Mornington-By-Mere – (30) Speech Impediment’s

 Mornington-By-Mere is a small country village lying in the Finchbottom Vale nestled between the Ancient Dancingdean Forest and the rolling Pepperstock Hills.

It is a quaint picturesque village, a proper chocolate box picturesque idyll, with a Manor House, 12^th Century Church, a Coaching Inn, Windmills, an Old Forge, a Schoolhouse, a River and a Mere.

As well as a selection of all the normal shops and services to make a difference to people’s lives.

 

23 year old Katie Parsons was the receptionist for the Mornington Doctors, Dentist & Orthodontic Surgeries which were an important asset to the village and the estate.

The reception area sat in an extension between the two buildings.

Because Mornington was such a small village none of the practices were open full time but Baron St George, the head of the Mornington Estate heavily subsidized all three as well as the Small Chemist shop, which shared the Doctors premises.

There weren’t enough patients to warrant full time staffing so in order to make appropriate use of the facilities the doctors surgery was made available to other practitioners in the afternoons and evenings, such as chiropractors, hypnotherapists, acupuncturists etc. but villager Claire Pollard, a Chiropodist was the only regular the others tended to be a bit more sporadic in their attendance.

 

The Doctors, Dentists, orthodontists and pharmacists were all based elsewhere and provided a skeleton service to the village.

The Doctors presence was maintained by the Dancingdean Health Centre in Shallowfield and one of their number, Locum Doctor Kelly Spearman lived in one of the Military Row houses.

The Dental and Orthodontic staff came from a large specialist practice in Finchbottom, Downshire Denticare. 

The Shallowfield, Robert Harvey Pharmacy in Oakwood Road filled any prescriptions and delivered them to the surgery every day.

 

The Normans who also ran the general store and post office provided Lily Norman and her son Robbie to staff the chemist shop for its limited opening times.

 

Katie Parsons lived at number 5, Military Row with her older sister Rosie.

She loved living in Mornington and sharing with her big sister although she lived alone most of the time because Rosie was a Staff Nurse at the Winston Churchill Hospital in Abbottsford and rather than commute back and forth she shared a flat with two other Nurses from the village.

 

Like her sister, Katie was born and bred in the village but she chose to move away following University because after her party lifestyle in Abbottsford the last thing she wanted to do was move back to quiet dull Mornington.

However she soon grew tired of the party scene and her tiresome on off relationship with lukewarm boyfriend Steve so she chose to move in with Rosie.

  

Physically she was not unlike Rosie, they were both blonde haired, modestly pretty, tall and slender, though Katie was a bit shapelier but there wasn’t a lot in it.

How they differed in a major way was that Katie was a bit more confident.

Which served her well in the big city and she was never short of company, and had the pick of the men.

But somehow she still managed to end up with the losers.

 

In Mornington the field of available men was considerably smaller than when Katie was at University but even if it had been a larger pool to fish in she would still have set her sights on George Boddington because she fancied the pants off him.

But despite the fact that she was brimming with confidence she could barely get a word out of her mouth when he was around.

 

Katie thought he was a really good looking lad with his thick black curly hair and wild gypsy eyes, dark and mysterious and she thought he was buff too, but when confronted with gorgeous George her brain turned to mush and she lost her ability to speak.

 

Apart from being butchers and owning and running a number of butcher’s shops in and around the Vale.

The Boddingtons were also pig farmers at Saddleback Farm near the hamlet of Fallowacres, which was as near as damn it the center point of the Finchbottom Vale, though that was only a geographical distinction.

 

All the Boddington’s served their time on the farm and then served their apprenticeships in the numerous butcher’s shops.

George had spent his time firstly in Shallowfield and then in Highfinch before doing a two day a week stint in Mornington.  

 

Six foot tall gorgeous George was a year younger than Katie, and she longed to run her fingers through his thick black curly hair and stare longingly into his dark and mysterious wild gypsy eyes, and thoroughly explore his well buff body.

Apart from being supremely fit he was extremely accessible as he worked at the shop across the road from the surgery.

 

Their first meeting was when he went to make an appointment with the doctor and there was no hesitancy in his voice or speech.

But then that was because he had nothing to fear at that point, he was just going to see the doctor, he had no idea he would find a beauty on reception.

