?”

“What? It’s absolutely soaring—your staff and your students would die for you.”

“What including you?” I teased.

“No way, I’m just a temp, remember?”

“So you are—so any trouble from you, missus, and I’ll call the agency and complain.”

“An’ if they take a week to cover me, who’s going to do your typing?”

“I give up,” I said waving a white tissue and disappeared back into the relative safety of my office.

The rest of the day was average, paperwork, more paperwork and yet more paperwork before we finished up with paperwork—the last bit being some exam papers. I decided to take them home with me and do them in my study, besides I had to go and collect the girls.

We’d kept the Sharran because there was more room for the girls though at times I longed to drive my Jaguar again, it was like the difference in riding a horse bareback or with a comfortable saddle. Perhaps I should make them walk to school—the exercise would do them good?

I’d just settled down to my marking, albeit reluctantly, as the dinner, I’d eaten too quickly so I could get on with my marking, now lay heavily upon my digestive system. David had done a delicious lasagne with all fresh ingredients and I’d eaten too much and too quickly. I’d have preferred to sleep than eat, but these had to be done—the exam papers, that is.

I was trying to stay awake when the phone rang. “Hello?” I said sleepily.

“Cathy, it’s Debbie could you do me a favour?”

“If I can.”

“I need someone to give as a referee for a house I’d like to rent.”

“I can give one as your employer, to say you actually work for me—is that sufficient?”

“I think so.”

“I’ll get Diane to type something up tomorrow.”

“Thank you, night.” She rang off.

I finished my marking at half past twelve—mind you I did half an hour on the turbo to wake myself up then went back to my thankless chore. If you think taking exam papers is bad, try marking the blessed things—believe me it is much worse. What is so frightening is, that apparently I can remember more about a subject I studied ten years ago than half the twits who were taught about it three weeks ago. Though I didn’t teach them.

Debbie was waiting for me when I arrived. She was talking to Diane who was typing something as she listened. As I was asked to sign it when I got there I think I knew what it was without reading it. However, it’s quite an acceptable thing to get an employer’s reference for a tenancy.

Debbie was bubbly, “I’ve found this smashing little place, a terraced house but it’s in great condition and the rent is reasonable. It’s empty from the weekend and I can rent it by the quarter.”

“That’s unusual,” I suggested.

“Yeah, but seeing as I’m on a temporary contract, it has advantages too.”

“I’m sure it does, especially if something better comes up.”

“No this will do me fine and the rent is so good.”

“I’m glad.”

“Thanks for this,” she said waving the envelope the reference was inside, “I’ll take it to Maureen, lunch time.”

“Maureen?”

“Yeah, a big lady but she is so sweet—she acts as an agent for some absentee landlord I expect—you know the type, most have never been that poor that some weeks you have to decide if you want to eat or stay warm.”

I wondered if the Maureen was my friend Maureen. It began to look like it could be and she has acted as letting agent for me so if any of my students rent one of my houses they don’t know it’s mine, so we don’t have any nonsense in front of a room full of students.

As soon as she was off I called Maureen who answered on practically the first ring. I explained what I thought was happening and she agreed it was Debbie.

“What d’you want me to do, ma’am?”

“If you think she’s okay, that’s fine with me but please don’t let her know who owns it.”

“I certainly won’t, ma’am.” I could practically see her saluting me—oh boy.

So Debbie was looking to rent Cate’s old house, not that she’ll remember it. I gave up for the moment trying to explain I wasn’t her mother, but Marie Drummond was, she got all flustered and insisted I was her mum. I’ll have to try again when she’s a fraction older. If I stay well clear of it all then no one can claim conflict of interest

I shall also have to make sure if Maureen comes round that Debbie isn’t here, which could happen as Maureen is supervising the builders renovating the cottages. Knowing my luck, it probably would happen.

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2928 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

For our dodecaphiles, episode 244 dozen.

Debbie was waiting for me at the office when I got in the next morning, what does she want now? Was my first thought, then I decided she probably still needs a bit of mothering as she doesn’t know many people here yet, so she comes to me, given the potential for the wrong thing to take more time to sort out than answering her query, my hackles went flat again.

“Thanks for the note, Cathy, hopefully I’ll be moving in at the weekend, that will feel so good—a room of one’s own.”

“I quite enjoyed that one, made more sense than bloody, Orlando.”

She blushed, “I quite enjoyed it actually.”

“Forgive for saying this, ladies, but what are we talking about?”

“Virginia Woolf,” we both answered in unison.

“Oh, I couldn’t take her seriously after Nicole Kidman’s false nose,” offered Diane.

“What?” we both said like it was rehearsed.

“She played Virginia Woolf in some film or other with Meryl Streep.”

“Ah, The Hours, with Philip Glass’ violin concerto,” I said realising what she was on about.

“What are you both talking about?” said a perplexed looking Debbie.

“Nicole Kidman played Virginia Woolf in the film, The Hours which used Philip Glass’ violin concerto in its soundtrack.”

“Ah—now I understand.”

“Good, this is supposed to be a place of enlightenment—please note I did say supposed, rather than is; though your self-confessed epiphany shows that we achieve it now and again.”

“Can you enlighten me further oh wise sage...?”

“Not if you take the piss, I won’t.” As I said this Diane laughed so much she had to run off to the loo.

“Professor um—Cam—um I mean...”

“Watts, perhaps,” I assisted.

“That’s the one,” she blushed and I pretended to be ferocious so she blushed some more. “I have some exam papers to mark.”

“So have most teaching staff it seems to be one of the reasons we’re called a place of education.” I was teasing her but with a dead pan face.

“Yes I know that bit, it’s what sort of marking plan you have that I don’t.”

“Ah, well do the same as I do—if they’re good looking pass them if they’re ugly, fail ’em.”

“You don’t do that, do you?”

“Duh.”

“Phew, you had me worried then.”

I shook my head in disbelief. “There is a plan but as we vary it each time we examine them, I can’t remember which marking scheme we’ve adopted this time, come through all will be revealed—of marking schemes, that is. She followed me into the office and I began to flick through the files in the cabinet extracting one, looking through it before returning it and extracting another one, which happened to be the current one.

Diane brought us in a cup of tea each and some biscuits—more of my Lotus biccies. These aren’t anything to do with the UK manufacturer of sports cars and formula one vehicles. Debbie and I sat down and I showed her what we were marking for and how some of the key phrases or words would be accorded extra marks if used in the correct context. She sipped her tea and nodded. I got Diane to do her a photocopy and she eventually went off muttering something about ducks, though why I didn’t know as we didn’t mention anything to with ducks in the course.

Finally, I could do some marking—not something I was anticipating with pleasure, rather it’s something I anticipate with sense of gloom or foreboding. Though by lunch time and three cups of tea later, I’d done most of my stuff and hoped to get some planning done for a sponsorship I hoped I could inveigle a local company to provide. Again not my personal idea of fun but I have more than myself to keep on board and sponsorship or contracts pays for post grad students to do research in the area required by the sponsor. We do have ethical standards so we won’t just do any old thing, it has to support the values we espouse or we won’t do it. I suspect most UK universities have the same sort of policy, at least in their publicity material, but someone must produce the research the weapons and oil industries use—but not us.

Actually, I know Southampton do work on oil spillages, some of which is bound to be funded by the oil companies but the details are not known to me, except I applaud them if they’re helping to make the marine environment safer. Talking of oil, I read that they’re drilling for it in the Amazon estuary and they discovered a huge coral reef which was a complete surprise in the muddy, fresh waters of the world’s largest river. There is so much water flowing down it that the sea is affected by freshwater for hundreds of miles and many species of animal and plant must have evolved to adapt to it. I wonder if I could do a sabbatical down there studying them for a couple of months except I suspect Debbie would find me down there as well to ask some advice on teaching or to shorten her knickers or some other such thing.

According to Maureen, the Drummond’s old house is let as furnished, so Debbie will only need to provide her own clothing and perhaps bedding together with any gadgets she wants. There was a television but a previous tenant took it with them—the joys of letting houses. I told Maureen to replace the telly or I’d have Debbie pestering me more than I do already.

As I was about to go to lunch at the refectory Debbie appeared again, I didn’t have the heart to tell her I wanted to eat by myself as I was still thinking about the wording I wanted to use to invite sponsors, so I let her tag along.

“You know, Cathy, I think the woman I’m letting the house from is trans.”

“Trans?” I queried knowing full well what it meant though it’s not a term I like or use.

“Yeah, you know transgender.”

“Ah, so why not use that term instead of the shorter form?”

She shrugged and it flowed off her back like water off a duck, “It’s just what people say in the community.”

“What community?”

She blushed realising she’d given herself away. “I read it in the Guardian I think.”

“Quite probably they seem to have loads of stuff about minority groups in there.”

“Yeah, they do.” I let it go and just as we were entering the refectory she asked, “I wonder if Julie would do my hair?”

“Why don’t you give her a call and see?” I said without feeling myself getting hotter though it was the last thing I wanted.

“She makes such a nice job of yours.”

I nodded and looked at the menu, though I didn’t know why, I eat the same thing pretty well every time I come here, a tuna jacket potato with salad garnish, washed down with a bottle of still water—as opposed to the sparkling variety, though there is talk of having a water cooler machine put in. If it is I wonder how much they’ll lose in revenues from selling bottled water at fifty pence a time?

“The marking’s coming along fine now and most of them have passes.”

“Good,” I said not wishing to discuss it.

“Are we still on for Friday night for my sewing? I’ve a skirt I’d like to try and alter, It’s a bit big across the hips.”

“What sort of skirt?”

“A red one.”

Oh boy, "What type of skirt is it, pencil, A-line, pleated...”

“Oh, I see, silly me, it’s a pencil one.” She’s going to get ‘trans’ women a bad name and she’s not even blonde.

I managed to get shot of her when she went off to do some tutorials and I could return to my begging letters.

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2929 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

Life continued to remain hectic throughout the week with exams and marking causing most of us to work long hours. I even had to ask David to take and collect the girls to school because I was going in early and coming home late. Just when it seemed to be heading for a crescendo, it went quiet. Debbie arrived first thing on Friday—I’d already been in for an hour and was drinking strong coffee—never a good sign—when she strolled in.

“Cathy, sorry it’s short notice but I’ve been invited out, so could we postpone our sewing night?”

Despite the coffee I yawned, “That’s fine, I think I’ll have an early night. Going anywhere nice?” I asked not really caring where she was going as long as it wasn’t my house.

“John has asked me out.”

“He’s a nice chap, so don’t wear him out over the weekend, I’ll need him on Monday because I’m teaching.”

“Oh, if I’m not busy, mind if I come and watch? You never know, I might pick up some pointers watching the best perform.” I was so tired I didn’t care if she planned to take all her clothes off and stand on top of the table.

“If you have nothing on,” I blushed as I said it especially recalling what had just gone through my knackered little brain.

“Oh, I’ll be sure to wear something tidy, don’t worry—a bit cold for going sky clad, don’cha think?”

Sky clad? Isn’t that a wiccan term? Don’t tell me she’s a bloody witch or sorceress? Somehow it wouldn’t surprise me. I don’t believe in most of that stuff anyway and I think I’ll keep it that way, I have enough trouble with Old Testament goddesses.

“Probably,” I said yawning, so the coffee wasn’t helping that much except to stimulate my bladder into extra evacuations.

“So you know the term, do you?”

“Which one?” I had already forgotten what we were talking about.

“Sky clad.”

“Wasn’t that the most recent Bond film?”

She roared, “Sky Fall was the Bond movie, sky clad means naked.”

“Yes, I read it somewhere.”

“Cathy, you look all in, why don’t you go and have a little snooze?”

I wasn’t sure I actually had the energy to close my eyes, let alone walk to my office and do it. Sensing this she led me back into office, sat me on the sofa and lifted my legs up, “There, have forty winks, I’ll tell Diane to keep everyone away.”

The last thing I remembered was hearing the door close then Diane was waking me with a cuppa. I’d zonked for two hours.

“Why don’t you go home, Prof? You’ve caught up with most of it and you still look all in. Anything else can wait until Monday.”

“I’m teaching on Monday.”

“So you are. I might come and watch if it’s quiet.”

“Not you too?” I groaned.

“What?” she had no idea what I was on about.

“Debbie is coming to watch the maestro.”

“Oh who’s that?” she teased. I yawned in response.

“Go home and get some rest or you’ll be ill.”

I took her advice and wandered out to my car and drove home while I was still awake catching David and Amanda up to something as they both came dashing from his caravan looking slightly bedraggled and extremely flustered. I left them to continue their chores and just lay on top of my bed, in ten minutes I was gone.

“You’re not a wiccan, are you Cathy?” asked Debbie who was wrapped in exotic looking robes and wearing a strange hat with a goat’s head embroidered on it.

“No,” I said feeling uneasy.

“Perhaps you should join, I could instruct you in the ways of the witch. The essence in you is very strong.”

“I don’t think so, Debbie, but thanks for the offer—it’s not my scene.”

“Think it’s all superstition, do you? Well it isn’t—I’m invading your dream and you can’t stop me.”

“Debbie, please just go away and let me rest.”

“Too frightening, is it—you’re not in control now are you Lady Catherine?” She laughed and it seemed to echo all around me.

“Please, I don’t wish to get angry,” I said trying to keep things calm.

“Ooh, she doesn’t want to get angry—why what you going to do? Oh shit...”

I felt myself being overshadowed by the energy and I felt myself growing slightly and the wings were attached to my back. I hadn’t asked this to happen, it did so spontaneously—well it’s a dream, so anything can happen.

“Does that answer your question?” I asked aware that she was now very scared.

“Ho—how d’ya do that?” she stammered at me.

“Do not mock the servants of the goddess,” said a powerful female voice which seemed to be in the very air.

“Uh, no your ladyship, we—um weren’t mocking her, we—um...”

“Silence. You are never to mock or threaten my servant again or you will live a very long time to regret it, do I make myself clear. My angels are not defenceless though we prefer to work with love—sometimes that entails what you humans call tough love. Do you understand? Or shall I call upon the essence of Gevurah to deal with you?”

“No your ladyship, we understand perfectly and apologise for any offence we might have caused.”

I woke up feeling less tired but confused. Was that just a bad dream or what? Gevurah or was it Geburah? Isn’t that something to do with the Tree of Life, in the Kabbalah? Judgement or something if I recall my days of playing with tarot cards.

The phone rang just after I got back from doing what we all do after waking up. “Cathy, I’ve just had the strangest conversation with Debbie,” said Diane.

“In what way?”

“She asked if you were into magic or occultism. I of course pooh-poohed it, saying as far as I knew you didn’t believe in anything like that, that science was your religion.”

“What made her ask in the first place?”

“She said she was sitting in her office—the one you used to have apparently—and you appeared before her like an angel, gleaming white with large feathered wings.”

“Was she doing marking?”

“I think she was.”

“I expect she fell asleep and dreamt it all. I was fast asleep in bed until about ten minutes ago, so I wasn’t there and I’m no angel, I can assure you of that.”

“Oh I don’t know, sometimes the things you do to help others—reminds me of...”

“I was running her down before I left if you recall, hardly the action of an angel.”

“No, but I happen to know you own the house she’s renting and I also know the rent is well below the average for Portsmouth.”

“She must never know that, Diane.”

“Relax, boss, go polish your halo or tighten your harp strings.”

“What’s the number of your agency...?”

“You going to type all these reports?”

“Have a nice weekend, Diane.”

“Which one are you, Gabrielle or Raphaela?”

“Very funny.”

“Bye boss, oh feel free to drop in if you’re flying past.” She laughed as she put the phone down.

I just sat there thinking what the hell had just happened?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gevurah

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2930 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

I made myself a cuppa ignoring the glances of David and Amanda and the blushes and giggles when I did look at them. What they do in their own time is their business but I resent the fact they might be bonking on my time. I’d let it pass this time but next time would say something.

I read up on Gevurah or Geburah or whatever it’s called, it’s definitely Kabbalah and is something to do with the administration of judgement and justice. Not quite sure what context that had for dealing with Debbie other than as a warning, which she understood—more than I did.

The angel has appeared before, sometimes at my bidding to make a point, sometimes because it was in context with what I was doing—usually healing; though they’re not always associated with sweetness and light—tell that to Pharaoh’s first born a la plagues. Okay, it’s mythology but we angels will respond appropriately to threats or attacks—I think, or is that me, the human, speaking? I glanced at the time and checked a number in my address book.

“Cathy, what a pleasant surprise.”

“Hello, Marguerite, I need some information or advice on matters spiritual.”

“You’re asking me?”

“Yeah, wanted the biochemical version.” She laughed at my remembering her previous occupation.

“So the mountain has come to Mohammed?”

“Explain, please unless it’s to do with my putting on a few pounds or you converting to Islam.”

She laughed again, “Cathy, you have far more contact with the divine than I do, it’s my job but it’s your very being.”

I cleared my throat as I was uncomfortable with that concept. She laughed again, “You don’t like to admit that your ability to heal and to help others is a gift from God, do you?”

“In a word no, it isn’t congruent with my map of the universe.”

“Maps can be redrawn, Cathy.”

“Yeah, I get invites from Ordnance Survey to buy the latest ones, quite regularly.”

“You know perfectly well what I mean.”

“Perhaps.”

“What did you want to talk about?”

I explained the experience of the dream and Diane’s phone call and asked her what she made of it.

“Seeing you as an angel isn’t difficult and that might be my bias as we all interpret reality slightly differently. While I wouldn’t encourage anyone to get involved in alternate beliefs, especially occult ones, most wiccans I’ve met were good enough souls who like to feel an attachment to this planet. I feel it would hold me back to think that way as we are on this earth not of it in a spiritual sense.”

“What about returning to dust and Adam being made from dirt?”

“That’s a metaphor, Cathy, in my universe, we are souls who interpret material bodies to exist here and to learn lessons about the physical world that might not be possible in the spiritual realms.”

“Okay, that works for you but I feel is a cop out, however, was Debbie threatening me or was I or the goddess threatening her?”

“I suspect she might have been trying to assert herself in a way that she felt you didn’t outrank her, possibly it was all unconscious stuff, however, she had a surprise realising you outranked her there too and your goddess was prepared to offer you her protection and sent Debbie away with a flea in her ear. That’s my best guess. If she has any sense she’ll not try it again.”

“Could it all have happened in my imagination?”

“How did that involve someone else not closely related to you?”

“I have no idea, perhaps my ego is so big she walked into it, she has the use of my old office as I’ve got Tom’s now.”

“Wasn’t he your professor as well as your dad?”

“Yes.”

“So if you have his office—you’re a professor—oh well done, especially at your young age.”

“I’m only acting professor, he’s acting Vice Chancellor.”

“But even so, it’s quite an accolade at your age.”

“Nah, they just wanted to keep the mammal survey here because of the prestige of it and the income it generates.”

“And this is your project, isn’t it?”

“Essentially, yes. Where I go, so does it.”

“I’m sure it’s much broader than that, after all you’re a noted academic as seen on TV,” she chuckled at me.

“That sometimes leads to professional jealousy rather than respect.”

“Sadly, I can appreciate that though I see no grounds for it unless they’re jealous of your looks, knowledge and skill in sharing it to make it interesting to others. My husband, who has as much interest in dormice as I do in model trains, found you totally captivating.”

I was blushing as I listened to her. “Perhaps you need to tell him about my ability to transform into a psychopathic angel?”

“Back to your usual self effacement, sadly.”

“I’m not comfortable with any of this stuff, the religion or the undeserved compliments.”

“Isn’t it the duty of others to determine how they feel about some experience they’ve had rather than yours to write it off because you didn’t feel it was too demanding. I have both your films on DVD and have watched them several times, including enough to notice you wrote and directed the film as well as presented them. To my mind, that constitutes a high level of skill.”

“It was a way of saving money—honest.”

“Cathy, you are a serial self-effacer, stop it and listen to your elder for a moment. You have incredible gifts and talents which I believe are divinely inspired because only God could give them to you. Your healing gift is second only to Jesus, himself and he was God incarnate. You are a very special woman, barely a day goes by without me giving thanks for your healing on my daughter’s face, please accept your special place in this world and the job you’ve been sent here to do.”

Oh not that old chestnut, not going down that road again.

“I have to go, Marguerite, it’s been lovely talking to you.” Before she could say anything else I rang off. No matter how hard I try, I can’t go along with being God’s special agent, it sounds like something out of the X-Files or the Spanish Inquisition. If I’m special, then we all are because we’re all human and it’s our humanity that makes us special as well as unique. It doesn’t need Gods or goddesses for that to happen, just compassion and love for others. I also recognise I’m as flawed as anyone else, so unworthy of being special, as a daughter of Cain.

My cup was empty and as I rose to refill it I noticed David drive off in the minibus thing, presumably to collect my children. I hurried to make my tea, my peace and quiet wouldn’t last much longer so I’d enjoy it, and its facilitation of deep thought, while I could.

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2931 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

It was nearly midnight when we heard the frantic ringing of the doorbell and Simon looked at me as to what he should do. “We’ll have to answer it before it wakes up the whole household.” The reason for our hesitation was we were both in bed and reading, another five minutes and I’d have been fast asleep—yeah, right.

I followed him downstairs, well someone has to protect him; only to find Daddy was already at the door and opening it. As he did so Debbie almost fell into his arms weeping all over him. I told Si to put the kettle on and went to assist Daddy, by peeling the distraught woman off him and into the kitchen where we had tissues and teabags—essential ingredients of calming distraught females, whichever route they took to get there.

Simon made several cups of tea and with my agreement disappeared. This was women’s stuff as far as he was concerned. I laid a cuppa in front of Debbie who was sitting sniffing opposite me. “Don’t tell me, you’re upset because you forgot to bring the skirt you wanted to alter?”

She looked at me in incredulity almost as if I’d spoken in tongues. Then she paused before she roared with laughter. “You are totally stark staring bonkers, Professor.”

“You mean, Esmond didn’t tell you?” I said trying to sound astonished. She laughed some more.

“He told me you were the best student he’d ever had as well as the most beautiful and the best teacher he’d ever seen.” This was punctuated by a sniff.

“He is given to exaggeration but I’m probably the only student whose pants he didn’t get into.”

“He told me that as well.”

“So why the tears and knocking on my door in the middle of the night?”

“I’m sorry,” she started crying again, “I didn’t know what to do and where to go.”

“What happened?”

She nodded to show she’d heard my question but had to compose herself first. I waited sipping my tea knowing I’d probably have to go for a wee in the middle of the night after drinking it.

She blew her nose and took a drink of her tea. “Sorry I disturbed you, perhaps I’d better just go.”

She rose as if to leave and I ordered her to sit again, telling her, “You aren’t going anywhere until you tell me what happened this evening.”

“It was awful,” she paused to blow her nose, “I arranged to meet John in a pub and when I got there he was talking to some bimbo. I got cross with him and stormed out then went to another pub and some matelot chatted me up.” I sighed, we remind female students that this is a naval port and not to get involved with the ratings. Of course they do and we have to sort out the problems that arise ranging from broken hearts to gonorrhoea.

“We went back to my car and were making out in the back seat, when some of his mates came out and took photos with their smart phones while I had my tits out.”

I sighed again, this sort of thing is happening increasingly.

“He told me if I let him shag me he’d try and stop them putting the photos on facebook. I told him to fuck off and threw him out, he just walked away laughing so I drove the car at him.”

I winced.

“I didn’t hit him or anything, but he jumped out of the way and fell over. I left him lying there and just drove for an hour. Then I came here.”

“You’re sure you didn’t hit him with the car?”

“No I didn’t, he saw me coming and jumped out of the way but I wouldn’t have hit him anyway; even though I felt like it.”

“Do no one any harm, eh?”

She gave me an old fashioned look. “How d’you know that?”

“I’ve had friends who were wiccans.”

“But you’re not?”

“I thought you knew that.”

She looked at me then nodded, “Dunno what happened there, I fell asleep and had this weird dream where you appeared as an angel complete with large white feathered wings. You out ranked me again.”

“If I thought like that, they’d confiscate my wings.”

“So you are an angel?” she gasped.

“Do you really believe in all that stuff?”

“I know what I saw and the power is very strong in you, isn’t it?”

“What power is that then?”

“You know what power.”

“Do I?” I played stupid. “Sounds like Star Wars, may the force be with you.”

“Yeah, but that’s fiction, you’re the real deal, aren’t you?”

“In my study is a photo of Simon, Daddy and all the children with me. I thought you couldn’t photograph angels?”

“Perhaps you can sometimes,” she offered lamely.

I stifled a yawn, it was nearly one o’clock. “I need to get to bed.”

“Thanks for your support, I’d better get back to the hotel.”

“The sofa in the lounge isn’t too uncomfortable to sleep on—I’ll get you some pillows and a quilt.” She made a half hearted effort to protest but accepted the pillows and quilt, I also gave her a toothbrush and loaned her a nightdress—one of Julie’s, who was more her size. Then after wishing her goodnight, went up to bed.

Simon had fallen asleep with his book in his hand. He woke when i took it from him. “Everything okay?”

“I left her to sleep on the lounge sofa.”

“Is she all right?”

“She got photographed in a compromising situation by a group of matelots.”

