Wuthering Dormice (aka Bike) Part 780 by Angharad

I hugged both my schoolgirl daughters – I wanted them to know I loved them. In turn they hugged me back and made happy sounds. I felt good about them and about myself – I suppose that was why I’d bothered to put some make up on and to wear a skirt.

“I got my new bike today, you know, to replace the one the car ran over.”

“Is it yellow like the old one, Mummy?” asked Trish, who always seemed to notice things.

“Yes, sweetheart, it’s pretty well a copy of the old one.”

“Did you ride it yet?” she asked me.

“Have I ridden it yet? Yes, sweetie, Daddy looked after Meems while I took it out for a test ride.”

“I wish I could have come as well,” she looked wistfully at me.

“Don’t be silly,” chided Livvie, “Mummy goes far too fast for you.”

“I can ride fast, too,” she pouted at her sister.

“Not as fast as Mummy can, so there,” Livvie stood with her hands on her hips and spoke in an aggressive tone.

“How d’you know how fast I can ride?” snapped back Trish, almost in a boy type response.

“’Cos I can ride as fast as you,” Livvie sneered this time.

I intervened – “Hey, what is this? You two are supposed to be sisters.” In reality this meant they would probably be ripping each other’s eyeballs out by now, so the fact they were still only exchanging verbals meant I could probably stop it. They both glared at me. “Now come on, in this family we help each other not fight each other.”

“So how come you gave Daddy a black eye?” asked Livvie.

“What do you mean? I didn’t hit your daddy, as far as I know.”

“Oh, we thought you did.” Livvie started looking at the ground.

“Well you thought wrong, didn’t you?” I said firmly, I know it was ungrammatical but that’s what my mother used to say to me.

“Yes, Mummy,” this was said more quietly than a dormouse squeak, and probably needed an owl to hear it. “I’m sorry, Mummy,” a slightly more audible remark followed by her grabbing me around the waist and bursting into tears. Trish looked on in confusion.

“It’s okay, but I think it’s Trish you need to apologise to, not me.”

A rather soggy, “Sorry, Trish,” was sort of half sobbed or sniffed from my midriff.

“’S’okay,” was her response and I placed a hand on both of their heads and gently ruffled their hair. I smiled at her and she shrugged back at me.

“What am I going to do with you two?” I asked.

“Dunno,” was the stereo reply, one speaker having more of a damper than the other. I hugged them both and we stood for a couple of minutes before getting into the car. The crisis was over I hoped, I was bemused by the event, were they tired or coming down with something? I had no idea – least not yet.

“Trish, we have to see Dr Henshelwood tomorrow.”

“I know,” said a weary voice from the back of the car.

“Can I come, too?” asked a different voice.

“I don’t think so, Livvie.”

“Oh, poo.”

“Why not, Mummy, I don’t mind and she’s as mad as me?”

“Trish, neither of you are mad.”

“Well, Louise Mayer says I am – she’s a friend of Petunia.” Trish’s tone was brave trying to avoid showing the hurt she was feeling.

“Don’t let them get to you girls, half of them are seeing a therapist as well.”

“So why do they tease me?” sobbed Trish and I could see Livvie hold out her hand to her sister.

“I don’t know, luvvie, it’s something some children and some adults do. It’s unkind and mean, but that doesn’t stop them. Sometimes it’s because they have problems of their own and they’re trying to divert attention from themselves by pointing the finger at someone else.” I was torn by a desire to seethe and then slap the kids who were perpetrating this bullying, and that to stop and hug my two until all the pain went away. The latter was winning and I pulled over at a bus stop and leaning back squeezed them both on the leg. “You okay to continue home?”

Trish nodded and Livvie voiced an affirmative, so I set off again. I still didn’t know who or how these kids knew about Trish’s visits to her shrink, but I would certainly take it up with the good doctor tomorrow.

It was actually a Saturday, tomorrow, that is. He was going on holiday but he wanted to see Trish before he went, he was going for a fortnight to the Caribbean – lucky sausage – we had a week in Bristol, unless you count a few days in Scotland while someone was trying to kill us.

After dinner, where Livvie didn’t show her customary appetite, pushing her food around the plate, it became obvious that she was incubating something. I put her to bed with a glass of milk and she slept very quickly. I hoped it was nothing more than a cold, but her eyes looked a bit pink, which could be measles – that was all I needed. I had no idea what inoculations she’d had, so had she had the MMR jabs or not? All the hype about the risks of getting autism from it had maybe stopped her mother having her done. Recent research had shown the risk to be infinitely small unless one had an allergy to eggs or some other unusual reaction. I wondered if our doctors would know what each of them had had or not, as the case may be. I would try and speak to them next week.

