by Simon Mason
Mum's Big Ride
Mum's Big Ride
A funfair came to town. It wasn't a small fair. It was massive.
The Quigleys sat in their back room, talking about it excitedly. The most excited person was Mum. ‘There'll be Waltzers,’ she said. ‘And Shunters and Plungers and Whirlpools.’ She grinned. ‘All the things that give you the tummy feeling.’
‘What's the tummy feeling?’ Lucy asked.
‘You know when Dad tosses pancakes? Well, it's a bit like Dad tossing your tummy.’
‘Is it a nice feeling?’
Mum grinned some more. ‘I haven't been to a funfair for ages, but when I was a girl I really, really loved it.’
‘Will I really, really love it?’
‘Tomorrow, we'll go on a ride together, and you can find out.’
Lucy wrinkled up her face. She wasn't sure about the tummy feeling. ‘I'll see,’ she said.
‘What about rifle arcades?’ Will asked. Will didn't like the tummy feeling at all. He liked shooting things and winning prizes.
‘I expect there'll be rifle arcades.’
‘Good. I'm going to win one of those eight-foot squirrels.’
‘Eight-foot squirrels?’
‘They always have prizes like that at fairs. Enormous soft toys. Giant teddy bears, monstrously big Babar the Elephants. But the best are the gigantic squirrels. They look sort of cute and sort of mad, and if one toppled onto you it would probably crush you to death,’ Will said excitedly.
Dad groaned. Dad didn't like the tummy feeling or eight-foot squirrels.
‘We could always stay at home,’ he said. ‘How about a quiet night in?’
* * *
The next day, just as it was getting dark, the Quigleys caught the bus into town. Usually at that time there weren't many people about, but tonight the streets were crowded. The Quigleys went slowly through the town centre, and turned a corner, and stopped.
‘Look!’ Mum said.
They all looked.
‘Where's the road gone?’ Lucy asked.
The High Street had disappeared below a mass of rides, arcades, fun-houses, kiosks and stalls. The fair looked like a whole city of moving lights. A hubbub of music, shouts and screams swept up to them.
‘Wow!’ Mum said.
‘Double wow!’ Lucy said.
‘Wow with knobs on,’ Will said.
Dad said, ‘I don't think we need to stay more than half an hour, do you?’
First, the Quigleys planned what they were going to do. Mum gave Lucy and Will some money of their own to spend. Dad agreed to buy snacks from the stalls.
‘Before we start, there are two very important Family Rules,’ he said. ‘First rule: stay together. I don't want anyone getting lost. If you do get lost, come to this lamppost here. The lamppost is our meeting point. Do you agree?’
They agreed.
‘Second rule: no vomiting on big rides. It's messy and embarrassing.’
Mum just laughed. ‘I'm never sick on big rides,’ she said. ‘And I can't wait to go on one.’
The first ride they came to was called the Churner. The Churner looked like the insides of a giant toaster, with two racks of people strapped inside waiting to be toasted. When the music started, the toaster shunted forwards, tilted sideways and suddenly flipped over, and the air was filled with the very odd noises of the people inside.
‘Anyone want a go?’ Mum asked.
Will shook his head. ‘I'd vomit,’ he said. ‘And that would be breaking one of the Family Rules.’
Dad shook his head. ‘I'd die,’ he said. ‘Which would be breaking one of my own personal rules.’
‘What about you, Lucy?’
Lucy watched the Churner for a while. It looked exciting. The people flew sideways, then backwards, then upside-down sideways. But she was nervous.
Mum said temptingly, ‘It looks like a good one for the tummy feeling.’
But Lucy couldn't make up her mind, and eventually the Quigleys moved on.
Will scanned the stalls for prize-winning games, and found two straightaway, one with darts and one with Ping-Pong balls.
To win top prize at the darts game you had to score less than five on the special dartboard. Top prize was a nearly life-size fake-fur ostrich with an unpleasant grin.
‘I'm so bad at darts I ought to be good at this,’ Will said. ‘I nearly always score less than five.’
He scored 17, 40, 6 and an unlucky 180.
‘That ostrich is putting me off,’ he said.
The top prize at the Ping-Pong-ball game was a nearly life-size fake-fur orangutan with insane eyes. To win it you had to score more than five, by bouncing three balls into the right holes.
