THE QUACK

Let me read for you! Skip introduction 4:01

As a child, there were three characters adults told me about, who seemed to make the world a better place. The obvious was Father Christmas, the man I had to behave for if I wanted to expand my Polly Pocket empire. Next was the Tooth Fairy, who I wrote handwritten letters to every time her visit was expected. Once, I bargained for a Jessi Doll instead of money. When my left canine fell out, I asked if she could help clean my room. I woke up with my room still a mess. It was worth a try.

Finally, there was the Easter Bunny, a conservatively dressed white rabbit, who’d hop around the world, dropping off commercial chocolate eggs to children. Out of the three, the Easter Bunny was the most mind-boggling. (I mean, it’s a rabbit ..delivering chocolate?!)

I grew up in a half-arsed Catholic family, with parents who liked to party, which meant Easter was kind of a big deal. During that long weekend in spring, the house was stuffed with grandparents, aunties, uncles, cousins, friends, and Martin, the bachelor from across the road.

The house was decorated with tiny yellow chicks and bouquets of tulips. Hot-cross buns were being toasted and buttered at all hours of the day, and the smell of rosemary lamb would drift from the kitchen. 

The main event of the day was the famous Easter Egg hunt, held in our garden on Sunday afternoon. We, kids, would stand at the edge of the lawn, as Dad laid out the rules of the hunt, with the same seriousness as Sir Alan Sugar, when instructing the contestants of The Apprentice.  

‘You can only pick one egg up at a time. You take the egg, put it on the garden table, and then go back to get your next egg. Only when all the eggs are on the garden table….

‘Don’t tread on the daffodils,’ Mum called out, interrupting his flow. 

 ‘…ONLY when all the eggs are on that garden table will the hunt be called off. And yeah, don’t tread on the daffodils. Right, your time starts……NOW.”

And we were off, charging into the garden, arms chopping the breeze, frantically pulling branches apart. We’d pick crème eggs from bushes, and find Lindt bunnies in trees, all the while going back and forth to the table, building up the collection of chocolate treasure.

‘Found another one!’ I would scream as I raised the tin-foiled trophy above my head.

‘Well done, love!’ Granny Pat would say as she raised her gin to me.

In no time at all, all the eggs had been collected, and the hunt was called off. We’d spend the rest of the afternoon with chocolate mouths, lying in the grass, as Didcot’s cooling towers made cotton tails in the sky above us.

1997 was a memorable year because the Easter Bunny made a special appearance. (We all could see it was Mum’s friend Lesley in a costume).

I was…disappointed. The Easter Bunny was supposed to be white, fluffy and wear a respectable blazer. This bunny (Lesley) was grey and had no clothes on. It also smoked cigarettes. It reminded me of the time I met skinny Santa at B&Q.

As I’m an adult without any children, Easter has floated in limbo. Mum still tries to keep the spirit by sprinkling tiny yellow chicks around her house and toasting some hot cross buns. One dull year, we forced her partner, Rich, into taking part in our egg drawing competition, which was a humbling experience for him, I’m sure, considering he had just exhibited his art in Manhattan. 

But the easter egg hunts no longer happened, as that would be a bizarre thing for adults to do without any children around. And so, the Easter Bunny was laid to rest a long time ago, along with the other magical characters of this world.

This year, Roman has invited me to a Good Friday lunch with his school friends and their kids. I only have two friends who have reproduced, so my socialising with anyone under the age of eighteen has been few and far between. Roman’s friends, however, are well into the family era, so over the last six months, I have met a shit-ton of kids. It’s fair to say, I have been a little rusty…

At the first gathering, I hovered next to a game of “What’s the Time, Mr Wolf?” with my glass of wine, brushing off any invitations to join in.

‘I’ll just finish this,’ I said with a polite smile.

On another occasion, a mother of two, whom we had brunch with, presented me with her baby to hold. I bumbled and offered to have Roman do it instead. I was beginning to worry that I was not cut out for motherhood, and that I was giving off Meredith Blake* vibes.

But a week ago, something strange happened: A pink-faced 8-week-old without a fully functioning neck was plopped down in my arms. At first, I was scared that she was silently suffocating, but after a few minutes, the tiny strawberry human seemed to be…alright. And then a few minutes more, I began to relax and realise, hey, these things aren’t so frightening. In fact, they’re quite nice.  

So, when Roman invited me to this Good Friday lunch with all these children, the first thing I said was, ‘Oh! I should come as the Easter Bunny!” Roman narrowed his eyes suspiciously. ‘For the kids…’ I explained. 

‘Do you …’ he cautiously began. ‘Think that it may be too much for the second meeting to come dressed as a rabbit?’

I got a flash of what it would look like, walking into Becky’s kitchen, dressed as a giant mammal.

I’d be the new Lesley… Christ.  

The Easter Bunny may just have to resurrect another time.

*Meredith Blake is the evil, soon-to-be stepmother with an amazing wardrobe, who wanted to ship Lindsay Lohan off to boarding school in The Parent Trap.’

Listen to The Quack on all popular podcast platforms