Who's Afraid Of The Easter Bunny?

Daniel Williams is a bully. He always has been, ever since we were in nursery together. My teacher says ‘bully’ isn’t a helpful label. My Mum says this is because the school has an anti bullying policy. So when bullying happens, they have to call it something else.

My Mum doesn’t like me calling Daniel a bully either. She says it puts her in an awkward position. She’s been best mates with Daniel’s mum since they met in hospital, having Daniel and me. His birthday’s the day before mine. We always have a joint birthday party. Daniel Williams has ruined every birthday party I’ve ever had. The people I invite never want to come now, because they know he’ll be there. Nobody likes him. I’m meant to be his best friend, and I can’t stand him.

Whenever I try to say anything about him, my Grandad says
‘Just give him a thump, Lad.’ That’s what he thinks bullying is, someone thumping you, and you thumping them back. Any kid will tell you it’s a lot more complicated than that.

It’s not even me that he bullies. Not really. But I hate seeing people getting away with doing wrong stuff. And Daniel gets away with everything. My Mum says that it’s because his Mum is on the board of governors. All the teachers are too scared to say anything bad about him. So he just carries on doing bad stuff. I hate that.

It wouldn’t be so bad if he was the kind of bully who just came up and hit you. But he’s a lot sneakier than that. He does stuff that nobody can prove. A while back he had this thing where he’d pinch himself, hard enough to leave a mark. Then he’d go and tell the teacher than someone else had done it. He always blamed the nice kids, the quiet ones that wouldn’t fight back. Usually, they just started to cry. In the end, Mrs Kershaw got suspicious. I think she said something to Daniel’s mum, because Daniel’s mum had a face on her, and she was always whispering to my mum on the playground. One time I heard her say that it was ludicrous to suggest that a child would deliberately harm himself just to get someone else into trouble. I don’t think she knows Daniel very well.

Last month, it was coming up to our birthdays. I gave the invitations to our party out. I gave out loads, even to people I don’t like, to allow for some people not coming because it was Daniel’s party too. One by one the reply slips came back. Nearly all of them said no thanks, they had better things to do than spend Sunday afternoon being blamed for stuff they hadn’t done. Well, they didn’t actually say that, but they might as well have done. In the end, the only person who was coming, apart from my family, was Greg Walsh, and he’ll go anywhere if there’s free food on offer. I’d had enough. I’d tried doing all the things I was supposed to, like telling an adult, and it hadn’t done any good. I took matters into my own hands.

The good thing about our mums being best friends is that I know stuff about Daniel that nobody else knows. I have this amazing ability to look totally engrossed in my homework, or my Playstation, or whatever, when actually I’m listening to every word that’s being said in the kitchen while my mum and Daniel’s mum are drinking their coffee. I know what Daniel’s greatest fear is. Don’t laugh. Daniel Williams, school bully, is afraid of The Easter Bunny.

When I thought about it, it made some kind of sense. When we were little, in the Nursery, then in the infants, Easter Bunny used to visit on the last day before the holiday. He would bring chocolate eggs and leave them in the baskets we’d spent the last week making. He always left a big mess behind. We’d come back into the classroom after watching a film in the hall, and there’d be rabbit prints all over the place. Sometimes there’d even be rabbit droppings. They looked a lot like currants. Greg Walsh tasted one once, and he didn’t die or anything.

One year, Daniel had a bad experience. For a start, he was a bit freaked out at the thought that Easter Bunny had been in the classroom. He has asthma, and he’s not allowed to have pets. Plus, EB had left these giant footprints behind. This was no ordinary rabbit. Eventually, the teacher coaxed him into the classroom, but the worst was still to come. When the Easter baskets were given out, Daniel’s wasn’t there. The teacher made a joke about Easter Bunny knowing that Daniel didn’t like him, and Daniel started to cry. The teacher had to give him spare chocolates from her desk to shut him up. In the end, it turned out that the basket had fallen down the back of the cupboard. But the damage had been done. Daniel was convinced that Easter Bunny had it in for him. After that, he was always mysteriously off sick on the day before the Easter holidays.

Easter Bunny doesn’t visit the Juniors. We don’t have time for making baskets, and the teacher just gives the eggs out at the end of the day. I remember last year, though, Daniel was dead jumpy, as though he was worried Easter Bunny would suddenly discover a gap in his schedule and visit us after all.

I wondered what would happen if I told everyone about Daniel’s fear. Every Friday afternoon we have circle time, where we’re supposed to talk about our feelings. I could easily work the conversation round to things people were scared of. Obviously, Daniel would never own up by himself, but I figured I could give him a helping hand. If everybody knew how soft he was they might be more willing to stand up to him when he was mean. But the more I thought about it, the more I worried that it might just end up making him worse. So I thought up another plan.

What was needed, I decided, was a sustained campaign of persecution. But it wouldn’t be me doing the persecuting – it would be good old Easter Bunny. I spent ages in my room, trying to imagine what a rabbit’s handwriting might look like. I devised a signature with a drawing of a carrot underneath. My little sister’s got some writing paper with fluffy bunnies on, and I helped myself to some of that.

