Hazel: My Friend Hilary

Could it be? Yes, it could
Something's coming, something good

'Now then children! Let's all gather at the front of the classroom, shall we, and I'll tell you a story. Come along now! Put the toys in the boxes. Eleanor, why don't you help Rosie tidy up the books? Dawn. Dawn? Dawn! Do wake up, dear. It's story time! You can play with your abacus later. Put it away for now, there's a good girl.

'Peter… Don't do that.

'Jaya! Leave Duncan alone! Sit at the front where I can see you better. That's right. Are we all ready? Are you all sitting comfortably? Then I'll begin.'

I reached into my desk for that old standby Stig of the Dump but it wasn't in its usual place in the right-hand drawer and I remembered that I had taken it home with me the night before. I'd been on baby-sitting duty at my sister's. I say baby-sitting, but actually Heather's James is very grown-up for a six year old. He had shown no sign of the restlessness that was affecting my class. Anyway there was no problem; the book would be in the pocket of my coat, which was hanging in the lobby.

'Ian, I'm making you class monitor for a couple of minutes. Children, you must all sit quietly for a moment while I pop out to fetch something.'

I was gone for thirty seconds, that's all. But when I returned all was screaming pandemonium.

Again.

- 0 -

Every teacher, especially one who works in a primary school like Ascot Road Infants, knows that there are some days when the children just won't settle. I'm not talking about individuals here. It's part of our job to keep a weather eye open for unexpected or sudden changes in a child's behaviour. A garrulous boy who becomes quiet, a sweet-natured girl who starts to scratch and bite, someone who refuses to take off their jumper even when it's boiling hot; these are the warning signs we're trained to look out for and which make our hearts sink when we notice them.

Usually it's nothing. Nothing serious, anyway. A child may be extra sensitive to adults' concerns. A piece of bad news on the television may have assumed a disproportionate significance in the child's mind. Usually a little talk is all it takes to set everyone's minds at rest.

Actually, bad news can upset a whole class, especially if it involves a child. Really big events, like the London bombings, bring out what I call group anxiety. Six and seven year olds can't distinguish between local dangers - like traffic - and remote ones, like being blown up by terrorists. This needs careful handling. As a teacher you mustn't lull them into a sense of false security, but neither should you frighten them into the kind of state where they retreat into themselves.

And then there are the things you can do nothing about. Rain, for instance. It makes a distracting noise and prevents the children from going outside to play. Even worse is a high wind. The rushing sound and the visual distraction of trees swaying outside can turn the most well-planned lesson into a farce. This is when I generally reach forStig of the Dump.

But there was no wind today and it hadn't rained for nearly a week. Something else was going on.

- 0 -

We used to be able to light up in the Staff Room but that's banned now, of course, and the rumours of the existence of a gin bottle in Miss Hedges' locker are just that - rumours. The kids would spot it on our breath straight away. In fact we can't even smoke outside when the wind is in the wrong direction as it either drifts across the playground or back into the school via the girls' toilets. All that's left now is a lingering smell of stale Old Holborn by the front porch which will doubtless disappear when the school is eventually redecorated or, more likely, demolished. We share a site with the next school up, Ascot Road Juniors, and the local politicos are always going on about amalgamating the two schools in the name of efficiency and something called “stakeholder value”, whatever that might be.

In the meantime the schools are separated by a wire fence stretched across the joint playground area, and a good thing too. Some of those Year Sixes are pretty big and tough and Mary Taylor's entry class consists of little more than toddlers. I stood by the dividing fence at break time and chatted with Mary, while keeping an eye out for cross-border incidents. I told her about my problems with keeping Year Two in order.

'You think you've got it bad,' she replied. 'It's been absolute blasted chaos for the past fortnight. Look over there!' She pointed to the far corner where a minor whirlwind of Year Ones was occupying the climbing frame. 'They're just the same in class. I'm petrified that Trudi's going to come in on us.'

'She probably knows what's going on already,' I pointed out. Mary nodded. Our Head, Trudi Webber, is a smart cookie. Her husband's involved with the Council and they're both on all kinds of public committees. 'Let's see how it's going next door. Jerry!'

A tall figure detached himself from the corner post of Ascot Road Juniors' adventure playground. He strolled over to the fence. 'Yes, Hazel?'

'How's it going over there with the great big boys and girls? Everything all right?'

