A Children's Story

This week I decided to respond to the title prompt by revisiting, revising and updating a story I wrote 22 years ago based on a real incident from when my daughter was 6-years-old. It's intended to be an illustrated story written in poetic prose and is a point-and-join-in story for 5 - 7-year-olds.

SUZIE AND THE BLACK THING

Suzie crept up the long, thin hall to play out in the garden. She crept through the doorway. She crept along the path. She crept past the flowers and Sootcat, Mummy’s cat.

Sootcat was an elegant cat – that’s what Mummy said – a Jellicle cat, a black and white cat, a cat of shadow and light.

The day was bright and sunny, and Sootcat was lazing on the garden wall. Rounded and sleek, she was fast asleep as Suzie tiptoed past.

Suzie didn’t want to play out in the garden…

Suzie had been sent to play out in the garden…

But out in the garden was a SCARY place to be…

Out in the garden, The Black Thing lurked…

Sometimes, it was tall and thin…

Sometimes, it was short and fat…

But one thing that never changed was its horrible, wobbly, knobbly head.

Suzie wished Ned was with her. She wouldn’t be afraid with her big brother, for Ned was A Schoolboy and scared of NOTHING, he said.

She creepy-crept past the greenhouse and tiptoed up to the tool-shed. The path was dark and shady, but there was a pool of light beyond.

In the sunny yard at the end of the path the sandpit sat full of silvery sand.

Suzie made a rush towards it and…

THERE THE BLACK THING WAS!

It was short and fat, and jumped out from behind the shed!

Suzie shook with fright as she saw its squat little body and horrible, wobbly, knobbly head.

She let out a screechy kind of scream and ran helter-skelter down the garden path. Through the back door she went and down the long, thin hall.

“Mummy, Mummy!” She burst into the kitchen like a lorry on runaway wheels.

Mummy was baking a ginger cake. The kitchen smelled warm and friendly.

Suzie was cuddled in soft safe arms. Her tears wiped away.

“What on earth’s the matter?” asked Mummy, her cheeks as red as Ned’s school pencils.

“It keeps following me, Mummy!” Suzie gulped, “and wobbling its horrible, knobbly head.

“I thought it might not be there today, but it jumped at me from behind the shed.”

“What did?” asked Mummy, frowning and looking puzzled.

“The Black Thing, Mummy!” Suzie said.

“Sometimes it’s big. Sometimes it’s small. But it’s almost always there when I go outside.”

Mummy looked up the long, thin hall at the sleeping cat on the garden wall.

“Black thing? Not Sootcat, surely? You’ve never been afraid of her.”

Suzie sighed, a big, big sigh, and shook and shook her curly head.

“No, not Sootcat. Of course not Sootcat! It’s a THING. A Black Thing with a knobbly head.

“It chases me in the garden and I just can’t get away.”
She began to cry again; tears that plopped out slowly like a leaky, dripping tap.

“Is it a spider?” asked Mummy, wiping Suzie’s eyes with a big, white tissue, warm from her pinny pocket.

“No, not a spider,” said Suzie.

There were lots of spiders in the garden – and spiders made webs of fairy thread. She was not afraid of clever spiders!

“A beetle, perhaps?” said Mummy.

“No,” said Suzie. “Much, much bigger than that.”

She cuddled closer to Mummy and could smell the cake smell on her pinny – all syrupy and gingery, and mixture-y.

Suzie liked ginger cake. She ate a slice nearly every day. She liked to lick the mixture left in the bowl.

She had licked the bowl clean before she was sent out to play.

‘Maybe The Black Thing liked ginger cake, too?

‘Maybe it could smell it on her?

‘Maybe that was why it chased her?

‘But it wouldn’t come inside… would it?’

She peeped round Mummy’s legs and…

THERE THE BLACK THING WAS!

‘The Black Thing DID like ginger cake! It had smelled the cake and followed her in!’

Suzie screamed and buried her face in Mummy’s baking-pinny. She was safe while she could feel Mummy, and smell Mummy’s smell. Nothing bad could happen with Mummy by her side.

“Whatever is it, Suzie?”

“It’s come inside! It’s come inside!”