Trish did perk up a bit later on, when Simon took her out with him when he popped out to get some more milk. A ride in Daddy’s sports car – just what a girl needs. While they were out I sat with Meems on my lap and we read a book of nursery rhymes together. It was quite funny, because half the time we knew them by heart and hardly had to look at the book. It amused Stella who was sitting opposite us giving Puddin’ her evening bottle.

Then the wanderers returned and after a biscuit and drop of cow juice, I put them to bed in the other room. Whatever Livvie had, I wasn’t sure I wanted them to catch – although I know loads of people deliberately bed them together so second child will catch it too. Apparently the reasoning is, it’s no harder looking after two sick kids than one. I don’t know, and I don’t really want to find out.

I read them a story in almost a whisper and tucked them in. Then I stole downstairs like a thief, trying not to step on the creaky stairs. Simon was quite concerned too, though I wasn’t able to discover if this was a concern for the girls or one for himself.

My sleep was disturbed by Livvie coughing and asking for drinks. I made her get up and use the loo, which I thought was better than having her wet the bed – mainly because she would be mortified, she is so clean. When she was sick a bit later, I nearly threw up with her – the smell in the bucket was revolting. I thought it had all gone in the bucket but I was wrong, as Simon pointed out to me when I got back into bed.

“Well go and wash it off then and change your nightie,” he said shooing me out of the bed.

“All right, I’m going,” I said rattily, “I didn’t see you rushing to go to see her?”

“Well, she wanted her mother, not me. It was you she called for,” he said smugly and I felt like blacking his other eye. Part of me hoped I had done the first one, smug bastard.

The rest of the night was a nightmare, Livvie was sick again and the other two complained of feeling ill, as well. I was in and out of bed like a yo-yo. What with Simon grumbling that he had to get up in the morning and the dawn chorus of ’huey’ from the kids, I didn’t know which way to turn. When Meems was sick in her bed and then burst into tears, I nearly joined her.

When he discovered it was Saturday, Simon decided as he’d had a disturbed night, he’d have a lie in. At this point I stormed out of our bedroom and slammed the door so hard I broke the lock on it. I went and sat in the kids room and slept in the chair wrapped in a blanket, which was where I was when Tom came up to see why I ‘hadnae come doon fer breakfast.’ He brought me up a cuppa and later mended the door.

Simon stayed well away from me, perhaps fearful of a tongue lashing or actual bodily harm. He did eventually reappear in the evening with three small bunches of flowers and a small box of sweeties for each of the girls, and a significantly larger bouquet and box of chocolates for their enraged ‘mother’. I sent him out to buy some ice cream as they all had sore throats and were only sipping tiny amounts of fluid. At least the sickness had stopped – for the time being anyway.

What I was doing was nothing new, millions of women and quite a few men, deal with sick children every day and presumably every night, as well. It was nothing special, didn’t require any great skill just loads of love and patience. Yes, I was tired and irritable with the adults, or one in particular. Tom showed his experience and kept us topped up with drinks and he even made a sandwich for me at lunchtime. He ‘wisnae afraid o’ thon bug,’ thank goodness. Stella kept her distance, which was more understandable than her brother’s behaviour.

When the diarrhoea started, I wondered if Simon had the right idea – the smell was something else, and both Livvie and Mima had accidents, got very upset and had to be dumped in the bath, while I ran downstairs, rinsed out their clothes and shoved them in the washing machine. Then I was worried about it causing them a urinary infection, as most of those are caused by coliforms – the bugs in the bowel. Trish thankfully, always made it to the loo in time, although she was quite wobbly on her legs.

I spent ages washing my hands in between tending my charges, then rubbing that alcohol gel on them – well they say, most of these bugs are passed on by poor hygiene. I also swabbed down door handles and the toilet seat every time the bathroom was used. The place smelt like an episode from ER – if only George Clooney could walk in now – oh if only? Ha, with my luck it would more likely be George Formby.

They say, ‘all good things come to an end’, which is true, it’s the same for bad things too. After a frantic weekend, the girls were nearly better by Sunday night, so I had intentions of sending them to school on Monday. I was so tired I could hardly stand up, then Simon began complaining of feeling sick ... and so it went on.