Pram Wheels

The doctor hurriedly put dark glasses over my eyes. They were darker than sunglasses but I could see. I could see his concerned face in front of me. I turned. Evie's battered face was smiling. I could see her. I could see the doctor. I could see around the room.

Over the next half an hour the doctor tested my vision. As he thought, I would need glasses to read with, and to look at things at a distance. But I had two eyes that worked. Even without glasses I could read the top three rows of an eye chart.

The doctor wanted me to wear the dark glasses for at least three days and always if I was out in sunlight. His receptionist made an appointment for me to come back in a week's time to have glasses prescribed for me.

I was worried that the surgery and the glasses would be expensive. The receptionist reassured me. The factory's insurance would pay for everything, as it had done for my husband Jack.

My husband? Yes. Jack is my husband. I was so used to thinking of Jack as OUR husband, Dottie and Evie's husband, that I had forgotten he actually only married one of us -- me.

Even with the dark glasses the next few days were like a wonderland to me. I could see our babies. I could see to move freely around our house, the house that we owned outright. I could see the vegetables growing in the garden. I could even see well enough to weed around the vegetables. But what pleased me most of all was to be able to see Jack and Evie. Evie's face might still be a mess but I loved it and her. I loved Jack too and was amazed to see just how well he could walk without his stick. He needed it for longer walks and if the pavements were wet, but most of the time he walked without it.

Once I had the glasses I could read again. I read nursery rhymes to the girls who were too young to understand them. They just liked my voice.

I could cook, properly, even if rationing meant I didn't have much to cook with. I could go shopping and deal with ration books. Life was great.

+++

The time for Evie's operation came. This time I went with her to hospital pushing the girls in that wonderful pram. I felt proud of that pram. Even with our increased income we could never have afforded anything like that pram when it was new.

Evie was in hospital for several weeks. It wasn't an operation. It was several delicate operations consecutively rebuilding the bone structure and remodelling the skin. I cried when I first saw Evie's bruised face and two black eyes. I tried to hide my tears but Evie knows me too well.

"Don't worry, Dottie," she said. "This is the worst part. Now I have to heal. That will take time, like Jack's legs and your eyes. But I'll have a face that I can be proud of."

Proud? I was proud to have Evie as a friend and as another wife sharing Jack. An Evie with a face that looked normal? She would be as beautiful as her naked body already is.

While Evie was in hospital Jack was missing her. I tried to make up for the missing Evie by fucking him and being fucked by him twice as often. But he and I missed having three in that large bed. We were so used to two women sharing Jack that one woman seemed inadequate.

+++

That long summer of operations on the three of us changed our lives. We had started with a crippled man, a virtually blind woman and a facially scarred one.

We ended with the three of us just enjoying what life had given us. Jack could walk. He could ride his wives. I could see. Evie? As summer turned to autumn Evie's face healed from the operation. She turned from an ugly duckling into a beautiful blonde swan, so much so that Jack and I were afraid she would want to spread her wings and fly away.

Evie didn't. She loves us as much as we love her, and we have two daughters crawling around the floor delighting all three of us.

Even our wonderful Silver Cross pram will be history soon when the girls start walking.

We began with pram wheels. We'll continue even when we no longer need a pram.

But we might. Jack and I, or even Jack and Evie, could have more children needing that pram. We wouldn't care if Evie's child was technically a bastard. He or she will have three loving parents.

The End.