‘Five? I never seem to score less than five.’
He scored zero four times on the trot and ended on a high with one.
Mum and Dad sympathized.
‘Do you know what the problem is?’ Will said, suddenly looking cunning. ‘I'm too hungry to win anything.’
They bought fried flying fish from a stall selling Caribbean food, and hot pork sandwiches, and quite a lot of pink-and-white nougat, and a tin of chocolate-coated peanuts, and a bunch of green candyfloss, and walked through the fair eating them from the bags. As they went, Mum pointed out rides which Lucy might like.
‘The Swooper's good,’ she said. ‘Very fast. So fast, you sort of leave yourself behind. Do you fancy it?’
Lucy said she wasn't sure.
Dad shuddered.
‘Or there's the Backlash. That's a bit like turning yourself inside out.’ Mum grinned.
Lucy said she quite liked the sound of that.
With his mouth full, Will said, ‘Why are you always forcing people to do what they don't want to?’
Mum explained that was what mums did. It was a brief explanation because she was in a good mood. ‘Anyway,’ she said, ‘Lucy wants to go on a ride. And there,’ she added suddenly, pointing, ‘is a ride she would love. My favourite – the Waltzer!’
‘What do Waltzers do?’ Lucy asked.
‘They give you the tummy feeling,’ Mum said.
Lucy thought about it. ‘OK,’ she said. ‘I'll go on if you come with me.’
‘I'm definitely going on,’ Mum said. ‘Anyone else?’
Will shook his head.
Dad looked the other way.
Mum and Lucy got into one of the Waltzer cars and sat back and pulled down the metal bar in front of them, and waved at Dad and Will.
Mum said, ‘Are you nervous, Poodle?’
Lucy nodded.
‘Don't worry. It's going to be fantastic!’
The Waltzer began to move. First they went slowly up and down, like a boat on the waves. Then they went quicker, and started turning round. Soon they began to spin. Mum grinned. Lucy grinned back. A fairground man climbed alongside them and gave them a push, and Lucy suddenly spun so fast she felt her grin stretch. The rest of the fair turned into a blur. Somewhere near, she could hear a bumpy, squeaky noise. The noise went Oh-oh-oh-oh, a-a-a-argh, nug-ganugganugga. After a while she realized she was making the noise. Sometimes she spun, sometimes she swung, sometimes she humpbacked up and down, and sometimes she did all these things together, and all the time she had a wonderful, glorious tummy feeling.
Even when the ride was over she couldn't stop grinning. She tried to explain to Will why it was so good, but she couldn't do that either.
‘I can't hear what you're saying,’ Will said. ‘You're grinning too much.’
‘It's the tummy feeling,’ she said, when she could. ‘I can't explain. You'll have to ask Mum.’
But Will wasn't interested in the tummy feeling, and neither was Dad, even though Lucy kept talking about it. They moved off together through the crowds, looking for games with giant-squirrel prizes, and no one noticed that Mum wasn't with them. Mum stayed where she was, leaning on a rail next to the Waltzer. Her face was white and a bit wet, and her hair was stuck to her forehead, and she was holding a han
d to her mouth. Mum had just realized that she didn't like the tummy feeling any more.
She groaned to herself and took a deep breath, and tried to think. Someone had to go on rides with Lucy. Dad and Will wouldn't go with her. It had to be Mum. She took another deep breath.
Dad came back to find her. ‘Are you OK?’ he asked.
Mum nodded. ‘Mmm.’
‘Are you sure? You look a bit … colourless.’
‘Just a bit chilly,’ Mum said weakly.
‘I wouldn't worry about that. You'll soon warm up when you go on another ride. Come on, we'd better catch up with Will and Lucy.’
The Quigleys walked through the fair, looking at everything. It was a very good fair. All round them people were screaming and laughing as they flew above the street lamps. Lucy kept teasing Dad that he didn't dare go on any of the rides.
They came to a ride called Thrasher.
‘This looks like a good one, Mum,’ Lucy said. ‘Dad wouldn't like it, but I bet you would.’
Mum nodded or, at least moved her head up and down. ‘Wait a second, though,’ she said suddenly. ‘Isn't that a doughnut stall over there?’
