The Other Side of You Read Online Free PDF

her or gainsay her.
    Nowadays, Olivia ran a boutique in the smarter part of Brighton. It was a waste of her intelligence but I’d long abandoned my earlier efforts to steer her career and the job seemed to suit her, mainly because much of the stock found its way on to her person.
    ‘Livy, that’s a fabulous frock. I’m green with envy.’ Bar, the least envious woman alive, was generous with compliments. Privately, I preferred her outfit, which was a pair of well-cut black trousers and a silk shirt. Besides being good-tempered Bar had a good behind.
    ‘Like it? It’s Gina Frattini.’ Olivia pirouetted, showing off the dress’s elaborately ruffled skirt.
    ‘I haven’t a clue who Gina Frattini is,’ said Chris, coming out of the kitchen in a pair of filthy trousers, ‘but she’s obviously posh. I’m afraid I’m as you see me, covered in dog hair as usual.’ The Powells had four children and three rowdy dogs. It was debatable which they spoiled more.
    ‘You’ve worried Dr McB about his trousers now!’ Dan had observed me covertly brushing at them. It was a subject for badinage among the assembled company that I’m fussy about such things.
    The dogs had been shut in the kitchen, but after a good deal of barking they were let out, until Cassius, an excitable Labrador, leapt at Olivia’s dress and threatened to rip it, so, to my relief, they were banished again.
    Dan, who showed an easy disregard for his clothes but disliked pets, remarked that ‘Olivia’s narcissism’ had ‘its uses’, which I was afraid might lead to one of their scratchy dialogues. I could see Olivia had gone the pink of her dress and fearing she was preparing a retort I lobbed a comment at Dan as a diversion. ‘I saw someone unusual today at Kit’s.’
    ‘Man or woman?’ asked Dan, who could be readily distracted by an interesting case.
    ‘Woman. A suicide but not one of your run-of-the-mill sort.’
    ‘Darling,’ said Olivia, ‘you sound so blasé, poor creatures.’ She hadn’t a grain of true sympathy for anyone misguided enough to land up in a psychiatric hospital.
    ‘Method?’ asked Dan. ‘D’you mind if I smoke, Chris?’ Dan, who never ate much at the best of times, had left half his first course untouched. Chris wasn’t the greatest cook, but sometimes I wished he would try harder.
    ‘I mind,’ interjected Denis.
    ‘That’s why I asked Chris and not you,’ said Dan, lighting up. ‘This is an inter-course break.’ He always made that joke and I was surprised to hear Olivia laugh. We had all long ago given up laughing at it.
    ‘She seems to have acquired some Soneryl from somewhere, so either she’s a darned poor sleeper or she’s clever.’
    ‘Darling, no one says “darned” any more,’ said Olivia.
    ‘Insomniacs are often clever,’ Denis interposed swiftly. ‘There’s nothing to say insomnia addles the wits. Mostly the sign of the sharp ones, in my experience. If you must smoke, Daniel, use an ashtray.’ He removed the plate on to which Dan had been flicking his cigarette and fetched a Stella Artoisashtray, which one of their kids must have taken from the pub.
    ‘Well, no, I mean, she must have talked someone into giving them to her with a view to bumping herself off. Soneryl’s a barbiturate. Not easy to get,’ I explained for Olivia’s sake. She couldn’t have cared less but I always felt this need to include her in these conversations.
    ‘She give any reason?’
    ‘Not so far,’ I said. ‘I think the reasons may be existential.’ I rather wished I hadn’t brought up the subject of Elizabeth Cruikshank.
    ‘Darling, don’t be so pretentious,’ Olivia said, smiling at Dan as if to say: Isn’t he impossible?
    ‘Things too much for her?’ Dan pursued, ignoring Olivia.
    ‘Spare me people who have to attract attention to themselves in that “look-at-me” sort of way.’ Olivia finally succeeded in terminating the conversation.
    For once I was grateful to her. It suddenly felt like