“Oh. These bloody mobile phones are a total pain. I asked a guy on the train to stop using his or leave the compartment. I pointed out the sign on the carriage window which forbade such calls, and he got quite abusive, especially when I grabbed his phone.”

“Oh, what happened then?”

“I told him I’d give it back to him if he promised not to use it in the carriage.”

“Did he keep his word?”

“He did but possibly only because he overheard Roger and George talking, one of them said quite loudly to the other. If he uses it once more I’m gonna stick the battery where he’ll have to wash his hands if he pulls it back out.”

“I didn’t realise that commuting was such an exciting experience.”

“You have to take your thrills where you can.”

“I’m too tired most of the time.” I pecked him on the lips and turned over to sleep. It seemed just a few seconds and I was away. There were no funny dreams, so if Debbie tried anything I wasn’t aware. I suspect she just crashed out after such an emotional night.

The next morning I introduced her to Sammi who went off to surf the web to see if they’d posted and pictures of her—they had and Sammi helped her take them down replacing them with pictures of him with his willie exposed which Sammi photoshopped to a mere couple of inches. Debbie came back singing her praises.

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2932 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

“Your Sammi is a genius with computers,” said Debbie extolling our daughter’s virtues.

“I know.”

“Course you do, I just didn’t think anyone could hack facebook.”

“She spends most of her waking hours trying to stop people hacking the bank, she’s very good at that, so a case of gamekeeper poacher I suppose.”

“Won’t they know it was her?”

“I doubt it, compared to her facebook are amateurs.”

“She’s such a pretty girl.”

“All my girls are beautiful.”

“I wish I was.” Her eyes filled with tears. I took her into study and asked Danni to make us some tea.

“Right, let’s get to the bottom of this—what is troubling you?”

With tears streaming down her face she said, “I’m transsexual.”

“Yeah, so what?”

“Well, I’m not like you or your lovely girls, am I?”

“Why not?”

“Didn’t you hear me, I’m not female am I?”

“Which definition of female are we using? Chromosomal, gender, legal?”

“Any, I’d fail them all.”

Danni arrived with the teas. I took them and shut the door before continuing the discussion. “Have you applied to have your gender recognised legally?”

“I’ve got to wait a few more months.”

“As soon as you can, do it. I legitimises who you are, however, the one advantage of being transsexual is the amount of legislation to prevent discrimination.”

“How d’you know all this?”

“It’s occurred a couple of times at the university just as I’m sure it’s happened at Sussex and most other universities. The Guardian these days is like the transgender times, so it’s very widespread.”

“Of course, it’s just when things happen it feels like I’m the only one in the world with these problems.”

“Isn’t that a perfectly normal reaction to life’s surprises, especially the nasty ones?”

“So you’re not horrified?”

“Why should I be?”

“To have employed a freak.”

“Who’s that then?”

“Me—now you know—you’ll be looking to sack me or not renew my contract.”

“If you can’t do the job for which we employed you, I might think about sacking you, but for being transgender—I can’t, even if I wanted to—and I don’t; the protocols and policies of the university protect you on that count and I helped draft them, so I have some knowledge of what we put together.”

“How is it you don’t have a problem with it yet others do?”

“I’m a feminist so believe that we are all equal and should therefore have equal opportunity to reach our potential regardless of age, sex, gender, sex orientation, race and anything else you care to mention that tends to separate us. We’re all humans—end of discussion. Unfortunately, I can’t speak for others but I can for the university and any form of discrimination shown by anyone, staff or students or anyone else associated with the university contravenes the policies and protocols of the university and would be taken very seriously. That I can promise you.”

“I’m surprised Diane didn’t tell you—I let slip talking to her one lunch time, I was a bit down and—well, I told her.”

“You don’t have to tell me anything you don’t want to.”

“I know, but you’re such a sympathetic lady—it’s like talking to my mum—only better because she isn’t very happy that I took pills and had surgery which stops her having grandchildren. She’s a bit ashamed of me, I think.”

“Providing you comport yourself with the dignity and standards of behaviour congruent with your position as a teacher at this university, I’ll never feel ashamed of you and I’ll support your right to be who you feel you are and to develop yourself as a teacher and I hope researcher.”

“I wish everyone was a nice as you.” Tears rolled down her cheeks.

“I’m not always nice, Debbie, I’m human like everyone else, but I try to see the other person’s point of view and not judge them—leastways not too quickly.”

“I’m really grateful for this chance to talk to you and I’m really pleased to think you’re behind me despite my history.”

“Debbie, your history isn’t important unless it affects the present or future. I’m employing you as a teacher not as a woman, that’s just what happen to be, and a very attractive one as well.” I watched her blush. “All it leaves me to say is, welcome to the world of women, the largest minority group in the world.”

“Thank you,” she said after a pause to digest what I’d said. “May I give you a hug?” After she’d calmed down she phoned Maureen and rearranged the time to collect the keys to her house. She went after a light lunch.

It struck me that all my girls recognised Debbie as transgender but she didn’t seem to spot it in them. Of course, she was meeting about five thousand of them opposed to one of her so she’d have been under multiple scrutiny while possibly being overwhelmed by the numbers.

I felt no need to reveal my own position even when she obviously misconstrued it. Just because she levelled with me, I don’t have to disclose my history nor that of my children because she has no need to know it in order to work with me. That she might feel resentful if she finds out is her problem. I don’t need to justify myself to her or anyone and being that much older, I hope I’ve moved beyond that position. Others may feel differently but that’s my position.

Naturally, I didn’t encourage discussion about her but at dinner it came up until Simon actually said firmly, “Leave the poor woman alone, you’re like a pack of hyenas.” They all made laughing noises after that which prompted him to declare, “You sound more like jackasses than carnivores.” Amazingly, it surprised them almost as much as it surprised me.

Later he asked me what had transpired regarding her humiliation by the Royal Navy or members thereof. “Sammi altered the facebook page to one which embarrassed him.”

“Isn’t that a bit dangerous?”

“It might be if it were the US government or defence department, but as they were displaying virtually obscene and humiliating images which were taken without consent, they’d have been taken down anyway. She just speeded things up, somewhat.”

“I’ll have a word with her, she can’t compromise her position at the bank for this sort of frivolous activity.”

“I don’t think character assassination by a gang of yobs is frivolous.”

“If she hadn’t been messing about in the back of her car it wouldn’t have happened.”

“Don’t be so judgemental,” I snapped at him.

“Just a moment, weren’t you being exactly that when she first arrived and telling her off about her clothing?”

“That’s different.”

“How so?”

“In work she was representing the university, in her own time she can do what she likes to some extent. It was unwise but she is very young, naïve and I suspect either oversexed or trying to prove her femaleness to herself by attracting men to her.”

“So how come you aren’t proving your femaleness?”

“I have a husband who told me to stop worrying about it because he loved me for myself and he said I was the sexiest woman he’d ever seen.”

“Did he now?”

“Yes, I’ve made an appointment at the optician’s for him.”

He groaned and muttered, “Can’t you prove it just once more?”

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2933 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

Back at the office and an hour’s marking done before Diane appeared. “You look very smart,” she said.

“I’m a professor, they’re all smart.” I deliberately misconstrued her remarks which related to the fact that I was wearing a brushed denim trouser suit with a blue striped blouse.

“That’s what they think,” she threw back at me.

“Make the tea, slave,” I called and some sort of riposte was lost as the door closed behind her.

I had two more papers to do when she returned with the tea, “If it tastes a bit sweet, it’s only antifreeze.”

“You can’t poison angels anyway,” I joked.

“Is that a challenge?”

“What happened to staff loyalty?”

“Staff what?” she said laughing.

“Can I finish this marking before you kill me then?”

“Okay,” she said and wandered back to her desk. I tasted the tea, it didn’t taste any different to usual.

Finishing the last paper I was just writing the marks on a score sheet I keep of my marking when Debbie knocked and entered. “Thanks for your support yesterday, it meant a lot to me.”

“You’re welcome.”

“I mean it, I brought you a little thank you present.” She handed me a potted orchid plant. I thanked her and put it on the window sill wondering how long it would survive. I don’t have a brilliant record with houseplants. Usually I forget to water them and then overcompensate and they drown.

“D’you mind if I watch you teach later?”

I glanced at my watch, I had less than an hour. “If you haven’t anything better to do, feel free.”

Forty five minutes later I was talking to John the technician about the slides I’d be using. This was part two of the principles of ecology. They were supposed to have read up about it but I’ll bet no more than a third actually did so.

Some days I think I’d get more response teaching a class of five year olds. Apparently they’d had a dance at the student’s union and it seems my course was well represented. I did remind them they were being treated like adults which meant self-responsibility. I finished the class early and told them to read the chapters for next time or I’d be taking disciplinary action against them. To say I was furious was a slight understatement.

Diane and Debbie came up on stage with me, “I wasn’t expecting that,” declared Debbie.

“Which, my sending them off with fleas in collective ears or closing the class early?”

“A bit of both. Most lecturers I know would have spouted on regardless and it would have been up to the students to work it out later.”

“I do things my way. If they can’t understand the basics, how are we going to move on to the more complex stuff? At least they now have the time to go off and read it.”

“D’you think they will?”

“Some might, most won’t—so the firing squads will be busy.”

She laughed, “You’re one of the most caring teachers in the whole academic system so what will you do if they continue to skive?”

“Make a few examples.”

“What pick on individuals?”

“Yep. I consult with the other teaching staff and if we have any slackers, they get a written warning, they also get an interview with me, the university ogress.”

“Come off it, Cathy, you wouldn’t hurt a fly.”

“They’re not flies and anyone who is perceived to be messing about will be cautioned and advised to mend their ways. If they don’t we drop them.”

“What you kick them off the course—what if they’re having problems?”

“They are advised to inform us as early as possible so we can help them.”

“What if they’re like me and can’t bring themselves to talk to anyone about their problems?”

“We can arrange for them to see Student Health who can refer them for counselling or other therapy. We can also advise them to take a deferment to have time to deal with their problems. We try to help when they tell us they have a problem but we’re an educational establishment not a nursery or therapy group.”

“Yet you helped me?”

“You’re staff.”

“Oh does that matter?”

“Of course it does. I have forty or fifty staff, I know most of them quite well, some have been here years. So any problems they have, I hope they would speak to me or to their senior lecturer or reader if that’s more appropriate. I have nearly a thousand students, most of whom I’ve never met on a one to one basis and the interview to tell them to knuckle down may be the first time we ever meet.”

“Okay, I understand it a bit better.”

“The exam results with the first and second years form the basis of our assessment technique, anyone who is seen to be struggling will be called in to see their tutor—you’ll have some, don’t you worry—to identify problems if we can. If they get to see me, they should appreciate they have real problems because I have better things to do than hold their hands, I have so many other jobs to do.”

“I’ve heard you’ve done all sorts of things to help your students including telling their parents they’ve got some horrible disease.”

“That was years ago when I was a simple lecturer.”

“But you care don’t you?”

“Of course I care but I don’t have the time or the energy to spoon feed them. They’re supposed to be adults, but because their parents have solved all their problems and kept them in cotton wool, for some, this is the first time they’ve actually been allowed out on their own. It’s now April, we’re in the final term for the year, if they haven’t matured enough to realise they have a contract with us, which if they break, they can find themselves sent down. This is a university not a kindergarten.”

“Okay, I’ll try and grow up and help some of the others do the same.” She walked away leaving me standing with Diane.

“C’mon, boss-lady, I think you need a cuppa.”

“Was I too tough with her?”

“She’ll grow up under your supervision. Nobody likes to be told they’ve got to get tough with others, especially when they’re hardly any older than the people they’re guiding or supervising.”

“In my first tutorial group I had someone who was old enough to be my mother and she wasn’t coping very well with the pressure.”

“So what did you do?”

“I gave up my lunch hours to coach her.”

“Did she pass?”

“I think she got a two two. Not exactly brilliant.”

“How did she feel about it?”

“She was delighted and went off to do a PGCE and become a biology teacher.”

“Good for her.”

“I don’t know, not sure if she’d cope with that pressure anymore than she did here.”

“But you did your best.”

“I tried.”

“Boss-lady, you are one hell of gal, d’you know that? You really are an angel, aren’t you?”

“Where’s that tea?” I said trying to hide my blushes.

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2934 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

End of April and blizzards in Scotland, frosts and cold winds in the South means lots of plants and small animals will die and the church expects me to believe in some omniscient being? Yeah, right.

Driving to work I watched various hirundines—swallows, martins and swifts—searching for food. They feed on flying insects. When it’s cold insects don’t fly and the birds don’t eat. It’s ironic, they survive flying across the Sahara desert, then across the Mediterranean, the guns of thousands of trigger happy morons in France, Spain, Italy and Malta only to starve to death in England which is probably the most friendly nation on earth to wild animals, especially birds.

So many of them are declining according to the experts who measure the numbers, but something like forty per cent of wild birds have vanished in the last fifty years. Even things like house sparrows, which used to be so numerous are disappearing from areas where previously they were relatively common and tree sparrows are very scarce in most places these days. When I was a kid in Bristol, we used to have small flocks of starlings land on our lawn and they’d go all over the grass eating invertebrates. There’d often be twenty or thirty of them, now it’s about half a dozen if we see any at all.

I was preparing a lecture on the pressures on wildlife from human activities—agriculture, logging, mineral/oil extraction, industry, housing and hunting. The latter in the UK, is only an issue where they have grouse moors or pheasant shoots and game keepers exterminate anything they think may endanger their birds—which are going to be killed anyway—irony is lost on them.

The bottom line is that there are too many humans, despite the efforts of disease, famine and war to thin us out. We are populating the planet at an alarming rate and have very few predators, save other men and disease, so aren’t hunted to extinction, though disease does kill a fair few, frequently caused by poverty even in wealthy nations. The rich are getting richer and the poor, poorer the gulf widening faster than for decades.

The only real weapon we have is education. If people understand why things are happening they usually try to help, but how can you expect them to give up greed when it seems to be their raison d’être?

War seems to be another despoiler of habitats human and wildlife which follows on from the above. Wars are caused by lust for power or resources, the power includes that of religion as most wars are often nominally fought over it, or it’s used to justify the savagery which is really about power or resources; controlling people by their beliefs or superstitions or the resources in an area. We all despise what’s happening in the Middle East and can see the falsehood of the so called Islamic State, but Christianity did it for sixteen hundred years. What drove the British to form the largest empire ever seen—greed and religion, the only good thing being it was also amongst the leaders in the abolition of slavery—which ironically was driven by religion. Apparently, slavery is still in existence though it takes a different form to the blatant exploitation of whole races of people. These days it seems to be about exploitation by stealth especially of young women who are then forced into becoming sex workers. The only answer is education but some cultures are resistant to it.

The reality is, where women are allowed to control their own bodies birth rates fall but more children survive because their mothers have more time to care for them. Where women are educated, the above also happens but also the women become more productive in terms of growing food and helping to run things which is where we have cultural clashes. In strongly paternalistic cultures, women are controlled and actively suppressed, usually there is a strong religious element involved and feminists would suggest that it all springs from men feeling afraid of women’s sexuality and being unable to control it. As a woman, I don’t know if I entirely accept that argument but I suspect it’s at least partly true.

I think it’s also partly true that many men can’t control their own sexuality and libidos and blame women as ‘wanting it’, or ‘asking for it’ if they happen to be ‘provocatively dressed’. What does that mean? How can anyone justify attacking a woman because her clothes provoked them? But they seem to think they can and the courts, mainly run by male judges, support them, yet the whole concept is so ludicrous how can it happen?

I read in the press over the weekend that one university in Utah awards blame to the victims of rape—duh! I thought universities were places of education, learning and logic—except in Utah or possibly parts of India or Afghanistan.

Okay, I’ve sort of wandered off the point or have I? What has all this got to do with ecology and overpopulation? Lots, if we educate women they begin to assert themselves and have fewer children. They tend to be more caring for the land and its wild inhabitants so everybody benefits unless you live in Utah. Feminism and ecology go hand in hand because they benefit everything and I’m talking about the real feminists not the transphobic, radical man-hating lesbians who are like the female Taliban.

While this train was still rattling along the rails of my mind Diane knocked and entered. “Boss-lady, we have a situation.”

I blinked at her. “What does that mean?”

“Geraldine Greene is outside demanding to see you?”

“Who’s she when she’s at home?”

“Leader of the radical feminist group.”

Was this some form of déjà vu? “I didn’t know we had one.”

“Apparently we have.”

“What does she want with me?”

“She wants you to sack Debbie.”

“On what grounds?”

“She’s masquerading as a woman.”

“Is this Geraldine Greene crazy?”

“Shall I send her in?”

“I think some tea is called for; put Valium in mine and arsenic in hers.”

I wasn’t sure what to expect as Geraldine Greene entered my office and we shook hands, her grip was certainly firmer than mine and I didn’t know whether to squeeze harder of let go. I chose the latter.

“Did you know you have a man masquerading as a woman on your staff?”

“Do I?”

“Yes, Debbie Matthews he calls himself.”

“On what grounds do you make this claim?”

“This,” she shoved a rather discoloured fax into my hands. It had been sent by a sister group of bigots from Sussex University and revealed she was transgendered.

“We have policies in this university about the non-discrimination of students or staff on the grounds of their race, religion, sexuality, gender, disability and so on. As far as I am aware employing Ms Matthews complies with that policy.”

“But she’s a bloke?”

“She identifies as female and has had gender-confirming surgery—that’s good enough for me and for the university.”

Diane arrived with a tray of tea.

“You’ve met Debbie Matthews, how did you find her?” I asked Diane.

“She seemed very nice, keen to learn, supportive of her students, easy to work with...”

“You’re both traitors to your sex,” declaimed Ms Greene and knocked the cup of tea from Diane’s hand before storming out in high dudgeon.

“Are you okay?” I asked Diane who was shaking. I made her sit down and having determined she was unhurt, just shocked, I called security. Then I switched off the webcam which had been recording the whole event. I hadn’t expected a personal attack as happened and was recording it mainly to show Debbie what she was up against. I sat comforting Diane until the head of campus security arrived. Just what I needed.

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2935 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

“Professor Watts, I’m sure this is a storm in a tea cup,” suggested Peter Whimbrel, head of campus security. “This sort of thing tends to die down after a day or two.”

“You’ve seen what constitutes abuse if not an assault on my secretary and accusations against a member of my staff.”

“Is she transgender?” he asked, “Just so I know exactly what we’re dealing with.”

“I’m unable to tell you due to confidentiality of staff records, but it’s irrelevant anyway as we have policies with promote acceptance of all minorities and outlaw discrimination, this is pure irrational hatred from a group of misguided misfits.”

“I see, might I speak with Ms Matthews?”

“I’m sure that could be arranged.” I looked at Diane who nodded. “We’ll ask her to arrange to speak with you.”

“That would be useful.” He left and I called Daddy’s office.

“Are ye invitin’ me tae lunch—aboot time.”

“If you like, Daddy, but we have something more pressing happening,” I explained what had happened and that I had a copy of the whole event on my computer. On his request I sent it by email to him. He called me back some quarter of an hour later.

“The woman they’re complainin’ o’ is she the one wha came tae dinner on Sunday?”

“Yes.”

“Whit’s wrang wi’ these people, she’s a bonnie lassie.”

“They’re extreme feminists, the sort who believe transsexual women are undercover men trying to take over the women’s movement and other ludicrous ideas. They’re paranoid, loud and aggressive. I’ve got Diane trying to find Debbie who hasn’t been seen since finishing a class an hour ago. I’m very worried about her.”

“I’m havin’ these stupid people suspended and removed frae thae campus as they’re acting contrary tae thae antidiscrimination policies. I’ve niver heard such nonsense in ma whole life. Let me know when ye find her.”

“I will, Daddy. What happens if anyone has a long enough memory to remember my status?”

“Ye’re legally female an’ a married woman an’ mother—let them try, I’ll hae them keel hauled an’ sent doon. Och, we’ve got thae press involved noo.”

I put down the phone as Diane poked her head round the door, “The Daily Mail are on the phone, would you like to speak to them,” she grinned.

“Tell them we’ll issue a statement and pass it on to them.”

“That won’t satisfy them.”

“Tell them to fuck off then.”

“Is that a quote, boss-lady?”

“Tell them I’m teaching.”

“Very good, ma’am.” She made a mock salute and left to deal with the tabloids.

My phone rang, it was John the technician. “John I’m rather busy at the moment, can I call you back?”

“Just thought you’d like to know I’ve got Debbie hiding in the technician’s office.”

“Keep her there, I’m on my way.”

“We’ve found a problem in the technician’s room, I’ll be back later.”

Diane looked at me for a moment, then nodded. “I’ll hold the fort, and say the university will release a statement in due course.”

“I’ll buy you lunch when all this is over.”

“For a whole week?”

“My husband is the millionaire, not me.” Her response was to laugh loudly.

I made my way round to the labs as quickly as I could without being followed—as far as I knew. I knocked as I got there and John opened the door. “What’s the problem with this computer?” I said loudly and he replied that he’d show me.

Debbie was hiding behind a filing cabinet and she was red eyed with mascara streaks down her cheeks. I heard John lock the door. “Look ladies, I’ll go and play outside, if you need me, just yell.” Discretion being the better part of valour, he left me alone with Debbie.

I gave her a hug. “What am I going to do?” she said bursting into tears.

When she’d calmed down, I asked her, “Who’ve you pissed off in Sussex?”

“Why?” she asked looking puzzled.

“I was shown an email purporting to come from there notifying the TERFs here about you. While I’m aware that prejudice doesn’t need reasons or excuses, I wondered if there was anything I should be aware of.”

“There was someone there who recognised me from before my transition.”

“At Sussex?”

“Yes.”

“Who was it?”

“Ailsa Gregory.”

“Who’s she?”

“She’s doing a PhD there in botany.”

“A flower arranger,” I said and she snorted, “so what happened exactly?”

“Nothing much, I was doing some maternity leave cover and a guy from microbiol had asked me out. We were going out that evening and Ailsa told him about me, he texted me to say he wasn’t gay and didn’t date boys.” She burst into tears again. “Then about a week later, the TERFs there started to hassle me and Edmond said he thought I’d be safer with you until it blew over.”

That’s why he was so helpful—the rat—he could have told me what was happening there.

“You haven’t done anything to annoy the Taliban here, have you?”

“No, I’m just trying to do my job and this happened.”

“Okay, the university will be making a statement supporting you and quoting our anti discrimination policies, which the TERFs are in breach of. The VC has asked for the complainants to be suspended—from the yard arm, I think. Sadly the tabloids have picked up the story.”

“Which one?”

“The Daily Mail phoned my office just before I left there.”

“Oh, Lucy Meadows all over again, is it?”

“Who?” I asked not familiar with the name.

“A transgendered teacher who was hounded out of her job by some parents egged on by the Mail.”

“I think I saw an article about it in the Guardian ages ago. Did you know her?”

“Not personally.”

“She took her own life—is that the one?”

She nodded and the tears started again, “I’m not going to let them pressure me into doing that, I’ll kill myself first.” She didn’t notice what she’d just said. I ignored it and hugged her again.

“Stay here, I’ll ask John to make you some tea and I’ll send over a sandwich.”

“I’m not hungry, but thanks for the thought.”

“I’ll take you back to my place when I go later on. You’ll be safer there.”

“I do appreciate all you’re doing but I don’t want to bring shame on you and your girls.”

“Shame?” I gasped. “The shame belongs to those who are harassing you for no good reason.”

“Isn’t being transsexual reason enough?”

“Not these days, it’s almost mainstream, besides there are laws and policies about discrimination against transgender students or staff. The university is very hot on both of those.”

“Perhaps I should just disappear?” she looked at the floor refusing eye contact with me. “Sorry to have caused you so much trouble.”

I grabbed her and shook her. “Are you going to let that young teacher die in vain?”

“I can’t help her can I?”

“You can help stamp out the prejudice which they allege caused her death.”

“What can I do against such powerful enemies?”

“Plenty—stand and fight—we’ll all help you. Show these brainless bigots up for what they are—shameful cowards. Stand and fight and we’ll stand with you. It’s time this sort of prejudice was confined to history.”

She sat sniffing for a moment then she sniffed very hard and standing up said, “Okay, tell me what to do.”

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2936 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

I was sitting next to Tom and the dean. The people in front of us were all journos some with camcorders. This was going to be on the news tonight.

“Thank you for coming. I’m not sure what you’ve heard but it appears a group of radical feminists have created a nuisance, especially to their views of gender. They are all required to accept the policies of the university regarding discrimination of minorities regardless of race, gender, sex, sexual orientation and religious belief. They have blatantly disregarded these policies and have been suspended for harassment of a member of staff. There will be an investigation in due course.”

“Jim Tinker, Daily Mail, Is it true the member of staff is a transgender person and they’re concerned about them using the women’s toilets?”

“I’m unable to give any personal details about the member of staff.” Tom replied.

“According to the tweets and so on, we’re led to believe she is transgender, so why not confirm it.”

“I’ve told you why we can’t and besides, we have policies regarding the protection of minorities, including transgender persons and that permits them to use the toilets of their current gender.”

“So you’ve got a bloke in a skirt using the women’s toilets?”

“No we haven’t.”

“What have you got then?”

“We have someone who is using the toilet which they feel is appropriate for their gender of which they have informed the university.”