They bought a bag of hot sugared doughnuts, Lucy's favourite, and shared them as they went on. Mum didn't want any.
The next ride they came to was called the Walloper.
‘What about that one?’ Will said to Lucy. ‘You and Mum could go on that. You'd like that, a bit of walloping.’
Lucy agreed. Mum made a noise which didn't mean anything, and looked all round, and at the last second said, ‘Oh, look, there's one doughnut left. Who wants the last doughnut?’
While Lucy was eating the last doughnut, they went past half a dozen more rides. But just as they were about to go past the last one, she finished eating, looked up and said, ‘I like the sound of this one. Don't you, Mum?’
‘Oh,’ Mum said, reading the sign. ‘The Thrash-Master?’ She seemed to go limp. But before she could say anything, Dad said unexpectedly, ‘Oh, I wouldn't bother with Thrash-Master.’
‘Why?’ said Lucy.
‘It's a bit feeble, to be honest. Don't you want to go on something fast with me? Something scary and vicious?’
Everyone looked at him, and he looked back at them defiantly. He was fed up with everyone teasing him for not daring to go on scary rides.
‘But you don't like anything like that, Dad,’ Lucy said.
‘Pah! You just watch. We're going to go on the fastest, scariest, most vicious ride here.’
Lucy looked interested. ‘Which one, Dad?’
Dad pointed.
Lucy looked. ‘Where? I can't see it. Is it behind the Helter-Skelter?
‘It is the Helter-Skelter,’ Dad said, with triumph. ‘And I'm going to go down first. Even though, really,’ he added, ‘I'm probably too old and might get killed.’
Lucy scowled again.
Will said, ‘Dad, even I think the Helter-Skelter's boring.’
Dad explained at length how dangerous the Helter-Skelter was. ‘Look,’ he said. ‘I'm good at the Helter-Skelter. I can come down backwards, head first or reclining on one elbow playing a well-known tune on comb and paper. You've got to want to see that.’
They didn't.
‘I'm going anyway,’ he said. ‘Say goodbye. This might be the last time you see me.’
‘Goodbye,’ Lucy said.
He queued up, got a mat and disappeared, leaving Mum, Will and Lucy waiting at the bottom.
They stood there, watching. Child after child came gently down the Helter-Skelter, slid slowly to the end, and were helped off by a fairground man.
‘Where is Dad?’ Mum said after a while. ‘He's taking ages.’
‘Perhaps he got nervous when he got to the top,’ Will said. ‘And couldn't face it.’
At that moment there was a noise from above.
‘Someone's shouting,’ Lucy said.
‘No,’ Will said. ‘I think it's someone singing.’
‘Oh god,’ Mum said.
Suddenly Dad came into sight round the last bend, travelling very fast. He was kneeling on his mat, leaning forward in an aggressive racing stance with his hands round his eyes like goggles, singing ‘Yes, We Have No Bananas’ very loudly. His appearance caused panic among the onlookers at the bottom. The fairground man shouted something. Dad tried to brake. He lost control of his mat, left the slide at speed and sprawled to a stop on the pavement in front of a baby in a pram, who dropped an ice-cream onto Dad's face and burst into tears.
‘Actually,’ Will said, ‘that wasn't bad. No style, but lots of chaos.’
After Dad had made various apologies, they left the Helter-Skelter. Dad said he didn't think a second go would be as good as the first. During the rest of their visit he moved in a painful crouching walk.
‘I think I've got burn marks,’ he said, wiping his face. ‘And that ice-cream got into my eyes.’
‘Never mind,’ Lucy said. ‘Mum and I will cheer you up by going on a big ride and showing you how it's done.’
Mum sighed and looked sad, but before she could say anything, Will said, ‘And now, if Dad's finished distracting us I'm going to win an outlandishly big squirrel.’
Mum perked up. ‘That,’ she said, ‘sounds like a great idea.’
‘Doesn't it,’ Dad said gloomily.
Will and Lucy led the way to the Toss-a-Frog stall.
‘I like squirrels,’ Lucy said. ‘When we've won it, where shall we put it?’
‘We can't put it on our beds,’ Will said thoughtfully. ‘It's too big, it would break our legs.’
