The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike) Part 1554 by Angharad Copyright © 2011 Angharad All Rights Reserved.

By the time I got back home there was a furniture restorer’s van parked outside and I couldn’t resist smirking when I saw it. I hoped that it would cost Simon plenty, because opening a tin with a hacksaw was a pretty stupid thing to do–to start with what about the filings off the saw in the food? Yuck.

I passed through the kitchen going in and there was no sign of anyone there but the table was missing, Tom appeared to refill his mug with coffee. “What happened last night?”

“Och, I dinna ken, ma heid is fair splittin’.” He rubbed his forehead and I shook mine in disapproval. “Dinna say anythin’ alricht?”

“Where’s the table?”

“They’re oot in yon garage.”

“Okay,” I decided I wouldn’t interfere, I’d see what sort of job was done first and then make Simon’s life hell if it wasn’t good enough. I made myself a cuppa and Caroline came down.

“That was a fabulous night last night, you lot really know how to party.”

“If you remember, I went home at half past ten with the children.”

“No, I don’t remember–I mean, I do remember but I didn’t know what time it was.”

“You met my step mother in law?”

“Oh Monica yeah, she’s amazing, she spends quite lot of time in France apparently.”

“Yes I know.”

“She buys and sells property out there, mainly to other Brits.”

“Yes I know, I have met her before.”

“Sorry,” Caroline blushed, “I just thought it was a fabulous way to live.”

“It helps to have a billionaire husband.”

“Yeah, I suppose it does,” she said as she made herself some tea. “Feels strange without the table. Just what did they do to it?”

“Simon, while under the influence, decided to make himself a corned beef sandwich only he couldn’t find the can opener, so he went and got a large hacksaw and gouged a piece out of the table. I went ballistic and he’s doing a penance, which if he’s lucky will only take the rest of his life.”

She sniggered then saw I wasn’t joking. “You disapprove of drunkenness?”

“Yeah, along with child cruelty and animal neglect, it gets on my list of behaviours to dislike.”

“So have I blotted my copybook?”

“Not that I’m aware of. Henry was supposed to send Julie home in time for work, so he might have done.”

“Oh, that might be my fault–I told him I’d get her home this morning and then overslept. Sorry.” She looked at the floor as we both stood drinking our tea.

“I see.”

“So I have blotted my copybook?”

“Yes, but all I’m going to say is in future, please don’t make promises you can’t keep. Oh and watch Monica, she swings both ways and is more predatory than a hungry Komodo dragon.”

“She seemed so nice.” And I thought I was naíve?

“Don’t say you haven’t been warned.”

“I won’t. How d’you know?” she said then the lights came on, “She tried it on with you, didn’t she?”

“Shall we say, I resisted her charms.”

“I’ll bet, and you were married to Simon? That’s not on is it?”

“I wasn’t then, I was going out with him, but it was my first real introduction to the Addams Family.”

She snorted tea and had to get some kitchen roll to wipe it up. “You are so funny, Cathy.”

I switched on the radio and after the usual politics and the fact that David Cameron was either the saviour who protected us from those nasty Europeans or the antichrist who sold his country down the river to stop a schism in his party. I probably sided with the latter even though we shared a surname.

I then heard about some ring tailed lemur which had been found on Tooting Common, suffering from hypothermia and dehydration. I checked the date it was December not the first of April, so the story was true. Don’t tell me, it was an illegal immigrant which fell off the undercarriage of a low flying jet. Presumably it escaped or was dumped from some collection of exotic beasts but the woman at the animal hospital needs to bone up on her classification. She described it as a monkey, it isn’t. It’s a primate–not in quite the same way the Pope is–but is separate from the apes and monkeys, in the same way the Pope is, oh, and you and I. We’re all primates and we split off from the other apes some three or more million years ago–well most of us did.

I was sent a link to contestants in a beauty contest, they were all Americans, so it was probably Miss America and they were being asked if evolution should be taught in schools. To their credit, most thought it should, but to describe it as a theory, when we have fossil records which prove it, and to include it in the same breath as creationism–which is fairy tales, with no evidence at all–made my hair stand on end. Still I suppose it was a beauty contest and not an entrance interview to Harvard.

Mind you when they asked British school kids if they’d heard of Mozart, many of them had but didn’t know why or who he was. People complain about dumbing down in the future. I have news for them, stupidity is alive and well and living in a town near them. I suppose if you asked them what an oasis was, they’d tell you it was a defunct rock band when we all know it’s the crumbly stuff flower arrangers use.

“Cathy?”

“Uh, yes?”

“I was talking to you and you seemed to ignore me.”

“Sorry, I was miles away.”

“Can I ask your advice?”

“Advice? I can give you an opinion but it won’t be advice.”

“Okay, an opinion then.”

“Did you realise that an opinion is an onion with pi in it?”

She looked strangely at me–okay so little things like that grab me. “Um, Monica invited me to lunch next week on my day off–should I cancel it?”

“She can be very generous and you did say you were lesbian–up to you?”

“What would you do?”

“She wouldn’t ask me in the same way.”

“Oh.”

“Have you had a relationship with a woman?”

“Um–only a one night stand, and that’s a misnomer–it didn’t stand, I couldn’t get it up, let alone do anything with it.”

“How old were you then?”

“Eighteen.”

“And that’s the only time?”

“Yeah–why?”

“In which case a romp with Monica might teach you all sorts of things.”

“But she’s your mother in law?”

“Yeah, it’s not me you’re in bed with, is it?”

“But she’s your family.”

“Yes, but you’re not, and you’re both adults.”

“When did you–you know–um–decide you were female–you know, liked men.”

“You probably won’t believe this, but I was sitting in Simon’s car, which had broken down and a rather rough but sexy mechanic came out and stole a kiss. I felt something I’d never felt before, until then I didn’t think I liked either sex.”

“So he awakened something in you?”

“Yes, apparently.” I felt myself blushing.

“We’re strange creatures aren’t we?”

“Only to men.” I smirked.

“Oh, I meant as transsexuals.”

“Speak for yourself, I’m a woman.”

“That bloody table is costing me an arm and a leg,” said Simon loudly as he entered the kitchen. “Any tea there?” Caroline switched the kettle on.

“Whose fault is that?” I asked him without any sympathy.

“Well how was I to know where you kept the can opener?”

“Simon, it’s hardly a sensible thing to try and open a can with a large hacksaw.”

“I was hungry.”

I decided I wasn’t going to debate the matter. “You could always have eaten the fingers you appear to have amputated.”

“It looks worse than it is.”

“I’m so glad, but I doubt it will teach you anything.”

“Hang on, I’ve had the damage repaired and it’s not your table, it’s Tom’s remember?”

“It doesn’t matter whose table it was, it’s your stupidity under the influence of alcohol which is what annoys me.”

“So I can’t have a drink or two now?”

“A drink or two, you mean a bottle or two. I know both you and Daddy can cope with one or two glasses of wine. To have been so drunk you nearly sawed your hand off, means you had significantly more than a glass or two. So don’t bullshit me–and don’t wake me up in the middle of the night either, whispering at the top of your voice. If you’re going to get pissed I’d prefer you stayed at the hotel like Julie and Caroline did.” I looked round and my housekeeper nanny had made herself discreetly absent.