The parasite

Jeni groaned. She was fucked and she knew it. She looked again her rear-view and saw the lights, then resignedly indicated to pull in and slowed to a halt. While she waited in her car for the inevitable, she began thinking how stupid she was to stay on at the bar and not get a cab with Gwen earlier. But she was only going a few miles dammit, and she hadn’t had that much to drink! Its not fair, and she already has 7 points on her license that Youseph doesn’t know about. If she loses her license what will she tell him? How would she get to work? Or get the kids to school. Fuck. What was she thinking?

It had all started so simply too. A work teambuilding exercise / training course. She had been delighted to be chosen to go and her friends were there too. Youseph had misgivings but she ploughed on insisting that she must go for the sake of her job, and of course the family depended on both of them working. It was the reason they had moved to Wales in the first place. That and the fact that Jeni no longer had ties to London since she married Youseph, her conversion to Islam cutting off all ties to her former family and friends.

The course she had been sent to was in a hotel in the pretty seaside town of Porthmadoc, which was a nice old sandstone building with lovely views out over the bay, but after the first day of the course, her friends Gwen and Ria had suggested they go over to the tourist town of Portmeirion, just across the bay, where apparently some famous TV show had been filmed. Jeni hadn’t thought too much of it to be honest, the two places looked more or less alike, but they had found a karaoke bar anyway and that was where Jeni really started to let her hair down, alternating cocktails with her take on girl-band classics. When the other two had said they wanted to leave and ordered a taxi, Jeni was still next on the list to sing Wannabe and more to the point was being shown rather a lot of attention by some of the male patrons, so she had made her excuses and said she would make her own way back. She had of course staved off the local Romeos, even though she had found their interest almost as intoxicating as the cocktails, but when closing time came she had decided to head back to the hotel on her own. In her own car!

She looked at the dash. 12:37. Her hotel was only a few minutes away in Porthmadog. Maybe she could start the engine and outrun the cop she thought fleetingly then dismissed it. She had almost made it along the quiet deserted country road until the blue lights appeared.

After a seemingly interminable wait, the cop walked up to her window and she lowered it.

“Good evening Miss”,

Jeni said nothing.

“Are you aware of the speed you were doing”.

“Yes officer”, she said trying to be polite. “It was an accident”.

“Yes, miss. But I have to inform you, you were doing 45 miles per hour in a 30 zone. Can you step out of the car please?” His voice was deep and resonant, she thought absently.

Jeni opened the door and got out, feeling physically sick, still in the low cut black dress she was wearing earlier for the night out, and she felt even more uncomfortable, watching the cop looking her up and down before he spoke again, his eyes lingering too long on her deep cleavage and her breasts. He came close to her, standing straight in front of her, invading her personal space so much that she took a step backwards and ended up bumping backwards into her little Volkswagen Up and stumbling slightly.

“Have you been drinking ma’am?”

Oh shit! Thought Jenny. Here we go. “Just a glass or two officer”, she lied, and tried her best to look sober.

“I’m going to have to ask you to accompany me to the police car over there Miss”, he said and indicated the squad car, illuminating the countryside with its quietly flashing blue lights then took her arm and marched her faster than she was comfortable with to it before opening the door and almost stuffing her into the back-seat. Her shoes had only just cleared the sill when the door was slammed shut behind her. She was surprised to see that there was no-one else in it though. She had expected that he would have had a partner in the car. Wasn’t there some sort of procedure? A moment later, she was even more surprised, when instead of getting in the driver’s seat, the policeman got into the other side of the rear of the car and sat down beside her.

Alarm bells began ringing dimly in Jeni's head.

“You’re in a lot of trouble Miss”, began the cop.