“What about you Professor, are you happy to share a toilet with a man in a skirt?”

“I’m not sharing it with a man in a skirt. The person concerned has been receiving gender corrective treatment and lives exclusively in the assigned role. I have no difficulty with them sharing the same toilet as me. In fact, being married to a Scot, I share the bathroom with a man in a kilt with no difficulty whatsoever. This isn’t North Carolina or Texas where bigots have caused difficulties to gay and transgender people, this is Great Britain, where we try to enable people to live in peace. That some people with extreme views have taken exception to the rules of this university means they’re in breach of our policies not the member of staff.”

“Why can’t she speak for herself?”

“Why are you here? This isn’t newsworthy.”

“Isn’t that for us to decide?”

“So you’ll stir up a hornet’s nest like you did for Lucy Meadows—is that your aim, to drive a poor woman to suicide to escape your persecution?”

“Certainly not, and I resent that you suggest our newspaper was involved.”

“Alex Parkin, Guardian, can we confirm we have a transgender woman who is being harassed by TERFs?”

“That would be one way of stating it,” I agreed.

“Has anyone asked the general student body about it?”

“As it is implicit that our students understand we have policies on discrimination when they accept a place at the university. We’ve had both transgender students and staff in the past and had no problems with either until now.”

“You’re not the woman in question, are you?” called someone from the back.

“I’m not even going to deign to answer that.”

“Professor Watts isn’t the person in question, I am.” I looked up in astonishment. Debbie Matthews was walking down through the room looking like she’d stepped out of a band box. She was wearing a red pencil skirt suit and high heeled shoes. Her hair and makeup were excellent. Cameras were clicking and flashing at her. “Which toilet do you think I should use?”

I leant across to Tom, “Did ye ken she wis gang tae dae this?”

“No, in fact I advised against it.”

“Weel, she’s no daein’ bad, is she?”

Debbie was taking and answering questions and seemed to have most of them eating out of her hand, even the bloke from the Mail. I heard her say she’d had surgery and was all woman now. When I spoke to her about fighting back this wasn’t quite what I had in mind but it seemed to be working, except we, the university no longer had control over what was said. We could therefore no longer protect her, though she didn’t exactly look in need of protecting at that moment—possibly the guy she was flirting with, might have.

Tom and the dean left me to keep an eye on her. I did for about an hour as she seemed to feed off the energy. I was minded that we sometimes get carried away with talking about our obsession and this seemed to be happening. I’ve heard it all before, several times and I wished I’d had my iPad with me as I could have done some work while I sat there.

I remembered I had my mobile in my pocket and called Diane asking if she knew Debbie was going to turn up at the press conference. She didn’t, she thought Debbie had gone home—she did to change he clothes and persona. She appeared to be enjoying the attention, so the woman hiding in the techies’ room earlier appeared to bear little resemblance to the person in control of a pack of hyenas. Don’t think I could have done it.

After the last photo had been taken and the last sound bite recorded she escorted me back to my office where Diane made us some tea. Debbie was still buzzing but it appeared her energy was dropping. I offered to run her home but she said she’d be okay. She wandered off at three o’clock.

I was home dishing up dinner when Julie arrived, “How did Debbie look?” she asked.

“What d’you mean?”

“She said she was doing a press conference and she needed to look as sexy as she could for daytime and could we do an emergency job for hair and makeup?”

“She certainly looked better than she did during the morning.”

“I half expected to see her here, she’s not here is she?”

“No, she opted to go home.”

“How did she get on?”

“Have a look at the news, she’ll probably be on it.”

“She do all right?”

“She practically seduced everyone in trousers.”

“Same tactic as you then?”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Watch your two films again—I’ve got to change, I’m going out tonight.”

“D’you want some dinner or not?”

“Go on, I’ll have a little,”—about twice as much as I ate but less than Danielle.

They watched the story on the news which was sympathetic on the BBC and okay on ITV as well. The Echo had on their website, ‘Sex Change teacher at university wins right to use Ladies loos.’ accompanied by a photo of her looking very attractive. It went on about her charming a room full of journalists while her boss looked on enviously. It had a further photo of me sitting and looking bored stiff, which would have been accurate, I was while she indulged in her obsession to talk about her compulsion.

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2937 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

The next morning our previously dapper member of staff dragged herself into my office wearing jeans and an open shirt with a tee shirt underneath, she had on minimal makeup and her hair was pulled back into a ponytail. She yawned as she walked into my office.

“Thanks for your support yesterday, I do appreciate it.”

“Come back down to earth now?” I asked.

“Oh yeah, I got home last night and after a glass of wine just zonked. I woke up two hours ago—slept for twelve or thirteen hours.”

“You didn’t see yourself on the telly, then?”

“Oh no, I wasn’t on telly, was I?”

“You were talking to the man with the large camera on his shoulder—what did you think it was—his hearing aid?”

“Sorry, I was on auto pilot trying to get it over as quickly as possible. I know you said the university would handle it but after thinking about what you said about fighting back, I decided to come out with all guns blazing. Did I do all right?”

“You did very well, but you’ve outed yourself now, so until people forget, they will, you’ll have minor celebrity status. So expect people to nudge their friends and also for some of Joe public to come up to you in the street and ask you personal questions about yourself, your sexual preferences and your medical history.”

“Really, isn’t that a bit personal?”

“More than a bit but you’ve been on the telly so they have a right to ask you, or so they think. You might also have people telling you how brave you are.”

“Goodness, how d’you know that?”

“It’s what happened the last time we had someone transition.”

“So you do know a bit about it?”

“I told you I did, I also had a daughter who was transgender.”

“Wow, so how did she get on?”

“She didn’t, she died.”

“Oh, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to...”

“It’s okay, she had a cerebral aneurysm burst while we were cycling—she died instantly.”

“Oh bloody hell—how awful.”

“Yeah it was, but I can talk about it now.”

“Thanks for telling me.”

I nodded. “Are you going to be up to working today?”

“Yeah, I’ll have to face the little darlings some time. Might as well get it over with.”

“Any problems let me know—I suspect you’ll find them quite supportive on the whole. Don’t accept any intrusive questions or behaviour.”

“I won’t.”

“You looked very nice yesterday and did really well with the press.”

“Thanks, I really appreciate that.”

“Right, off you go—back to the salt mines.”

She laughed and left to go and do some tutorials. Another week and it will be mostly forgotten except by those who’d like to emulate her or find her sexually attractive or those who despise her for being different, their motivation usually driven by religious or political fervour—the politics being more likely petty variety such as the TERFs. We also have one or two Muslims and born again Christians who would condemn her but without thinking about it beyond the narrow confines of their self righteous indignation. If the complaints come to me I simply ask how they’d feel if they were attacked because of their religious beliefs. Their response is usually something like, God, Allah or Jesus will help them to cope as they are in the right.

I usually ask them if their god is always right, and they usually say aggressively, of course he is. Which leaves them open to my counter-question of, “If that’s the case, did he make so and so, like they are? In which case, why are you persecuting part of your god’s paradise?” They usually get aggressive at that stage and stamp off like angry six-year-olds.

“What happened to our fashion model?” asked Diane as she brought in my cuppa.

“I think a nasty attack of real life.”

“Was it like that for you?”

“I was about to be outed by some very nasty characters from the Russian mafia so Si and I went to the BBC and gave them an exclusive interview. It stopped most of the others being too bothered afterwards.”

“I’d have thought you were a more newsworthy target than Debbie?”

“I’m old hat now, especially against the younger prettier variety.”

“You’re a real beauty, boss-lady, don’t let anyone tell you different, besides being married to the Camerons of High St Banks plc, is far more exciting than being a young and pretty teacher.”

“If you say so.”

“I do, oh you realise you’re teaching at ten.”

I looked at the clock—poo, I should have found my notes and read through them. It was a quarter to and it looked as if I’d have to perform without them.

After finishing my tea, I clicked my way up the corridor in my stiletto heels feeling very self-conscious in the relative quiet of the corridors. The session went better than I expected with only two questions or remarks made about Debbie. I told them if they were that interested they should ask her to her face. It calmed down after that.

I couldn’t tell you why I was wearing an expensive suit to work. I didn’t really know unless it was to stifle the opposition. Debbie’s suit came from Top Shop or Next mine is an original Calvin Klein. It probably cost as much as the shop Debbie bought hers from—yeah, the whole shebang.

Then again, I’m not here to compete with one of my junior lecturers. I’m here to manage a faculty to develop my staff and students to reach their full potential. I let Diane and Debbie go to lunch together and they brought me back a tuna baguette. In some ways my avoiding Debbie was possibly a way of avoiding the ‘being seen together’ association leading to memories of my transition several years ago. While lots of people who were here then have left, there are still a few about and I didn’t want to jog their memories, but I half expected to hear feedback that the biology department is now the transgender department or something like that, or even that it appears the only department that doesn’t recognise genetic sex is biology.

While it was quiet, I called Dan and said I’d pop out to the reserve tomorrow. I felt in need of getting back to my roots and a walk in the woods would possibly assist that. I made a note to bring my walking boots and gaiters with me—the ticks could be active already and some might carry Lyme disease. Life at present is complicated enough without something like that happening to make it worse.

Yes, tomorrow I’m taking a few hours off to do some unofficial fieldwork.

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2938 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

I felt quite guilty in skiving off to the nature reserve, but not enough to stop me. When I arrived, Dan had the kettle boiling and I added the two cream cakes I’d acquired on the way.

“You had some excitement back at the ranch then?” he asked as we sipped our teas.

“I take it, you saw the local news?”

“Yes, pretty girl, what’s her name?”

“Debbie Matthews.”

“It could appear that gender problems are epidemic amongst biologists?”

“Why? You’re not thinking of...”

He roared with laughter, “No thanks, but at least I’d have a sympathetic boss.”

“Dunno about that, we might have to shoot the next one to try and halt the trend, or we’ll be getting Portsmouth a bad name.”

“I thought it had managed that by itself a long time ago.”

“A naval garrison town, plus the dockyard—all adds pressure on the forces of law and order.”

“Plus all these weirdos at the university...” he teased.

“Right well this weirdo from the university is here to do a quick inspection and have a wander round the woods.” He nodded and asked what I’d like to see.

I asked to see the diary and then made specific enquiries about different groups booked in—mostly schools, but also one or two others like the Brownies and a local scout troop.

The centre had also had three of our post grad students working there doing surveys. I saw their field reports, which looked quite interesting. One was looking at birds—nesting variety; another was doing a survey of mammals and the third was doing insects. On an occasional basis we sent someone to help Dan do a botanical survey—though he’s pretty good himself at identifying plants.

About Christmas time, we arranged to coppice about an acre of the woodland to measure how quickly things returned. Coppicing means cutting trees down above the roots but not to kill them. Obviously, some trees will cope better than others but this was how woodlands used to be managed from Medieval times to about the time of World War I.

According to Oliver Rackham, one of the world’s experts on the history of woodlands, the wood for coppicing or kindling was worth more than standard trees, which is the opposite of what happens now. They would coppice everything, including oak, on something like a twenty year basis and the base of the tree left behind is called a stool. Rackham suggested that some of these stools in longstanding woodlands, were up to twenty feet across, they’d been coppiced so often. The men who worked in the woods knew what they were about too, so effectively, the trees were kept in a juvenile state, regenerating from suckers—these are shoots which grow up alongside the original trunk. Some species use this as a main form of propagation, though it prevents increasing the gene pool because each sucker would have the same DNA as the parent tree. Elm trees used to spread by suckers, which might also have explained why so few seem able to survive Dutch elm disease.

It was time to don walking boots and take a look at the changes. “We’ve got some nightjar nesting, which is a new record for the area and we think we’ve got glow-worms.” Dan was effusive in his pleasure at new species already colonising the coppiced area.

“Looks like it could be suitable for grasshopper warblers too,” I suggested, their name arising from their song, which sounds like a continuous grasshopper song, think someone pinging a long comb—melodious, it ain’t.

With the extra light, there’d be loads more flowers over the next few years until the taller plants began to dominate. We were going to report on this on a monthly basis for as long as anything seemed to be happening, this would include photos, videos and written notes. Dan showed me a clip of a nightjar wing clapping, a noise the males make when flying at dusk. Their song is like stridulation so not of the melodious sort, usually being described as a churring call, which is onomatopoeic. To make life more enjoyable, we also had song thrush and wood warbler singing away as we walked around and swallows scolded us with their tetchy song.

I stopped to pick up and examine some hazel shells—I handed them to Dan. He looked at them closely. “What am I looking for?”

“To identify the animal who ate them.”

“Don’t tell me, dormouse?”

“Yes.”

“We haven’t seen any hereabouts, usually the other side of the reserve.”

“Get them to put some tubes up on those bushes,” I indicated some gorse, “and also on those birch trees. They’ll need to check them weekly.”

“Okay, anything else?”

“Yes, we need some water here, I’ll have to see about diverting the stream enough to form a pond here.”

“That would attract a few more species.”

“If we get more things to visit the area, they’ll bring predators—hang on, we’ve got sparrowhawk about, hear that call.” We stood stock still and a few moments later a female sparrowhawk flashed across the clearing. “See, just the mention of a pond, brings predators along.”

Dan laughed at my joke.

He showed me some toothwort, a virtually colourless plant that parasitizes hazel roots. In one part it was quite prolific and certainly contrasted with the bright yellow of the lesser celandines which lined the edge of the path.

As we arrived back at the visitor centre, I suggested a few more projects and that I would be getting some quotations for the work to divert some of the stream to form a pond.

I asked Dan about the job he was doing and he replied it was the best job he’d ever had because there was something different each day and at times he wondered if he was dreaming because he couldn’t believe his luck. We had another cuppa which he made as I changed my footwear back to my trainers and put my boots into a carrier bag, then added my gaiters on top.

“Are ticks becoming a problem?”

“They’re about probably courtesy of the fox hunters.”

“Eh?”

“Well before they abolished fox hunting, the bloody things used to hide on the reserve and they’d shed their ticks. They’ve been here ever since,” Dan shrugged as he spoke.

The biggest worry with them is Lyme disease which can be spread by ticks as they tend to clear their mouthparts inside the wound, though it’s more associated with deer than other mammal species.

I said my goodbyes and drove back to the university. Diane knew where I was but my phone hadn’t rung so I assumed everything was fairly okay. There’d been one or two magazines wanting interviews but that was all. Possibly, the nine days wonder was in decline—I certainly hoped so.

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2939 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

I arrived back at the university just in time to grab a tuna baguette for my lunch. They hadn’t missed me apparently. I sat with Diane and Debbie who were discussing various household things like curtains. “I thought your house was furnished?” I said knowing full well it was, it was my house or one of them.

“Yeah, it is but I’d like to personalise it a bit and some new curtains in the lounge would do that.”

“It’s your money.”

“I’ve seen some nice ones in Debenhams or John Lewis.”

“Make sure they’ve got the right top to them.”

“What d’you mean?”

“Is it a Swish type or curtain poles?”

“I don’t think it’s poles.”

“So you’ll need some with rufflette tape.”

“What’s that?” she asked looking puzzled.

“It’s the tape they put on the top of curtains to put your hooks in, it also enables you to ruffle the tops of the curtains. How big are the windows?”

“I don’t know.”

I looked across at Diane who rolled eyes, effectively saying, you started it, you finish it.

“Right, you need to measure the windows both width and drop, then depending upon the amount of ruffling you want you need to allow for that in the width of the curtains, usually that’s about three to one. So each curtain will need to be about one and a half times the width of your window or wider. Then for the drop...” Diane smirked, Debbie had no idea. So it looks like she had never tried to hang her own curtains before.

The last thing I needed was to start domesticating another late adolescent woman, it was bad enough having loads of them at home. It seemed that so many young women have no idea about homemaking—so presumably they either get their mothers to do it, live somewhere it’s all been done already, or pay someone to do it for them. They can do all sorts of things on their smart phones, call up airstrikes or find out the weather forecast for Mars but they can barely boil an egg or wash and iron their own clothes. Am I an anachronism?

It’s not just because some of them were brought up as boys, I was—nominally at least, but I was still taught these skills. I suspect my mother either guessed the truth, even if she didn’t want to accept it but she taught me how to be a homemaker or housekeeper all the same, passing on the skills she had, like my dad showed me a small amount of bike maintenance, some DIY and gardening. I never really like gardening but I did enjoy seeing the hidden wildlife in the garden, various insects and other invertebrates, which you only see when you start doing things like moving tubs or pots or digging. I remember finding six different type of spiders in the garden shed, from cribellate web builders that prey on woodlice—the web is like a barbed wire entanglement and the more the prey struggle the more they entrap themselves, to small jumping spiders, like Salticus scenicus, sometimes called the zebra spider. I still enjoy finding them, they have wonderful eyesight which they use to stalk their prey, then jump on it. If you move your finger slowly round them in a circle they’ll turn round to watch it—great fun.

On the floor of the shed when I moved a petrol can out ran another woodlouse hunter, Dysdera crocata which feeds almost exclusively on them. My dad finally came to see what I’d been doing and when I pointed out all the spiders he told me I could clean them all out next weekend and tidy the shed, unless I was too girlish to do so. Okay, I don’t like having things crawl over me or feel webs sticking to my skin, but none of the British spiders worry me, even though all but two are venomous, their fangs aren’t generally thought to be strong enough to bite us. There are always exceptions and the tabloids are full of horror stories of how someone got bitten on the foot and their leg dropped off—most are total nonsense.

Apart from Debbie not being much of a practical housekeeper, she wasn’t much of a practical biologist either, neither being a lab rat type or a fieldworker like me. She knew the theories and seemed to get by with those in the various exams she did, without being good at dissection or microscopy. I was good at both, though I hated the former I was pretty damn good at making microscope slides, which I think I might have mentioned before when Dr Butterworth at Sussex noticed my writing on other people’s slides—he always called me Miss Watts, I suppose my appearance and writing were a bit girlish.

The downside of Debbie’s practical shortcomings is that someone else will have to teach those things she can’t, or we’ll have to teach her how to do it. I don’t know which is going to take more time. She seems bright enough, so I don’t quite understand how she missed out on it, let alone how she passed her exams. Oh well, we’re stuck with her now. John the technician has been supervising one or two students, he’s studying himself for a master’s degree, but not with us, which removes one element of potential criticism. I might get him to show Debbie how to do certain things in the lab.

Could it be inflation, but the nine-day wonder seems to have reduced by two thirds. People still point her out on campus but the media interest seems to have died down thank goodness. So all we need to do is teach her loads of practical skills and she’ll make someone a good wife and biology teacher—not necessarily in that order.

As we walked back towards the department, she asked me if I’d been taught all that when I was a girl. I nodded and Diane smirked, which fortunately wasn’t noticed by Debbie. “You’re so lucky, I was brought up as a boy despite my telling my mother I wanted to be a girl, she tried to ignore me and it. As our house was always quite tidy I assume she could do most of it but never taught me anything like that.”

“Boys should be taught basic life skills as well as girls, so cooking, cleaning, doing repairs should be across the board and I feel if boys want to learn how to sew, they should be allowed to learn.”

“Good idea, perhaps they do it nowadays.”

“In some schools, but too many don’t bother, mind you lots of girls can’t do the basics either, so you’re not alone,” I offered as mitigation and she grabbed it with both hands.

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2940 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

“So will you teach me to sew?” asked Debbie.

“They do run evening classes on sewing and dressmaking.”

“I’d rather learn from an expert.”

“I’m not an expert, Debbie, I only know what my mum showed me and what I’ve since gleaned as I’ve gone along. I don’t do fancy sewing, making fiddly cushion covers or patchwork quilts because I don’t have time, I have a busy life with a demanding job and even more demanding family.”

“Is that a no?” she looked crestfallen and I felt such a meanie.

“I’ll teach you some of the basics, beyond that, you’ll have to either read the book or find a class. That’s my best offer.”

“Done,” she said offering her hand which I foolishly shook. Now I was committed to even less free time, though I suppose I could encourage some of my girls to tag along. Peculiarly, Danni and Trish seem better at sewing than Mima or Livvie. I don’t know why unless like Debbie and possibly even I, are trying to legitimise our female status by doing girly things—except some of the best needleworkers in the world are men.

“Friday evening, come for dinner and we’ll hold our sewing bee afterwards. I’ll ask David to do something fairly light so we all stay awake and fewer fingers will get pricked or mistakes made with cutting out or measuring.”

“Sounds good to me. Now, if I was to invest in a sewing machine, which is the best?”

I hate that sort of question, it’s at best offering opinion, like which is the best car? How do I know, I’ve only driven about a dozen types out of hundreds. Still it had been asked and I had to answer it. “I don’t know, there are so many to buy these days which do all sorts of things, most of which you’ll probably never need. If I embroider I do it by hand, which isn’t often. I certainly don’t want a machine to do it for me.”

“Cor, can you really get machines which do that?”

“Yes, but what they cost and how good they are, is anyone’s guess.”

“What have you got, then?”

“My mother had an old Singer and I got a Brother a few years ago.”

“Which is best?”

“The better,” I said correcting her grammar, “is dependent upon what you want to do with it. The Singer is simpler and thus has less to go wrong and it was serviced a year or two ago, the Brother has a larger variety of stitches but is more of a fiddle to set up.”

“Would you help me choose one?”

“What for—I mean, what are you going to be using it for?”

“Curtains.”

I had a horrible feeling she was going to say that and while they’re not the most difficult of projects, they can be awkward simply on account of size and type of material and rufflette tape can be a bitch to add.

“Why don’t you see what’s available commercially and I’ll help you shorten them if necessary, that way you get to see some results more quickly?”

“Really? I was hoping to do it from scratch but I suppose you’re right and I’ll be able to say I altered them, won’t I?”

“Exactly, and hung them as well.”

“So if my mum comes to visit...”

“She can see how you’re developing as a nest builder.”

“Mmmm, I like that idea, prove to her that I can do it as well as she can.”

“That might be a fruitless contest. Instead of trying to out-woman her, why not just try to be the best you, you can be?”

“You sound like my therapist.”

“Sorry.”

“No, you’re probably right; it’s just that everything I’ve done since beginning my transition has failed to meet her approval. It would be nice to receive it once in my life.”

“How did you fare when you were still living as her son?”

“Not as well as my older brother. He was always perfect to both my parents whereas I was a girly boy who was rubbish at everything, especially sports or chasing girls. My dad thought I was gay. I’m not, I was a female—in my head anyway—so having sex with a girl was like—I dunno—homosexual; yet if I’d told them I had a crush on a boy, they’d have been very upset. So I just tried not to think about it. Now I’ve got the equipment, I’m not sure I can be bothered especially as I never really learnt how to deal with boys as a woman and sometimes I’m frightened both by my inadequacies and them finding out about my past and either being horrible or being aggressive and horrible.”

“I can understand all that.”

“How can you? You’ve had your whole life to train for who you are now. I’ve had to learn very quickly and missed out on much of it.”

Oh boy, this getting very awkward very quickly. What if she discovers my history or one of the girls blabs when she’s there for sewing? How is she going to feel? Should I tell her before then or am I entitled to keep my status as I do now, it’s not as if we’re having a relationship and I don’t have to justify anything to anyone. I shall murder Esmond bloody Herbert when I next see him, why couldn’t he have sent her to London or one of the larger universities? Why me? Because I’ve been there, done that and got the bloody tee shirt.

Why do I seem to attract these people and why the hell do I then allow them to manipulate me into helping them? Am I just weak? Do I need to get approval or just have a compulsion to rescue them?

She went off to do tutorials and I called Diane into my office but to bring tea with her. “That serious, is it?”

“Could be—I’m thinking of running away to a monastery.”

“Don’t you mean nunnery?”

“If I were lesbian possibly but I think a monastery might be more fun.”

“Wouldn’t it be incest if you were doing it with your brothers?” she threw in as she went off to make the teas.

She’ll have to go.

“So what’s the problem, oh wise professor?”

“You mean apart from an insubordinate subordinate?”

“You mean me?” she asked disingenuously.

“I do.”

“Huh, just because I’ve been a secretary to a professor longer than you’ve been a professor, you’re paranoid.”

“No, I was paranoid long before I had a lab stool let alone an academic chair.”

She choked on her tea—served her right.

Once the banter subsided I got down to the meat of the problem, me. “I feel awful with Debbie thinking I’m a natural female when I’ve been through so many of the problems she’s encountered. At the same time, I’ve moved on from all that; I’m a married woman with loads of children and I don’t want to be a role model for any transgender women who want to work in a university. What d’you think?”

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2941 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

“How can you not be a role model? Not just to new women but to those young women who want to be scientists or film makers—you’re a huge success in every sense, attractive, clever, teacher extraordinaire, outstanding film maker and presenter, mother to millions and my boss—probably the best one I’ve ever had.”

I don’t know about the rest, but blushing is something I really am good at and was colouring up like a giant tomato.

“So do I tell her or not?”

“Are you ashamed of your past?”

“No, nor especially proud of it either. It happened, good and bad and I feel it no longer has much relevance to who I am now.”

