The Broken Read Online Free PDF Page A

overdramatic. But she had a huge heart and was capable of impulsive acts of jaw-dropping generosity. And she was the mother of his child.
    ‘Come on,’ Hannah said, when she could bear the muffled sobbing no longer. ‘Drink your tea and tell me.’
    Sasha’s eyes opened – well, as much as they could in their present puffy state. She looked a bit startled, as if she’d forgotten Hannah was even there. She heaved herself up into a sitting position and brought her knees up to her chin, pulling the faded Ramones T-shirt she had on under her denim jacket down over her legs as little boys sometimes do to give themselves freakishly large fake breasts.
    ‘Oh Hannah. He doesn’t love me.’
    The words were pieces of broken glass, so painful that Sasha had to spit them out one at a time.
    Instinctively Hannah leaned forward and flung her arms around her friend. ‘I’m sure you’re wrong,’ she found herself saying.
    ‘He told me,’ Sasha continued, oblivious to the lack of surprise in Hannah’s voice. ‘He says he doesn’t think he’s in love with me any more. He says he needs to go away for a while, to have some space to work out what to do.’
    Hannah’s hand, which had been rhythmically stroking Sasha’s shoulder, froze. He hadn’t told her. The cowardly shit. He hadn’t told her there was someone else.
    ‘What am I going to do? I love him so much. I can’t lose him. I just can’t. September is not going to come from a broken home. She is going to have a proper family.’
    Sasha’s voice had become increasingly shrill and Hannah felt suddenly chilled. Obviously she was upset, but there was something unnerving about her intensity. It wasn’t as if they didn’t know anyone else who had split up – half the kids at the nursery were from single-parent households. Besides, she was almost shouting now, and Hannah was worried the noise might wake Lily.
    Too late.
    ‘Mummy!’ The little voice sounded frightened.
    ‘I’d better go,’ Hannah tried to get up, but Sasha had her hand on her arm.
    ‘I can’t live without him,’ she said, staring at Hannah. Her eyes looked wild. ‘He can’t do this to us. I can’t be divorced. I won’t be divorced.’
    ‘Mummy! Mummy!’
    ‘I need to go. Lil’s calling me. She needs me.’
    Sasha’s fingers tightened, vicelike. ‘She’s fine, for God’s sake. She’ll never stop being such a baby unless you stop mollycoddling her.’
    Hannah tore herself away. Her heart was hammering. ‘I’ll be back in a minute.’
    In Lily’s room, she held her sniffling child in her arms and tried to calm her down. ‘Hush now, everything’s fine. I’m with Auntie Sash.’ Sasha hadn’t meant to be nasty about Lily, she told herself, she was just so overwrought.
    By the time Lily had finally got back to sleep, Hannah had put Sasha’s words from her mind and she was relieved, when she slipped back into the living room, to see that Sasha clearly had too. Her friend was sitting much straighter on the sofa, sipping from her surely stone-cold tea. She seemed more alert.
    ‘I’m sorry, Hannah, I’ve been a complete idiot, haven’t I?’ Sasha scrunched up her face in an abject expression.
    Hannah tried to insist that she hadn’t.
    ‘I have. I’m a total idiot. I’m completely overreacting, as usual. Dan’s just having some kind of mid-life crisis, isn’t he? All he needs to do is go whizzing around Goa on a motorbike for a few weeks and he’ll be sorted. Don’t you think?’
    Hannah looked into Sasha’s hopeful, pink-rimmed eyes and found herself saying: ‘Yeah, that’s probably it. A mid-life crisis.’
    Instantly Sasha brightened up, sniffing back the dregs of her tears and opening her eyes a little wider. ‘Thanks, Hannah. I knew you’d help. You’re always so good at putting things in perspective.’
    Guilt tugged at Hannah’s heart. ‘You don’t think he could have . . . found somebody else?’
    Sasha’s eyes narrowed. ‘No.’ The word practically