The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2979 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

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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.
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“I’m not so sure of my photo being shown in that shop, Mummy. What if the others find out?”

“You haven’t done anything wrong and no one knows Danielle Cameron there anyway. I spent the first eighteen years of my life there and hardly anyone knows me.”

“I think you’ve probably changed a bit, Mummy—grown more beautiful,” she smirked.

“I suspect you’ve changed even more than I did. Remember they were calling me names when I was a kid.”

“They did me as well after France.”

“Talking of France, the Tour starts today.”

“Oh yeah, is Cav riding?”

“Yeah, hopefully he’ll get to the end of stage one this time.”

“Oh, did I tell you Wales are through to the semi-finals.”

“Of what?” well how was I to know?

“The Euro championships, they beat Belgium.”

“Is that good?”

“It’s brilliant, Mum, Belgium were ranked number one or two, Wales were sort of at the bottom.”

“Oh well, good for them—oh is that the thing England were beaten in?”

“Um yeah—but we won’t talk about that.”

“Oh okay.”

It was four o’clock and we were too late to see the end of the opening stage of the tour and the M4 was very busy. I switched on the radio to get the news and was astonished to hear that Cavendish had won the first stage and the yellow jersey.

“Looks like he stayed on his bike this time,” smirked Danni.

“Wonderful,” I sniffed.

“You’re not cryin’ are you?”

“No, course not,” I sniffed. I was but I bet Mark Cavendish was too. I glanced up at the rear view mirror, we were in the inside lane and I was driving very carefully, when I watched in horror as a caravan being pulled by a car came past us and started swinging about.

“He’s going too fast, isn’t he?” piped my co-pilot.

“Possibly, looks like there’s something wrong with his carav... oops.”

The caravan suddenly swung to the left and I braked hard. Then a wheel sheared off it and in a moment the van flipped over on its side and the car was catapulted across the inner lane and down the embankment, smashing through the crash barrier.

“Bloody hell!” exclaimed Danni. The road was blocked and I had to stop, hazard lights on. I pulled over to the hard shoulder and instructed Danni to follow me up the bank. I locked the car as we ran from it and started calling triple nine.

“You stay here,” I said to her as I ran down the embankment to the crashed car. Two other people were ahead of me as I had to negotiate the wrecked caravan. I knew the two people in the front seats were dead, only one of them had a head and the other had a steering wheel stuck in his neck. Danni called to me and I told her to stay put.

The three of us who formed the rescue party were horrified by the carnage and the contents of the car littered the grass. One of the doors had come off as it rolled and there were toys and clothing everywhere.

“There’s a child somewhere,” I said looking at a soft toy.

“What in the car?” asked one of the men. He looked inside the rear of the car and promptly threw up. Inside a little girl had been strangled by her seat belt, she was blue and her tongue projected from her lifeless lips. I felt sick too.

The motorway was quieter as traffic had to slow to get past the obstruction or slowed to watch the scene from the other carriageway. Some people are just disgusting as well as nosy.

“Listen,” I shouted. I could hear whimpering. It was coming from some bedding and a pile of clothing beyond the deceased child. “There’s another child in there.”

“Well I’m not going in there,” stated the man who’d showed us his lunch.

“We can’t leave a child in there can we?”

“Feel free.”

“Help me get the girl out,” I implored and he shook his head and walked away. I looked at the other man and he nodded. With my Swiss army knife I cut away the seat belt and between us we dragged the child out, she can’t have been more than eight. I could hardly see what I was doing for tears. We laid her on the grass and the man covered her face with a coat that had come from the wreckage.

The car was on its side and with blood still running down the seats and windscreen, what was left of it, I scrambled to pull the clothing away to uncover the child who sounded like a very young one. I simply threw stuff out of the side of the car, and finally I found another little girl still strapped into her car seat, she can’t have been more than a year old and once again I cut the straps and lifted her out of the seat, passing her to my accomplice just as a the sirens sounded and two police vehicles hove into view.

Scrambling back out of the damaged vehicle took me a moment and when I jumped back down to the grass I saw I had smears of blood on my hands and my clothing. The man handed me the baby, “You probably know what to do with her better than I do,” he said and I took the now screaming infant and held her closely to me, pouring in the blue light as I cuddled her.

“Jesus Christ,” said the first copper on the scene as he viewed the carnage. “Did you survive that?” he asked me looking ashen.

“No, I just climbed in to rescue her. Sadly her sister didn’t make it.” I pointed to the small body lying on the grass.

“Well the parents certainly didn’t.” He clicked on his mic, “We’ve got three fatalities and one live infant. We’re going to need cutting equipment.”

One of the things I saw as I walked away from the car was a bag of baby clothing and nappies and on the top was a bottle of milk. It wouldn’t be as warm as it should but it might calm the baby down a little. I picked it up as a second policeman ran down to the car. “I’ll be up here with the baby,” I said to him.

“What—oh yeah, okay.”

“What happened, Mummy?” asked a very anxious looking daughter.

“I’m afraid the mother and father and the big sister of this little mite all died. Hold my bag will you?” I handed her my handbag and sat down on the grass and offered the baby some milk. She stopped crying and started sucking.

“You’ve got blood on you,” said Danni sitting down beside me.

“Yeah, I know.”

“Okay.” Emergency services were running all over the place ignoring us, perhaps assuming it was my baby. “You’re not going to keep her, are you?”

“No darling, I think the two I’ve had from tragedies is enough. I laid her in my jacket and changed her putting the dirty disposable nappy in a plastic bag inside the baby bag. Then I nursed her to sleep in my arms. It must have been half an hour later that someone actually asked me who I was and if it was my baby.

I surrendered her to a policewoman with the bag of her nappies and after giving our names and address and a brief statement we were able to proceed home.

“You haven’t said very much, darling,” I observed.

“Just thinkin’ about that baby, I hope she’s got some more family or she’s gonna end up in a home an’ I think I’d prefer she came to stay with us than that.”

“Let’s hope she has more family, shall we?” but my smile in recognition of her compassion wanted to shed tears.