“From the bits you’ve told me which I won’t share with anyone, I think you should be proud—you survived abuse at home and school. Your passive resistance, growing your hair long, being successful as an actress who was convincing enough to make the critic in the local paper think you were a girl acting with boys. I saw your Lady Macbeth and it was good, better than I could have done and I was older and theoretically more experienced than you. No one who saw that play could see anyone but a quite pretty young woman acting most of the others off the stage.”

“You saw me?”

“I’ve told you, we used to watch you walking about with your lezzy girlfriend and at one time we began to wonder if you were actually her butch girlfriend who was pretending somewhat unsuccessfully to be a boy. We saw you wearing the girls’ uniform but going into the boys’ school which none of us could understand. You confused a whole school, did you know that?”

“I think my own confusion was probably greater than all of yours put together. No, I wasn’t confused, I knew I was female, it was proving it and getting something done about it that confused me. I didn’t know where to start.”

“Being a woman is tough enough, being a transgender woman is ten times harder, yet you have made it very successfully and I hope Debbie will too.”

“So should I tell her?”

“I think as you’re the one to cope with the consequences, you have to be the one to make the decision. I’m not copping out, I’m trying to be completely honest about it. If you think she needs to know, I’ll tell her if you want or point her in the direction of the bits on the internet when it was newsworthy. Personally, I don’t think it ever should have been considered as such unless the individual wanted publicity, which I presume most don’t.”

“No, we just want to fade into the background and be left in peace.”

“So to do that meant saving children, fighting crime, raising the dead, becoming a professor and making nature documentaries all while adopting a zillion kids and marrying a banking heir?”

“Yeah—duh.” We’re all our own worst enemy because we know our weaknesses and go for them like a terrier with a rat.

“I’m astonished you have time to come to work, with all those children and being a bank director but you do and you cover other people’s workload while continuing to do your own with rarely a complaint. You really are a bloody angel, aren’t you?”

I was back to my speciality—blushing.

“What about Debbie? Do I tell her?”

“If you want, assuming she doesn’t already know?”

“What d’you mean? You told her?”

“Certainly not—why d’you think she got sent here?”

“Because things were getting hot at Sussex and we were short staffed.”

“But why here?”

“Because of me,” my eyes began to fill with tears and I felt incredibly stupid.

“Because one of the most renowned ecologists in the country had survived the same problems, if anyone could help her, it was going to be you and her old professor knew that.”

“So why did she act as if she didn’t know?”

“Because she didn’t want to intrude. If you were a married woman with loads of kids, why should she disturb your relative peace and quiet, she could learn from you as both a great teacher and a woman. When you start to teach her about homemaking skills, she knows you’re a woman because men rarely do it and if they do, they make their nests more utilitarian as a rule. You see the odd one where a man has decorated and done the soft furnishings like a woman would, but mostly they don’t bother.”

“Where is she?”

Looking at the clock, Diane, said, “Just finishing her tutorials.”

“Better call her in.”

“Okay, want me to stick around?”

“If you could, I’d appreciate it.”

“Tuna baguettes all round then?”

“Here, let me pay, “ I handed her a ten pound note.

She smiled and left to call Debbie in and go and get the lunches. I ran into the toilet and had the squits. Why was I so nervous?

Debbie arrived with Diane. “We eat first and then you can have your confab?” So saying, Diane went off to make some teas and I went to the loo again. We ate and while the conversation was light, the atmosphere was tense. It got worse as we finished eating and I had to run to the loo and be sick—waste of a good tuna roll.

I withdrew to my office and then asked Debbie to enter. She sat down and I noticed tears forming. “You’re going to sack me, aren’t you?”

“Is that what you think?”

She nodded tears running down her face.

“Why would I do that?”

“Because of what I am.”

“Debbie, I’ve already told you, you can’t be sacked for being transsexual—that would be discrimination and it’s illegal.”

“But you’re going to, aren’t you...?”

“If that were the case I’d have to sack myself.”

“What?”

“For once being transsexual.” I’ve said it and I’ve got pretty warm but not caught fire—yet at least.

“You’re female.”

“I am now, but not always so. I came here as a rather mixed up person who was working up to transitioning and was on hormones but it took my sister in law to propel me into womanhood—for which I’ll always be grateful.”

“I know about your transition—I saw it on telly, with your boyfriend. You were so beautiful and I was doing biology A-level and it said you were a biologist and I thought if you could do it, then so could I. I’ll never be as beautiful as you or as clever, nor have my own children, but I try my hardest.”

“I know, girl, you’ll make it all right and I can’t believe you won’t attract some fellah who will want to spend the rest of his life with you and perhaps you could adopt children after that.” I paused adding, “I can’t believe you knew all along yet treated me like a natural woman.”

“I see you as one, and Julie told me you breastfed two of your children as babies plus helped with one of your nieces; that just confirmed it.”

“I’m AIS.”

“Hence the very female shape—that explains it. See you are as close to being a cis-gendered female as is possible. I knew you were something special when I saw you on telly that day—I walked about in a trance for days afterwards, but I knew what to do after that. You also own my house, don’t you?”

I looked at the floor and nodded.

“That’s why the rent is so reasonable, isn’t it?”

“That’s what I charge for that house, Maureen does the letting for me. The house actually belongs to Cate, or will do one day, it was her parent’s house.”

“I promise to look after it.”

“Thank you.”

We chatted for a while longer and Diane interrupted with fresh teas, then it was time to go home—I felt shattered, so how she felt I hate to think.

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2942 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

I drove home feeling like a large weight had been lifted off me though carrying it for so long had left me feeling very tired. Once home after speaking with all of the younger girls, I made some tea and after changing into some jeans and a sweat shirt I went and sat in my study. I needed a few moments to process what had happened today.

I was knee deep in reverie when Danni tapped the door and came in, “You okay, Mummy?”

“Yeah, just a bit tired.”

She came and sitting next to me gave me a huge hug.

“Thank you, sweetheart.”

“That’s okay.” She paused, she obviously wanted to talk about something. “Mum...”

“Yes, darling?”

“I think I want to give up football.”

“Playing it or what?”

“Completely.”

“What about England?”

“I think I’m a bit too far for them—they haven’t even hinted they’re interested in me anymore and I’m fed up with training or getting all bruised and scratched every time I play.”

“Why don’t you think it over for a couple of weeks and if you still want to give up, then I’ll help you write to each of the clubs.”

“Thanks, Mum.” She pecked me on the cheek, “So did you tell Debbie?”

“Tell her about yourself and all the rest of us?”

“Why should I tell her about myself?”

“Because it’s been eating you up for weeks.”

“How d’you know about that?”

“The odd sign here or there, it all led to one thing.” She was getting so intuitive and also very pretty.

“Yes, I told her.”

“An’ she knew already.”

“Yes—how d’you know that?”

“She’s ten years younger than you, Mummy, she uses a computer for everything. She’d probably looked you up before she came to Portsmouth.”

“Long before, she saw me on the telly with your dad doing the first interview when one of the tabloids threatened to expose me. She was doing her A-levels and said it inspired her to change over herself as soon as she could, especially when she saw I was a biologist.”

“That’s what I want to do instead of football.”

“What is?”

“Science, probably biology.”

“Why can’t you do both?”

“Both what?”

“Soccer and science?”

“I don’t want to, trainin’ and stuff takes up too much time.”

“And you really don’t want to play for England again?”

“They don’t want transwomen playing for them, too many questions to answer.”

“Well more fool them, you happen to be one of their best players.”

“Not anymore, they have a game in two weeks, the squad will have been put together weeks ago. If they’d wanted me, they’d have said so.”

“Would you like me to call them tomorrow and tell them to remove your name from their list?”

“I dunno—yeah, please.”

“Which?”

“Phone ’em, please.”

“Leave me the number and I’ll do it tomorrow, but only if you’re sure.”

“They’d have been in contact by now if they wanted me.”

“Okay, I’ll do it but if you change your mind...”

“I won’t,” she sniffed back the tears that had been forming in her eyes.

“You love your soccer, why not just play for the school?”

“That’s like playing with kids. Unless the opposition can stop me, my side will win. If they do stop me—legitimately, we’ll have overlaps and will win. At school level, any team I play in will win.” Having seen her play, I knew she wasn’t exaggerating nor being conceited. She really was in a league above everyone else until you get to international level, which is where she belongs. However, it seems as if they’ve dropped her and it isn’t because her skills are less so it has to be something else—her gender change, is the most obvious despite the FA being signed up to a code of anti-discrimination for gays and transgender players.

Later on I spoke to Julie and told her about my chat with Debbie. “She knew all along.”

“Yeah, I know.”

“How d’you know?”

“She asked me when we did her makeover. She was anxious that they’d think it was you and stir everything up again, so she decided she wanted to draw their fire away from you and thought the easiest way was to just appear and say it was her.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

“She asked me not to say anything, she also asked about how she could tell you she knew an’ I just said you’d tell her when you were ready. She saw you on telly years ago with Dad.”

“I can’t believe all this.”

“Why not?” she asked.

“Well to start with, you keeping a secret—that is weird.”

“Ha, hark who’s talking...” we bantered for ten or so minutes. I told her that Danni had decided to give up football.

“Why? It’s the one thing she’s good at.”

“I’ve asked her to reconsider but she seems adamant.”

“I think she’d be making a mistake.”

“Perhaps you need to do the big sister thing—she listens to you.”

“Since when?”

“Will you try?”

“Okay, but I doubt it will work.”

It didn’t and the next morning I was calling the man in charge of the England women’s team—yeah I know—man in charge. I introduced myself and told him I was calling on behalf of my daughter, Danielle Cameron.

“That name is familiar—hold one second please.” I heard papers rustling and a computer peeping. “I thought so, sorry I don’t pick the teams I look after the administration element, As I thought, she’s been invited for squad training on the weekend, haven’t you had the letter yet?”

“No.”

“Is there a problem with her availability?”

“Where is it?”

“Usual place, Reading.”

“She’ll be there.”

“Oh good—so why were you phoning?”

“I wondered if she was going to be included again.”

“Yes she is. We’ve been playing around with different squads and she’s seen as one of the stars of the future, we hadn’t picked her because she is quite young and the last thing we need is to get her crocked before she gets to her full size and strength. So we’ve been saving her but she has huge potential and I’d like to see her achieve that in an England shirt.”

“She’ll be there on Friday evening.”

I sent her a text, ‘Make sure ur kit is clean, ur part of the England squad on fri. Mum xxx’

She’s have been in lessons but I got one back a little later. ‘Eh? D xxx’

I set her another asking her to call me when she could.

“Hi Mummy, what’s this all about?”

“You’ve been summoned for training in Reading for the England squad.”

“I thought you were telling them to stick their team?”

“What we agreed was that if they were putting you out to grass, I’d tell them you weren’t available.”

“Yeah, so?”

“Apparently there’s a letter in the post to you asking you to appear for squad training.”

“Oh—that’s different.”

“I told them you’d be there.”

“Oh.”

“What’s the problem?”

“It’s the school’s final on Saturday.”

“I’d have thought the national side took precedence.”

“Okay, I’ll go and tell them.”

Some days I do wonder if I should stay in bed.

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2943 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

“Lady Cameron, I fully appreciate that Danielle has to put her career with the national side before our game with Leigh park, but we have never got to the final before let alone won it and it would mean so much to the whole school including the girls who play in the team. They already think of Danielle as a minor deity when she’s on the field with them and she’s even taught Ms Dunford lots about tactics and training. She is such a complete footballer...” she sighed, “and now we’ve lost her.”

“You’ve still got Trish.”

“Goodness, she’s far too young.”

“She’s probably as good as most of your older girls and the rules say, ‘You can’t play an older player with a young team not a young one with an older team.’ I mean, usually they term it under fifteens or what have you.”

“D’you think Trish would be prepared to try and play for us?”

“If you ask her nicely I’m sure she would. She’s no substitute for Danni but she is as good as most of the players you have.”

“I’ll ask her tomorrow, I hope she’ll agree.”

I went and found Danielle who was polishing her boots. “Tomorrow I want you to fill Trish in on your tactics for the schools’ final.”

“Why?”

“Because she’s going to take your place on the school team.”

The look on her face was initially one of shock then she started to laugh very loudly. I could have hit her.

“What’s so funny?” asked Trish appearing as she’d just materialised by the side of us.

Danielle looked at her and roared with laughter again. “What’s up with her, she forget her medication again?” asked the brain. Danielle laughed even louder and her mascara was running down her face with the tears.

“I’d get your money back,” Trish said to her elder sister.

“What?”

“Your waterproof mascara.”

“What about it?”

“It isn’t.”

“Isn’t what?” asked Danielle.

“Waterproof.”

“Aw hell,” said the older sibling rushing off up the stairs to clean it off and probably reapply it, though she’ll be going to bed in an hour or so’s time.

“I told Danielle that you’d be replacing her in the school cup final on Saturday.”

Trish started to laugh and I began to wonder if this was some form of unconscious code I was giving them.

“That’s really funny, I’ll be there cheering on St Claire’s and watching my sister score a dozen goals.”

“Danni has to go do an England training camp.”

“No, we’ve never won the soccer and with Danielle we should do it.”

“I’m sure you could do it too. Think how that would look on your CV.”

“Hmmm,” she said, “she’d have to tell about the tactics.” With Trish it’s all about motivation and ego comes high in the list of topics in that area.

When Danielle came back with fresh mascara, I left them to it and when Trish went off to bed some hour later they seemed quite amicable. I buttonholed Danni. “How’d it go with Trish?”

“Okay, she understood the principles, whether she can provide the same degree of accuracy remains to be seen.”

“Can you repeat that in English?”

“She knows what I was going to do, whether she can do it, is another matter.”

“Could you give her some lessons?”

“I thought she knew everything?”

“Yes very droll—now can you or not?”

“I s’pose I can try.”

“When?”

“We’ve only got tomorrow night, haven’t we?”

“I suppose we have, where?”

“Wosswrong with the school field?”

“What about the football club practice ground?”

“What? They’ll never let us practice there.”

“They might if I ask them.”

“Just remember I play there, they already call me a bighead ‘cos of my cap.”

“Leave it with me.”

The next day dragged as I waited to be able to take my two to the Portsmouth training ground. Finally, we went with Trish not looking as confident as she had been this morning. However, I parked the Jaguar and we wandered over to the soccer pitch where Danni tried to teach her younger sister to bend it like Beckham. It didn’t seem to be going too well and I wondered if my idea was going to prove useless.

A couple of men were running circuits of the pitch and they stopped to watch my two girls, then one of them wandered over and I felt my hackles rise. If he said anything negative to either of them I’d be all over him like a rash.

Instead I stood and watched as he corrected Trish’s posture showed the area of her foot to hit the ball. She tried again and the ball definitely curved. Half an hour later, with the man’s coaching she was actually quite good and Danielle was even better. I drove them home with both of them chattering in high spirits. “Who was the chap who helped you both?” I asked wondering if he was a player or a teacher.

“The Pompey captain, why?”

“I wondered, he was very patient with both of you.”

“Yeah, I told him I played for the ladies side but was off to an England training weekend, that’s when he asked to see me kick the ball.”

“He showed you a trick or two with bending it, didn’t he?”

“I knew what to do, he just helped me improve it.”

“What about you, Trish, feel any better?”

“Bring it on,” she said nonchalantly.

I wondered if I should warn her of overconfidence.

Danni was really pleased with her free coaching lesson and Trish walked around with this peculiar smile on her face the rest of the evening. I had a feeling she was going to be wearing a certain shirt for the game. While she was busy with Livvie doing some homework, I found the particular item of clothing and surreptitiously washed it. I’d asked Amanda to press it tomorrow while they were in school, I asked her do Danielle’s as well—the England shirt with number seven on the back and a certain name above it.

I finished early on Friday to have the time to run Danni up to Reading FC for her weekend. I made sure the shirt was packed as well as the rest of her kit plus some money, her mobile and a few chocolate bars and other snacks.

The drive up with the rush hour traffic was about as much fun as sticking wet fingers in a live socket, but we got there and Danielle gave me a tremendous hug. “I feel so nervous,” she said.

“Look here, girl,” I said, “you have so much natural talent in this sport, all you have to do is let it shine.”

“Yeah, but I’ve seen girls crocked by friends of others.”

“If anyone injures you deliberately to stop you qualifying, get me their name and I’ll sue the knickers off them and everyone they’ve ever met.”

“Wow, my mother the guard dog,” she said smirking.

“The dormouse that roared, eh?”

She laughed and relaxed, “Yeah, why not?”

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2944 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

My evening was mostly filled by driving back home. The tediousness of the journey wasn’t helped by the sky darkening, despite it only being about seven o’clock. This was shortly followed by a sense of heaviness in everything, as if the very sky itself were leaning on us. Then a single flash lit up the universe, like a huge flash bulb going off, huge blobs of water started smacking the roof and windows of the car. The rain was torrential and the road soon disappeared to become a shallow river of boiling water.

It reminded me of the beginning of my story, the day that Stella hit me off my bike. Hail stones bounced off the bonnet of my car and I slowed down a little in the far from clear visibility of the road ahead.

My car is new enough to have the daylight lights, LED lights on both back and front, which should be enough for other road users to see me in either direction, except it’s a well know fact that ninety per cent of drivers are poorly sighted and the other ten per cent are registered blind. So I was quite glad that when the sky darkened the car’s head and tail lights came on automatically.

About halfway home, a motorcyclist—you know, the sort, organ donor on wheels—came flashing past me as I was about to overtake a lorry. Despite his lights, the motorbiker’s, I didn’t notice him until he drew level with me because I was trying to see through the wall of spray thrown up by the multiple rear wheels of the truck—one of those pulling a trailer as long as the truck.

I was temporarily startled by the motorbike and took my foot off the accelerator and dropped back a fraction, the truck simultaneously indicating and pulling out into the space I’d have occupying had I not slowed down. I held my breath as the motorbike scarcely made it through the gap. It upset me enough to turn off at the next services area and stop for a drink and a wee. The storm had abated enough for me to trot to the buildings without getting too wet and I had a telescopic umbrella in my bag should I need it for the return journey.

Sitting at a table on my own I consumed my cup of tea—well that’s what the label said—and I cogitated on the rest of my journey. Theoretically, the worst was now behind me but I sent Trish a text to say I’d stopped for a cuppa while the thunderstorm raged. It had finished but they didn’t know that and I asked her to tell her dad. Her response was that it was dry with them and to drive safely as she didn’t look that good in black. Despite her cheek, I got them all some sweeties at a rip off price and strolled back to my car.

I decided I was going to watch Trish playing tomorrow in the hope that she would part fill Danni’s shoes enough to get a win for the school. As I drove I reran my memory of Danni and then the two footballers showing her how to do the bendy kicks that made David Beckham famous. But the skill I suppose wasn’t so much in being able to just bend the kick but being able to deliver it to the exact place you wanted it to go; usually to the feet or head of a team mate. I’d seen Danielle do it but wasn’t sure Trish could do the same and being smaller, over the same sort of distance.

Once again the skies darkened and down came the monsoon and once again every lunatic with a motor vehicle tried to play Russian roulette with the traffic. Why is it that people don’t seem to understand that if the road is temporarily under two or three inches of water, there is a risk of aquaplaning if you apply your brakes suddenly. Even with modern cars and all the safety devices they contain, if the driver is a complete moron, the safety stuff is not terribly helpful. A motorbike once more came flashing past me in the outside lane followed by a large Vauxhall Omega. Both were going too fast for the conditions and as they came past me another large lorry indicated and pulled into the outside lane.

This time I was far enough behind not to feel directly threatened by any of them, however, that changed rather rapidly when the back of the truck clipped the motorbike and flipped it over the crash barrier into the oncoming traffic and the Vauxhall driver who’d been going too fast braked hard and I watched helplessly as his car continued on its way but spinning round as it went before it slammed into the back of the truck which was slowing to a stop after its collision with the motorbike. I had to stop as the accident blocked the whole road and I suspected the same was happening the other side of the carriageway with the hapless motorcyclist.

Remembering my previous experience with motorway accidents. I stopped on the side of the road, hazard lights flashing and grabbing my waterproof jacket, departed the car and stood up the bank. Several other people were dealing with the accident so I stayed out of the way. The traffic was stationary now in both directions and sirens were sounding in the distance. I stood and waited trying to stay calm and dry while the emergency services sorted things out.

Normally, I’d have been rushing about in all the mayhem, helping where I could but today I decided I was best staying put and letting others deal with it. My family wouldn’t be too happy if I got myself run over and thinking about it, I decided I probably wouldn’t be that pleased about it myself either. There were lots of things I wanted to do with my life yet, including watch my daughter play for England and the other win the schools’ cup final tomorrow.

My phone showed that I had a signal and I called home to let them know I was delayed. Simon was delighted to hear that I wasn’t involved in the rescue and that I was staying well away from the carriageway. I told him I’d let him know when we were allowed back to our cars.

Two hours later after watching the fire service cut the roof and side off the Vauxhall I was making my way back to the car when a police officer stopped me and asked if I’d seen anything. I was tempted to say I hadn’t, but I actually had seen it all. I described what had happened, the two incidents both involving the truck and he took my name.

“Cameron, Cathy Cameron.” I showed him my licence.

“Lady Cameron—not the Lady Cameron, the one married to the banker bloke?”

“Yes,” I sighed.

He took my address, though I suspect most of the local plod know it by heart, and told me they’d probably need a statement. Finally he let me go and I arrived home at after eleven. Despite the best efforts of the heater in the car my feet were freezing and Simon sat me down at the kitchen table and made me some tea. The children were all in bed except Julie and Phoebe who’d been talking computer systems with Sammi.

I wished them all a goodnight and with Simon following behind I retired to bed feeling absolutely bushed.

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2945 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

We waited in the sunshine, shivering occasionally in the cool breeze which I believed was a north easterly wind. The girls were in the changing room and I could almost predict that they were standing round Trish who would be reminding them of their tactics including, let me take the free kicks. Some of them would be several inches taller than her, but Danni said she’d spoken to the coach and the vice captain, who would be the captain for the day in Danni’s absence.

The Leigh Parkers emerged first and they all looked to be about two years older than our girls, some of them looked as if they could double as bearded ladies in a side show and they looked suspiciously broad shouldered and knobbly kneed for girls. They all looked about a foot taller than Trish and I began to worry for her if this got physical.

St Claire’s came out to lots of shouting and clapping and the ‘Parkers’ saw the size of Trish and began to laugh. That was okay, it would make her try harder but it still looked like a massacre was in the making.

We had the kick off and the ball was passed back to Trish in midfield while two of their forwards raced up field. She whacked it towards them, the one passed to the other who hit it on the volley and St Claire’s were one up. I was yelling so much that my throat was hurting and Livvie and Mima were jumping up and down nearly pulling Simon over.

The Parkers restarted and it became rather physical with our girls being bounced off the ball by their larger players. Twice the game was stopped to deal with injuries and Trish narrowly avoided being flattened by diving out the way after kicking the ball into touch.

What happened next was nothing short of comedic, though our little starlet acquired a couple more bruises as it happened. The Parkers’ main forward lost the ball to a St Claire’s defender who saw Trish free on the wing, somehow she managed to pass it towards her and to my amazement, Trish trapped the ball and simply rolled it out of the path of a Parker defender then ran round them. However, as she dashed up field another defender knocker her off the ball and as she fell over she grabbed at the other player’s chest and her bust fell out down through her shirt—two pieces of shaped foam—she was not a girl.

The lineswoman—all the officials were female flagged the referee and the game was stopped. After an argument between the referee and the Parker’s coach, where the referee threatened to suspend the game if it was found that they were playing boys in an all girl game. They compromised and the offending ‘girl’ was withdrawn and a much smaller, female looking player came on as substitute.

St Claire’s were awarded a free kick for the challenge on Trish who elected to take it. Did I mention she had the shirt on—number seven, with Beckham written on the back. With all but the St Claire’s goal keeper in the opposing half and seven of our team in the penalty area, it got a bit congested and when Trish took the kick, much to everyone’s astonishment, she lobbed it up in the air so it dropped into the penalty area. Then, I’m not quite sure what happened because it was a bit like pin ball with the ball rebounding off feet and legs as it traversed the Parker’s goal mouth but didn’t enter it.

Trish was racing to the middle of their half and screaming for the ball. I don’t know who eventually passed it to her or if it just happened but she hit it on the volley and caught it absolutely right because the ball curved out to the right and looked to have missed the goal before it swooped back in and into the top corner of the goal. There was total silence for a couple of seconds before the St Claire’s fans went wild. I spotted Sister Maria hugging two of her colleagues and jumping up and down. I felt so proud of my little girl.

The rest of the first half saw Leigh Park unleash wave after wave of attacks but all to no avail. The way things were looking, St Claire’s would probably not be able to hold out for a whole half an hour against more of the same and although they had a lead, it looked unlikely to be enough if their opponents started shooting on goal.

We watched Trish call her team around her and she and the captain urged them to keep playing as they were. She also shouted, ‘Plan B,’ and they all nodded as they took their positions for the second half, playing with the wind behind them. Of course, that was how she lobbed the ball earlier on, she kicked it into the wind and it dropped just right to cause mayhem.

Leigh Park kicked off the second half and they literally battered their way to the goal, several of the St Claire’s team were flattened in the movement and received attention from their coach. One was still limping after the treatment.

