Chapter 3
Friday evening:
Jane's phone rang, and she answered it. "Hey Jane, you doing anything on Sunday afternoon?" asked Sarah from work, "It's just that a group of us are going on a bike ride, and wondered if you wanted to....". She went silent for a moment, realising what she had just said. "Ummm... don't worry, we're not going to be riding on any roads, it's pretty much all going to be on country paths, and in the woods, so yeah, ummm.... would you like to join us?"
Jane wasn't really looking forward to Monday, and that would also mean that her mum probably wouldn't be great company over the weekend either... not that's she'd been particularly great company much since.... yeah, since this weekend last year. The problem was that Jane had not actually been on her bike since..... but she thought that maybe it was time to give it a go again.
"Yeah, ok, that would be nice. I have one problem, I'm not sure if my bike is actually ready to use, it's been a while...."
"Oh, ok... yes, I understand. Um, we have a spare bike, you can use it if you like."
"Oh, thanks, that would be good!"
"So, if you can be ready for, say, just before 2? It's only a 10 minute drive to where we'll be starting. Don't forget to bring a drink, although we are planning to stop at a nice tea-shop for tea and cakes about halfway around."
"That sounds nice... Oh, do you have a bottle holder on your spare bike? If so I can use my bike bottle"
"Yeah, it does. Ok see you on Sunday then!"
Jane felt a bit nervous about the idea of riding a bike again, after what happened last year, but she felt that she needed to try and get some sort or normality back in her life.
She went up to her room, and watched TV for the rest of the evening. Jane needed to try to get out a bit more, she needed to rebuild her life... not that she had much of life before: she used to spend a lot of time with Peter, but that definitely wasn't an option now. The programme she was watching ended, and it was almost 11pm, so she decided it was probably time to go to bed.
She took her clothes off, and had a quick wash, then grabbed an incontinence pad, and put it into her panties, then grabbed her plastic panties, and pulled them up on top. She wondered if tonight she'd be dry or wet. She first wet the bed *THAT* night. She'd woken in the middle of the night after a pretty horrible dream, to find that she was lying on a damp bed, so she had got up and changed the bedding, then went back to sleep. The same thing happened the following night: a bad dream, and damp sheets. Given what had happened, Jane had a feeling this would keep happening, so she had bought a pack of adult nappies, which worked well, but were a bit expensive. So then she tried using simpler incontinence pads, and they were ok-ish (and a lot cheaper), but sometimes leaked a bit, depending on how she had been lying, so she had bought herself a couple of pairs of plastic panties, and the combination seemed to work pretty ok. Not particularly flattering, but effective.
Things seemed to go in cycles: she'd not have the bad dreams and she'd be dry for a week, then the dreams would return, and she would wake up wet. It always seemed to be a version of the same dream: she was cycling down the road, and she was being chased by a huge lorry. And when I say huge, I mean nightmare-dreams huge! And it was slowly catching her up.... luckily she always managed to wake up just before it caught her.
Yeah, she had been to trauma counselling, and it helped her a tiny bit. But not really that much. She knew WHY she was having the dreams, that wasn't the issue, it was how to get past it....
Jane got into bed, pulled her lightweight duvet over herself, closed her eyes, and sent her love to Peter, which brought a tear or two to her eyes. Then she opened her mouth, put her left forearm in between her teeth, and bit down gently, giving herself a bit of pain. It was a nice pain, and helped to comfort her. She fell asleep surprisingly quickly.
When she woke the Saturday morning, not only did she feel pleasantly refreshed, she hadn't had any nasty dreams, and she was dry. She turned on the radio quietly, and listened to it for a bit, as she continued to just lie in bed. She decided that she would go into town in the morning, and do a little bit of shopping, then in the afternoon she could take a short bus journey to a nice place she had read up about online, and try doing some more drawing. Jane used to do pencil drawing at school, and whilst she wasn't especially amazing at it, she enjoyed it. So about 9 months ago, she had decided to try drawing again, hoping it might help her. If nothing else, it was nice way to pass the time. It gave her an excuse to go somewhere, and just sit there enjoying the view, and have a go at drawing it. Sometimes she would walk out into the countryside, other times she'd actually sit in town, or in the park, or wherever. She'd definitely improved, but she still didn't feel she was especially good: anyway, they weren't for anyone else to look at, they were for Jane to do for herself, spending some time doing them, and occasionally taking a look at them later on.
