Chapter 2
‘I like you,’ Alfie said to Noman.
Alfie loved Noman’s stick arms. Alfie loved to pick up a stick every time he went for a walk. He thought it would be fun to have sticks for arms.
Alfie began to wish he was a snowman.
Noman was happy; he liked it when people said he could be their friend. Alfie stared hard at his new friend. He wondered what it was like to be a snowman. He didn’t think he would like to be a snowman. He thought it would be a bit cold. Alfie liked to be warm and especially enjoyed cuddles with his mummy and daddy.
‘Do you like being cold all the time?’ asked Alfie.
‘Yes I do,’ said Noman. I love it. ‘What I don’t like is the rain and the sun, they are not good for me.’
Just then Mia and Millie came running back out into the garden. Noman hoped they would not mention his green, sticking out teeth.
Now it was Mia and Millie’s turn to stare at Noman.
Noman was a bit worried.
‘Why are you wearing sunglasses?’ Millie asked him quietly. Millie had a lovely pair of sunglasses but she only wore them in the summer when she went to the beach in Cornwall.
‘I wear sunglasses because I want to be a cool snowman and besides when I was made, my owner didn’t have any coal to use for my eyes,’ Noman replied in a voice nearly as quiet as Millie’s.
‘I like them,’ said Millie, ‘they suit you. You do look like a cool snowman. I am sad you have got no coal for your eyes.’
Noman thanked Millie for saying such kind things, he was not used to children saying nice things. Most of his old friends only made fun of him and his green, sticking out teeth.
Now it was Mia’s turn to ask her new friend a question.
‘Where are your daddy and mummy?’ she enquired. ‘Are you here on your own?’
Noman told the three children that he didn’t have a mummy or a daddy and that snowmen usually just lived on their own.
Mia, Millie and Alfie felt sad; they all loved their mummies and daddies very much, they were sad that their new friend didn’t have a daddy or a mummy.
Millie thought they could adopt Noman and he could live in their garden all year. She would ask he mummy later.
‘Do you have any friends?’ Alfie asked him, trying not to look at his green, sticking out teeth, which had started to chatter in the cold.
‘I have three friends, but I don’t see them very often. One of them looks just like me and he wears sunglasses and a scarf too, but my best friend is called Olaf. He is very famous and he is a film star. We have been friends for a long time.’
Mia was so excited to hear this. She loved to watch Olaf in her favourite film.
Noman told Mia that he wanted to be in a film too but no one asked him because of his teeth.
Mia looked at Noman’s teeth. They did look a bit green, but she thought that he still looked very handsome.
“One of my friends is very rich, Noman told the children, ‘he lives in a big house and he has a real hat to wear on his head.’
Mia remembered the snowball hat she had made for Noman. She wished she could give Noman a nice hat just like his friend.
Just then Mia’s mum called them in for dinner and they said goodbye to Noman. They asked him to wait in the garden till they came back out. Noman said he had nowhere else to go and that he would see them later.
Noman felt happy to have three such lovely new friends.
Ramblings of a retired teacher 