“Hi, I’d like to make an appointment” he said

“Medical or Dental?” Katie asked brightly

“Medical”

“Ok was it urgent?” she asked

“No I just need a prescription” George replied

“I can fit you in tomorrow at eleven”

“Perfect” he said and inexplicably blushed and then after giving her his name he returned to the shop.

 

The next day when he returned for his appointment and Katie greeted him with a hearty

“Hello George”

He stammered his way through his reply and went scarlet before going to sit down which was the precise moment she fell for him.

 

That exchange was in July and they had barely managed a sentence between them in the two months that followed.

Day after day, week after week he would look at her in admiration but he could never speak to her, not important stuff, there would be occasional nodding and smiling.

He desperately wanted to ask her out, he had almost done it so many times but his nerve would always go, as would his ability to speak.

He so often formed the question in his head but the words just wouldn’t come out, George always steeled himself for the big moment, but it never happened.

He could respond if she spoke to him but she never really engaged with him not since that first day they met.

 

Katie was no better at conversing with George than he was with her, in fact she was worse because that kind of behaviour was against her nature, she was a supremely confident person, but her failure to speak was abject and happened with monotonous regularity.

George was only in the shop 2 days a week and not always on the same days.

So each morning as she walked to work she would look across the road into the shop to see if he was there and if he was alone she would cross the road and go in.

But invariably when she did enter the shop one of two things would happen, one of his brothers or his father would appear from the back of the shop or they would stand there stammering at each other with scarlet faces.

Whichever was the case she would leave the shop with a pound of sausages.

“God that girl buys a lot of sausages” Georges father James said on one particular occasion in September.

 

George’s older brother Allen was marrying Ruby Legg from the farm shop later in September so that became the target date for him to take action.

He decided he would invite Katie to accompany him to the wedding at St Winifred’s and the reception afterwards where there would be dancing and a chance to hold her.

George just had to pick his moment, so one day, on his day off when she looked particularly alluring as she walked to work he decided to strike.

“Katie” he called and she stopped and turned around

As he closed the distance between them he thought to himself

“This time will be different, this time I have rehearsed” he said to himself even though it was only to his own reflection “this time I will do it”

So armed with a well-constructed sentence he made his move and taking a deep breath he faced her, with the short sentence looping through his head, over and over and he opened his mouth to speak, but the sentence did not appear.

Instead jumbled words tumbled out from his anxiously dry mouth, but not in the order he intended.

Some words inappropriately joined together giving an altogether different meaning that may have caused offence had it not been so totally incomprehensible.

It had definitely gone better in front of the mirror.

He just stood there spouting his nervous stuttering gibberish and he thought she must think him such an idiot and fully expected her to laugh in his face but instead she smiled at his nervousness opened her mouth to speak, blushed violently and continued on her way to work.

He watched her walk away and reformed the words of gibberish back into a coherent sentence, the very sentence he had rehearsed.

“Would you like to come to the wedding with me?”

But she was out of earshot by that time.

 

Had Katie been in earshot she wouldn’t have heard what he said as Katie was too busy chastising herself loudly in her head.

“What is the matter with you? You’ve turned into a gibbering idiot” she ranted “I think he was trying to ask you out you silly cow”

 

Katie was still arguing with herself when she walked into the surgery

“What happened to the girl who dated three guys simultaneously for a whole week at University?” she asked herself

“Where is she now that I need her?”

 

After their abysmal failure only ten days before the wedding that may well have been the end of it had, events at that time unknown to her and totally beyond her control, not cast a benevolent shadow on Katie’s and Georges future.

Which came in the form of an invitation to Allen Boddington and Ruby Legg’s wedding at St Winifred’s Church for her sister Rosie and a plus one.

 

She saw it laying on the table when she got home from work and did a little jig when she saw it but stopped when her sister Rosie walked into the room.

“Why have we got a freezer full of sausages?” she asked “I’ve just been in there to get something for tonight’s dinner and it’s full of sausages”

“It was just an oversight” Katie replied

“Well guess what we’re having for dinner tonight?”