'Sheer bloody hell, of course.'

'So no change, then.'

'None whatsoever. Tots playing up?'

'Rather.'

'You have my deepest sympathy, dear ladies. Now, if you don't mind….'

We were dismissed.

- 0 -

I popped into Waitrose after school to pick up a thing or two for later. It costs a bit more to shop there, but it's more civilised than the Tesco's down the road. A better class of shopper, as a rule. Look, I'm not being snobbish. It's just that I prefer it, and it's local to me. I'd have to take the car if I went to Tesco. How green is that?

Anyway, Waitrose is usually blessedly free of rampaging children and yelling babies and that's the real reason I go there. I get quite enough rampaging and yelling during the school day, thank you very much.

And today was much the same. There was no screaming to speak of, but every push-chair I passed had something odd about it. Whether it was the intent expression on the face of the boy or girl, or the harassed air that hung over all the parents... I didn't know. Of course all parents of small children are harassed, that's a given. But there was something different, something I find hard to put into words. Something strange, other-worldly. Something that affected me curiously, as if I had an appointment coming up that I was apprehensive about, like a job interview or a check-up at the dentist. Not worrying, exactly but - disturbing. We were all disturbed, all of us; parents, teachers and small children. Even the teenagers - sullen or boisterous; dressed in uniform black - sitting on the benches by the supermarket car park had seemed preoccupied in a way that had little to do with unbalanced hormones. We were all, though we couldn't see it clearly at the time, in a state of nervous anticipation.

I bought a few essentials, queued, paid and walked the hundred yards to my first-floor flat. It was only after I had put the milk in the fridge and the bread in the cupboard and had sat down in front of Neighbours with a cigarette, a cup of tea and a plate of digestive biscuits that I finally realised what had been so strange about the babies and infants I'd seen in Waitrose. Each child had been staring with fierce concentration at his or her hands. And those hands had been blurred.

- 0 -

Mrs Webber called an impromptu staff meeting in the following morning's break. She told us that a number of parents had noticed their children behaving unusually and had asked if we had seen anything similar in school. The unspoken implication, as ever, was that it was somehow the school's fault. 'I've had a word with Jane Manners over at Foxglove Primary,' Mrs Webber said, 'and they're having just the same issues that we are, so I'm happy we're doing nothing wrong. Even so...,' and she outlined some changes in our routine. Mostly this meant less formal teaching and more pastoral work. We were to try to interact more closely with our pupils and see if we could get an idea of what was going on.

'Pump the little blighters, she means,' said Mary during our lunchtime no-smoking break. 'It'll all blow over in a couple of days, you'll see.'

But it didn't.

- 0 -

I wonder - did you have an imaginary friend when you were young? I did. Her name was Hilary, the same as my rag doll. I think that was because I didn't want anyone to find out about her. Possibly I thought I would betray myself inadvertently by vocalising my side of our conversations. But I could always have said I was talking to my favourite doll and my parents would have smiled and nodded. Even then I knew with a child's certainty that I was an odd, quiet little thing, and that I was not turning out quite as my mother and father had expected or hoped. There had been no brother or sister for me. I never found out why.

Best not to be caught talking to myself then, or to a fictional playmate.

Hilary had been my best friend for fifteen years by the time I went to University. Exuberant where I was restrained, chatty where I was taciturn, adventurous where I was cautious, she was the cause of the scrapes I got into from time to time; escapades that would cause my parents and teachers to shake their heads and declare that they were surprised, and whatever could have got into Hazel to make her behave like that?

Hilary was the pretty girl who got all the boys; I was the plain friend who relied on her for introductions. It was Hilary who tried vodka, who smoked her first spliff in my company, who was discovered at the back of the gym with Craig Harries in a state of mutual undress.

But it was Hazel who got the necessary A level grades to get into Durham and read English and Hazel who fully expected when she went in for teacher training that she'd end up expounding on the work of the Brontë sisters to a classroom full of enthralled Sixth formers. Somewhere along the line, though, I think Hilary took over and I ended up with primary school kids.

Who often had secret friends of their own.

