The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 3148 by Angharad Copyright© 2017 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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Another day another dollar, as they say. It also meant Diane fawning over me like she was pleading for her life, I was only loaning her my holiday home for goodness sake, not going to execute her daughter—and if I had been the way she was acting, I probably would have done the deed just to stop her.

“Diane, please, I’ve agreed you can use my villa, please stop acting so grateful and go and do some work—oh and a cuppa would be nice.”

“Huh, I’ve got better things to do than make lazy professors cups of tea,” she smirked as she went out of my room, I’m sure she did. At least she left me in peace for an hour so I could continue my plans for world domination without anyone finding out—actually, I was reading through a new health and safety policy for laboratory use by both students and staff. At times like this I wonder if they pay me enough.

My ungrateful secretary brought me in not a cuppa, but a pile more papers to read and put them on the table across the room from my desk noisily, then turned aloofly, by that I mean her nose was almost parallel to the ceiling, and off she went.

“What’s that?” I asked.

“Dunno, but it was addressed to you,” she shot back, “too busy doing my own stuff to read yours.”

“Reading mine is part of your job,” I yelled.

“No, dealing with your post is on my job description, I’ve dealt with it—it’s over there. I’m going to lunch.”

“Would you get me a tuna roll, please?”
“I’m not allowed to work in my lunch period.”

“That isn’t work,” I sighed wishing I had the old Diane back, then resolved to ignore her games, I wondered if she was on because she was acting so bizarrely. After finishing the stuff I was doing, I got up and collected my mail. She had already sorted it and I worked my way through it for the next half an hour.

I was just finishing that when the door was knocked and I called for whoever to enter. In she walked and placed a mug of tea and a wholemeal tuna and cucumber roll on my desk, with a bag of crisps.

“Thank you so much, how much do I owe you?”

“If you stop telling me off, nothing—my treat to you.”

“Telling you off—you were overwhelming me.”

“Okay, I’m sorry, but I wanted you to know how important borrowing your house is. This will be the first two week holiday I’ve had since my honeymoon, and that’s a few years ago.”

“I’m delighted to help and glad you’re going to have a good holiday. Have we got a temp in to cover you?”

“Yes, I don’t know who, but she’s coming in for the day before I go away.”

“Good idea, as long as it doesn’t put her off.”

“Why should it do that?”

“Well all the abuse you get from your irascible boss, especially about cups of tea.”

“The plan is to spend half an hour describing what she has to do and the rest of the day with her practising making your tea—not everyone likes it like dishwater.”

“They should,” I said my tongue firmly in my cheek.

“What so a tea bag lasts a whole month?”

“Exactly so, we’re very environmentally conscious here, you know.”

“That’s why we all drive round in gas guzzling Jaguars...”

I blushed as I answered, “Actually I’m using the orphanage minibus at the moment.”

“Orphanage?” she gasped.

“Yes the Cameron foundation for homeless waifs, strays and England football hopefuls.”

It took her a moment to process what I said. “Ha ha,” she said turning to the door.

“Oh and, Diane...”

“Yes, boss lady?”

“Thank you for my lunch, I do appreciate it.”

She smiled and nodded. After that we returned to a normal working relationship and got through quite a bit more work.

“Have you put in a holiday application?”

“Oh bugger, no,” she gasped clasping her hand over her mouth. “To whom do I do that?”

“Me, when you’re ready pop it in.”

“Thanks, got a bid carried away—sorry.”

“No problem, but you’re supposed to give a month’s notice, so backdate it last week.”

“Sorry—thanks, Cathy.”

I winked and went back to my room. She appeared ten minutes later with it and another cuppa, this time with two, plain chocolate hobnobs—paradise on earth. I accepted her bribery and corruption destroying the evidence in moments. I left it on her desk as I went off to collect the orphans.

“When’s Easter, Mummy?” asked Trish.

“Usually the Sunday following Good Friday, why?”

“No, what day is it?”

“Sunday,” they all said loudly before falling about laughing.

“No, what date is it?”

“Sixteenth, I think.”

“Gosh, that’s only three weeks away.”

“Yeah, so...”

“Are we going away somewhere?”

“Not at Easter.”

“What about the summer?”

“Nah too many school kids about.”

“Are we not having a holiday this year?”

“What for?”

“To relax, see the world, recharge our batteries—you know the stuff.”

“How can I recharge my batteries if you lot are with me?”

“But we’re your children...” she said her face contorting in my rear view mirror.

“Exactly,” I said desperately trying not to let my mouth betray my tease.

“Told you to leave it to me, din I?” chided Hannah.

“Where d’you wanna go?” asked Danielle.

“Dunno, Menorca?”

“Not possible, my secretary has borrowed it for two weeks.”

“What, you let her have our house?”

“Whose house?” I snapped.

“Ou—I mean yours, Mummy.”

“Right, let’s get it straight, it’s my house and I’ll loan it to whoever I want to. Got that?”

“Yes, Mummy.”

When we got home Trish apologised and I accepted it graciously. “I need to tag some more dormice.”

“Why, Mummy?”

“They’ll take my permit off me if I don’t—didn’t do any last year.”

“Have you got to do some every year, then?”

“I don’t know, sweetheart, but I’d hate to find out the hard way.”

“Can we come and help you?”

“If you want.”

“Okay, is that all we’re going to do?”

“Well if we got some of that done the first week, we could pop up to Scotland for a few days.”

“What to the castle?”

“Uh huh,” I said nodding.

“Oh,” she said and went to leave.

“What’s wrong with the castle?”

She shrugged, “Every time we go there something bad happens.”

I suppose based on her experiences that was true. We had the attack by the Russian mafia then Alice hanged herself and I was ill after that. Perhaps we’d be better going somewhere else.

“I’m sure that’s just coincidence.”

“Yeah, you’re probably right, Mummy,” she said sounding anything but convinced.

“Don’t you want to go?”

She shrugged and went off.

Oh boy, I’d sent an email to John Dunstan at Stanebury asking him to get things ready for a visit over the Easter holiday and he’d confirmed he would, could I firm up the dates?

Was it a place of sadness and bad memories? I wasn’t sure anymore about anything, I was spending too much time in my ivory tower I needed to touch base by doing some dormousing and I also needed a holiday. Oh boy.