St Claire’s kicked off and their two forwards once again raced forwards as Trish received the ball, but this time they were heavily marked and our little minx, kept the ball and started racing up the centre, dribbling past two opponents and into the penalty area, where the goalie was screaming, ‘Stop her.’ A defender did. She was hacked down from behind and as the whistle blew, she was rolling about in agony.

Simon shouted in anger at the much larger girl who’d chopped her, I wanted to run on and hold her but couldn’t—she’d have never spoken to me again. However, I could send her some help and imagined the light healing whatever had been hurt while asking it to do so invisibly. Once she was standing, hopping on one leg, the referee pointed to the penalty spot. Trish signalled to her captain that she wanted to take it. The captain came up and they argued about it and reluctantly she allowed Trish to place the ball on the spot, which she did limping quite heavily. We all held our breath.

Again limping badly, she tottered towards the ball and suddenly slammed it at the goal. It looked to go wide but hit the side post and bounced out hitting the goal keeper on the head whereupon it flew into the goal. I don’t think Trish could believe it. Simon leant down to me and said quietly, “You didn’t have anything to do with that, did you?” Phew, it had suddenly got very warm. I mean I might have asked the energy to help it along a bit but I didn’t think I deserved the muttering of ‘’Arry Pottah,’ that he said as well.

I do admit that the girl, at least I think it was a girl, who’d chopped Trish, did meet a bolt of energy a bit later when she jumped up to head the ball and I threw a bit at her. She missed the ball and seemed to land a bit heavily, whereupon she looked around to see who’d bashed into her. Nothing the ref could see. When Simon glanced at me, I blushed again but I was wearing a very warm coat.

The whistle finally blew for full time and the more physical tactics of the Parkers had failed against the cleverness and teamwork of St Claire’s. Sister Maria was so excited that as soon as the whistle sounded, she was running onto the pitch to hug everyone of her players but especially, the baby of the team and late replacement for her sister, Trish, who immediately burst into tears.

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2946 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

It took half an hour to drag Trish away from the celebrations—it’s not every day she gets a prize for sport—now maths or physics, that’s a different matter. As Simon drove us home I reminded her that although her contribution had been outstanding, it was Danielle’s plan they used and it still took ten other girls to make it work. She was agreeable to that and said that she’d enjoyed working with the team although they’d have lacked leadership without her. I responded by telling her that if she hadn’t been there it would have been because Danielle was and she normally led them.

Trish was quiet for a while then said, “But I played better than the others, didn’t I?”

“You played out of your socks, kiddo, but only because the others helped you to. Without them, you’d have been playing against eleven other people on your own and even numbskulls like them would have been able to stop you doing anything very much.”

“Yeah, I s’pose. Okay, we were all outstanding but I was more outstanding than the rest.”

“Only because Danni’s plan made you the focus.”

“What about the girl with the false boobies?” said Livvie and everyone laughed.

“That was a boy,” said Trish disdainfully.

“It certainly looked more boy than girl, mind you so did half their team.” Simon offered his opinion, I cleared my throat to remind him that a few years ago, Trish and Danielle would have been too, in a physical sense. Now after surgery and hormones they’re not, only the training that Danni does so regularly keeps her so fit and I sometimes worry that she’s pushing her body too hard at times.

After lunch I got a text from Danielle to say she’d be ready anytime after three, so I set off with Trish to collect her. Trish was still like a bottle of pop and I know that she only wanted to come to brag to her sister. However, Danni had been pretty much assured she’d be in the squad for the game against Germany, though some of those girls were so big, she was a little apprehensive. I think I might have been too. She’d survived without any injuries though she was quite tired and I think had some difficulty staying awake while Trish reported every kick of her game. She was really pleased for Trish and the rest of the team as well as for the school and Sister Maria but she was obviously very tired and at one point I let her sleep in the front passenger seat while Trish sat behind her telling me exactly the same stuff she’d just told Danielle.

I did wonder if I could grab her and fling her out of the window while remaining in control of the car and decided I couldn’t, so I had to suffer her penalty for the fiftieth time from the offence that won it and then her unbelievable kick which was blue light assisted, though she’ll never know that. Her leg was hurting a bit now so I suggested she sit and heal on it—that made her quiet for the last half an hour. When I managed to look behind the front seats, she was as fast asleep as her sister. They’d both had a tiring day, bless ’em.

My feet had only just begun to get warm as we entered Portsmouth and they both woke as I slowed down to come up the drive. They were both a little dopy, so they really had gone right off. However, they were looking forward to a dinner which was waiting for us as we arrived. David had done us a turkey stew and judging by the amount of meat in it, it seemed highly possible that for it to have come from one bird, it must have been one crossed bred with a millipede. If it were, it would take some catching. I smirked but didn’t share my silly thoughts with anyone else—besides only Lizzie or Simon were young enough to appreciate such silliness.

Dinner over, I went to do some sewing in my study. I had loads of paperwork I could have been doing, I know Tom was when he has a wee drap as well, usually single malt. Given that he’s seventy or possibly seventy two, he does really well and his mind is a sharp as a tack. Unlike mine because I made a mistake, clogged up the machine and spent twenty minutes swearing at it while I dug cotton out of the mechanism and then had to rewind the bobbin and re-thread it. That was when I gave up and announced that the younger girls should go straight to bed. Trish was still talking about the game and how she won it single handed. I pointed out that she wasn’t John Wayne and that even David Beckham needed ten other players to win games.

Of course it was a mistake. All I wanted to do was go to bed before I strangled our nascent football star and she now wanted to learn who John Wayne was. Simon didn’t help by drawling, “Get off yer horse and drink yer milk.” I told him it sounded more like Nicholas Cage, that provoked more questions. In the end I shouted at them, “Go to bed—NOW.” I think they got the message that I was very slightly irked. Five minutes after they got to bed I went and changed into my jammies and cleaned my teeth. They were still talking about soccer and John Wayne, or Trish was. It was only when I threatened to tie her up in the garage and let the spiders sniff her, that she got the message. I went straight to bed but then couldn’t sleep—just think what we’d be missing out on if it weren’t for irony.

At least it was Sunday tomorrow, so Danni’s training hadn’t been so long this time. She told us it was all tactics and set piece moves, which she’d enjoyed and her curling free kicks were a big part of them. So unless they’d been telling lies, it looks as if my daughter will get her second cap in a couple of weeks’ time. Thinking that helped me relax and I was on the point of dropping off when Simon came up to bed. The stupid man woke me up messing about in the bathroom—I could have murdered him too, I was so irritable from tiredness.

Sickeningly, his head touched the pillow and he went straight off while I tossed and turned. In the end I went down for a cuppa and afterwards slept quite easily.

I awoke to sunshine streaming through the curtains—it was six o’frigging clock. Why oh why does Apollo have to start driving his frigging chariot so frigging early?

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2947 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

The Sunday morning weather had me wanting to get out on my bike, preferably by myself. However, going downstairs in my cycling shoes alerted Danielle to my intentions and she raced downstairs in her pyjamas to ask if she could come too. I could hardly say no, could I? So I told her to go and dress quickly while I boiled the kettle and made us some toast.

Breakfast over, we went to the workshop to collect our trusty steeds only to find they both had soft tyres. The track pump made short work of those and ten minutes later we were trundling down the drive and out onto the road. I hadn’t cycled for weeks, in fact I hadn’t done much exercise at all, so I knew this ride was going to hurt. Danielle hadn’t done much riding recently either but her fitness was much greater than mine, so I half expected her to trounce me on the hills. I really should have gone up onto the downs but instead we rode out past Southsea round Langstone out to Hayling Island and obviously back.

The wind was brisk along the coast and at times a little challenging, especially with my fitness levels. Danielle tucked in behind me and seemed content to ride along at my pace. At one point, the wind veered round behind us and I upped the pace to a racing twenty but she stuck with me and even passed me when my energy nosedived a little after the effort.

We managed to find a cafe open and I had a latté coffee and she had cuppa and a sticky bun. Then after a visit to the ladies we set off for home and arrived back there at ten o’clock with Simon muttering about having had to organise breakfast for everyone. Seeing as even Cate gets her own breakfast most days, I ignored his grumbles and went up to shower. I felt like telling him that they were his children too, but I suspect it would just run off his banker’s back.

I know that generally, he’s quite supportive of me and the children but he does seem to think it’s a mother’s job to feed her offspring, not the father’s. He’s supposed to provide for them and he does a super job at it, he’s just not very good at looking after them, perhaps because there are too many and he likes just one or two around him. If he takes them out in his car, they come back with tales of ice cream sundaes or milk shakes. So he spoils them rotten. This time he got Julie and Phoebe to organise them, so he was complaining about nothing and as I said earlier, it didn’t affect him that much. Coming out of the bedroom after showering I bumped into Danielle who gave me a hug.

“What was Daddy complaining about? He didn’t do anything anyway, Julie did it all.”

“I think he was miffed because I got up and went out without him knowing and didn’t ask him to supervise the children.”

“God, if that’s all he ever has to complain about he’ll lead a charmed life, bloody men,” she said rolling her eyes. I had to stifle a chortle it just felt so funny, especially when I considered a couple of years ago her status was very different but she seems to have firmly embraced her new gender and looks really female now. I gave her a little hug and we descended the stairs together. “Thanks for the ride, Mum, it was really good.” I smiled my response.

Having spent some time with her, I felt I had to do something with the others, so spent an hour in the orchard with Trish and Livvy bug hunting for a project they have to do for school. I have some bug pots, these are plastic pots a couple of inches in diameter and about the same in depth with a magnifying lid, so you can see what you’ve got more clearly. As we weren’t killing specimens, my identification with the odd photo was probably enough for their project, though we only managed about fifteen different species—it was nice in the sun but the breeze was cool. Most of the things we caught were spiders—wolf spiders mainly, but I took a couple of photos of butterflies in the garden as well—peacock and with difficulty, a male orange tip who was rather flighty as soon as I got anywhere near. I solved the problem by getting my proper camera, a SLR with a telephoto lens and took a picture from a few yards away, which blew up nicely on the computer and could be identified clearly.

Part of the orchard is a bit damp, a bit of a spring oozes out there, runs into the pond and then the overflow goes down a drain. Near the damp part we have cuckoo flower which is one of the foodplants, Cardamine pratensis. Sometimes if you look really carefully you can find little yellow blobs about a millimetre or two long which are the eggs of the orange tip. Under a lens they resemble little yellow Ali Baba type baskets a characteristic of several of the White or Pierid butterflies, of which the Orange tip is a member.

A male orange tip butterfly Anthocharis cardamines. (Photo by of Quartl courtesy of Wikipedia)

Orange tips remind me that we’re well into spring but sadly their season is quite short as adults, a bit like cuckoos, which seem increasingly absent from Southern England, though apparently are doing all right in Scotland and Northern Ireland. Researchers have discovered that they use a different migration route from their southern cousins which must be safer for some reason—possibly either crossing the Sahara or those delightful people in the south of Europe who like to slaughter them alongside other song birds for the fun of shooting things. Despite Chris Packham’s attempts to persuade the people of Malta to vote against this annual slaughter a year or two ago, the Maltese voted by the slimmest of margins to continue killing songbirds—there were also stories of corruption influencing the vote or the count but these things always happen in referenda—just look at the recent Scottish vote on independence, which as a Scot by birth, embarrassed me or the accusations afterwards did. The Nationalists will never give up until they get the result they want being ideologically driven rather than concerned about the people of Scotland. But then I accept my own distaste for nationalism is because I associate it with the swing towards the right which also tends to bode badly for minority groups—just look at the situation in the US with the so called ‘bathroom laws’, which is led by primarily very rightwing conservatives, often very narrow minded puritans.

I’m not suggesting that the Scottish Nationalists are in quite the same category of intolerance, because they seem quite tolerant of minorities, so are a different kettle of fish, but I do believe that we are better off as a United Kingdom than smaller, kingdoms which would endanger our credibility abroad. Scotland has a population of about five million, and Wales about three million compared to over fifty million in England, so should the question arise again, surely we should all have a say in it because it could potentially affect us all.

Thankfully, our pottering in the orchard, where the trees are starting to blossom didn’t involve the politics I mentioned above, so we had no grumbles from the girls and a few useable photographs.

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2948 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

I felt exhausted. It was eleven o’clock on a Sunday evening and after trying to please everybody with some attention, I finally went and dealt with my emails. They were all work related and I spent an hour responding to them. I was too tired to even consider a cup of tea. I found Simon who was watching a film with Julie. “I’m off to bed while I still have the energy to walk up the stairs—night.” I pecked them both on the cheek and stumbled up to bed. Ten minutes later I was asleep having given my teeth one of the fastest brushes known to medical science. I hadn’t even looked at the book on the bedside table.

Unusually, I didn’t even feel Simon come to bed let alone get up the next day. I woke at about half past six to sunlight and birdsong. Once upon a time, I’d have got up and been out on the bike before having a shower and my breakfast. In those days, there was only Si and Tom and me to worry about and life was relatively uncomplicated, though at the time it didn’t seem any less tiring and stressful. In those days, I’d worry about people finding out about me—my history; or get embarrassed by being described as Lady Cameron before I’d got married.

Given the level of responsibility I had now, why was I so stressed then because it was like a cakewalk compared to my life today? Yet I was. How did I let my father bully me so much and be so frightened of him? As a child, physical size was enough for him to do so then as I grew, the intimidation grew and he physically assaulted me more than just a slap or two—twice he actually beat me up. Why didn’t I fight back? Because part of me thought he was right or had a right to do it. I was some sort of freak and deserved it—while there is a still a large part of world still feels that anyone who doesn’t conform to narrow stereotypes is deserving of beatings or humiliation or even killing—I no longer feel ready to accept victimhood and I know that I am not only as good as them, but in reality superior because despite them I have succeeded in my chosen field and I don’t bear them any long term malice.

We have to move on and bearing grudges or any other form of resentment requires far too much energy to maintain while doing you harm instead of the ones who deserve it. Embitterment eats away at the holder not the cause and holds them in that same place—the hell that began it all.

For years people like my father and Aubrey Murray, my old headmaster, held a power over me through my fear and bad memories. Fortunately, I had a chance to confront my fears, overcome them and eventually move on. I learnt to defend myself against physical abuse and also against psychological abuse and became determined never to allow myself to be cast in the role of victim again.

When I became responsible for children who wanted me to be their mother I had to make sure I didn’t follow the same model of parenting that I received, at times that was difficult, especially when it became obvious that some of the children were gender different.

Also, I didn’t want to have children raised to believe in fantasy stories that they should always be happy as if it were their right, that they were perfect and deserving of everything without earning it. That sounds as if I felt they should be flogged twice a day and sent up the chimney or down the mines, it meant they should be taught that the reality of life on this planet is tough but that with the correct support and encouragement, they could achieve their dreams as I had.

As a parent, I realised it’s my job to show an example and to provide with the skills and resources they’d need to survive and prosper. In children without gender uncertainties, that’s difficult enough; in those with gender problems, it makes everything a little harder. I don’t know if I’ve been somehow blessed to receive children who were exceptional in themselves or if I’ve somehow by accident got it right and enabled them to develop some sort of ability to cope and indeed thrive despite their handicap and I mean that in almost the same sense they do in golf or horse racing—an added obstacle or complication but not an insurmountable one. Unless one is very disabled physically or psychologically, a reasonable life is still possible if you’re given the resources you need to achieve it. Unfortunately, lots of parents are inadequate so the children have extra struggles to overcome and many don’t make it so underachieve.

It reminded me of a phone call I’d received from the father of a student we had sent a written warning to for lack of effort in the first year. The father was irate complaining about the lack of teaching his son had had from us and that he had a good mind to sue us to refund the fees we’d received for a contract we’d not fulfilled. While I was talking to him, Diane got his file out and I quickly scanned it. The boy hadn’t attended half his lectures, so he wouldn’t be up to date with his knowledge. Consequently he hadn’t completed half his assignments so was well down on his marks and finally, he’d failed mid-term assessment exams, hence the shot across his bows. His father huffed and puffed trying to blame us and in the end I simply told him the facts of life, by all means sue us but be prepared to lose big time because we have no obligation to give people degrees who can’t be bothered to turn up or do any work anymore than he could expect a salary from an employer with bothering to attend and earn it. He swore at me and cut me off.

I sent the boy a second letter telling him to make an appointment to see me to explain his lack of attendance and completed assignments and for him to bring evidence of any ameliorating reasons for this state of affairs. He didn’t nor did he bother to turn up for anything else here again. I assume he dropped out. If his father had assisted him in attending for lectures or completing his assignments, he may have had a chance of succeeding in completing the course and getting his degree. Instead he chose to blame us for his own failure which I refused to accept. I’ll work with anyone to help them reach their potential but I won’t do it for them and in my inaugural lecture to new first year students I remind them we have a contract with them. We offer them the skills to interpret the data they’ll receive or generate and to use it but we require them to help us do it by attending, listening or watching and by performing the tasks we require of them to complete to prove to us they have reached the standards we set. It’s not easy, if it was they wouldn’t value it or themselves for achieving it.

The radio alarm came on and instead of listening why we should or shouldn’t stay in the European Union, I went for shower while I decided what I would wear today. I lead such an exciting life.

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2949 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

I opted for casual to work, some black slacks with a TdF in Yorkshire tee shirt and a black jacket. It was supposed to be a nice day so I wore some flat shoes with the intention of going for a walk at lunch. I even made myself a tuna and salad roll to take with me. I took the girls to school in the minibus thing promising to remember to collect them at half past three. Trish had the cheek to say she’d send me a reminder at three o’clock to make sure I did remember.

After dropping them off, I parked at the university remembering my parking pass and went to my office. Diane was already there and asked if I’d had a good weekend. I considered that apart from tiredness I had. As I entered my office she went off to make the tea.

She told me briefly what she’d done and I told her that Trish had won the school’s cup and Danni had been selected for the squad to play Germany. “Oh wow, talk about trumping me and that’s the Brain who played for the school?”

“Yes, Danni had originally planned the strategy but was then called to a training session at Reading with the England squad so she taught Trish a few tricks who put them to good use in implementing the plan her sister had formed. The Parker’s were a bit rough and one of their team looked decidedly boyish, especially when she and I use the term advisedly took Trish out, Trish grabbed at her jersey and pulled her boobs off.”

“Pulled her what?”

“Trish was effectively knocked off the ball and as she fell she grabbed out, caught the front of the defender’s shirt and her breast padding fell out.”

Diane’s jaw fell open and then she roared with laughter. “So she wasn’t a girl?”

“The referee wasn’t impressed but we let it pass when she was substituted by a more obvious female. We scored from the free kick so it backfired on them anyway.”

“I can’t believe they’d try playing a boy as a girl.”

“Cheating is so rampant these days from cycling to athletics and even in examinations. We had one a few years ago while I was invigilating.”

“What happened?”

“They’d substituted a calculator with a smart phone but they were caught and disqualified. They were dismissed from their course—the university has a zero tolerance of cheating.”

She nodded, “You remembered you’re invigilating this morning?”

“Yes at ten. I’ve brought my laptop so I can deal with some emails. I’ve also got a scanner thing which tells me if anyone is using a mobile or similar device.”

“Are you expecting to catch some more then?”

“No because I shall tell them I’m using it. I shall also ask them to switch off their phones and leave them in pockets or bags.”

“It’s first years, isn’t it?”

“Yes, the final years’ papers are being marked, the second years were the other week, so it’s the babies turn this week.”

She squinted at my tee shirt, “Le Tour?”

“Yes, the Tour de France was in Yorkshire a couple of years ago, bought myself this shirt as a reminder.”

“What you rode in it?”

“No, it’s a men’s race and I’ll never be good enough for the women’s standard let alone the men. I just went to watch and bloody Cavendish fell off and broke his shoulder on the first stage.”

“Oh, who’s he?”

“Mark Cavendish, the most successful men’s rider this country has ever produced.”

“Oh, that Mark Cavendish,” she said quickly dodging out of the door before I could throw something at her. I’m going to have to get a soft foam ball just for that purpose.

At ten I was addressing the assembled throng to switch off their mobile phones and any other devices, except pacemakers and hearing aids. “What?” shouted some wag—there’s always one. I also showed them my tracking device which would discover any illegal use of electronic aids. Then it was three hours of misery—for me—those seats are so bloody hard, I had to get up and walk around every so often as my bum was hurting. Quite how the students manage, I’m not sure though I spotted two of the girls had brought cushions to sit on—they deserve distinctions for that alone. Wish I’d thought of it.

Debbie relieved my other invigilator and she nodded as she took their place, then she sat and sewed while I dealt with some emails. Afterwards, I discovered she was hemming a skirt using the method I’d shown her. I felt quite pleased with that and told her that I’d see her on Friday if she wished—she did.

I’d hardly seen her for a few days and she told me she’d been busy and had a new boyfriend who knew about her history and wasn’t bothered by it, so she had hopes they’d stay together. I wished them well and left to go for my lunch time walk.

Grabbing my lunch, the roll and bottle of water, plus my sunglasses and binoculars and set off towards the local park, if nothing else I’d get some fresh air and boost my vitamin D levels in the sunshine. It was quite warm in the sunshine and I sat in the park listening to chiffchaffs competing with herring gulls for their audience. Of course being black, the tee shirt soaked up the heat and by the time I walked back to the office I was feeling three parts roasted.

“Debbie’s got herself a boyfriend,” I said to the bum that was sticking up at the back of the desk.

“What?” said Diane standing up then sitting down with the papers she’d picked up from the floor.

“I said, Debbie has got herself a boyfriend.”

“Yeah, I know.”

“Oh,” I said feeling taken aback, “why didn’t you say?”

“You told me you didn’t do gossip.”

“That isn’t gossip, she told me herself, if you’d told me—that would have been gossip.”

“Doesn’t that mean your telling me is also gossip?”

“No, I’m a professor, so I’m educating you.”

“Ha—one law for the rich and another for the poor.”

“Exactly, it’s worked for two thousand years or more, so why change it?”

“That’s okay if you’re mega rich like Donald Trump...”

“But that’s only in money, you have more functioning brain cells, I’m sure.”

“Ha ha, very funny.”

“Look at it this way: if he makes a million dollars he’d hardly notice it but you would. He’s got so much he could buy nearly anything he wants...”

“Except the presidency.”

“That’s to be seen, if he subsequently wins it, he will have bought it by funding his own campaign.”

“He won’t win it will he?”

“How do I know? The way it’s going anything could happen, a bit like Brexit winning the referendum.”

“He’s backing that,” said Diane.

“Who is?”

“Trump, or whatever his name is.”

“What’s t got to do with him?”

“I suspect someone asked him.”

“Yeah well, loads of opinions and very little knowledge—sounds like Trump or me on a bad day...”

She sat there and laughed—she’ll have to go.

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2950 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

I went to collect the girls and was actually earlier than they were which impressed them enough to hesitate in their chatter for a millisecond. They seemed very excited and then Danielle handed me a letter.

Dear Parent,

We would ask you to exercise a little extra care when bringing or collecting your child(ren) as a strange man has been seen loitering near the school. While we aren’t at all sure there is any extra risk to the students and the police have been informed, we feel it appropriate to notify you of this occurrence.

Yours,

Sister Maria
Headmistress.

“Have any of you seen this man?” I asked firmly and of course they all burst out laughing.

“Load of rubbish, innit?” said Trish.

“It’s such a load of rubbish that Sister Maria saw fit to write to all the parents.”

“Well, she’d be liable, wouldn’t she?” responded my smart arse daughter.

“I want all of you to take extra care, just in case.”

“Yeah yeah,” came from the seat behind me.

“I mean it, you don’t know who is about these days...” I spotted Trish miming what I was saying and wagging her finger and I saw red. “Patricia Cameron, I don’t know what you think you’re doing but unless you behave yourself you’re going to find yourself in hotter water than they get in the geysers at Yellowstone.” She gave an embarrassed laugh and a very quiet ‘Sorry, Mummy,’ came over the seat. I watched her blushing in the rear view mirror and she was in the classic embarrassed pose of blushing and trying to neither cry nor laugh.

I said nothing more about it, they knew how I felt and while I’m sure they thought all adults are stupid, they knew I was serious. It must have played on my mind because that night—I was with the girls, or some of them and we were walking past the school grounds when we saw some man walking along. “That’s him,” exclaimed Trish and I immediately bristled, but when I looked more closely there was this awful sense of sadness about him. It was almost palpable, the sense of loss. We crossed over the road and I asked the girls to wait while I spoke to him.

“Are you all right, sir?”

His empty eyes looked at me, “I lost her, I’ll never get her back.”

“Lost who?” I asked politely.

“It was you, wasn’t it?” he suddenly snapped and I began to feel scared, his eyes were now full of anger or even hate. He suddenly thrust out his arm and grabbed me pulling me towards him and I saw the arm raised with the knife. My god, he was going to kill me...

I tried to pull away but he was so strong and I watched in slow motion as the knife dropped towards me and I screamed...

“It’s okay, Cathy—it’s just a dream.” I heard Simon’s voice in the distance and I relaxed and woke briefly. “You okay?” he asked having switched the light on.

“Yeah, sorry if I woke you—that was a horrible dream.”

“Okay, you’re quite safe, I’m here.”

