Time to Let Go Read Online Free PDF Page A

especially when it came from friendly and obviously well-meaning strangers. It still felt as if he and Biddy were being patronised, though.
    Hanna would have approved of the belittling way the waitress was treating his wife and would have encouraged her to carry on. Maybe that was how people in the service industry treated everyone who was slightly different from the norm, just so that they could carry on with their job. Walter let out a deep sigh of frustration and then placed their order.
    While they were waiting for their drinks an old school friend of Biddy came into the coffee shop and walked straight up to their table.
    “Hello Biddy! How are you?” the woman asked.
    “Good, thank you for asking,” was the almost automatic response. “How are you?”
    It would not have been obvious to an outsider whether Biddy had recognised her friend or not. Biddy had dropped tricky details, such as names, from her conversations a long time ago.
    “Do you know who I am?” the friend asked directly but luckily she decided to give the answer away before putting Biddy cruelly on the spot. “I am Minnie. Minnie Crook. Or maybe you remember me as Minnie Chadwick. We went to school together. I married Martin Crook.”
    “Of course, of course!” Biddy said with apparent lack of conviction. “How is he?”
    “Oh sweetheart, Martin died a few years ago. You went to the funeral.”
    “I am sorry Minni e; her memory has deteriorated since you last saw her. I am not sure she recognises you at all,” Walter interrupted, trying to rescue the situation.
    “ But I do recognise you!”  Biddy insisted. “You look more like your mother now.”
    “That is right,” Minnie said laughing. “I am old now. Just say it like it is,” but turning to Walter she mouthed: “You poor thing.”
    “It is quite all right,” he reassured her. “Biddy and I are just fine. What are you doing in town? How are your children?”
    Minnie looked nervously at Biddy, unsure whether to involve her in the conversation or better just to speak to Walter alone.
    “I just came into town to return my books to the library. Since Martin...you know...I have been reading a lot, something I did not have enough time for before he...well, the kids are fine I guess. Ryan is now a lecturer at the university and Emma is pregnant again. That will be her fourth and from her third marriage. I told her it is madness. She is 43. You know what they say about giving birth at that age and it is not as if there aren’t enough children in the world already as it is. But it is a new man and she wants to seal the union with a child. I am worried sick that it will come out with a defect but Emma says the scans are all fine.”
    Walter sat dumbfounded by this verbal assault and the use of double negatives, but he managed to get out: “I am sure it will be all fine. You know modern technology and medicine have come a long way since our days. Especially with giving birth, the doctors have perfected their ways. I wouldn’t worry. If only they had advanced that far with old age and its side effects,” with a meaningful glance at his wife, who had followed the conversation, nodding with seemingly great interest yet with no indications that she knew what was being discussed.
    “Well, I better go,” sai d Minnie quickly. “All the best. Bye Biddy, great seeing you!”
    “Yes, nice meeting you too. ” 
    After Minnie had left them there was an awkward silence. Walter found it difficult having to steer their conversations as much as he had to these days. He had always been the quiet one of the couple and had let his wife talk about what ever she wanted to. Now that she was less forthcoming he had to rise to the challenge. In awkward moments like this, when he saw that she was struggling to make sense of what had just been said, he had to think quickly to come up with a new topic to distract her. The things he could easily discuss, such as football or sport, were not always suitable