- 0 -

That was what I was seeing now, amongst my Year Twos. Every one of them, almost without exception, seemed to be engaged in a continuous secret conversation with an invisible partner. Even the noisiest of them - Ian Chambers - was quietly whispering to himself and looking down into his cupped hands throughout the school day. Nothing I or any of the other members of staff did had the power of distracting the children for more than a few minutes at a time. To add to the strangeness of the situation this preoccupation was spreading steadily up through the year groups. I wandered into Year Three's room one morning to find them as distracted as my year had been a week previously. And Mary's tinies were looking like the babies in the supermarket. They were completely locked into themselves and their hands had that same blurred quality I had first noticed in Waitrose.

Somehow we carried on. There was, after all, a curriculum to follow, targets to be attained and educational value to be added.

- 0 -

It was a week or two later that I woke up suddenly in the middle of the night and knocked the alarm clock off the bedside table. It fell to the floor with a muffled ting. I muttered something under my breath and was reaching for the light switch when a voice came out of the darkness.

'Leave it Hazel. It doesn't matter. Tomorrow's Saturday.'

'What?'

'Leave it.'

I realised with a sudden clarity that I was dreaming. I was not awake at all. Anyway, I recognised the voice.

'Hilary?'

'Hi.'

'What the hell are you doing here?'

'It's nice to see you too.'

This was ridiculous - literally so. I laughed. 'Hello. Long time, no see.' That was true enough. I hadn't spoken to Hilary for years. Months, at least. But it was nice to hear her again, even if it were only in a dream. 'What have you been up to, Hil? Trouble?'

'No, not at all. I'm a reformed character. Look - do you mind if I snuggle up?'

'Go ahead.'

If I had been the kind of person who keeps pets, what happened next would have been no surprise to me. But I was startled when a soft, warm, furry presence slipped next to me in bed , climbed onto my left arm and nuzzled my neck with a moist tongue. My first thought was that downstairs' cat had somehow got into my flat. But cats don't talk, do they? And this one most certainly did. In my dream, anyway.

'You're a very fortunate lady, you know,' the creature said. Its voice was soft and slightly buzzy in my ear. 'Not everyone has someone like me. Not yet.'

'Not yet?'

'The children have. The babies definitely have. You must have noticed by now.'

'A friend, you mean?'

'Yes, more or less.'

'Are you saying that the children are running around like madmen, or lying curled up like catatonics, because they've all had dreams about mysterious animals getting into bed with them? And watch where you put that tail!'

This was the most lucid dream I had ever had. I mean, how often have you been tickled in a dream?

'Dreams? Surely you don't think this is a dream?' Furry laughter. 'See you again soon.'

And then, just like that, I fell asleep - or doubly asleep - and when I awoke the alarm clock was lying on the floor next to my bed. There was no animal presence in my flat, all the windows were closed and the door was locked on the deadbolt, as usual. I was alone once more.

- 0 -

I spent the following day in a state of mild distraction. It was fortunate that the children paid me very little attention, absorbed as they were in their private worlds, gazing fixedly into their cupped hands, their mouths and lips moving in silent conversation. The only thing that disturbed our routine was the appearance in the early afternoon of a council van. It had come from the Community Hygiene Department. A rat, or some similar small mammal, had been seen in the Year One classroom. Several, in fact, together with an assortment of birds, butterflies and amphibians.

'Nature Study?' I asked. Perhaps the mites thought they'd been asked to hunt for some mini-beasts and bring them into school. But no.

- 0 -

I had been half expecting it, so it was no surprise when Hilary came to me again that night, as I lay snuggled up under my solitary duvet. I think I would have been disappointed if she had not. We chatted about old times and I asked her what she'd been up to and it was... oddly thrilling. As before, she left suddenly and I fell into a deeper sleep immediately afterwards.

- 0 -

The invasion - or infestation as Mrs Webber called it - continued. Word reached us on the teachers' grapevine that we were far from being the only affected school. The problem was national - international, even - although there was little about it on the news, except for an admonitory feature on Newsround about the responsibilities involved in keeping pets. We soldiered on like the troupers we were, even though the children - and it was all the children throughout the school now - mostly ignored us.

And then this morning, after another vivid nocturnal meeting with Hilary, I woke to find a tabby cat lying on the bed next to me. It looked directly into my eyes as I sat up in bed, then followed me closely as I got up, put on my slippers and walked into the kitchen. Its presence was strange, yet utterly familiar. I had no fear of it. Perhaps its mouth moved as I put the kettle on. Perhaps I heard it speak. I think I might know its name.

Something great, something extraordinary, something that will change everybody's lives is about to happen, I just know it. I wonder what it will be?