Falsie

Ann MacLaren

In 1958, when I was six years old my parents took my grandmother, my sister, my brother and myself to Port Seton for our first holiday at the seaside. They had rented what would nowadays be called a chalet for two weeks: actually it was just a hut. It had only one room, although part of that had been sectioned off to hold a built-in double bed, and there was a cupboard with a single bed inside, where Granny would sleep; everything else was crammed into the living area, including stove, sink, table, chairs and bed-settee. The toilet was at the end of a grassy lane and was shared by all the other huts in the field. We thought it was heaven.

On our first night the three of us sat up in bed, Peter and I at the top, Margaret at the bottom, waiting for Granny to get ready for bed because she had promised she would come in beside us and tell us a story. She had a great fund of stories, my granny, none of which were of little bunnies or fairies or good little boys and girls. She favoured the ghost story, the more horrific the better, and whenever we spent the night with her she would come into bed with us and scare the wits out of us with her tales. ... (continues)