‘But it's too big to go in the wardrobe,’ Lucy said.
They thought a while.
‘I think it needs its own hammock,’ Will said at last. ‘Dad can make a hammock for it.’
Dad rolled his eyes. ‘Fine,’ he said. ‘And shall I build an en-suite bathroom for it in the corner of the room?’
‘That would be nice,’ Lucy said. ‘Thank you.’
Will started playing Toss-a-Frog. First you put a frog in your dish. Then you aimed the dish. Then you thumped the lever, and the dish shot up. And, if you had aimed properly, the frog flew through the air in a short, graceful arc and landed on a lily pad floating in the middle of the water tank, and stayed there, and didn't slide off one inch to the left or one inch to the right, either of which would disqualify it.
‘Nothing to it,’ Will said.
It was one pound fifty for three goes.
After he had spent nine pounds, Mum asked him to give up.
‘Mum!’ Will said. ‘I've just been practising till now. You're always telling me to practise things. You're always telling me I'll never do things properly if I don't practise first. That's what you're always saying. And now I'm practising, and you're telling me to stop.’
‘You know that's true, Mum,’ Lucy said.
‘All right,’ Mum said. ‘But you have to do it properly soon.’
Will spent another nine pounds.
‘Please!’ Mum said.
‘Just one pound fifty more,’ Will pleaded. ‘It's for the squirrel. That squirrel's all I've ever wanted.’
They all looked at the squirrel. The squirrel looked back at them. It was eight-foot tall, bright orange and looked ridiculously pleased with itself.
‘This is your very last go,’ Mum said.
‘Pray to god he doesn't actually win it,’ Dad said.
For the twenty-fifth time, Will took aim. He missed. He took aim again. He missed again.
‘By the way,’ Dad said suddenly, ‘I know I can't see properly because of all this ice-cream in my eye, but isn't that a rifle arcade over there?’
There was a small commotion, caused by Will abandoning the Toss-a-Frog stall and making his way quickly towards the rifle arcade, followed by Lucy, followed by Mum.
‘What about your last go?’ Dad shouted after Will.
‘Dad says what about your last go?’ Lucy said kindly. She often repeated Mum and Dad's questions to Wil
l when he forgot to listen to them.
‘Tell him to take it for me!’ Will said, as he examined the rifles. ‘I'm too busy winning a shooting prize.’
Lucy told him.
Dad sighed. ‘I'm don't think I'll bother,’ he said to the lady on the Toss-a-Frog stall. ‘I don't actually want to win. Anyway, I've been part-blinded by ice-cream.’
‘No harm in having a go if you've no chance of winning,’ the lady reasoned.
Dad sighed again. ‘I suppose you're right,’ he said.
At the rifle arcade, Mum, Will and Lucy were having an argument.
‘This is too expensive,’ Mum said.
‘It isn't expensive for something I've always, always wanted to do,’ Will said.
‘But you're not paying for it,’ Mum said.
‘That's not the point. The point is that I really, really want to go on it. Just like Lucy really, really wants to go on one more big ride,’ he added.
‘I'd forgotten about one more big ride!’ Lucy said, pink with pleasure. ‘Thank you, Will.’
Mum, however, hadn't forgotten how bad she felt.
‘Just one go then,’ she said. ‘But take your time,’ she added.
The rifle arcade was called ‘Wild West Saloon'. There was a counter with a waxwork barman behind it polishing a glass, shelves of bottles, four waxwork cowboys playing cards at a table, a waxwork old man playing an accordion, a birdcage, a piano, a picture of Niagara Falls and a stuffed bear. All these things had little targets on them, and if you hit one the thing moved or played a tune. It all looked creaky and old-fashioned.
‘What do you win?’ Will asked the man. ‘Is it a squirrel. Or an ostrich?’
The man shook his head. ‘If you hit all the targets you win this.’ He held out a keyring with a silver bullet on it. ‘It's real,’ he said. ‘No squirrels here.’
Will gasped. ‘A real silver bullet,’ he said. ‘How many targets are there?’
‘Ten.’
‘How many shots do I have?’
‘Fifteen.’
‘Has anybody ever done it before?’
‘Not tonight.’
‘Never mind,’ Mum said to the man. ‘We'll come back next year.’