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Do children still play with toys, I wonder? I don’t mean video games; I mean actual physical toys.

Frisbees. Foam gliders. Little green soldiers. Marbles. Plastic rifles with orange muzzles. Paratroopers with polythene parachutes. Bouncy balls. Life-sized babies with soft vinyl heads. Die-cast metal cars you push around the carpet. Hula-hoops. Slinkies. Trains on wooden tracks. Do any of these things still exist? Or have they all been consigned to the dustbin of history?

I can’t speak for today’s children, but back in the eighties, we were obsessed with “action figures”. That was what we called dolls for boys. Most of mine were characters from Star Wars. My friends Ben Jackson and Adam Cook (aka the Cookie Monster) collected figures from Thundercats, Masters of the Universe and The Real Ghostbusters, which were all about two inches taller than the ones from Star Wars. That didn’t mean we couldn’t play together; it just meant that all our games were like mad re-enactments of Lord of the Rings, starring He-Man, Peter Venkman, and a bunch of lightsaber-wielding hobbits.

We went to a school in North Manchester called St. ░░░░’s County Primary. If you’re my age or older, you might have heard of it, because five of the pupils went missing in 1989.

It was a crazy time to be a child there. The police kept giving talks at our morning assemblies. Some of the parents even organised a “chaperone club”, where adult volunteers would collect the children from each street and escort them to school in one big group.

I barely recall what the classrooms were like, but I remember the school grounds very clearly. At the back of the playing field, there was an embankment covered in long grass. We were banned from climbing up it, but that just made it irresistible. We even used to sneak our action figures into school, so we could make them have adventures on the slope.

There was another boy called Danny Greenhouse. He used to play near us—never with us; just near us—using toys of his own. I remember how his action figures were always really naff, like the generic plastic people you would get with a doll’s house. Still, he seemed happy enough in his own little world, walking them around and making them talk to each other, or bending them in painful ways, or mashing them onto hard surfaces.

Danny and I weren’t friends, exactly, but I did know him. His house backed onto mine, so our gardens shared a panel fence. I could see his bedroom window from mine, and he often had a bedside lamp on, sometimes well after midnight. When he did, it made the polyester curtains glow very faintly. I was dimly aware that he lived with his gran, because his dad had died in 1986. I can’t say what happened to his mum, but as far as I know she’d never been around.

Anyway—when I think of my childhood, I always remember a Friday in June, just before the summer of 1989. The first two children were already missing. We were worried, but not so worried that we stopped playing our usual games. That would come later.

In our latest roleplay, He-Man and Fisto were leading an expedition to find the missing children. Luke Skywalker and Boba Fett, being much smaller than the aforementioned Masters of the Universe, were standing in for the two children. Danny was also there, doing his own thing less than ten feet away. Other children were playing further along the slope.

After a while, we were interrupted by a familiar voice.

“Jesus Christ,” the voice jeered—“are those meant to be toys?”

It was Tom Harding, the “Ginger Ninja”. He was wearing a faded red jumper that clashed horribly with his hair and loudly sucking a gobstopper. He was also clutching a handful of action figures, but he seemed more interested in picking a fight than playing with his toys.

“They look like pieces of shit,” he added.

Ben panicked and froze. Cookie Monster—who was half a head taller than Tom, and a good stone heavier—looked at him in annoyance.

“Why? What’s wrong with them?”

“What’s wrong with them? Jesus Christ! They’ve only got five points of articulation!”

None of us knew what that meant, but we didn’t give him the satisfaction of asking.

“So?”

“My G.I. Joes have got thirteen,” he boasted. “Dad sends ’em over from the States. I can pose ’em any way I want. Yours have only got five joints in total. What an absolute waste of space,” he finished bitterly.

Cookie Monster lost interest in the conversation and picked up his Lion-O. Tom turned his attention to Danny, who was quietly tormenting a pair of cheap-looking dolls, bending them into awkward positions.

“Jesus Christ,” Tom marvelled—“what are they meant to be?”

Danny looked up from his game.

“Action figures,” he said simply.

“Action figures? Piss off, Danny. Action figures have weapons. Those are dolls. Why are you playing with dolls? Have you got a doll house to put them in?”

Danny didn’t answer, so Tom marched over and grabbed one of the figures to get a closer look. Ignoring the protests of the smaller child, he held it up to study it, then laughed in surprise.

“Jesus Christ,” he marvelled again—“lads—look at this!”

He ran over to show us, eager to share the joke, briefly forgetting that we weren’t friends.

“Look at this!” he crowed. “Have you ever seen such a piece-of-shit toy?”