Before going out she'd done a bit of research: she had looked on the online maps, then looked at the bus route. So today, after doing her shopping, Jane caught a bus going to the far side of town, a place she didn't normally go, getting off at a park she'd never been to before. She had a bit of a walk, then stopped by the pond. Or was it a lake? We're not talking about one of those ornate ponds, this one felt pleasantly natural. There were a couple of benches near the pond, so she sat down for a while, just absorbing the view. Then she got her sketchpad and pencils out, and started to draw. The first one was a fairly normal, realistic drawing, looking across the pond. Then she tried something similar, but in a different style, one that she'd been reading about online. The first drawing was more of her getting used to draw in that new style, so she started another picture but in the same style. The more she drew, the more this new way of drawing made sense to her, and she started to quite enjoy doing it.
She looked at the time on her phone: it was almost 6pm. She checked online (luckily mobile coverage was pretty good here), and worked out that, if she got going straight away, she could catch the next bus (if she waited, then it would be another 30 minutes till the next one). So she packed up her stuff, and started walking. Her timing was spot on: she had only been at the bus stop for about a minute when the bus arrived. So back into town, then wait for her bus back home... luckily they were every 15 minutes, so she didn't have to wait long.
Out of simple courtesy, she'd texted mum, to let her know she would be a bit late, so she just leave her dinner on the side, and she'd reheat it, which she often did. Jane's relationship with her mum has been rather strained this last year, since... yeah, since then. Her dad was less of a problem, he was just dad, and wasn't one for sharing his feelings.
Yes, Jane still lived at home, with her mum and dad. She's thought about moving out a few times, once she even got as far as looking to see where she could live.... getting a small place for just herself would be quite expensive, so she'd probably end up in a shared house.... which would probably do her a lot of good, having some company more of her own age.
Mum was a bit quieter than normal tonight, which didn't really surprise Jane, given what this weekend was. Jane heated up her dinner, which she then ate, then sat down and watched TV for a bit.
She went to bed sort-of looking forward to tomorrow, to going out on that bike ride. She seemed to be a bit reticent about actually falling asleep, knowing that she would probably have that nightmare again, and probably wet herself. However, she fell asleep quickly, slept really well, no nightmares, and was completely dry when she woke up.
She went down to the kitchen, and put the kettle on, to make herself a coffee, and mum came in.
"By the way, I'm going out just before 2, so need to make sure we have an early lunch. Tell you what, why don't I make it?" suggested Jane.
"Yes, ok..? I was planning on having the pork chops and veg..."
"I can do that!" said Jane. Jane actually quite enjoyed cooking, and was reasonably good at it, so she was very happy to make the lunch today.
Lunch was cooked and eaten, and it was about 20 to 2, so Jane needed to get herself ready. Up in the bedroom, she brushed her hair, then she went to the bathroom, where she brushed her teeth, then took a look at herself in the mirror, smiling a little so she could see her teeth.
To be honest, her teeth were a mess! Jane thought of her mouth as being a bit of a war zone!
Looking back, Jane realised that she really should have got braces as a teen, but the way she got so badly teased when she first got her glasses completely removed any possibility of her ever wanting braces, as she knew she would be teased even more if she got them. Instead she just put up with her horrible teeth - at least the level of teasing for having bad teeth and glasses was a lot less than for having a mouth full of braces on terrible teeth and glasses. She had several fights with her parents about her not wanting braces, and eventually Jane won!
So here she was: she's 26 years old, she's been out on a few dates and had a few 'one night stands', but she's never had a proper boyfriend. She knew for a fact that a couple of guys have been put off by her teeth. They had told Peter! B*st*rds!
So maybe now that she could see and hear clearly (wow, those hearing aids were really amazing! They are so much better, and so much more comfortable, than she ever thought they would be!), she had been thinking that maybe it was time to see about getting her teeth fixed.
They had got one of those adverts through the door last week, for 'Smile Club' - I guess that by calling it a 'club' they think you'll more likely to go to them. Nice try guys, but I think Jane's teeth are going to need rather a lot more treatment than your nice aligners can provide!
