Hushy

Hushy has the biggest ears in Candyfloss Land.

Everybody comes to Hushy. Mopsy comes when it is grey. Jitters comes before big days. Chatty comes daily, at length, and Hushy listens to all of it, properly, without once looking over Chatty's shoulder to see if anything more interesting is happening.

Nobody has ever asked Hushy how Hushy is.

Not because they are unkind. Because Hushy never leaves a gap for it. The moment a conversation turns, Hushy says "and how are you?" and it turns straight back.

On Thursday, Hushy's own week had been horrible.

Chatty arrived and talked for twenty minutes about a difficult thing, and Hushy listened and helped, and at the end Chatty stopped, halfway out of the door, and came back in.

"Hang on," said Chatty. "You've been listening to me for twenty minutes."

"That's alright."

"What happened in your week?"

"Nothing much."

Chatty sat back down and did an extraordinary thing for Chatty: Chatty said nothing at all.

The silence went on. And on. It got quite uncomfortable.

And Hushy, who cannot bear a gap, filled it — and what came out was not small talk. It was the whole horrible week, all of it, in one go, for eleven minutes.

Chatty listened to every word.

At the end Hushy said, "Sorry. That was a lot."

"That was eleven minutes," said Chatty. "I did twenty about a bus."

Hushy laughed, and then discovered that the horrible week had shrunk considerably, which is what happens when a thing comes out of your head and into the room.

Hushy still listens more than anybody. It is Hushy's whole gift: Hushy hears when a friend needs help, often before the friend has noticed it.