“Never mind the sausages, what about the invitation” she said

“Can I be your plus one?” Katie asked

“Oh I’m not going” Rosie replied

“What do you mean you’re not going?” Katie demanded

“Well I don’t really know either the bride or the groom” Rosie said

“But we have to go” Katie insisted

“We?” Rosie replied

“Yes I can’t go on my own”

“Why do you want to go at all?” Rosie asked

“There’s someone there I want to see” she replied coyly

“Don’t tell me it’s one of the Boddingtons” she said “That’s why we have so many bloody sausages”

Katie didn’t respond she just looked at her feet.

“So what’s the problem is he resisting your charms?” Rosie asked

“No I haven’t asked him yet”

“I see, its early days, so when exactly did you set your cap at him then? How long has it been one day or two?”

“Two months”

“Months?” Rosie said in astonishment

“What’s holding you back? Doesn’t he like you?”

“No I’m sure he likes me he’s just a bit shy” Katie replied

“Well that doesn’t normally stop you, just go up to him and ask him like you normally do”

“I’ve tried” Katie admitted

“What you’ve asked him and he said no” Rosie asked

“No I mean I’ve tried to ask him”

“My God you’ve got it bad girl” Rosie said sympathetically

“Which is why the wedding would be a perfect place to break the ice with him” Katie said

“But that’s my Saturday off and I was going to drive over to Sharpington” she remarked

“Oh please Rosie” Katie begged “I’ll make it up to you I promise”

“And no more sausages?”

“Agreed no more sausages” Katie said

 

So it was at the end of September when the weather was unseasonably warm that Katie was getting dressed for the wedding and she giggly happy.

Rosie wasn’t at all fussed about going to tell the truth it was her day off and she really wanted to drive over to Sharpington and reacquaint herself with a certain chestnut haired florist named Kelly.

Rosie wasn’t really fussed about going to tell the truth it was her day off and she really wanted to drive over to Sharpington.

In actuality she was surprised to get the invitation at all, she didn’t really know either the bride or the groom that well even though they were distant cousins of the Boddington’s, several times removed.

But her sister Katie insisted they accept as she was interested in becoming better acquainted with the grooms’ brother.

 

So it was an excited Katie, who along with a grumpy Rosie, made her way through the village towards the church.

As she and Rosie stood outside the Church mingling with the other guests Katie search the crowd for George while Rosie’s eyes settled on a tall straight backed statuesque amply proportioned thirty year old, with wavy chestnut hair blowing gently in the afternoon breeze. 

“It can’t be” Rosie said to herself, it turned out that the attraction Rosie was interested in finding in Sharpington was at the wedding and dressed in Lavender.

 

At the reception while Rosie was outside snogging the statuesque Kelly, Katie had finally got to grips with George on the dance floor but at the end of the night when the music stopped they went their separate ways without a word or a kiss, the situation wasn’t helped by the fact that they were both desperate to pee after two hours of none stop dancing so they parted with just a smile.   

When they immerged independently from their respective facilities the other was nowhere to be seen.

 

On Sunday Rosie dragged a disconsolate Katie to the Old Mill Inn for lunch, very much under protest.

She had chosen that particular venue because she had it on good authority that George Boddington and his three sisters were going to be there.

So they walked into the pub and Katie brightened considerably when she saw George at the bar with the rest of the Boddingtons.

Kelly Westwood, the Sharpington florist with a penchant for skinny staff nurse Rosie Parsons, soon took charge and had the Boddingtons eating out of her hand.

After the third round of drinks Kelly made a sudden announcement

“I have two tickets here for the Tivoli Theatre in Sharpington” She paused for effect and then added “So George”

“Yyyes” he stammered

“Are you free Saturday night?” she asked

He was a little afraid now, in fact he was very afraid that the big lesbian was going to ask him out

“Yes” he replied

“Good” she said “You are now going to the pictures”

“Oh ok” he said meekly and gave Katie a sideways glance to which she shrugged in response.

“Ok then that’s settled then George and Katie are going to the pictures on Saturday night” Kelly announced “Together!”

“Hooray” Rosie said as George smiled at Katie who returned his smile and blushed

“Another round is in order” Kelly said and to Rosie she whispered “I don’t think I’m going to be able to drive home”

“I think we can find somewhere for you to lay your head”

“What was that?” Katie asked

“I was just saying that you can stop buying all the sausages now”