It Had to Be You Read Online Free PDF

motivations were based on love and concern. Then she might have been able to forgive him. But she understood too well that Bert knew nothing of love, only of power.
    So she wandered the halls of her father’s house that night saying prayers for the souls of dead animals and unloved little girls, while she counted the hours until she could run away from this place where she’d known so much unhappiness.
    Peg Kowalski, who had been Bert’s housekeeper for the last eight years, had left a single light burning in the large family room that stretched across the back of the house. Phoebe walked over to the windows that looked out on the grounds and tried to find the old maple that had been her favorite hiding place when she was a child.
    Generally she tried to avoid thinking about her childhood, but tonight, as she stared into the darkness, that time didn’t seem so long ago. She could feel herself being pulled back into the past, to that old maple tree and the dreaded sound of a bully’s voice. . . .
    “There you are, Flea Belly. Come on down. I’ve got a present for you.”
    Phoebe’s stomach did a flip-flop at the loud intrusion of her cousin Reed’s voice. She looked down to see him standing beneath the tree that was her haven during those few times when she was at home. She was supposed to leave for summer camp the next morning, and she had so far managed to avoid being caught alone with him, but today she had let down her guard. Instead of staying in the kitchen with the cook or helping Addie clean the bath-rooms, she had escaped to the solitude of the woods.
    “1 don’t want any present,” she said.
    “You’d better come down here. If you don’t, you’ll be sorry.”
    Reed didn’t make idle threats, and she’d learned long ago that she had few defenses against him. Her father got mad at her if she complained that Reed teased her or hit her. Bert said she was spineless and that he wasn’t going to fight her battles for her. But at twelve, Reed was two years older than she was and lots stronger, and she couldn’t imagine fighting him.
    She didn’t understand why Reed hated her so much. She might be rich while he was poor, but his mother hadn’t died when he was four like hers had, and he didn’t get sent away to school. Reed and her Aunt Ruth, who was her father’s sister, had lived in a brick apartment building two miles from the estate ever since Reed’s father had run off. Bert paid the rent and gave Aunt Ruth money, even though he didn’t like her that much. But he loved Reed because Reed was a boy, and he was good at sports, especially football.
    She knew Reed would climb up after her if she defied him, and she decided she’d feel safer facing him on solid ground. With a sinking sense of dread, she began descending the maple tree, her plump thighs making an ugly swishing sound as they rubbed together. She hoped he wasn’t looking up her shorts. He was always trying to see her there, or touch her, or say nasty things about her bottom, not all of which she understood. She dropped awkwardly to the ground, breathing hard because the descent had been difficult.
    Reed wasn’t unusually tall for a twelve-year-old, but he was stocky, with short, strong legs, broad shoulders, and a thick chest. His arms and legs were perpetually covered with scabs and bruises from sports activities, bike accidents, and fights. Bert loved to inspect Reed’s injuries. He said Reed was “all boy.”
    She, however, was lumpish and shy, more interested in books than in sports. Bert called her Lard Ass and said that all those A’s she made in school wouldn’t get her anywhere in life if she couldn’t manage to stand up straight and look people in the eye. Reed wasn’t smart in school, but that didn’t make any difference to Bert because Reed was the star of his junior high football team.
    Her cousin was dressed in a torn orange T-shirt, cutoffs, and battered sneakers, exactly the kind of rumpled play clothes she