“I know, darling.” I pecked him on the cheek and slipped out of bed for a wee thinking that he no longer tried to hold me if I have a bad dream after I gave him a black eye one night—well how was I to know he wasn’t the monster that grabbed me?

I got back into bed and let him spoon around me. He felt as warm as toast and I thought I’d be too warm but I soon fell back to sleep and slept through to the morning when of course he’d gone off to town with Sammi.

In the shower I reflected on the dream but shrugged it off as the product of an over active imagination, such things don’t happen in real life—I mean sensing someone’s sadness—nah not me, far too wrapped up in my own world for that.

Breakfast was the normal mixture of the chimps tea party and a custard pie contest and I had to raise my voice once to stop the two arguments which were growing louder and louder. “Trish give that book back to Livve, Livvie stop shouting. Cate stop poking Lizzie and Lizzie stop whining.” None of them took a blind bit of notice of me so I banged on the table and knocked a glass of milk over the cat who was sitting next to Trish’s chair waiting for titbits. By the time I’d cleared it up, we were running late and I had to make them hurry to get in the car or they’d be late for school and I needed to be in work on time as I was invigilating at nine and it was half eight already.

I dropped them off at the school gate momentarily forgetting the warning the school had given, started to drive off and then remembered, so reversed back to my parking space. On glancing down through the school gates I saw Trish talking to some strange man and my tummy flipped. What if he was the...? Before I could think I was out of the car and racing towards her.

“What’s going on?” I demanded loudly and they both jumped.

“Oh hi, Mummy, this man wanted to speak with Sister Maria, I said I’d show him where her office was.”

I felt a complete fool and apologised for over reacting and he said he understood.

Walking away, I suddenly recognised the voice as the same as the man in my dream. I quickly bleeped the lock on the car and hoped my bag was safe as well as my laptop and turned back towards the school.

Trish and the stranger were nearly at the door when he lunged forward and snatched at her, by this time I was running flat out towards them. She stepped back and kicked him hard between his legs and ran into the building. He straightened up just long enough for me to crash into him and knock him through the doorway, me landing on top of him. I rolled off him and grabbing his arm wrenched it as hard as I could behind him in a hammer lock, he squealed loudly. As I did so, Sister Maria and Trish came running down the corridor saying loudly, “The police are on their way.”

They were there minutes later until which time I held on to his arm and kept him pinned to the ground. Two burly constables arrived and he was cuffed and led away. I glanced at the clock—oh hell, I had five minutes to get to the university. I promised to give a statement later and raced back to the car only to find the police car blocking me in.

I called Diane and told her I was held up by the police and would be there as soon as I could, could she cover for me in the hall. She apparently did so when I eventually arrived with scuffed knees and tousled hair, looking like I’d been brawling in the corridor—which I suppose I had—she gave me a really funny look. “Shall I wait until you’ve had a chance to tidy yourself up, Professor?” Which is what I did, including having a quick cuppa. I made her one as well and covered it with a coaster to keep it warm. I told her it was there when I replaced her, feeling calmer but both my knees hurt and had grazed through my jeans. It would be interesting to find out who the creep was and what he was after, but that would keep until I’d—damn—I left my laptop in the office. It was obviously going to be—shit it was Friday and the thirteenth day of May...

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2951 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

I sent Diane a text and she brought my laptop through to me so I was able to do some work apart from answering queries from exam candidates wanting extra paper and so on. This was Year One Ecology, and the only suspicious character was a lad who’d messed up part of a question and asked for extra paper so he could extract the bits he wanted from the mess. Glancing at his mistakes, it looked as if he’d done a better job the second time around though he’d be pushed to finish the paper.

One of the emails I received was asking if I could help with a dormouse count on the coming Saturday—is the pope a catholic? I replied in the affirmative. I think I’m the only one with the class 2 dormouse licence which enables me to mark, clip or chip dormice, the class 1 simply permits handling for surveying or conservation, such as sexing or weighing. The licences are quite definite in what they will allow but they’re not as complicated as the bat licences which involve quite a bit more. Clipping is cutting off little bits of fur to try and identify mice and while less traumatic than chipping—the insertion through the skin of a small microchip as used in dog and cat identifying—it’s not as accurate as the microchip, which is 100% accurate as long as your scanner is charged. Once the dormouse has been chipped the only trauma is being trapped in a plastic bag while it’s being read—takes seconds and doesn’t harm the animal—though chipping it can.

I’m reminded of a story I heard about someone who’d just chipped an edible dormouse up near Tring and it croaked as they finished—embarrassing to say the least. Glis glis, the edible dormouse is bigger and nastier than our Hazel variety and requires wearing heavy protective gloves to handle them and they’re introduced to the country by way of escaping from Rothschild’s collection near Tring. They’re more squirrel like and a bit of a pest if they get into a house, but they require a licence to handle them separate from the Hazel dormouse one.

While it’s regrettable if any dormouse dies during or after micro-chipping them, the data we can collect about individual animals is greater and much more accurate. So it’s probably worth the risk after all, the greatest weapon we have in protecting species or habitats is data, particularly that used in educating people. Wild life doesn’t have the vote but those we try to educate do. I hope they vote to stay in the EU because quite a bit of protection for people and creatures has originated there and hopefully they’ll drive through the banning of neo-nicontinoids which are wiping out bee populations, which the UK government has been loath to enact by themselves, although even they have suspended some use of them as the evidence mounts.

As the soccer season has practically ended I decided I’d ask Danielle if she’d like to come mousing and possibly invite Livvie and Trish as well—they all three enjoy it. The reward for wading through damp or overgrown woodland, is the chance to handle a truly wild, but extremely cute, animal. They usually think it’s worthwhile. I know I do. Sometimes I think I might have been happier still doing that than running a department.

Licence holders have to submit records of dormice to PTES (People’s Trust for Endangered Species) who coordinate it for Natural England, we also get it because of our survey project.

The morning seemed to pass a little quicker once I saw the invite about the dormouse survey and after collecting the papers, I was soon back on my way to my office and Diane.

“The police phoned while you were invigilating.”

“Oh?”

“Can you call this number to make an appointment to go and see them?”

“Okay,” I sighed.

“What happened—or is it too personal?”

“The school had warned us of some weirdo seen hanging around the place and I’d just dropped the girls off when something made me look again and some bloke had snatched at Trish who stepped away and kicked him in the goolies. By this time I was racing towards him and managed to arrest him until the police arrived.”

“Let’s hope he was the pervert then and not an Offsted inspector.”

“Why would an inspector try to grab her?”

She shrugged, “How would I know?”

“He didn’t say he was at any rate just yelled at me to let him go.”

“Did you?”

“Only to police custody.”

“Better go and ring them, then. I’ll make some tea.”

“Good idea,” well the Rosie lee was. I picked up the slip of paper with the number on, retired to my room and dialled. “Hello, it’s Cathy Cameron, I was asked to call to make an appointment.”

“Regarding what, Ms Cameron?”

“I helped detain a suspect at St Claire’s Convent this morning.”

“Oh, we had you down as Professor Watts.”

“Watts is my maiden name, I still use it for work.”

“And you’re a professor?”

“At the university.”

“Which one?”

I was tempted to say Hogwarts but kept it simple and truthful. I could go anytime that afternoon. I decided I’d go after lunch. Diane appeared with the teas and I told her what had transpired with the police.

While we chatted I texted Trish to see how she was. She said she was fine, so I double checked by calling the headmistress who supported Trish’s opinion. I told Diane I’d be leaving early to make my statement but worked through my lunch to make up for it, hoping not to get too many crumbs in my keyboard.

At two I left for the cop-shop and was parked there ten minutes later despite the heavy traffic. Once they understood why I was there, I was taken to an interview room to wait for someone to take my statement. I hated this building having had some untoward experiences here. It was my hope that some of them may have made the people working here less likely to make similar ones as the damages we received were designed to make the pips squeak. I donated them to charity.

“Ah, Lady Cameron, good to meet you,” said cheery voice emitted from a young woman probably my own age but a bit broader in the beam. The statement was quite straightforward and she typed it up while I waited. I then signed it. “So Trish had escaped by kicking him?”

“She stepped away from his attempt to grab her and kicked him.”

“And you raced in and knocked him down?”

“Yes, I just wanted to stop him grabbing her or another child.”

“Well he won’t for the moment, he’s still in custody as we were waiting for your statement to charge him.”

I almost smirked for a moment when I thought about charging him—wasn’t that pretty well what I did to him?

“Have you taken a statement from Trish?”

“Your daughter?”

“Yes,” duh?

“Yes one of our special officers went to speak with her in the presence of the headmistress.”

“Okay. Right I’d better go and collect her and her sisters.”

“How many has she got?”

“At St Claire’s?” I asked and she nodded. “Three.”

“And none of them saw anything?”

“I don’t know, all I know is what I saw.”

“Of course.”

I left and went to get the girls from school. I still didn’t know who he was or what he was—his reason for being there other than predatory.

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2952 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

Episode 246 dozen for the dodecaphiles.

When we got home I called Trish into the study and asked her what had happened. Apparently the man had said, “Excuse me, young lady...” and before she could ask him what he wanted he grabbed at her so she let him have it right between the legs.

“I often wondered what it would be like to do that to a boy,” she said dispassionately.

“Well now you know, don’t do it again unless it’s an emergency.”

“Bah, you’re no fun anymore,” she teased and she was lost to a fit of the giggles for the next couple of minutes. I knew that saying anything would make matters worse, so I just waited until she calmed down.

“That was all he said?”

“Yes that’s what the policewoman asked me as well.”

Oh well, it would seem like I’m on the right track in terms of process.

“Then she asked if I knew you were there an’ I didn’t, I thought you had to go to Uni. I just ran and called for help and Sister Maria rang the police. When we came back to see if he was still about, you were sat on top of him with his arm bent up his back and him shouting at you.”

“That’s what you told the police, was it?”

“Yes, you have to tell them the truth and the whole truth, I saw it on the telly.”

I wasn’t going to confuse the issue because in most regards she’s probably correct in the same way most coppers are okay, just trying to hold down a difficult and at times dangerous job—nearly as bad as dormouse counting—did I tell you about the time Simon got shot, or I got shot at by a grumpy farmer who blew out the windows of my car.

I congratulated Trish on her quick thinking and let her go to do her homework. I had some of my own to do—these days there always seems to be something I have to finish at home or work late to complete in the office and having had some less than happy experiences in the university after hours, I try to come home where at least I should get a meal.

Dinner was at seven because David wanted to watch something on the telly—football I expect, he seems to like his sport. Okay so I could have watched the Giro, but at the moment, I’m too busy to do anything much but work or look after the children.

We’d just finished eating when the doorbell rang. Not expecting anyone I went to answer it. It was Andy Bond, the nicest policeman on the force. “Come on in, tea?”

“Yes please, you know me I never refuse a cuppa.”

“Well just in case it’s your third or fourth, you know where the loo is,” I pointed and he nodded that he did know. I made the tea and we sat at the table. “Now I wonder if I can guess why you’re here, Sergeant Bond?”

“It wouldn’t surprise me if you did, Professor Watts.”

“Let’s see, how about some strange man who grabbed my daughter in the school playground and received some bruising round his gonads for the effort, was then detained by said girl’s mother who proved even more violent and held him until the police arrived some few minutes later. They weren’t very gentle with him either.”

“I’d say your clairvoyance was excellent, however it didn’t include identifying him as a school inspector, did it? So only seven out of ten.”

“School inspector? He grabbed my daughter, I saw him do it.”

“He says he did it because she was running and may have crashed into someone, he only wanted to make her walk.”

“Is this guy for real?”

“His ID said he was and we checked it out with the DoE.”

“And he’s kosher?”

Andy nodded.

“So why didn’t he say?”

“He said you didn’t give him a chance and he feared you might dislocate his shoulder.”

“It did cross my mind.”

“You naughty professor you.”

“What would you have done if you’d seen someone grab one of your kids?”

“Probably more than you did—you seemed very restrained this time.”

“I had him secure until the police arrived. I didn’t need to waste further energy.”

“Okay, you cracked two of his ribs and his shoulder is rather sore.”

“I should apologise? You have to be joking. If a strange man lays a finger on one of my girls, I’m going to react protectively.”

“You realise he could sue you for assault?”

“If he does my lawyers will have something to say about it.”

“Cathy, he has said that if you apologise he’ll accept it was a misunderstanding and no charge will be made against you.”

“How can I be in the wrong? He grabbed my daughter and we’d been primed by the school that there was some pervert hanging about, so it was probable that he was the pervert not some bloody Ofsted tosser. I mean how much training do these guys have—not enough by the sound of it?”

“I can understand your anger as to what you thought you saw. But if it went to court it would be messy and unsettling for all of you, whereas a simple apology would stop all that. C’mon, Cathy, let’s clear this up quickly with no further bad feeling.”

“What if he turns out to be some sort of creep hiding as a schools inspector?”

“Then we’ll have him and let you talk with him alone for five minutes, but the chances are he isn’t and you could have quite a problem on your hands. I know you could afford to go as far if not further than almost anyone short of Richard Branson, but is it worth it? Think what else you could do with that money.”

“If he apologises for grabbing Trish, I’ll do so for forcibly detaining him in the belief he was a criminal. I suppose he wants Trish to apologise as well, does he?”

“No, he’s going to sue her.”

“What?” I gasped and he laughed loudly.

“Cathy, your face was a picture.”

“So what about Trish?”

“He’s writing that off down to experience.”

“When does this happen?”

“Asap.”

“I’m not invigilating tomorrow for a change. Tomorrow morning, what time?”

“I’ll collect you from the university if you want?”

“No way am I leaving the university in a police car.”

“In my own car and I won’t be in uniform—okay?”

“What time?”

“About ten.”

“Okay, but he has to apologise for grabbing Trish.”

“I’m sure he will.”

“He’d better or know some good lawyers because he’ll need them. If I tell mine to attack, they will and it’ll make anything I did very amateur by comparison.”

“I think I prefer it when you’re talking about saving dormice rather than destroying people.”

“Talking of which we’re doing a survey on Saturday.”

“What dormice?”

“Yes, it’s good fun.”

“I’m sure it is.”

“Why want to come?”

“What—really?”

“Yeah, you might have to put up with some of my whining children.”

“What you take Trish and Livvie?”

“I was meaning my first year students...”

He looked at me then burst out laughing.

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2953 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

I was up to my armpits in paperwork when Andy Bond arrived in a jacket with open necked shirt. In comparison I was wearing a DK skirt suit in maroon with a three quarter sleeved, grey silk cowl neck blouse. I wore some two inch heeled, black Mary Jane shoes. I opted for comfort in the foot department as I wasn’t really dressing to impress, but as a man he was unlikely to recognise designer clothing when he saw it anyway. I however, felt up to dealing with anything from Royalty to runaway trains. My makeup and hair were done to a minimalist perfection, hopefully enhancing my appearance rather than making me look overdressed. Finally, I opted for Coco perfume, which is lighter than my favourite No 5. I hasten to add it’s named after Coco Chanel not Coco the clown.

Andy waited patiently while I gave instructions to Diane and told her we’d be an hour or so, then decided it would be two hours. Andy gave me a funny look and once out of Diane’s hearing told him I’d treat him to lunch. “I’ll have to refuse, Cathy, it could be seen as bribery.”

“I’m not entirely sure about all this, you know. They did check with the Department that he was one of their inspectors and due to be at the school that day?”

“I think so.”

“Please stop the car and check that they did so.” As we hadn’t left the car park he didn’t have too much trouble to stop.

He called on his mobile after switching off the engine. “Hi it’s Andy, I’m taking lady Cameron to meet that guy she detained yesterday at the school—St Claire’s. Could I speak to the officer in charge? Okay I’ll hold.” He held his mobile to his chest and looked at me, “They’re just finding her.” A voice sounded over his phone so he put it back to his ear. “Lady Cameron has asked that we did ascertain that the inspector chap was just that and registered with the Department, she also wanted to know if he should have been at the school that day.” He put the phone on loud speaker and the woman’s voice said, “He’s a registered schools inspector, apparently no one asked if he should have been at St Claire’s. I’ll try and get hold of them again and see where he should have been, I’ll ring you back as soon as.”

“Okay.” He looked at me and shrugged.

“If it was anywhere else but St Claire’s I’m going to ask that you arrest him.”

“You won’t have to ask,” he said tersely but I was smirking. He started up the car and put his phone in a holder on his dashboard. If he put it on loudspeaker he could use it while driving and I could operate it for him anyway.

It was at least ten minutes before the inspector got back to him. “He’s definitely registered but he should have been in Havant yesterday, they don’t know what he was doing at St Claire’s and it has happened before on three occasions he went to the wrong school.”

“I feel I ought to caution him, ma’am and ask him to attend for interview again.”

“Drop the nutty professor off and go and bring him in, I’d like another talk with him.”

“The nutty professor could hear all that, Inspector.” I said into the phone.

“Sorry, no offense meant, it just slipped out.”

“None taken, thank you for being so thorough.”

“Yeah, at your suggestion.”

“That doesn’t worry me if you do it properly the second time and if he is the St Claire’s stalker, gets charged with it.”

“Don’t worry, if he is, we’ll have him.”

“I sincerely hope so, but I might take a few precautions myself.”

“I hope that won’t involve violence.”

“So do I, I grazed my knees yesterday and they still hurt.”

“I’m sure they’ll be fine in a day or so.”

Andy turned the car round and dropped me off back at the university. Diane of course looked at her watch and I just said, “Running slow again is it?” She glared at me then smiled. Well, you can’t let them take the initiative.

I did let her make me a fresh cuppa and dived back into my paperwork.

“So what happened to the two hours?”

“I thought of something the police hadn’t and so they were taking him back in for questioning.”

“I thought the police were professionals?”

“They are, but I’m a professor of science, so they let me ask silly questions because they hadn’t apparently.”

“Like what?”

“Should he have been at my daughter’s school?”

“I take it he shouldn’t?”

“Apparently not, no.”

“Is he very old?”

“About mid-forties.”

“Oh, so it isn’t dementia.”

“I can’t rule that out but I have some doubts.”

“So he’s a pervert then, is he?”

I shrugged, “Possibly. Unfortunately, I don’t have his name or I’d ask James to do some poking around.”

“I thought he had friends in the police?”

“Okay, I’ll call him.” I waited and she showed no intention to move so I prodded her and asked, “Haven’t you got a cauldron to stir or other work to do?” She stood up, saluted—like a Nazi—and flounced out. I couldn’t call James for a few minutes I was laughing too much.

“Who is he?” asked my regular accomplice in dubious activities.

“I wasn’t given his name but I’m sure you’ll be able to find out as I forcibly detained him.”

“Cathy, you promised me you’d renounce violence—except to rescue private investigators.”

“Oh, I misunderstood that agreement, James; I thought I renounced it only when considering rescuing private investigators.”

“I thought that was only lawyers and estate agents.”

“Mighta been. So go and investigate, I’m not paying you for passing the time of day with me.”

“Very good, your ladyship, I’ll drag my knuckles to the bone pursuing every enquiry that is open to us and some that aren’t.”

“I hate to think what they must be thinking at Cheltenham, listening into this.”

“They’ll have to get a bit cleverer to listen to my calls, they’re triple encrypted.”

“Gosh, just like your grammar.”

“My grandma died years ago so leave her out of it unless you offer to pay her while the investigation is going on.”

“If she’s dead, I’m not paying her.”

“Well it was worth a try, it would work in Greece.”

“Which is why they’re borrowing from the EU—to pay for all those payroll corpses.”

“So should we leave then? Sounds like you think so.”

“No I’m not, I’m a remainer—there may be loads of Spanish practises that need sorting, but that will be easier from inside than out in the wilderness.”

“Ah, your man is one Joshua Dell.”

“I thought he was American and played the violin.”

“Cathy, get a hearing check I said Dell as in delta echo lima lima.”

“What?” I said hearing him perfectly.

“Go and ask Si to do a credit check and repossess his house or something.”

“I don’t know his address.”

“Waverley Grove, Southsea—now go and play and leave us professionals alone.” I was tempted to say something frightfully rude but decided against it because knowing him he’d turn it against me. Instead, I sent a text to Simon saying I wanted to check out the man from yesterday and he told me to use James for quickness. That’s good, it means he’ll pay the bill. Now can you see why I’m a professor?

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2954 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

For the next couple of days nothing much happened regarding Joshua Dell, the police told me nothing and more importantly, neither did James. Sometimes he does seem to have a radio silence and other times he’s sending me facts all the time. This was in the former category.

The only person I heard from was Andy Bond who told me he couldn’t make the dormousing. I immediately wondered if he’d been told off for fraternising with the enemy, but there’d be other times and I’m sure he’d enjoy it.

On Friday I mentioned it to Trish and Danielle; Danni was playing football on Sunday and would love to come, Trish said yes before I gave any details. Livvie only decided to come when she knew the other two were. Meems decided she’d look after her daddy while we were out enjoying ourselves. She’s always been a daddy’s girl and looks to remain so. Mind you he spoils her to death as well. Because I didn’t have a good relationship with my own father until I’d transitioned and he’d had to accept me or lose me after my mother died, I really wanted Si to have a real part in our children’s lives and given the constraints of his job, he does show some effort in doing so. We’ve had the odd disaster when he should have been somewhere to support one of the girls and he’s been unable to get there for whatever reason ad of course the same has once or twice happened to me as well. I think the situation is called life.

Saturday morning dawned but only just because of the rain it was pretty misty and murky and dark. After breakfast I sorted out my waterproofs, Danielle had some she used for cycling and with Trish we improvised putting an old pair of my gaiters on her legs above her wellingtons which with her long cagoule thing, meant she’d be mostly dry. Livvie took one look at the weather and went back to bed.

We met at the rendezvous with the other surveyors, there were five of us in all with two of us having licences. We split into two groups and agreed to do half the plot each. That meant we had about fifty boxes to check. I’ve done more on my own and with the greatest of respect, Danni and Trish were going to slow me down. I decided to keep them with me and they’d share in any finds we had. Trish had her camera and Danielle would be our weighing lady and carried my little balance with her.

Essentially, what we did was to locate the boxes, then after covering the hole in the back to prevent any occupants escaping, I’d check the box by sliding the lid a little to see into the box. Any nesting material, unless there was blue tit or eggs in the nest, we’d have them off the tree and checked them. So far we’d checked about five with nests and had nothing. I was keeping a record as we went along. An hour later, we were into our final dozen when my phone rang to say the others had had one dormouse details would be given on Monday and they were soaked and going home.

We soldiered on and with two more boxes to go, we found a torpid dormouse in an otherwise empty box. It was a little female and weighed just eleven grams. So she was presumably saving energy by sleeping away the poor weather. A few yards further on we got our second dormouse and this one was more lively requiring some effort to keep her in hand she was wriggling so much. She was five grams heavier and I wondered if the weight difference was the real cause of the difference in their activity levels. Trish got to check her for the microchips but she nor the other one had been chipped and with the weather as it was, i wasn’t going to start doing them in the heavy rain.

Although we were all quite damp despite the wet weather gear but my two assistants thought they’d had good fun and I was pleased that two of my kids had participated in one of my favourite activities. It was very important to me that at least some of them did and did so willingly. Hopefully the younger ones would get a chance to try it as they got older. Walking round soggy woodland is no place for young children.

We stopped for a drink on the way home aware that David was probably serving up lunch to the rest of the family—at least those who were home—while we struggled to cope with tea and a plate of chips, while I wrote up my dormouse log. We’re required to keep details and send a summary to Natural England each year to maintain our licences and you need a log to refer to for those summaries. This time it would seem we had three dormice from a hundred boxes—not the best start to a season but neither was it the worst. I am also convinced that climate change is partly responsible for a drop in the population in recent years though I have yet to discover how we prove it because of other variables involved.

My concern is that the mild damp winters cause the animals to emerge from hibernation and then discovering there is no food available attempt hibernation again but don’t then have enough fat to last the winter. There might be other causes including discovery by predators, drowning if there is a lot of rain, or fungal diseases.

It strikes me as puzzling that a creature who is on the edge of its natural range in this country, doesn’t do better here. In very cold weather they can die, they don’t function too well in very hot weather when they become torpid or in cold snaps, when they do the same. On the continent where the weather is by definition, continental, they seem to do better yet it’s colder in winter and hotter in summer, though it’s also normally drier than our oceanic climate—the problem of being a small rock in a large sea.

On completing my log in the dry and warm atmosphere of the cafe, we headed home where the two girls would probably demand a second lunch, though I certainly wouldn’t.

Sunday was forecast to be showery, at times heavy, yet Simon and Tom managed to do some gardening while I did housework in the morning and took Danni to her soccer game in the evening. I sat and watched her play, including scoring a goal and making another, making her the leading goal scorer for the club. Considering she lost some time and fitness to time out and injury, she is quite prolific and she said that if she stayed there next year, she wanted to raise the record by several goals. Currently it stands at seventeen in a season. She effectively got fifteen this year in what was really only half a season. No wonder England want her.

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2955 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

Friday evening eventually arrived and Debbie came for dinner and then we did our sewing with Danni inviting Cindy to come as well. Of the others, only Trish opted to join us. She enjoys her sewing especially embroidery and is getting quite good at it. When Debbie saw what Trish was working on, she said she felt quite inadequate.

