The Land of Decoration Read Free Page A

had a stomach pain and had to have Gaviscon and crackers. On Sunday I woke up as if I were coming through water again, and my clothes were sticking to me and the pain was worse. I looked at the clock. There were now twenty-six hours to go.
    I couldn’t eat breakfast, but Father didn’t notice. He dropped an armful of wood beside the Rayburn stove and swigged his tea. “Ready?”
    I was. I had on my best pinafore and the blouse with the roses on the collar and my black shiny shoes. My hair was in plaits. I’m not sure how even they were. Father grabbed his sheepskin coat and cap and I put on my coat.
    Outside, it was very still and very cold. The air was misty and the sky was one block of cloud the color of feathers. No one was about, except the dog from number 29. We went over the roundabout and turned down the hill. I could see the town, the aerials and chimneys and rooftops, the river, and the electricity pylons striding like lonely giants down the valley. And at the bottom of the valley was the factory, a great black thing with funnels and towers and ladders and pipes and above it huge clouds of smoke.
    At the foot of the hill we passed the multistory car park, the bingo hall, the Labour Club, the unemployment office, the betting shop, and the pub where bleach mixes with the beer smell. On weekends there are water balloons on the pavement and sometimes nappies stained red. Once I saw a needle and we had to cross over.
    In our town nothing seems to be where it should. There are car engines in gardens and plastic bags in bushes and shopping trolleys in the river. There are bottles in the gutter and mice in the bottle bank, walls with words on and signs with words crossed out. There are streetlights with no lights and holes in the road and holes in the pavement and holes in exhaust pipes. There are houses with broken windows and men with broken teeth and swings with broken seats. There are dogs with no ears and cats with one eye and once I saw a bird with not many feathers.
    We passed Woolworths, the pound shop, Kwik Save, and the Co-op grocery store. Then we went through the tunnel beneath the bridge where the walls are dark green and trickling, and when we came out we were on a piece of wasteland and there was the Meeting Hall. The Meeting Hall is a black metal shed and has three windows down each side. Inside there are a lot of red seats and on each windowsill bowls of yellow plastic roses with pretend droplets of water stuck onto the petals at regular intervals.
    Father and Mother helped to build the Meeting Hall. It isn’t very big but it belongs to the Brothers. There weren’t many people in the congregation then, only four or five. Without Father and Mother, the congregation might have fizzled out, but they kept preaching, and eventually more people got baptized. It was wonderful when they finally had a meeting place of their own. It took three years to build and every penny was donated by the Brothers.
    Inside the hall, it was cold because the radiators hadn’t warmed up yet. At the front of the hall, Elsie and May were talking to old Nel Brown in the wheelchair.
    May said: “Well, if it isn’t my little treasure!”
    Elsie said: “Well, if it isn’t my little love!”
    “Ah, she’s a lovely girl!” said May, hugging me.
    “She’s a blessing, that’s what she is!” said Elsie, kissing my cheek.
    May said: “Auntie Nel was just telling us about the time she and the priest had a dustup.”
    “Grape?” Nel said. Her chin wobbled as she chewed, because she doesn’t have teeth. Her top lip was whiskery. Her bottom lip was spitty.
    “No thanks, Auntie Nel,” I said. I was too worried to eat, and even if I hadn’t been I wouldn’t have fancied one, because Auntie Nel smells of wee.
    Uncle Stan came up. Uncle Stan is the Presiding Overseer. He drinks milk because of his ulcer and he’s from “Beemeengoomb.” Apparently Beemeengoomb is an even bigger Den of Iniquity than our town. It’s where he