1. TO TWELVE TREES

Detective Inspector Rosie Baur is on holiday with her family, off to a caravan site...

There were jobs to be done.

And ten year old twins Jack and Jill were the very people to do them. The fridge needed to be switched on (it operated on both gas and electricity �" twelve volts from the battery when the gas was turned off, as it was now) �" and it needed to be stocked up with enough food to last for as long as they’d be away, an indeterminate period, though the kids were back at school in about a fortnight.

Rosie knew exactly where they were going today, though. It was Twelve Trees Park, a concealed caravan and camping site off the beaten track and because of the liberal rules set down by its owner, clothing was optional. That was why Rosie took the kids there. Close enough to the coast to be a short drive away from the rolling waves and a golden beach and far enough away from the main holiday resorts to be … isolated.

Not that she was the only person to use it. Twelve Trees was popular to a wide and sometimes peculiar clientèle of nature lovers, sun worshippers and their hangers on. Not that hangers on were tolerated if they spent longer than absolutely necessary staring at the undressed. That was considered to be most infra dig.

And those undressed represented humanity in all its glorious beauty down to positive ugliness. There was, on one end of the spectrum and one of only a handful, the Rosie Baurs of this world. In her thirties and eternally attractive, probably a consequence of the mixed blood that coursed through her veins, she had been widowed young and could see no reason why she should fall for another man. Not yet, anyway. There were the twins to think of, Jack and Jill. And she had a full-time job as a Detective Inspector in Brumpton where she was widely respected.

Whilst quite happy to saunter about the site and away from the public scrutiny in the all together herself, the children weren’t allowed to be quite so undressed. She knew that there were weird sores in the great morass of humanity that occupies the planet, and she didn’t want the kids scrutinised by any of those. It seemed to be only sensible to her, and anyway she was aware that they would have rebelled had she insisted otherwise.

The site itself nestled up to a piece of ancient woodland where few ever trod, not because it was scary or had strange and frightening stories attached to it but because there were sizeable sections that were impenetrable, or at least difficult to pass through by those who chose nudity as their preferred costume.

The servicing of the caravan having been completed, she sighed and looked at the twins.

“Let’s hope for better luck this time,” she said.

Last time she had been called away from her holiday early on because a murder enquiry had needed her and this time she had told Superintendent Desmond Flibbert that if another murder occurred she would be unavailable, on a one-way trip to Mars with the twins. The Super had assured her that he would roll his sleeves up himself rather than let her peace and harmony be disturbed. She hadn’t believed him.

So they set off. She had a Nissan x-trail, a handy vehicle when it came to towing a family-sized caravan.

“Well, this is it!” she exclaimed, and glanced into the rear-view mirror at her two angels. “The open road, and bacon and eggs for tea!”

“I’m a vegetarian,” announced Jack. “So no bacon for me!”

“And I’m a vegan,” declared Jill, always needing to be one up on her imaginative brother.

“And I’m neither, so it’s bacon and eggs for tea,” grinned Rosie.

“Are you going to be shameless and embarrassing by going about in the nuddy?” asked Jack, his eyes twinkling as he bobbed up and down on the back seat.

“Not if the weather stays like this,” smiled Rosie, indicating the cloudy skies. “I only like soaking up the sun when it’s too warm to be wearing anything! Clothes are to keep you warm, after all.”

“There are fat men who go about with ugly wrinkled bits and pieces even when it’s raining,” said Jill.

“You shouldn’t be looking at anyone’s bits and pieces!” reprimanded Rosie, not really shocked because they were her kids and she knew too much about how their young minds worked.

“I don’t!” proclaimed Jill.

“I’m going to explore the woods,” said Jack, changing the subject because, in all truth, to his mind he’d already exhausted the last one. “They’re mysterious, are those woods, old and dark, with shadows everywhere. I’ll bet there are goblins in there, little men with knitted hats sneaking between the trees going about their mischievous lives with knives and fishing rods!”

“Then you’d best introduce yourself to some,” laughed Rosie. “And maybe you might bring one or two home for tea seeing as we’ve got too much bacon now that you two have turned environmental.”

“I won’t be vegan until we get back home,” decided Jill.

“That’s just as well, because the soya drink I’ve brought doesn’t go so well in tea,” Rosie told her, “and you do like a cup of tea in the mornings, don’t you?”

Jill nodded whilst Jack said, “Whoa there! I’m a coffee man!”

“With too much sugar in it for your own good,” reproved Rosie, “sugar can be really bad for you, you know. Like sweets and fizzy pop.”

“It strikes me that everything that’s really nice is bad for you,” moaned Jack. “Now shut up, everyone, I want to go to sleep and dream of ice-cream, lollies and hot sweet coffee!”

“And I want to dream of bacon and eggs,” sighed Jill, “with baked beans and sausages,” she added.

“Very good for a vegan,” smirked Jack. “I think I’ll stay carnivore for a little bit longer, like my stone-age ancestors.”

“I want to be humane and decent to the animals,” Jill told him.

“All the more for me then,” he decided, and yawned. “What do you know about the woods near where we’re going to put the caravan, mummy?” he asked. “I mean, have they always been there?”

“They’ve been there a long time,” she told him, “though I doubt they’ve been there for ever. Maybe they were planted by some land-owner hundreds of years ago and not been tended to since back then. I don’t know, but some of the trees look very old to me.”

“Can I explore them, mummy?” he asked.

“Of course you can, darling,” she said, “but don’t go too far in until you’re sure of your way back!”

“I won’t, mummy.”

She drove on. The good thing about the Twelve Trees Park site is that it doesn’t take forever to get there, she thought.

And it didn’t. Less than an hour later she had turned right off the main road, onto a rutted and badly-maintained very minor road. It had been like that for as long as she’d been going there, and that was some years, since long before Paul had been killed during a stock car race two years ago. Back then they had made the journey together, stripped their clothes off together and soaked up the sun together.

Now it was just her and the kids.

Twelve Trees brought back wonderful memories. It was more than a holiday when she was there, it was a repository for some of her best memories.

And it was where the twins had been conceived.

© Peter Rogerson 20.03.17

Reviews

[Mr.Writer]

Great first chapter! You introduced the characters, had started up the plot and conflict!
Keep it up!

[Peter Rogerson]

My hobby (if that's the right word) is to create around 1200 words a day and at the moment it's an on-going serial. Thanks for your encouragement.

[Mr.Writer]

No problem! :) Keep it up! Go for it!