July 2010
The balloon was as big as William; it was exactly as big as William, because the man in the shop had carefully made sure that it was.
It was nearly the end of term and tomorrow it was mufti – a dressing up day – and William wanted to dress up as Harry Potter, so his mother had brought him to the Fancy Dress Hire Shop to see if they had anything suitable he could wear. It was while he was trying on a long purple cloak and a tall pointed black hat that in the mirror he saw Angela Parkinson, who was in Mrs Pettitt’s class. She was standing at the counter while the man inflated a balloon. It was blue and it was enormous.
William forgot all about the Harry Potter outfit and rushed over to see the wonderful balloon. Angela was not as tall as William and, as the man inflated it to exactly the same size as her, the balloon was quite a lot smaller than the one William was to have, but it was, at that time, simply the biggest and the most amazing balloon he had ever seen. As Angela was walking out through the door with the balloon floating gloriously above her he turned to his mother and said, ‘Can I have one like that? Can I? Please!’
His mother sighed and turned to the man throwing up her shoulders in silent resignation. The man leaned down to William and grinned, raising his purple bowler hat towards him. He was wearing baggy blue trousers and a bright red jacket. The jacket had white silk frills around the cuffs and the collar; in his breast pocket was a floppy white handkerchief, which drooped halfway down his chest; pinned to the other lapel was a giant pink flower which the man said was a Chrissy Antler Mum, or something, William couldn’t remember exactly what it was he had said. But the very best thing of all was his bow tie: it was huge and glittery white with bulbs set into it, which flashed all the colours of the rainbow and spun around like a Katherine Wheel when he pressed a secret button in his jacket pocket.
He looked a bit like a clown, but like a clown who had got half way dressed that morning and had decided not to finish.
The man slipped his hand inside his jacket and pulled out a string hung with fat balloon bladders of every colour. William looked at them all but there was really no choice – the balloon had to be red and this balloon was the brightest, most marvellous red he had ever seen, more red even than the clown man’s jacket.
He stood William on top of a chair, next to the till, and slipped the neck of the balloon over the end of the pipe. When he turned on the tap, the gas hissed and the balloon made a funny whistling sound as it slowly inflated. William could hardly believe his eyes, the balloon was already big and it was getting bigger by the second.
The man turned off the tap, pinched the neck of the balloon and held it up against William, looking him up and down, ‘Not yet, big boy.’ he said, ‘Not nearly ready yet.’ He re-connected the pipe, the gas hissed some more and the balloon got even bigger until, finally, the man held it up against William and said, ‘There we go – exactly as big as you are young man.’ William was unable to speak, his mouth was hanging open, a perfect ‘O’, in amazement.
‘No use trying to persuade me to make it any larger,’ the man said, tying off the balloon and attaching a long piece of silver ribbon, ‘Health and Safety, you know. Any bigger and it would carry you off, up into the sky – as far as the moon I have no doubt!’
He tied a loop in the end and slipped it over William’s hand, ‘Now, hang on tight to your mum, you hear, or else it’s . . .’ he pointed upwards, ‘Let’s leave that to NASA, shall we?’
William was no longer listening; the man had let go of the balloon which was now hovering high above him. He pulled it downwards and it bounced back hard, tugging sharply against his wrist – cool!
The balloon was so fat that the man had to help William to hold it as they squeezed through the door and out into the street, and then, when he let go the huge blue balloon surged upwards again. William grabbed his mother’s hand, but, although the balloon was pulling on his wrist as the wind caught it, playfully snatching and tugging, his feet, miraculously, stayed firmly on the ground. All the way to the bus stop, William looked around him, catching the eyes of the people in the street, who were all staring incredulously at his amazing balloon.
When the bus doors opened, the driver took one look at the balloon and said, sternly, ‘You can’t bring that thing on here, young man.’ William stopped, one foot on the bus and one on the kerb. Angrily, his mother asked, ‘Why . . . ?’ but the driver said, ‘Won’t be able to keep the wheels on the road!’ and began to roar with laughter as he beckoned William aboard. Someone at the back of the bus clapped and the other passengers all joined in, applauding William as he steered the balloon down the aisle to his seat, blushing with pride.
When they reached home, there was a further struggle to get the balloon indoors and up to William’s bedroom, where he finally slipped the loop from his wrist and let the balloon leap upwards to settle against the ceiling, where it hung above him, gently wriggling in the breeze from his window.
Something brushed against his legs and he jumped, then relaxed as he realised it was only Fluffy, their old, fat, smelly ginger tom, come to see the exciting new toy. At first the cat was simply bemused by the balloon, but when it saw the string dangling a few feet above the floor, it leapt upwards, its claws swiping uselessly at thin air inches below the loop. William laughed and tugged down on the string, letting it go just as the cat leapt again, but the cat soon tired of the worthless game and wandered off.
For a whole week the balloon hung in his room, waiting patiently for him to come home from school and play with it, but then, each day, he realised that when he let go of the string, it was with less and less force that the balloon surged back to the ceiling; in fact, he noticed with horror that the balloon was smaller, much smaller now than William. It was still big, but it was not the monster it had once been.
One morning, when he woke up, the balloon was no longer pressed tightly against the ceiling, it was drifting in mid-air, the string trailing against the foot of his bed. He pulled on the string, but the balloon only reluctantly rose into the air again. Dejected, he sat heavily on the side of the bed and stared at the pitiable remains of his amazing balloon.
There was a sudden movement by his foot and a ginger blur as sharp claws snatched at the string, dragging the balloon down with the momentum. The balloon fell to the floor, where, with one swipe, it burst with a dull pop. Fluffy fled in terror before William could take his revenge. He sank onto the floor and gathered up the limp distorted red rubber, which was now exactly as big as William’s hand.