The snake and the seeker

“Coming! Ready or not!”

Trouble is, I’m not ready. Not for this. When they drew the snake, I took too many guesses. My count was huge. And we always play hide-and-seek in the dark. That was what we called it, often hyphenated, sometimes even rushed into a single word: hidenseekinnadark.

Somehow, it didn’t work in the summer months. Those long summer holiday evenings were no time to look for the shadows. But now, back in school since forever, dusk draws in fast. I’m standing beneath the sodium gaze of the one streetlight in our cul-de-sac. Curtains drawn over TV flicker. I’m completely alone.

I counted so long it feels like we’ve gone from dusk to proper dark. I know they’re out there. Chris and Nick from over the road, Susie and Sarah from next door. Even Philip and Elizabeth from the house on the corner. A full decade between oldest and youngest, yet tied together by proximity if not affection. Certainly not always.

There’s a half-suppressed giggle, more anxious than amused. It takes a moment to realise that it’s me. I can’t see anyone, and I know that if I stray too far from the gatepost – the block – I risk losing everything. This isn’t just hide-and-seek, you see. When you spot someone, you race back to the gatepost. Outsprint your opponent, lay a hand on the gritty brickwork and chant “Block Sarah by one-two-three. No save all!” After that, individual players might get to the block behind my back, but nobody gets skinchies and there’s no general amnesty. But if I step away, out of the sodium circle, anyone could leap from the shadows. “Block myself by one-two-three. Save all!” Then everybody crawls from the woodwork with confidence of winners laughing and teasing at my failure. I have to submit to the search again.

What was that? A nervous rustle in the undergrowth? Or next door’s haughty cat making her way past the rose bushes? That’s a garden we can’t go into, on pain of sharp knocks on the door and angry parents. Actually, mum thinks they’re miserable old buggers – that’s what she told dad – but we’re not welcome to jump over the gate in search of lost balls and absolutely forbidden to try those tempting hiding places in the shrubbery. The other banned garden has no formal ruling, but the hideous tangle of untended undergrowth locks out all comers. Mr. Almond is the only person on the street we don’t address by first name; everyone else is aunty or uncle in the easy manner of familiar adults moving through a children’s world.

The tactics vary. Slip down the passage into our back garden, and it’s an easy run back to the gatepost and “Block myself” when the seeker steps away. Philip and Elizabeth’s back garden is also open for play, and there’s even a shed for extra concealment. But, if spotted there, you give up too great a head start and, inevitably, will be blocked. The boldest gamble is to squat down next to the gatepost itself. It’s heads down for the count and, if you can stifle your giggles – which nobody can – you might manage to “Save all!” before the seeker looks up to cry “Ready or not!”

Movement in the corner of my eye. I whirl round. Was the wind moving the branch? Or is someone hiding behind the tree? By day, the giant monkey puzzle in our front garden is a friendly if formidable sight; at night it turns spooky. My bedroom overlooks it and I’m sure once, after dark, I saw it move. Not sway in the breeze move. A purposeful, step forward kind of move as if it noticed me and was creeping in my direction. For weeks, I protested when the curtains were opened, but I couldn’t contemplate switching to the back room. The back garden was no safer; a giant rock – giant to a seven-year-old, anyway – lurked under the hedge. It would have been a great hiding place, and our back garden was on limits in this game, but one evening I saw it pulse, eerie, like a stone heart beating once a century.

Varied tactics for hiding. So, as a seeker, you have to vary it too. Stay close to base and wait for someone’s nerve to crack? That can work, especially off a short count, but I run out of patience too soon. Stride decisively towards a likely spot and hope that someone makes a reckless dash that you can head off? That’s fine, but it helps if you have eyes in the back of your head in case someone pops up from behind the Robsons’ van while you’re scanning the Elliotts’ wall. It’s an agony of indecision, made all the worse by the creeping lonely darkness.

I can’t bear it any longer. I have to act, to step into the shadows and hope for the best. One of the littl’uns might be getting nervous by now, ready to give herself up with some childish whining. I’m faster than them, too, so they’re easy prey. But what if Chris, a teenager, long-legged and energetic, vaults the low fence and “Saves all!” before I can react? It’s a chance I’ll have to take.

A few short strides, alternating determined then tentative, and the street transforms. Hiders, half-scared by minutes in isolation, make desperate runs for the post. A flurry of action, knees pumping, arms pounding. Fingers outstretched, ululation and chant. It’s ill-judged, distance is on my side. I just need to block one and, by one-two-three, I win. Or at least I don’t lose, and in a strange twilight of walking trees and pulsating rocks, that’s better than properly winning in daylight.

At least, until I had to hide. Alone. In-the-dark.

Recently I reviewed an anthology of poetry written by a neighbour from my childhood. In the midst of that collection was a line that transported me back to a boyhood game. Which got me thinking further, and led to this. Names have been changed, and a couple of details blurred, but if you were there you would probably recognise this.