Wuthering Dormice (aka Bike) Part 782 by Angharad

I couldn’t believe that we hadn’t thought of doing a campaign to look for chewed hazelnuts or acorns and spread a few silver or gold nuts to encourage people to look. Of course, those with metal detectors will find them most quickly, so it could be self defeating – maybe a plastic token which could be redeemed for a silver acorn would be better. Oh well, if they’re doing survey work, they’re going to be feeding me data – as far as I know, I’m still the UK lead for dormouse records, but I’ll check with Natural England – the government agency which licences all of this.

Maybe, we should run some walks – run walks? Yeah, well I know what I mean and probably three million Irish will too, it’s perfectly clear which is the noun and which the verb – to me at any rate. I mean how can you have a walks run? Don’t answer that.

I went to bed still wondering about getting back to work and how many records I’d have to deal with. Simon had gone off in high dudgeon after I’d explained the facts of life to him, so do I go up to our bed or sleep somewhere else?

My mother had always told me that when I got married, I should never sleep on a quarrel – when I looked puzzled, she explained that one should always make up before going to bed. As I didn’t wear makeup in those days – as far as she knew anyway – I presume she meant as in kiss and make up. I took a deep breath and went up to the bedroom, which was in darkness and I could hear Simon’s regular breathing suggesting he was asleep.

I undressed in the bathroom and after cleaning my teeth slipped my cold feet into the bed against his warm ones and my cooler body against his well-cooked one. I got something I didn’t expect – he squealed and we both ended up on the floor, on opposite sides of the bed.

“Cathy? Is that you?”

“Who else were you expecting?”

“Don’t be like that, I was walking across the ice when this polar bear made a grab at me,” he paused and his breathing was rapid, “then I felt this cold thing touch my leg and more cold stuff touched my body, and in my dream the bear had got me.”

“That would explain the scream,” I said standing upright and switching on the light.

“You scared me to death,” he said still sitting on the floor.

“For a corpse you have a lot to say.”

“What?”

“You implied you had died of fright.”

“Very funny.”

“I didn’t think so, but if you do, that’s fine.”

“Did you come to bed looking for a fight?”

“No, I came looking for a cuddle.”

“So why did you put your cold feet on me then? To deliberately wake me up and shock me?”

“No – simply to warm them.”

“Even though you knew it would wake me up?”

“It doesn’t usually, but if you think that, maybe I’d better go and sleep elsewhere.”

“The damage is done now.”

“What damage?”

“Waking me up.”

“Seeing as you thought you were about to become a polar bear’s packed lunch perhaps I did you a favour.”

“Did me a favour, how?”

“I have heard of people who have actually died in bed through a bad dream.” This was total B-S, but he didn’t know that.

“Have you? I suppose it was pretty frightening – so I could believe it.”

“So – did I do you a favour?”

“Perhaps – perhaps you did.”

“So – do you want me to sleep elsewhere?”

“I s’pose not, no let’s go to bed, shall we?”

I thought he’d never ask, “I think that is one of your better ideas, Simon.” He got up and we both clambered into bed, by now he was nearly as cold as I was – consequently, we cuddled up close together.

“What would you think if I told you the Peoples Trust for Endangered Species were scattering silver and gold nuts in woodlands to get people looking for dormice?”

“I’d think they were nuts, why?”

“That’s what they’re planning to do.”

“What’s this, dormice spotting with metal detectors?”

“Yeah, get them to eat the metal nut and then track them with metal detectors.”

“Is this your latest project?”

“No – PTES are doing it. We did some radio tracking a few years ago, while I was still in Sussex – I did part of my degree on it. I got some special collars made and we set up a tracking station which the IT people wrote a special program for – we were able to show a sort of map of where individuals went over a period of three weeks.”

“Why only three weeks?”

“We had to consider if they were under stress from wearing the collars – actually a small harness thing – I made them myself from little elastic straps with special thread that dissolved after about a month. We had a wet period and they only lasted three weeks. I was asked to do a PhD on it, but I got bored with all the jibes about my lack of masculinity and came to Portsmouth.”

“Tom tells me you cycled from Brighton down to Portsmouth to hear him do a talk?”

“It’s not that far and I did stop for a wee on the way.”

He looked at me and burst out laughing. “You were just as crazy before you changed your body, weren’t you?”

“If you say so. I had a point to prove, they didn’t think I could ride that far so I did it to show them I could.”

“Wonder woman, you’re my heroine.” He batted his eyelashes at me.

“Want me to black the other one for you?”

“So it was you who did the first one?”

“Would I hit you, Simon?”

“You just threatened me, so I s’pose you might.”

“Huh,” I pouted, then added, “Just remember it’s a long night.”

“Not any more it ain’t, it’s one o’ bloody clock in the morning.”

I switched off the light, and we both lay down. After a few minutes I whined, “You didn’t kiss me goodnight.”

“Oh bugger,” I heard muttered from alongside me. Then as I sat up to kiss him, he did the same to me only slightly faster and we cracked heads – his nose against my head.

His nose stopped bleeding at about two o’clock.