The first note was dead simple. It just said
‘I’m watching you Daniel Williams, love Easter Bunny xx’. Daniel found it in his tray when he went to get his pencil out. I saw him looking round, as though he was expecting EB to be lurking behind the science cupboard. There was real fear in his eyes. I actually felt a bit guilty, but the feeling soon passed. For a minute I thought he might show Mrs Kershaw, but even daft Daniel was bright enough to realise how it would make him look. I’d got away with it. He was really quiet for the rest of the day, and that night I started plotting my next move.

The second note took me a lot longer. I left it for a while, to lull Daniel into a false sense of security, but he soon fell back into his old ways. He started threatening people too, saying he’d tell tales about them if they didn’t give him their sweets or let him copy their work. I had to think of something that would really scare him. In Easter Bunny’s shaky hand I wrote
‘I’ll be coming to get you if you don’t stop.’ I didn’t say exactly what it was he was supposed to stop. I thought if they were any crimes I didn’t know about it might stop him doing those too. This time I slipped a few currants (sorry, rabbit droppings) into the tray along with the note.

I wasn’t there when Daniel found it, but I knew he had because his face was really white and he kept telling Mrs Kershaw he wasn’t feeling well and wanted to go home. She took no notice of him. The bullying stopped. In fact, Daniel started spending most playtimes sitting on his own by the railings. I started to feel a bit sorry for him. Then I remembered my last birthday party, and all the other parties he’d ruined for me. There was no way I was going to stop. I was enjoying the power too much.

I started to get creative. In the next note EB threatened that harm would come to Daniel if he didn’t wear girls’ frilly ankle socks to school. I knew he’d done it when I saw he’d unpicked the hems of his trousers so they were long enough to cover his shoes. He was obviously a bit brighter than I’d given him credit for. Not that bright, though, because he’d forgotten it was a PE day. Nobody said anything to him, when we got changed, but there was a lot of laughing and pointing. Mrs Kershaw acted like it was a perfectly normal everyday sight. I think teachers must get training in that. Daniel’s face was nearly the same colour as his socks.

My confidence grew. This was the best fun I’d had in ages. So a couple of days later the Easter Bunny informed Daniel that if he didn’t jump up and sing ‘The Wheels On The Bus’ (all the verses, with actions) in the middle of numeracy he’d be getting a nocturnal visit. I didn’t use the word ‘nocturnal’, because I didn’t think he’d know what it meant. I just put ‘in the night’. I wanted him to think EB knew where he lived. I even sellotaped a photograph of Daniel’s bedroom to the letter. It was one I’d taken with the camera I got for my birthday. Daniel never knew I’d taken it. I’d just wanted to show Mum and Dad how much better his room was than mine. Dad said the little brat was spoiled rotten.

The first day after he got the letter, nothing happened. Daniel sits on the other side of the room from me, because we’re in different groups. I saw him glancing round, watching Mrs Kershaw, waiting for an opportunity to perform, but he didn’t have the nerve. To be fair, I wouldn’t have done it myself. The next day, though, he was braver. He must have been really desperate. We were all slaving away at our fractions when I heard his chair scrape back as he got to his feet and started singing. He’s not much of a singer, but he gave it a go. I was actually a bit impressed.

He’d got to the bit with the mummies on the bus, and everybody, including Mrs Kershaw was just staring at him, when Mrs Bennett, the Head, walked in. Everybody’s scared of Mrs Bennett, including most of the teachers, probably. She has this way of looking at you that makes you feel guilty even when you haven’t done anything. She just went
‘Daniel Williams, my office’ and pointed at the door. She followed him out. On the way she gave Mrs Kershaw The Look. She must have thought she wasn’t controlling us properly. I felt bad then. She’s a bit soft, Mrs Kershaw, but most of the time she’s a good laugh.

Daniel was gone for ages. He was still missing after playtime, when Mrs Kershaw had a serious talk with us. She said someone had been sending Daniel unpleasant notes, and she had reason to believe that someone was in our class. Things would be much easier all round if the person owned up now. I didn’t say anything, but I felt myself going red. I don’t know if Mrs Kershaw noticed.

I waited until lunchtime, and when everyone else had gone out, I told her what I’d done. I think she was secretly seeing the funny side, because she kept looking away, and her shoulders were shaking a bit. She probably ran off and had a good laugh in the staff room when she’d delivered me to the Head’s office. Daniel was still sitting there, snivelling. Mrs Bennett’s not known for her sense of humour. In fact, I’ve never seen her smile. She went on and on about how she was appalled, disgusted, outraged, and a lot of other words that teachers use when they’re not impressed. The worst bit was when she called me a bully. So much for my mum’s theory about having to call it something else. She said I had deliberately and systematically set out to make Daniel unhappy and I should be ashamed of myself. To be honest, when she put it like that, I kind of was.

Mum and Dad got called into school. They made a big thing about banning me from my Playstation for a week, but I could tell their hearts weren’t really in it. I think they understood why I’d done it. Mum isn’t friends with Daniel’s mum any more, and he’s been told to keep well away from me, which suits me just fine. Mum seems a lot happier too. Daniel still gets up to his old tricks from time to time, but the quiet kids stand up to him a bit more now. The teachers are all a bit more clued up about him too. I think Mum and Dad had a long talk with Mrs Bennett.

The best thing is that I’m having a birthday party of my own next year, and Daniel Williams definitely isn’t invited. Easter Bunny should be paying a visit to school in a couple of weeks. Obviously, he’ll just be coming to see the little ones, but he might just find the time to look in on us Juniors. Take care Daniel – you never know who’s watching you.