So what's actually wrong with her teeth? I'm not really sure where to start. Her teeth themselves are in pretty good condition: Jane brushes them carefully at least twice a day (although that isn't entirely easy), and she only has one filling. Her dentist is very happy with their condition, but has told her, many times now, that she should seriously consider having orthodontic treatment to sort out her teeth, otherwise she would end up with badly worn teeth, and even jaw pain, neither of which sounded good.
So, her top molar teeth are a bit close together, from one side to the other, and tip inwards a bit. So are her bottom ones, but not so bad. None of her teeth actually line up... her molars aren't in any sort of straight line, although only a couple of her small molars are crooked / rotated.
All four of her canine teeth are up (or down) in her gums. None of her bottom front teeth line up, they are all twisted and staggered, and at the top, her front two teeth stick inwards (inside her lower teeth), and the next ones are at about 45 degrees.
It also seems that she has 4 lovely and pristine wisdom teeth fully erupted at the back of her mouth, apparently causing part of her problems.
Her dentist used the phrase 'severely crowded and malocclused' to describe her teeth. I don't think Jane would have felt quite so bad if he hadn't included that word 'severely'. Jane would have 'bitten a bullet' and go see an ortho, but she was scared that biting a bullet would only make her teeth worse! Besides, where would she find a bullet anyway?
All of this means that Jane tries to keep her mouth closed as much as she can, to hide her 'war zone', and when she speaks, she's got into a habit of trying to make sure her lips covered her teeth as much as possible.
She looked at her face in the mirror once more. She tried to imagine how she would look with nice straight teeth. As she looked at herself, she realised that she really needed to learn how to do makeup properly: her makeup tended to be very simple, and was probably almost the same as she used to wear in her late teens, despite now being in her mid 20s. 'Maybe I'll just have to start watching makeup videos rather than cat videos!' she thought. That was a bit of a joke, because, if she were honest, she'd much rather watch a good techie video than either cat videos or makeup videos!
It wasn't just her teeth and face that she disliked, it was all the rest of her body. To be honest, her body wasn't THAT bad, but Jane put herself down a lot. Jane's hair was a strange colour, neither red nor brown, but something between. She's had long hair for as long as she could remember, and it currently almost reaches her waist. It actually looks quite nice, but it's a right pain in the a$$ to look after.
She's 5ft 5ins tall, and luckily she's able to stay pretty slim without trying - unlike Peter who used too be a bit chubby as a teen. She's not especially happy with the shape of her nose, she feels that it's too big for her face, and there's a bump in it about a third of the way down. She's not too happy with her boobs either, they are only 34B's, I think she'd like something a little bigger, but she can't see that happening, so she just wears a padded bra. 'Maybe I can get onto "Botched" somehow, and get Dr Nassif to do my nose, and Dr Dubrow to fix my boobs, all in one go?' she thought. She'd love to have more of an 'hour-glass' body, but it's far from that, it's pretty much like a tube, the same sort of size all the way down.
'I really need to do something about my fingernails too' she thought: Jane bites her nails, and they are much too short. She's not really sure why she bites them, but she does. She even tried wearing gloves... yeah, right! She sometimes uses those stick-on fingernails, but even if she trims them so they're not quite so long, they feel strange to her, so she doesn't wear them that often.
And then there's her eyebrows, her bushy, and strangely shaped eyebrows. I guess it could be worse: she could have a mono-brow!. In the past she's tried plucking them, but they just ended up being a bit of a mess, so they are their natural bushy shape again - and horrible. Yeah, more videos for Jane to watch, I guess.
Jane's mouth is pretty non-descript... it's not narrow, nor is it wide, and to be honest, it's not an interesting shape. She's tried things with lipstick and lip gloss, but it comes back to not really understanding how to use makeup to make the best of a bad job... she definitely need to watch those videos. 'I wonder if anyone around here does makeup courses of some sort? Something like 'Makeup 101' or 'Makeup for Dummies' ' she thought.
There must be SOMETHING that Jane likes about herself? Well, her ears are pretty normal, not too close to her head, and not sticking out too far, and they even have a nice shape. But Jane thinks that her nicest feature is her eyes. Her blue eyes. And when I say blue, I don't mean grey, they really are a lovely blue colour.
So, as long as she can make a guy look at her eyes, she reckons she'll be ok. Not an inch above (her eye brows), or an inch or two below (her nose and mouth), but just at her eyes!