His face was so close to mine that I could smell the aniseed gobstopper in his mouth. I could even hear it rattling round his teeth when he moved it from cheek to cheek. I despised Tom Harding, but I had to admit: he was right about Danny’s toy. It really was a piss-poor excuse for an action figure. The face was badly painted, to the point where it was almost comical—but also unsettling, I suddenly realised. The eyes were two round dots that seemed to stare in terror. The mouth was a big uneven blob, stuck mid-scream.

“Give it back,” said Danny.

Tom didn’t oblige. Instead, he picked up a rock and threw it at Danny’s head. The smaller boy cried out in pain and ran away. He was screwing his little red face up, the way boys do when they’re trying not to cry.

Tom watched him go, feigning surprise.

“Hey, Danny!” he called. “Danny Doll-House! Don’t you want your doll back?”

Danny skidded to a halt and looked at him from a safe distance.

“No,” he said firmly. “Keep it. I don’t need it. I can always get another.”

With those words, he hurried back towards the school, and the rest of us got on with our games.

Later that day, Tom spent the whole afternoon saying “Danny Doll-House”. By home-time, it was firmly established as Danny’s new nickname. Danny, as far as I remember, bore the indignity in silence.

---

The next night was very humid. For the third time that summer, I was too hot to sleep.

Sometime after midnight, I got out of bed, tiptoed to the curtains, and opened the casement window. Mum and Dad had banned me from doing this because there was meant to be a child-snatcher at large. I didn’t care. I needed to let some air in.

Danny must have been restless, too. At the bottom of the garden, on the other side of the panel fence, his bedroom curtains glowed very faintly.

Time slowed to a crawl. The night felt dark and dangerous, like a ticking time-bomb. I wondered if it was the thought of the two missing children, but I knew in my bones it was something else.

I don’t know how long I stood there, but there came at last a merciful peal of thunder. Moments later, the heavens opened. One by one, as the stormcloud sailed overhead, the gardens gave up a soft hiss of rain, like a wordless prayer of thanks.

I leaned out the window, letting raindrops cool my face. Moments later, Danny threw open his curtains and did the same. I grinned and waved, thinking we could connect in the moment—two tired boys, bonding over their shared insomnia—but my smile soon faltered, because Danny was behaving very oddly. He kept reaching up into the air, clutching at the rain, rubbing it in his eyes and licking it from his hands. Then he swayed drunkenly for a while before doing it again.

When the first bolt of lightning came, it really made me jump. It came down on the far side of the panel fence, right in front of Danny’s window. Then another, and another, and another. I thought I saw it arcing round his room, making him writhe in ecstasy as it flowed through his arms and lit up his skull.

The image lasted less than a second. A razor-thin fraction of a second, so fleeting that I couldn’t trust my own eyes. Then he was grasping at raindrops again, followed by more swaying. Each time he repeated the process, the night seemed to grow in menace. I had a wild idea that he was charging it up, somehow, like a battery.

Eventually, he shouted something that I couldn’t quite hear, which sounded like a prayer, or maybe an instruction. As he did, the sound of rain intensified. There was another peal of thunder, as if the night itself had heard his plea, and was growling in response, your wish is my command.

Prior to this point, I’d been fascinated by Danny’s antics. Suddenly, I was just scared. I backed away from the window and pulled it shut, wondering what on earth I’d just witnessed. As I did, Danny’s face whipped round and locked onto mine. He’d heard the dull wooden thunk! of the window closing, and his gaze had been drawn by the unexpected sound.

On reflection, it’s strange that I could see his face in the dark—but I could. His eyes now had a strange electric gleam. His top lip was curled in a sneer, revealing teeth that glowed like struck quartz. I guess the air was full of static by then, and it was welling from his face like St Elmo’s fire.

I fumbled with the curtains but couldn’t close them properly. Then I gave up. I dived into bed, pulled the sheets over my head, and didn’t get out till morning came.

---

When I went to school the next Monday, I knew at once that something was wrong. The adults were having tense conversations, just out of earshot. By the time they ushered us in for a special announcement, word had got out: Tom Harding, the Ginger Ninja, was now missing.

I didn’t put two and two together until I found Danny playing on the slope.

He had a new action figure—or rather, one that looked less damaged than the previous two—and was repeatedly jamming its head into the ground. When he heard me approaching, he glanced up from his game. Then, very slowly—drawing my attention to the new toy—he placed it face-up on the ground before him.

When I saw what it looked like, my blood ran cold.

“Look at this,” said Danny softly. “Have you ever seen such a piece-of-shit toy?”