“The Black Thing? Where?” Mummy looked where Suzie looked. “I can’t see anything that shouldn’t be there.”

“There! There!” Suzie pointed.

The Black Thing pointed back.

“See? It copies me and follows me. Watch it when I move.”

Suzie moved cautiously away, making a space between herself and Mummy. Her knee bones seemed to have melted and her legs felt strange and bendy.

Her heart began to pound… She could feel it and hear it… It was like a drummer with a big bass drum was banging in her chest.

But Mummy was here. Mummy wouldn’t let The Black Thing get her.

Mummy watched for a moment or two as Suzie twisted and turned.

And then she began to smile.

“That black thing, Suzie, is your closest companion. Look! I have one, too.”

She walked to Suzie, to the pool of white sunlight that flooded in through the kitchen window.

As Suzie watched, another Black Thing appeared on the floor next to hers…

A big Black Thing…

A VERY BIG Black Thing…

Much, much bigger than her Black Thing.

It was a GIANT Black Thing!

Suzie closed her eyes and backed against Mummy.

When she opened them again, the little Black Thing had DISAPPEARED!

‘Had the giant Black Thing EATEN it?’

The giant Black Thing’s enormous body filled the space between the sink and the table, and its four black legs covered the floor tiles, making them seem dull and dirty.

Mummy moved slightly away and Suzie grabbed her hand.

The little Black Thing was suddenly back!

‘The little Black Thing HADN’T BEEN EATEN!

‘It was standing holding hands with the giant Black Thing…’

Suzie stared at the two Black Things, each with their two black legs, and the drummer in her chest drummed a little louder.

“Don’t be afraid,” said Mummy and she flapped her arms like a bird.

The giant Black Thing copied her…

Mummy wiggled her fingers…

The giant Black Thing did it, too!

Sootcat strolled in from the garden and down the long, thin hall, standing between them on dainty white paws, elegantly twitching the tip of her tail.

Now, between the two Black Things was a smallish Black Thing with a long, thin tail…

“Do they remind you of anyone?” asked Mummy, smiling down at Suzie.

Suzie smiled up at Mummy and gave a huge, great sniff.
“They look a bit… like… us,” she said.

Mummy reached into her pinny pocket and pulled out the big white tissue again…

Suzie blew her nose like an elephant’s sneeze… And felt the bones go back into her knees.

“Those are our shadows,” said Mummy, “made where our bodies block out the sunlight.”

“But… why do they change size?” said Suzie, flapping and wiggling like Mummy had done.

“It’s all to do with the position of the sun.”

Mummy flapped and wiggled, too.

“When it is high, our shadows are short. And when it is low, our shadows are tall.”

“I see,” said Suzie, still flapping and wiggling. “So, The Black Thing is only ME!”

Suzie and Mummy, and their two black shadows, stood and flapped like four funny birds: two bright parrots and two black crows.

Sootcat looked up with bright green eyes and twitched her coal-black ears and tail. They went twitch, twitch, twitch…

And so did the shadow cat’s.

“Do you think Sootcat knows about shadows?” Suzie said.

“I’m sure she does,” said Mummy. “Elegant cats know everything.”

The six of them stood in the sun’s warm light: Mummy and Sootcat, and Suzie - solid and real and bright… and Mummy and Sootcat, and Suzie - see-through-ish, ghostly and dark as night.

The real Suzie smiled, a big, big smile - and shook and shook her curly head.

The little shadow wobbled its knobbly head.

But it wasn’t a horrible head.

“It’s just like a DVD - a film of me!” Suzie laughed and clapped her hands.

“Yes,” said Mummy, picking up Sootcat. “A bit like a film. A bit like that. Nothing to be scared of.”

“I won’t be, now I know who it is,” Suzie said, shaking and shaking her curly head.

And she danced away to the tune in her heart back up the long, thin hall.

“Come on, Suzie Shadow. Come on, Sootcat Shadow. Come and play with me.”

Mummy put Sootcat gently down.

“Skedaddle!” she said, with a smile.

And Sootcat… the Jellicle cat… the black and white cat… the cat of shadow and light, skedaddled after Suzie up the long, thin hall. Elegantly - of course.
END