Paraffin and Rain, by Joycelyn Baptiste

An original novel extract set in the twentieth century.

My father had written that he had found us a home, so I expected a house. In November 1957 the taxi from Waterloo stopped outside a tall terrace in Brixton, and he led us up three flights of stairs to one room at the back. It held a double bed, a wardrobe with a door that swung open on its own, and a gas ring on a tin tray beside the sink. The gas ran from a meter that swallowed shillings, and my father kept a row of them on the mantelpiece like soldiers. There was a paraffin heater in the corner, and its smell got into the blankets, into the bread, into everything. My mother looked at it all for a long minute, took off her good hat and asked where the bathroom was. It was two floors down and shared with five other families. That night my brother and I slept top to toe in the bed while my parents sat up on the two hard chairs, and I lay awake listening to rain on a window that did not quite shut.

List five things you learn about the family’s room in London.