It had a red jumper and orange hair, just like Tom. The eyes were two round dots that seemed to stare in terror. The mouth was a big uneven blob that seemed to be stuck mid-scream.

I stared at it in shock. As I did, I remembered what Danny had told Tom that same afternoon: “I can always get another.” Suddenly, it felt less like a boast and more like a threat.

“I turn people into things,” he explained. “I collect them.”

“Is that—?”

He nodded.

“But—how—?”

He didn’t answer at first. He just picked up the toy and fondled it, slowly twisting the head round. Then he spoke.

“You know how I did it,” he reminded me. “You saw me do it in the middle of the night. Back in the day, I bet they turned people into frogs. Well, I prefer toys. But it’s all the same magic. My dad came back and showed me what to do.”

“Your dad’s dead,” I remembered, looking at him in horror.

“I know. But he never went far.”

I was terrified. I felt bad for Tom Harding, who was now a toy, but my instinct for self-preservation was overwhelming.

“Are you going to—”

“Do it to you? Nah. You’ve always been nice to me. Just keep your gob shut, yeah?”

With those words, he forced Tom’s plastic head into the ground, grunting with exertion.

---

I’m afraid that’s not the end of my story. The fact is, there were three more storms that summer.

Two coincided with the disappearances of Matthew Walker and Sarah Crease. On each occasion, after they went missing, Danny came to school with another new toy, showing off his growing collection.

I could see the pattern, of course. Even if no one else could, it was very clear to me. Before they vanished, Sarah and Matthew had both been unkind to Danny. Sarah verbally, Matthew with his fists. Now they were gone, and the adults were getting more and more desperate.

By this stage, Danny was the only child left playing on the embankment. I knew what he was up to, but I tried to ignore it. I didn’t want to know what he was doing with his new toys. I didn’t want to know if they were still able to think and feel. I hoped they were all beyond suffering, but really, I didn’t have a clue.

The final storm played out very differently.

Of the six we had that summer, it was by far the loudest. I remember lying in bed with my eyes shut and my hands clamped over my ears. The thunder and lightning were simultaneous, exploding overhead and making car alarms go off in the street. No. 9’s dogs were going mental. I even thought I heard Danny, shrieking with laughter on the far side of the panel fence.

But then I heard something else. The unmistakable sound of sirens in the night.

Fire engines, I thought.

They were getting louder. Soon, I heard the boots of the firefighters. I opened my eyes and saw, to my surprise, an orange light that fluttered on the wall.

Fire, I realised.

I knew what had happened, even before I got out of bed to see. Danny’s house was ablaze. Flames roared from the bedroom window, making the polyester curtains shrink and melt. Before my eyes, the whole house became a fireball, filling the air with thick black smoke.

I stood and watched it burn

I remembered how Danny had leaned from the window, communing with the storm, conjuring lightning from the clouds. Had he bitten off more than he could chew, I wondered?

After a while, I thought I saw a dark shape fighting its way to the window. It was instantly swallowed by flames.

And that was that.

We found out later that lightning had struck the house, starting a fire in Danny’s room. They managed to get the grandma out in time, but they weren’t able to save Danny.

After that, no more children went missing at my school. So you might think that’s the end of my story—but I still have a couple of bits to add.

First of all, Danny’s poor grandma never recovered. She went straight from the hospital to a nursing home and died an incredible thirteen years later. I think there’s been an argument about the will, because no one can take possession of the estate, and the house is stuck in limbo. As far as I know, it remains derelict to this day.

For my own part, I slept in the same room of the same house until I moved to student digs in Mossley Hill, Liverpool, at eighteen years of age. For nearly a decade, whenever I looked out of the window, I saw the burnt-out shell of Danny’s old house, peering over the top of the fence.

Once or twice, when it felt like a storm was brewing, I thought I saw his ghost. It was standing in his old room, waving at me from the window. On those occasions, I remembered him saying that his dead father hadn’t gone far, and I wondered if the same was true now of him.

Is that the end of my story, then?

Not quite. I’ll tell you one more thing before I go.

Because the cause of death was so outlandish, Danny made the news. I remember one of the tabloids had a picture of his fire-damaged bedroom. The caption read, “Unrecognisable after the blaze: a small heap of half-melted toys.”

I recognised them, even if no one else did. I could just make out the charred orange blob of Tom Harding’s hair. His screaming face had melted away, but he was still the Ginger Ninja, even in death.

That same afternoon, I put all my action figures in a box and stuck them in the loft, never to be seen or played with again.

And that’s the end of my story.

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Ellis Reed, 12/03/2024