“Cathy, would you speak to a transgender group?”

“About what?” I asked feeling horrified.

“About having adopted tg kids.”

“I don’t know, I’d hate for any to be identified because of it.”

“We’ve got a joint tg and Mermaid’s meeting and the speaker has gone down with some sudden illness, I wondered if you could save the day?”

“I don’t know, it pushes my buttons somewhat and may remind people of my history.”

“You’d be amongst friends.”

“Many of whom have problems. If it got out that I was married to a wealthy family, it could get a bit rough given how many just manage to scrape by financially.”

“That’s not your fault, is it?”

“That wouldn’t matter. Years ago I was accused of being a gold-digger because I was marrying Simon, who comes from a wealthy family.”

“Yeah I know, the Camerons.”

“Didn’t you say the daughter who died was transgender?”

“Yes.”

“Could you talk about her, that would leave the others out of it.”

“It seems unfair to always dump all this sort of stuff on Billie, just because she’s dead.”

“Whatever is said can’t hurt her, can it?”

“No but I like to preserve the purity of her memory.”

“Surely there’s nothing to besmirch that anyway is there?”

“No but I like to talk of my daughter without being asked if she was a boy.”

“Can you think of anyone else who could talk to the group at such short notice?”

In my mind’s eye, I could see Billie who was smiling and nodding at me. “Okay, I’ll talk to your bloody group.”

“Wonderful, I’m sure they’ll all enjoy it.”

“Yeah, well, I need to jot a couple of things down on paper for tomorrow. Oh what sort of clothing do people wear to these things?”

“The TV/TS group is very variable and given that some of them have limited opportunity to dress, they often appear over the top. Don’t you remember that from your early days?”

“No, I never joined any groups, except cycling ones.”

“Oh, okay. So this could be educational for you then?”

“I doubt it, groups are groups it’s only the reason for membership that varies.”

“Can I quote you on that?”

“If you want. I expect you’ll find someone interesting said it before I did.”

“Possibly, but for the moment I do at least know who said it to me.”

“Yeah but in fifty or sixty years when you come to write your memoirs you’ll have forgotten.”

“I doubt it. You’re the best boss I’ve ever had and also the most beautiful.” I felt myself blush very red, or it was considering the amount of heat I was giving off.

“Right, I don’t want anyone to know anything more than they have to, so don’t tell them I’m your boss.”

“How do I introduce you then? Lady Cameron, or Dr Watts?”

“Nah, they’ll think I’m a physician or psychiatrist.”

“Mrs Cameron?”

“Okay, but I suspect someone will recognise me.”

“So, you’re famous and had a trans kid, so what?”

“If their memory is good enough they may also remember my case in the news as well.”

“They should all be on your side anyway, so don’t worry about it.”

“I have been to one or two things like this before and I always upset somebody.”

“How? You’re one of the nicest people I know.”

“Not always.” I blushed again.

Over breakfast I mentioned that I was doing the talk and that I’d be talking about Billie. “You can talk about me if you want,” offered Danielle only keep off the soccer stuff.

“Or me,” said Trish.

“Me too,” said Sammi who was putting in a rare appearance at breakfast, even for a Saturday.

“Go on, do me as well,” said Julie.

“Me too,” said Livvie.

“Dummy, you’re not trans,” criticised Trish.

“How d’you know, I might want to be a boy for all you know, Miss Smartarse.”

“Yeah, well perhaps if you had to live as one for a bit you might appreciate my situation a bit better,” Trish threw back at her.

“Yeah, okay. Mummy, can I live as a boy...” I almost swooned at this before realising they were just teasing each other. Then she laughed and said, “I can tell what it’s like living with all these weirdos.”

“Huh, you’re as weird as any nutter I can think of,” Trish fired back.

I shouted at this point and the banter stopped.

The weather was warmer and surprisingly it was a bank holiday weekend, obviously, no one had told the weather as it usually manages to rain or blow or both. I opted to wear a dress, a short-sleeved one with a vee neck and slightly fuller skirt which came to just above my knee. It was a blue and white floral pattern, the flowers being only a few millimetres in diameter. I wore blue sandals with a two-inch wedge heel which I could stand or walk comfortably in.

Adding a simple bangle and my watch and a simple gold chain necklace I did a basic makeup and my hair was down. I usually wear it up or in a ponytail so hopefully wouldn’t be recognised by casual observers.

I took the Jaguar and hoped not too many people saw it. The venue—Henry’s new hotel on Hayling Island. As I’ve only been there once, I hoped I wouldn’t be recognised by staff there either—I suppose if I was. I was—not much I could do about it anyway.

I arrived at three o’clock and was met by Debbie. She was excited but also flustered, we’ve had a fourteen-year-old talk about being trans and her mother ended up on stage too.”

“So are you saying you don’t need me?”

“Not quite.”

“Anyone talked about having several trans kids?”

“You’d do that? What about the children, are they happy about it?”

“Amazingly, yes. They volunteered I could talk about them but obviously, I shall have to try and maintain some privacy, so will use different names.”

“Yeah, that’s okay.”

I thought it had better be or I won’t be talking at all.

I had arrived in the middle of a tea break and Debbie went off and found me one and a chocolate biscuit. I hoped the sugar would give me a little extra energy although normally I feed off the energy of the audience when I’m lecturing, I assumed this would be similar, at least once I got going.

As I finished my tea and biccie, Debbie came to lead me to the stage they had at the back of the room. “Here we go, Cathy. I’m just going to introduce you as Cathy and tell them you’re going to talk about having more than one trans kid.”

“Okay, let’s do it,” I replied wondering if I was doing the wrong thing.

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2956 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

“Right folks, if everyone can get back to their seats.” Debbie paused for a moment. “Our last speaker is a mother who has four transgender daughters, so I thinks she’s something special, please welcome, Cathy.”

I counted about thirty people there with a few more dashing in either from the toilets or the bar. “Good afternoon,” I said and received a rumble back which I assumed was a reply.

“I’ll start off by confessing that I can’t have children or shall more correctly state I can’t conceive my own children despite the most advanced techniques, so I was hoping to adopt. My first foster child was foisted upon me by someone who I can only surmise decided her daughter would have a better chance at life with me than with her. She told me she had to leave the country to deal with an injured hubby and I foolishly offered to have her little girl while she was away. She’d been involved in a road traffic accident and was at that time unable to walk. However, she found some shoes of mine, red ones with high heels and her desire to try them was greater than her injuries or so it seemed because an hour or two later she was tottering about in my shoes.

“When I took her in for a check-up the paediatrician was astonished and asked me to see if I could do the same with another little girl. She’d had a head injury and although everything seemed healed she wasn’t able to walk. Believe it or not the red shoes worked again and with a couple of days she was walking as well. The second child was biologically a boy but identified as female. That was several years ago and she has never appeared as a boy since. She goes to school as a girl and is doing very well, she’s very bright—as transgender children often are.

“The third one was discovered lying injured on a rubbish heap. For some reason one winter’s early morning, I found myself driving down near the docks and spotted something unusual lying on top of a pile of rubbish. It turned out to be a young woman who was wearing bleached blonde hair, a very short skirt and over knee stiletto boots. She looked like a tart who’d either got herself blotto or beaten up. It was a cold morning so I couldn’t leave her lying there and as I’d forgotten my mobile, I picked her up and was going to take her up to the hospital but she begged me not to, so I took her home if only to get her warm and give her some food and a drink.

“It transpired that she was also originally a boy who was living with unhelpful parents and had gone clubbing having changed at her friend’s house. She was picked up and by a punter who on discovering her true sex, beat her senseless.

“Before someone suggests I get a kick out of changing boys into girls, I have to say all these girls were already presenting as female when I met them. The next two are different. They both arrived as boys.” There was a ripple of noise on hearing the previous statement.

“The first was less masculine than the other and recognised the first transgender girl who they’d teased somewhat in the same children’s home. However, once I laid firm boundaries that if they tormented her, they’d be back to the home the next day—they’d come to stay with us over Christmas. I assumed they were ordinary boys and was pleased as it would help the younger girls learn how to form relationships with boys but within a year the younger boy was encouraged to wear skirts and act like a girl by my daughters and took to it very well. I did try to dissuade her but she insisted she wanted to be a girl. She certainly seemed happier as one, although I think we all preferred her to stay as a boy—we had enough girls. Then her experiment with new gender roles stopped when she had a brain haemorrhage and died while we were out cycling. It broke my heart and I still feel a void there. My only consolation was that she had been happier the last few months of her life than she had been the whole of her earlier life, this wasn’t just my opinion, her psychiatrist and the family GP all said so as did her teachers.

“The other boy who came to stay, was all boy—or so I thought—although he was in danger of being overwhelmed by all the girls, he soldiered on seeming to enjoy himself and he actually got into a couple of fights over his sister—the one who died. All my adopted children decided they would become brothers or sisters to the others and largely it has really worked.

“As a boy, he was confident, sporty and seemed to like girls then when he was twelve he was indecently assaulted while in a public toilet in France, on a school trip. His friend was similarly attacked. The friend on returning to the UK castrated himself, removing his penis as well as his testes. Because they’d gone through quite a lot together my son, with my support continued the friendship. I learned afterwards that the friend was calling himself by a girl’s name and that he and my son had been dressing up as girls and using makeup.

“When I found out at first I was disappointed, I had plenty of girls and didn’t need any more. So I tried to discourage him while encouraging the friendship—in school they were being described as gay and various other untrue names. Then my boy decided he liked wearing dresses and makeup. I wasn’t very happy but having given the others room to explore their identity, I had to do the same for him.

“We went up to Scotland and he couldn’t decide if he wanted to dress as a boy or a girl. Seizing the initiative I made him dress as a girl for our stay. When there we discovered another transgender girl and I tried to help her escape her transphobic parents. Sadly it didn’t work and she took her own life. My son decided as a homage to her he would stay in role as a girl until we went up to her funeral. I tried to talk him out of it but he insisted.

“The other child who’d been assaulted in France, with whom he’d been in regular contact invited him over one morning and after knocking him out removed much of the meatus of his penis and also his testes, destroying the tissue so it couldn’t be rebuilt.

“The surgeon seeing this child wearing makeup and with massive damage to his genitals did a vaginoplasty, assuming he wanted to be a girl, except at that stage he hadn’t made up his mind and required some intensive therapy to deal with the shock.

“She has since realised that she is a very pretty girl and enjoys flirting with boys. She seems to have a very much better life than she did as a boy.

“The final one, is a university graduate who was referred to see me as I’d helped some others, including my own girls. My other daughters helped her become a very clever and extremely beautiful woman.

“That’s my family or some of it, any questions?”

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2957 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

“How can you possibly have four transgender daughters, you must be encouraging them.” This was asked by someone who was obviously male despite wearing a dress.

“I didn’t encourage them but I did allow them space and time to explore gender roles, so I didn’t discourage them.”

“But most transgender children go on to become gay not seek reassignment.”

“I can’t answer for others but my own seem content in their new roles.”

“Only because you make them.”

“I can assure you, Cathy doesn’t make them live as girls, it’s all their own choosing,” Debbie stepped in.

“You should have discouraged them, all you’re doing is building up problems for later life.”

“On what authority do you make that pronouncement?” I fired back at him.

“Well it’s obvious, isn’t it?”

“No because for the most part all I saw was depression or frustration because they wanted to dress as girls—actually they wanted to become girls, I simply allowed them to experiment.”

“But you shouldn’t have—can’t you see, they’d have been normal if you’d made them toe the line.”

“I disagree. Two were presenting as female, one eventually gave in to her urges and the encouragement of some of my daughters and the last one was doing it without my knowledge. When he revealed it to me, I was less than enthusiastic but he kept on and I finally allowed him to crossdress. She took to it like a duck to water despite having been quite a boyish boy. My husband was very disappointed but agreed if it was what she wanted to do, we’d let her in the hope she’d get fed up. She hasn’t.”

“How did they find you?” asked a younger person.

“I was asked to foster the first child who was subsequently dumped on me and if you recall had mobility problems. When we got her mobilised by a bit of sleight of hand, the doctor she was under asked if I do the same with another child who happened to be transgender but presenting as female. She was aged five but had negotiated the right to wear girl’s clothing and be called by a girl’s name.”

“At age five, come off it,” was heckled.

“She is a remarkable child. At her custody hearing, when we were seeking to adopt her, she actually followed the judge through his chambers and negotiated with him.”

“How do we know you’re not just making this up?”

“Why would I do that? It makes no sense. Look, I didn’t want to come here and talk about my children but I did as a favour to Debbie. I know we constitute a cluster effect in Portsmouth, but as they all came from here to begin with, what difference does it make?”

“I reckon you con them into becoming girls.”

“I can assure you I don’t and they are all under the care of a consultant psychiatrist with some experience of gender identity disorder.” I was beginning to wish I hadn’t bothered.

“I don’t believe you.”

“This morning, I was going to talk about my experiences with my one daughter and mentioned this at breakfast and to my surprise, they all said I could talk about them if it helped someone else. In part, I wished I’d brought one of them with me, to confirm my statement. If I’d brought one of them, she’d have argued the toss with her for the rest of the evening, she doesn’t give up and loves to argue. If I’d brought the teenager, she’d have flounced off having told you where to go. Believe me, I didn’t force anyone of them to dress or act like girls.”

“But if they’re living in that sort of environment, isn’t it more likely they’ll do the same as the rest of the girls?” So far this was the first bit of logic I’d had thrown at me.

“I don’t know and accept it could have been a factor although I did discuss this with the paediatric psychiatrist we use. She could see no evidence for it and said that she’d look out for it more in future.”

“Are they following some unconscious agenda you have?”

“Again I asked this of the psychiatrist and she could find no evidence for it but I am aware of it.”

“Aren’t you just in denial?”

“I don’t think so and neither does anyone else.”

“You mentioned other daughters, how many do you have, exactly?”

“Ten.”

“Ten girls and you wonder why the boys don’t want to compete? What are you some sort of man-hating lesbian?”

“I neither hate men nor am I gay, I’m happily married to a lovely man.”

“So you haven’t tried to convert him then?”

“What have I got to do to prove to you that I didn’t cause any of them to choose to be female, they all did it themselves, I just gave them space and made no judgement about them.”

“I think that’s enough now, let’s thank Cathy for coming to speak to us this afternoon.” Debbie once again stepped in and closed down the session. “Dinner is at seven but the bar is open from six, see you all later.”

“Thanks, Cathy, sorry there were some hostiles here today, normally it’s better than this.”

“Don’t bother asking me again, Debbie.” I walked away deciding to visit the loo before driving home. I’d just emerged when I ran into one of the awkward squad.

“You’re weird, you are,” he said to me—this coming from a man in a dress while we were standing in the ladies loo.

“And you’re not? Try looking in the mirror,” I said angrily as I pushed past them.

“I don’t damage children,” was called at my back. I chose to ignore it and go home because there was grave danger I’d have torn him to shreds both mentally and physically. I stormed out of the conference area and just my luck was recognised by a member of staff as I walked through reception.

“Lady Cameron, how nice to see you. Is there anything we can do for you today?”

“No,” I said and walked on to the car park, jumped in my car and drove out faster than I should. All the way home I decided that I would never have anything to do with groups of trannies ever again no matter what the cause.

I calmed down and drove home sedately. The girls were waiting for me when I got home and they were horrified when I mentioned the seeming abuse I received because I had so many transgender children, which they couldn’t accept because it was outside their experience or comprehension.

From now on I’ll stick to rodents, don’t get the same sort of problems from them.

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2958 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

“Hang on a moment, Mummy,” said Julie, “you got abused because you have four transgender daughters?”

“More or less, they assumed you were all tricked into following some hidden agenda I have to turn all the boys in Portsmouth into girls.”

“Why?

“I don’t know, they didn’t tell me.”

She laughed.

“Why did they think that, Mummy?” asked Danielle.

“Think what, sweetheart?”

“That you’d tricked us—into being girls.”

“It’s a theme that arises in lots of stories in the gender swap genre, boys especially being forced or tricked into being girls and finding they like it—except most boys wouldn’t like it, would they?”

“I did, but you didn’t trick me or force me—I still like being a girl, it’s better than being a boy.”

“Don’t listen to her, she just loves all the fetish stuff like makeup and high heeled shoes,” teased Julie.

“So what?” pouted Danielle, “And so do you.”

“Yeah so?”

“Girls, please. Today was traumatic enough without you making lots of noise.” They both apologised and went off to do something elsewhere, probably bicker—they seemed to enjoy it, or Danni did but then she was a teenage girl.

“Next time you do one of those things I’ll come with you for moral support,” offered Trish.

“Thank you, darling, but I doubt I’ll be doing another one.”

“Why not?”

“Because they seem to like criticising me.”

“Is that because they think you’re an ordinary woman?

“I don’t know, sweetheart, but it could be.”

I thought about things, I wasn’t introduced as anything other than ‘Cathy who had four transgender daughters.’ So they might well have thought I was cisgendered or whatever the term is. But surely enough of them knew about me to quash that idea? I didn’t know, not that it mattered that much to me. I just wouldn’t do anything like that again. I thought back to the one I did in Bristol for Caroline’s group when I took Julie to advise on makeup and hair. It wasn’t exactly a brilliant outcome either. Then I thought about how Caroline had been manipulated and effectively destroyed by that woman. I did wonder if I should contact her to see how things were but then she could just as easily contact me.

I decided that in her case I’d let sleeping dogs lie. Our final goodbye had been less than satisfactory and she seemed somewhat lacking in both gratitude and graciousness.

I was sitting in the kitchen drinking some tea when the phone rang and as i wasn’t expecting any calls, let Julie answer it as it was more likely to be for her than it was for me. To my surprise, she called out that it was for me but had gone before I could ask who it was.

“Hello?”

“Cathy, it’s Debbie.”

“Oh hello,” I said thinking all sorts of negatives to which I didn’t give voice.

“Look I’m sorry for the way you were treated by some of our people.”

“Fine, I accept your apology but don’t ask me to talk to them again.”

“Don’t worry, I doubt I’ll be talking to them myself.”

“Why is that?”

“Shall we say I appreciate your position a bit more than I did partly because I share some of it.”

“What happened to the political firebrand?”

“I think I realised I didn’t have much in common with most of the people who attended. I’m not criticising them for being transvestites or whatever, they’re entitled to be who they think they are but I don’t think that qualifies as female.”

I nodded vigorously even though she couldn’t see it, “I’m not going to disagree.”

“This is what you’ve been trying to tell me isn’t it, in a roundabout way?”

“Yes.”

“And why you live in stealth?”

“Yes.”

“So you’re not into support groups?”

“Not for myself, no. I never have been though I’m aware for some they are probably very useful. However, in virtually all groups you get petty politics and that becomes a pain for everyone else.”

“Well I think I’ll try and function without one from now on.”

“There’s nothing to stop you maintaining friendships with one or two of them because with them you can be totally relaxed since they know your history.”

“Yeah, but it doesn’t move me on, does it?”

“Depends upon whether or not you’re ready to move on.”

“I think so. I’d rather have been with John than the bunch of cranks and crackpots half of them turned out to be.”

“Don’t let it get to you...”

“Yeah, my skin is pretty thick, but the way you were treated was shameful.”

“One or two saw me as a woman who was intent on revenging herself upon the entire male population of the United Kingdom, by changing them all into females.”

“Yes, that’s about the bottom line.”

“So they didn’t see me as transgender?”

“No and I didn’t mention it.”

“It possibly explains some of their hostility. Some of them don’t like women even though they want to be like us. I suspect it’s about the politics of envy but don’t quote me.”

“That makes much more sense than their supposed concern for the safety of your children.”

“That might have been the motive for one or two but jealousy is much more likely.”

Seeing as we were now singing from the same songsheet, I encouraged her to drop the group and get a relationship with someone who was reliable and yet a safe pair of hands.

“That’s easier said than done, Cathy. You were just incredibly lucky to get someone the first time you wore a dress.”

“Yes I know and I still thank the universe when I can reflect upon it, not that there’s much room for that these days.”

“Anyway, all the delegates who stayed in to cast nasturtiums aren’t worth bothering so they can go and hang themselves.”

“Debbie, you can’t just dump them.”

“Too late, I have and feel like a load off my shoulders. Anyway, are we sewing on Friday night?”

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2959 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

So Debbie had come round to my way of thinking. I wasn’t sure if that meant she had matured or that I was validated on my experiences and subsequent opinions. Did it matter? Not really, her life was hers to live and I had determined I wasn’t going anywhere near another support group, unless it was for orphaned dormice or confused professors.

Stella seemed to think the group had been pushing its own agenda, but what that was she didn’t seem to know any more than I did. The girls were horrified as I’d previously mentioned and fortunately, they had a family support group available should they need it so didn’t require external ones. I accept that can be a mixed blessing because families know all the background info and don’t pull punches in giving it straight to you, but sometimes you need that sort of response.

Monday soon came around and before I knew it, I was back in work supervising post grad students or invigilating exams. At least when doing that I could take my laptop and deal with emails or draft letters while occasionally wandering up and down the rows of desks—well little folding table things we use. I’ve got an old one in my office with my laser printer on it.

Invigilating is so boring. You can’t sit and read anything very deep or long because you need to be alert to any unusual behaviour in case of cheating. Also you may have a hundred very stressed individuals sitting there, usually youngsters but not always and heart attacks are not unknown or even epileptic fits. Then there was the young bloke who suddenly jumped up from his seat and yelled in agony before falling over in the aisle—he had cramp—he’d been running that morning and it was quite cool.

The other invigilator took him to the back of the hall and massaged his leg. He lost ten or so minutes of his exam time but he seemed able to continue. I settled down to my emails and to my astonishment received one from Dave Lane, Des’s father, asking me to call by the next time I was up in Bristol, though he wouldn’t say why.

I think I’d only seen him once since Des’ funeral when we were all rather upset but he had told me that the will would be a surprise to me as Des had told him he fell in love with me.

You’ll probably remember he was engaged to marry Stella when he died in a car accident, yet he left all his property to me, not her. I’d let the house and banked the money in a fund for Puddin’ as she was his daughter. I still couldn’t understand why he’d done it, because it seemed a strange thing to do, but possibly he was going to change it in Stella’s favour and didn’t have time to carry it out.

It had bothered me for a long time that he fancied me more than Stella who was a genetic female, but I had resisted his charms, one of only two women to do so whereas she hadn’t. Did that cheapen her in his eyes? Mind you, they’d had sort of sex while they were both at school, Stella told me she’d lost her virginity to him, which gave her a degree of kudos amongst some of the girls in her dormitory.

Des had met me first when I was still pre-op and had pretended to seduce me or attempted to, to wind up Simon. It had failed although I felt a sort of frisson from his efforts. He had an animal magnetism which made women want him sexually even though they knew it was potentially disastrous, especially for those in established relationships. Normally, Des didn’t seem to care about the women he seduced until he met me—or so I was told. I found it ludicrous. How could someone fancy me, especially when I didn’t have the wherewithal to consummate it and also that they knew about my shortcomings? It made no sense to me, but perhaps that’s how life is away from my tidy little ivory tower.

So had I wanted him, even though I was promised to Simon? In some ways, a definite yes. There was something about him that gave me a frisson of excitement, that doing something with him was wrong and you knew it but didn’t care—for that moment at least. Quite how I’d held out, I wasn’t sure except I’d tried to keep Simon in my mind the whole time I was alone with Des.

I had awful problems with my conscience regarding his will and my inheritance, as Stella got nothing nor did his daughter. I should have told her immediately but was too cowardly fearing it might make her do something stupid or destroy our relationship. In the end it did neither but at times it was close.

The exam finished and we collected the papers and dismissed the candidates. They possibly had other papers to sit, but this one was now over for good or not. I was very pleased it wasn’t one I had to mark.

Debbie turned up at lunch time and suggested we went for lunch together. I didn’t really want to as I’d heard enough about the weekend but she wanted to talk about her relationship with John, one of my technicians—should they get engaged? As they’d only known each other five minutes, I told her I thought she was rushing things. She told me it was John’s idea. I wasn’t sure I entirely believed her. However, she’d met his mum, so perhaps she was telling the truth. At least he knew about her history.

After lunch, Jacquie sent me a text to say the Aga wasn’t working properly. I called her and she said one of the ovens wasn’t working as was one of the hot plates. I told her to call the repair chap. I also wondered why Amanda hadn’t noticed and reluctantly, Jacquie told me that Amanda was in David’s caravan, which is parked in the drive way up by the garages as the builders are still working on his cottage.

It looked as if I may have to have words with David. I didn’t really care what he did in his own time but seducing the help on my time is a dismissible offence, surely he knew that?

David called me to say the Aga was kaput what did I want him to do? I asked him what the options were, telling him that Jacquie had called the Aga man. He said he’d cook on the gas range, which he usually does anyway, so why he’d phoned I wasn’t sure.

I finished up some emails arranged a meeting for the next day with some of my staff before heading off to the school hoping I’d be able to get everyone in my Jaguar.

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2960 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

Somehow we managed to squeeze everyone into the car, with Trish and Mima in the back acting as rear gunners—they’d done something about the battle of Britain in history. I didn’t like to point out that rear gunners lasted about three trips and fighter pilots about three weeks. The attrition rate was enormous in both allied and axis airforces.

