Hastings, 16 August 2012
We parked the car at an angle on the north side of Wellington Square, then walked across the old sandstone pavement slabs and down the wide, worn steps to the shopping area with its red-brick pavements in Wellington Place. The town centre was thronged with people milling about in the sunshine, and we almost had to elbow our way into McDonald’s – the place eight-year-old Ellie was aiming for.
Inside, it was like Dante’s Inferno or a painting by Hieronymus Bosch: dark, hot, and full of children, adults, and staff. The more junior ones wore brown uniforms with yellow piping and seemed worn out, while their overseers marched up and down behind them to ensure there was no slacking.
There was the smell of frying fat, chips, burgers, and onions; a clattering of feet and plastic cutlery; and the confused babble of conversation.
A loose queue formed to order food, and individuals or groups were directed to the next free till. Ellie and I got in a bit of a muddle with this and ended up at a till where there appeared to be no attendant. When one did appear, she still seemed to be dealing with the previous customers, who had already gone away.
Ellie asked for a Happy Meal – a children’s product that comes in a colourful cardboard box with handles, containing a burger, French fries, and a few other bits and pieces, as well as a small toy. All this was accompanied by a milkshake for £2.39.
We walked back through the warmth and the wind, with Ellie as lively as a slip-jig of embodied sunshine in her mini-chiton of the lightest pastel-green fabric. She ate her Happy Meal and drank her milkshake in the car before we drove back up Albert Road and Queens Road to Morrison’s supermarket.
There was not much we needed there, but Ellie was still hungry and bought a ham and cheese wrap, which she first constructed into a face from a kit of parts with some imaginative skill – an amusingly ambiguous comment on fast food.
After this gastronomic experience, we had little to do and waited some time for Becky to return. With the warmth, the exercise and, in Ellie’s case, the food, we both fell asleep.
