grimmutterings

Alice was 8 years old and her mother thought she was too old to have an imaginary friend.

Her mother asked Alice’s school teacher for advice, one parent/teacher evening, in fact the teacher may have brought it up first, but either way, both agreed that Alice’s imaginary friend was getting  disruptive and Alice needed to stop with the imaginary friend business.  Alice was a lovely child and had had many real friends, but over the last few years they had been replaced by an imaginary friend Alice said was called Emond.

Emond on his own might have been understandable, although barely tolerable, after all, most children have an imaginary friend at some point.  Don’t they?  Emond, however, had friends too it seemed, and in all there were about 13 of the imaginary bunch hanging around.

When they were around, things got a bit crazy.  Light bulbs blew, windows opened and shut, furniture moved around, oh and the amount of coffee they drank was ridiculous.  They didn’t clean up after themselves either and left quite the mess in the kitchen.  The cups and mugs in Alice’s house had been replaced with paper disposable cups, it was easier than trying to find where the real ones had been left, should anyone want a drink, after Emond and Co had paid a visit.  It was starting to get a bit difficult to imagine Emond and Co as being imaginary.

Alice agreed they were a bit naughty, but they hadn’t got a mummy or a daddy like she had, she said, and so no one had taught them any manners.  She was doing her best to teach them, she told her mother, but she was only 8, and they were all hundreds of years older than her.  A piece of information that kept her mother awake, and crying, most nights.

Alice solved the problem by herself, the clever girl, and she announced at dinner one night, over the macaroni and cheese, that Emond and Co would no longer be making a nuisance of themselves.  Alice further informed her parents that she had had a long talk with Emond and Co about their bad behavior, and they had apologized and promised to try and behave themselves.

Her mother was nowhere close to being reassured by this piece of information and her father, never sure of what was going on in his house, said ‘Good girl Alice, a little manners can’t hurt’.  Also, Alice carried on, Emond and Co were here for dinner and could her mother please feed them.  They were hungry.

Sent to bed early for making her mother cry, Alice washed her face and brushed her teeth all the while talking to herself.  Was she angry?  Upset?  No, she was giving out instructions.  In hushed tones, Emond and Co were being told, and reminded how, to wash and clean themselves and then to go and get their pajamas on.  Only when they had done all that, Alice told them, would they get a bedtime story.

Her parents listened downstairs to the giggling and whispering upstairs.  The sound of many feet scampering about and doors opening and shutting and the toilet flushing 13 times until finally it was quiet.  Her mother sat wringing her hands and staring at the ceiling and her father, clueless, went upstairs to say goodnight to his daughter .. and her friends.

Alice’s bedroom was dark, except for the small light from her iPhone and she was huddled under her blankets, with a book in front of her.  As her father said goodnight from the doorway, 13 figures turned as one, and said ‘SSSSHHHHH’, then turned to loom over his little girl.

There were excited giggles and raspy chuckles, and some pushing and shoving as Emond and Co jostled each other to get closer to Alice, then Alice opened the story book.   ‘Yaaaay’ the rabble hissed delightedly, their eyes shining bright with anticipation, ‘Sssstory time, and look its gots picturesssss’, and they fell quiet, and waited.

‘Once upon a time…’ Alice said, and began to read a bedtime story to her not so imaginary fiends.  I mean friends.