I thought I might watch the movie of the Battle of Britain again, although I didn’t like war films generally, Ron Goodwin’s score coupled with Sir William Walton’s Spitfire prelude and fugue make it worth struggling through Susannah York’s wooden acting and Laurence Olivier frowning and sighing as Air Chief Marshall ‘Stuffy’ Dowding. He was the man who saved Britain from the Luftwaffe though the costs were high in terms of pilots and aircraft on both sides.

My preferred aircraft from those times was the mosquito which I think is the prettiest aeroplane ever built and I saw one fly—I think a replica—but it was so beautiful, a real racing aircraft made of balsa and plywood and covered in canvas. The originals were unarmed and used for photo reconnaissance as they flew quite high and faster than anything the Germans had. Later versions carried bombs and had cannons in the nose becoming fighter bombers. I shall never forget the sleek lines and the sound of those twin Rolls Royce engines.

“What are you thinking about, Mummy?” asked Livvie noticing my lack of interaction with the girls.

“Nothing much, why?” Well I could hardly tell them I was thinking about a World War 2 aircraft, could I?

“You seem very quiet, Mummy?” she persisted.

“Am I? Okay, you lot, change and get your homework started and I might do some sewing with you after dinner.” My comment was met with a mixture of cheers and groans.

Trish and Danielle enjoy sewing, while Livvie hates it and Meems is a bit cack handed, last time she did any with us she sewed her material to her skirt. Took me half an hour to undo it. Julie is quite good but she’s often in work or going out when we’re sewing so she rarely joins us.

I had some repairs to do to various bits of school uniforms, which I threatened to make the wearers do themselves, except that was Livvie and Meems and we’d have been there all night. Trish eventually agreed to hem Meem’s skirt and I did
Livvie’s blazer—she’d somehow split the shoulder seam. She claimed not to know how she’d done it and I couldn’t see how in normal wear and tear it would happen, but it had. It took most of my evening to sort so the repair didn’t show.

To my delight Julie did come and join us and we all chatted as we sewed, except Trish. When she’s concentrating her tongue is sticking out and she doesn’t hear half of what is said let alone reply to it.

At nine I told the younger children it was time for bed and they eventually managed to get there by half past—they could dither for England—Danielle was sent up at ten, though she reads for a bit and Simon and I went up at eleven leaving Julie and Sammi talking. I wasn’t quite sure what Jacquie was doing, possibly reading for her course.

Simon appeared tired claiming the Brexit nonsense was losing his bank and the rest of the economy money it didn’t need to, due to the uncertainty of the referendum outcome. Believing that it was better to remain in the EU, I decided that was how I’d vote but it took a long argument with their father for Julie and Sammi to agree with me.

Of course if England votes out and Scotland votes in, the nationalists will push for another referendum on independence and probably win it, so destroying the United Kingdom. If that happens I hope Boris and Gove will feel proud of themselves, because I think they’re like a pair of nasty schoolboys voting to abolish school because they think they’ve learned enough. Sadly, Cameron doesn’t look likely to take his revenge on them—how about locking them up together in the Tower for the next two hundred years?

I mentioned to Simon about David Lane’s email to call by when I was next in Bristol. He was as puzzled as I was. I’d kept Des’ house and rented it out to the same person for the past couple of years, the proceeds going into a trust fund for Puddin’, which was now quite sizeable. Simon controlled it, as he did with the funds we’d set up for most of the others, to maximise profits for them—they’d come in handy in the event of going to university or if they married and wanted to buy a house.

“So what does he want?” asked Simon.

“I have no idea, unless he wants to see his granddaughter.”

“That’s a point, you could always take her with you, I’m sure Stella would agree.”

“It’s hardly like she ever goes to see them, is it?”

“Not as far as I know.”

“That’s probably it then.”

“Yes, probably,” I agreed but had no idea if it was right or not. I had mentioned it at dinner but Stella said nothing so I’d have to ask her outright. If she refused I wasn’t sure what I’d do or say, especially to Dave and Sue lane; and Stella could be awkward, even with her back to her old self.

If she did refuse, I’d ask Simon to speak to her. Once before, she suggested that her dad, Henry and Tom were enough grandparents for her two girls, with Monica of course, as well. Except part of me felt you could never have too many grandparents provided you gave all of them definite guidelines for how you wanted your kids treated—with parity, for instance.

What else could the Lanes want? I couldn’t think of anything, so it was probably about their grandchild. I drifted off to sleep and when I awoke the next morning, Simon and Sammi had gone off to work without me even hearing them go. At least it was light now, well in theory it was but the heavy cloud and cold winds made it feel as if we’d gone straight from spring to autumn—again. I kept trying to understand that Portsmouth is about as far south as one can go in the British Isles and south is supposed to be warmer—so how come temperatures were higher in bloody Scotland than down here? Global warming I suspect but doubtless, the Scottish nationalists will claim credit for the sunshine.

I showered then woke the girls, thinking how I might ask Stella if she’d let me take Puddin’ with me when I next went to Bristol, which I was thinking I might do on Saturday. Oh well, breakfast could prove interesting.

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2961 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

“I’m going to Bristol at the weekend, I wondered if I might take Pud and perhaps take her over to see Dave and Sue Lane?”

“You taking any of yours with you?”

“I haven’t asked them yet but I suspect Trish or Livvie might want to come, meems will want to be with her dad.”

“She really loves Simon, doesn’t she?”

“Yes she does, and he spoils her rotten, but given her own father was an absent figure for most of her life, it’s understandable that she tries to compensate with Simon, who thrives on it, too.”

“He’s as much of a father figure to my two as well, with Tom and Dad, so maybe seeing Dave lane will be good for her.”

“Why don’t you come as well?”

“Uh no thanks, I don’t think I dare show my face anywhere near them after what happened at Des’ funeral.”

“Stella, you were ill, no one thought badly of you, especially Dave and Sue—they understood.”

“That’s more than I did, no perhaps next time.”

“I’ll have to see if they’re available.” I went off and phoned and they said they would be. I hinted that I was bringing some of the children if that was okay and it was. I decided not to raise their hopes in case Stella does an about face and stop Puddin’ coming with me.

I asked Livvie and she said she’d come but Trish wasn’t that interested saying something about doing something with Sammi. As that’s a rare event I decided I’d leave them to it. I didn’t expect Danielle to want to waste her Saturday but she surprised me and said she’d come.

Later on that day I had a call from Andy Bond to say they were still investigating Joshua Dell but it looked as if some sort of prosecution was going to happen or at least be passed to the DPP to decide if there was a case to answer. While it was still up in the air, it did sound positive so I felt okay about it.

There’d been a recent case in the UK about some photographer a British man who’d been convicted of goodness knows how many child sex crimes in Malaysia ranging from six months old to teenage. How anyone could harm a six month old baby is mind boggling, especially for their own sexual gratification—it just doesn’t compute in my mind, as I suspect it wouldn’t in most people’s minds, men or women. I feel he should serve the rest of his life behind bars, but this is England so I know he won’t—it’s too expensive to keep him behind bars. However long they keep him there, he’ll still be a threat when he comes out which I think is unacceptable. I mean he abused about seventy kids and took videos and photos of it to share with his twisted friends on the dark net. Had it been my kids he’d messed with, he’d be lying in a ditch somewhere minus various bits of his anatomy—like his vital organs, arms, legs and head.

I calmed myself down—child sexual abuse was inexcusable and unforgiveable and totally unacceptable anywhere. It is illegal as well as immoral and makes me angry. I went and made some more tea and went back to my paperwork—like marking or second marking exam papers—gives new meaning to tedium and I hate it. I’d rather wash down one of the laboratories than realise how many of our students hadn’t grasped the basics of either biology or ecology. Was that because they weren’t there? It certainly looked as if they’d been absent, because, let’s face it, if you attend enough lectures and tutorials or read the odd book, you tend to learn something. Some of these struggled to write coherently, to form a sentence let alone form an argument or discuss a hypothesis. I suspect most of them thought it was the diagonal bit in a right angled triangle.

We did have three bright sparks who could well get firsts if they kept their concentration up. I hadn’t seen their papers yet so I’d wait and see, but a few of them looked to be re-sitting or being sent down for lack of effort.

Every year I give a similar warning, we’re a university not a social club, that the students were there to study or apply their learning. If they didn’t without very good reason, they would end up being sent down, an ignominy in anyone’s language.

The week seemed to drag by then suddenly galloped past in the final furlong and it was up to Bristol with Danni, Livvie and Puddin’. I was pleasantly surprised that Stella let me take her and she chattered away with Livvie in the back of the car while Danni either listened to the radio or chatted with me. I also let her set the satnav to the Lane’s house and we arrived at my parent’s old house at mid morning. The weather was nice, nicer than it had been at Portsmouth, so we set to the chores I’d identified as needing done before we went to see the Lanes.

The younger girls helped me with the housework while Danni in shorts and vest mowed the lawns for me. I then treated them to fish and chips for their lunch, going to get it while Danni watched the younger children. It was from the shop where Malcolm Bragg had worked when I’d last seen him, a couple or more years ago. He wasn’t there but the quality of the product was still good.

Replete, we cleaned up and set off for Des’ parent’s house, it was now two o’clock in the afternoon. I hoped we’d be finished by three so we could go and enjoy the sunshine, perhaps to grab an ice cream and a walk along the canal.

The house was in a part of Bristol I didn’t know very well, not surprising as it’s a biggish city once being England’s second city, though that has been usurped by either Manchester or Birmingham these days. Despite the satnav, we appeared to have got rather lost and I had to phone them and ask for directions. Dave thought it was hilarious, given I’d spent much of my life there. I found it embarrassing.

Danni discovered we’d entered the wrong post code, so were lucky we hadn’t ended up in Swindon or Bath—mind you, Bath is a lovely city unlike Swindon, which used to be a railway town—they had a huge depot there. Nowadays, it’s known as the place of roundabouts, some of which confuse people who’ve lived there all their lives. Thankfully, we hadn’t ended up there and given our luck so far that day, we’d probably run out of fuel driving round in circles.

It wasn’t to be, and I spotted Dave waving to us at the end of his drive. At last we were there and while Danni entered our next destination in the satnav, I parked between their caravan and their large Skoda car, which I presumed pulled it. I hoped we weren’t going to be here too long.

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2962 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

“Who have we here?” asked Dave Lane, his wife standing beside him.

“This is Danielle, Livvie, who are mine and this other young lady is, Desiree or as we call her, Puddin’.” With that Puddin’ blushed and smiled nervously.

“Our granddaughter?” gasped Sue.

“Yes, she thought it was time she saw her grandparents, didn’t you, Pud?”

“Yes,” she said squirming. I simply thought it was easiest to get things over as quickly as possible.

Needless to say, they made a huge fuss of her but remembered the other two as well, although Danni and Livvie were both mature enough to cope with all the attention focused on Puddin’.

While Sue fussed around her grandchild Dave asked me how I’d managed to get Stella to let her come. I told him the truth that I’d asked her directly and also told him that Stella was still embarrassed by her behaviour at Des’ funeral, when she was more confused than usual. He asked me to tell her that they’d realised she wasn’t well and hadn’t thought about it since except to miss meeting her and their granddaughter. I speed dialled her and as she answered her mobile I simply said, “Someone would like to say hello,” and handed him the phone. I then walked away to give them both space.

Five minutes later Dave handed me back my phone and smiled. “We’re going to meet halfway next month.”

“Oh good. I’m afraid Tom has been standing in for you as a second granddad, a position I suspect he’d be reluctant to leave.”

“Can you have too many granddads?” asked Dave.

“I suspect not and a surfeit has to be better than a dearth.”

“Absolutely,” he said grinning. “Thanks for forcing the issue.”

“That’s okay, I just sensed the time was right.”

“You women are so good at that sort of thing, aren’t you?”

Now it was my turn to blush, “Uh not always. In fact, I’d suggest my record is pretty poor.”

“Oh,” he said and I shrugged. It was no big deal. I knew what I was and conforming to all sorts of irrational stereotypical behaviour would neither confirm or deny my status, either personally or officially. I suspected on people whose identity was challenged or hung in the balance would consider things any differently.

When I was still living in my previous role, any mention of girly appellations would have embarrassed me but confirmed what I really felt. The same was important when I transitioned, but now, I tend to ignore them because I don’t need to hear them anymore. I suppose it’s a matter of self-confidence in my choices and in reacting to people. Okay, someone reminding me of my previous existence, even now can challenge me somewhat but I feel much stronger in dealing with it, especially as they can’t do anything about it. My status is legally recognised and I’m comfortable with it as are my loved ones—end of...

“You hinted there was something you wished to talk to me about,” I said quietly to Dave.

“Was there?” he looked bemused for a moment. “Oh yes, yes there was. I found a pile of photos of Des and I was going to ask you if you thought Stella or Desiree would like some of them?”

“I think it would be better to ask the two ladies themselves.”

He paused for a moment before agreeing with me. “Yes, you’re probably right. We can ask her when we see her.”

“I suspect that would go down better than telling her which ones you’d thought she’d like. Stella is fiercely independent.”

“I had a feeling she was.”

“But there are ways of dealing with her.”

“Yes, but I lack the ability you women have to do so.”

“In which case I’m sure your strengths lie in other directions.”

“Perhaps,” he said absently.

I glance at my watch and said quietly to him, “We’ve got some further things to sort out, so I’ll have to repossess the children.”

He nodded his understanding and called the children to order and then thanked us all for coming and me for bringing them their beautiful granddaughter. I was simply happy to have been a help.

An hour later we were walking along part of the Kennet and Avon Canal having just eaten a delicious ice cream. The sun was shining and life felt good. A canal barge came puttering by and as it did so the wash disturbed something in a stand of reeds the other side. It looked like a bundle of rags and then we saw arms and legs attached. It was obviously a body. I sent Danielle to go upstream and stop any boats coming down—any sort of motor would chop the corpse to pieces and destroy evidence which may help to identify it.

I immediately called for the police and said what I’d thought we’d found. They promised to have someone there in minutes and they were quite right. A police car came out onto the tow path and parked about fifty yards away, the blue lights still flashing. I pointed out our grisly find and they took my name and address and thanked me. I had a very strong feeling that the body had not met a natural end or just fell into the canal, I suspected that the body had been placed in the water after death, possibly weighted down and somehow the bonds to the weights had become detached and the body had floated to freedom. It looked, face down, like that of a young woman or teenager.

As soon as the police said we could go, we left the scene. All the girls were excited but I felt very sad by putting myself in their position. It might bring some closure but dreadful sadness for a family and I understood how they felt.

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2963 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****
I was glad to get back to Pompey, the thought of what we’d seen in the river was making me feel quite down. We had no information about the body at all, the police just took over and closed down everything, erecting screens around everything. Doubtless there would be police divers searching the bottom of the canal later if there’s any thought of foul play. ( I was going to say fowl play – but I chickened. Okay a pretty poultry joke.)

Of course we don’t know there has been any, we don’t even know if it’s a male or female body, just that it’s dead and not terribly fresh. They can tell how long a body has been in water from the amount of conversion from normal body fat to adipocere—the fat becomes denser and harder.

Was it an accident, someone a bit over the eight falls in and drowns? Or a suicide—it happens, or a murder? Bodies in canals are likely to be discovered eventually as canals are relatively still compared to rivers which usually have a distinct flow to most of them; generally taking the water down to the sea. If you’ve just murdered someone, then dumping the body in a river may be a good way of either disposing of it or destroying forensic evidence which might convict you. Burning is another way to slow down identification and evidence.

A bit later I checked on the Bristol Evening Post website and all it said was that a body had been discovered in the canal by a woman walking with her daughters. See, we’re famous, not. I didn’t say anything to the girls as I didn’t want to have to deal with nightmares, though I’m sure they’ll be speculating about it. I’d not picked up anything from being near the corpse, so it had probably been dead for some time.

“You still upset about the canal?” asked Simon once we got to bed.

“It’s sad but I don’t feel any involvement with it other than being the person to discover it was there and reported it to the police.”

“But if it was some sort of murder dumped in the water and weighted down with stones, it’s curious that it suddenly floats on the surface as you’re walking along the tow path.”

“Oh yeah, it obviously knew I’d be along there at that moment and released itself—duh.” It made him snort and then cough, so it was probably response enough.

“Seriously, you don’t know if that happened or not.”

“No and neither do you, so shut up and cwtch with me.” I felt his arm around me and feeling safe, I relaxed and was asleep minutes later.

I was walking along the canal when I spotted the rags drifting towards me. I was holding a long pole and managed to snag the clothes and draw them towards the bank. Pulling it towards me, I somehow flipped the body over and seeing the face for the first time, realised it was female.

The long hair floated away from the face and as I stared at the swollen pale features the eyes opened and stared back at me. I froze in horror unable to move as the arm raised up into the air towards me and the hand clutched at me...

“Wake up, Cathy, you’re having a bad dream,” I heard Simon’s voice from a long way away as i struggled against the hands that were trying to grab me. “Ouch, stop struggling, woman, you’re safe—that’s me you’re hitting.”

I woke up hot and sweaty where I’d been struggling against Simon. He was wrapped round me like an anaconda trying to stop me hitting him. When I’d come too, we both lay there panting.

“Goodness, you’re strong when you get going, girl.”

“Well, I was frightened. I’ll bet I’ll be all bruised now.”

“Well I could hardly leave you screaming there, could I?”

“Sorry.”

“That’s okay. If it’s all right with you, I’m going back to sleep.”

“Of course, sorry I woke you, darling.”

“Okay,” he rolled over and I decided to slip out of bed and have a wee. I was soaking wet, so I had a little wash and changed into a clean nightdress, then I snuck downstairs and put the kettle on. It was two in the morning on a Sunday. Debbie was coming over for dinner and we were going to do some sewing in the afternoon. I felt it was the least I could do for cancelling the Friday session.

Apparently, John goes to his parents every Sunday for lunch. He invited her to go with him but she preferred David’s cooking—see us academics aren’t as stupid as you think.

I made myself a cup of milky coffee in the microwave and sat blowing on it—well, it was too hot to hold let alone drink. Next time I’ll only do half a cup and add some cold milk. That reminded me, we needed some more tomorrow. I’ll nip out first thing and get some from the corner shop. It’s much dearer than the supermarkets but for them I’d have to wait until after ten because of Sunday trading and its archaic trading laws. Apparently, in the dim and distant past you could buy a girly magazine full of tits and bums but not a copy of the Bible. It was even more ludicrous in those days and it’s not as if anyone ever goes to church. So the keep Sunday special mob are out of touch with the rest of the country, especially when you compare it to the US which is a much more religious country yet the shops are all open. Then again, I suppose Mammon is the patron saint of capitalism.

I finished my coffee and went back to bed. Simon was totally zonked and didn’t even stir when I put my cold feet against his leg. I soon warmed up and turning over with my back to him caused him to roll over into the back of me and put his arm around my waist. It felt snug and safe and I was soon asleep again.

Fortunately, I slept through, so perhaps the milky drink did the trick. I was up fairly early and went down the paper shop and bought the Observer and a couple of two litre bottles of semi skimmed. I’d ask Simon to go and get some more from Tesco or Asda later, but we had enough for breakfast and that was the priority. We also had some frozen ones in the spare freezer but they take all day to thaw.

As I walked into the drive, accompanied by the hound of the Baskervilles, well okay, Kiki, I saw a police car parked in the drive. My heart rate raced as I walked more quickly to see what they wanted.

The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2964 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

---

This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
*****

247 dozen for dodecaphiles.

I practically ran up the drive and into the house Andy Bond was laughing and joking with Tom in the kitchen, “This is good coffee, Professor,” he said indicating the mug in his hand.

“Perhaps ye’d like to tell that to my dochter, she thinks it’s awfy stuff.”

“It is,” I said quickly, “d’you know he gets it free from some company who clean the gunk out of old diesel engines.”

Andy smiled.

“Are you here to arrest him for making disgusting coffee?” I joked hoping to find out what he did want.

“Uh no, Cathy, the Somerset and Avon Police asked us to ask if you’d thought about the body they found in the canal; have you thought of anything new that may help them?”

“No, a boat went past and this bag of rags seemed to be floating in the canal by the reeds and it moved slightly in the wake and I realised there was something inside the rags. I sent the girls to stop any further traffic and called the police.”

“That was exactly the right thing to do, but they’re still trying to identify her.”

“It was a woman, then?”

“Yes, sorry I thought you knew that.”

“Do they know if she just fell in or was she pushed?” I asked.

“It looks like murder.”

“Poor woman.”

“Quite, she had head injuries and a stab wound.”

“Oh.”

“They think she might be of Indian or Pakistani origins. Doesn’t ring any bells?”

“No, why should it?”

“You sometimes get these insights.”

“Not on this one, I’m afraid.”

“Nothing else comes to mind?” he pressed.

“No, I think I told them everything at the time.”

“Okay, if you think of anything however small, call my colleagues in Avon and Somerset, won’t you?”

“Of course, Andy.”

He left and I made myself some tea, putting the milk in the fridge as I did so. “Did he say she was Asian?”

“Aye, Indian or Pakistani.”

“I wonder if she was born here or came here.”

“Whit difference wud it mak’?”

“None, but it seems even sadder if she travelled halfway round the planet to get murdered here.”

“Aye,” he said then left me to the kitchen which suited me fine as I wanted to reflect upon the scene.

The problem with trying to think myself into someone’s mind, is I’m never sure how accurate it is. I’ve seen psychics who seemed amazing in the things they ‘give’ people about the deceased but then I’ve also seen NLP practitioners do the same sort of thing all by careful observation of the person they’re working with. Now, I can’t do the latter, I’m not trained for it, I’m an ecologist not psychotherapist and beside my client is somewhat dead, poor woman.

I visualised the poor person floating in the canal and the feelings I got from it were disappointment, possibly even betrayal and then anger. It felt as if the woman had been betrayed and then angry about it before she was killed and her body dumped in the canal. She was dead before they put her in the canal. Okay none of that will be usable in court but it might help discover who murdered her. Was it a racist attack—not unknown in England nor in Bristol, though both it and nearby Bath have multi ethnic communities and both are big university cities, with two or more universities in each. Did she go to one of them?

I tried to focus on the feeling of betrayal. What would cause that? Goodness, lots of things but it usually involves someone the victim trusted and that trust was broken for whatever reason. Is her ethnicity important, or was it just that she was female that caused her to be killed. I had a feeling that this wasn’t entirely the case and that she’d been killed because she was Pakistani and female. Oh no—perhaps she was in an arranged marriage or destined for one and she refused or fell in love with someone else? That could explain it but I suspect so could many other things, including being pregnant outside of wedlock.

If things happen for a reason, other than pure happenstance, why did it happen when I was walking past? Coincidence—probably, but what if I was the best chance of her finding peace by discovering her killers? I felt all goosebumps and shivered then the first wave of offspring seeking breakfast arrived and I had to deal with more mundane activities.

After breakfast, I was clearing up while Stella and Julie took the younger girls outside to play catch on the lawn when Trish came up to me. “Did the lady speak to you?” she asked.

“Which lady is that then?” I asked loading dishes in the washer.

“The one in the river.”

“River?”

“Yes, yesterday.”

“Canal you mean?”

“Yeah, whatever. She came and spoke to me but I couldn’t understand her.”

“When was this?”

“In the night. She mentioned your name, Mummy, that was the only bit I got, the rest was all mumbo jumbo. She was murdered, wasn’t she?”

“Probably.”

“Does she want us to catch her killers?”

“Trish, that’s what the police are for.”

“Yeah but we can help them. She wasn’t very old but very pretty an’ she wore those trouser things under a dress.”

“Trouser things?” I queried wanting more information from her without telling her anything.

“Yeah, like foreign women wear with headscarves an’ things. Muslins aren’t they?”

“I think you mean Moslems because the only thing that usually wears muslin is a cheese.”

She thought that was hilarious.

“It’s true, before they had all these plastic packaging for everything they used to wrap cheese in thin cotton cloth like muslin or cheesecloth to keep it clean while it was matured.”

She didn’t believe me.

“Why d’you think they call your favourite cheese Cheddar?”

“Because it’s better than—Fred.”

“No, it’s because the cheese was originally made by dairies in the Cheddar area of Somerset and they used to store the cheeses in the caves to mature them.”

She thought that was nonsense so I sent her to look it up on the internet. By the time she returned David had arrived and I was just finishing the clean up in the kitchen.

“Clever clogs,” she said to me.

“We all know your mum is clever, she’s a professor.”

“She knows all about cheese and how they wrap it in moslems.”

David gave her a very strange look, “I suppose it would give a new meaning to cheese dip,” he said smirking.

Trish was not amused, “They used to wrap cheeses in moslems to keep them clean when they put them in the caves at Cheddar.”

“Moslems are people who worship Allah through Mohamed. Muslin is a thin cotton cloth they used for cheese.” I rapidly explained and David’s smirk got bigger.

“Well how was I supposed to know the difference?” she said hands on hips as if her confusion was my fault, then she stormed off to see the others in the garden.

I looked at David and said, “Cheese dips? What has that got to do with Moslems?”

He shrugged, “I was grasping at straws, cheese variety of course,” then he fell about laughing.

Sometimes I wondered if closing all the asylums was such a good idea?