To Have and to Hold Read Online Free PDF Page A

content, who’d do her Sainsbury’s shopping while her husband followed with the pushchair. He’d made the child’s birthday cake this year, uneatable sponge but who cared? There was Mrs Maguire next door, Ann could hear her now, shouting at her children. How did they all fit into that house, with her husband unemployed and home all day? There was Janine. On Saturdays her ex came round; he took Simone out and then the little girl got stomach ache because he was trying, according to Janine, to buy her love with sweeties, and when Simone had a tantrum on Sunday then Janine knew who to blame it on. She said once:
    â€˜You know Annie, sometimes I envy you.’
    â€˜Why?’
    â€˜Just you and Kenny. Snug.’
    Ken, his back to her, was standing at his aquarium. He was suspending a plastic bag in the water to equalize the temperatures. In the bag was a fish.
    â€˜Always feel like I’m making tea,’ he said.
    â€˜Why?’
    â€˜Dunking the tea-bag.’
    Ann laughed.
    â€˜That’s a nice sound,’ he said.
    â€˜What is?’
    â€˜You laughing.’
    She paused. Then she continued sewing – one stitch, two. She kept her voice normal. ‘It’s something . . . well, I’ve been thinking about.’
    â€˜Tremendous news and about time too. You’ve been working there long enough.’
    â€˜I don’t mean the job business. I mean something else.’
    â€˜What?’
    She stopped sewing. ‘But I don’t know what you’ll say.’
    â€˜Try me.’
    â€˜Can’t you guess?’
    â€˜Nope.’
    She kept her eyes on him – the luminous fish, blocked by his shoulder; his pale blue shirt; his stocky body that she thought she knew so well. She looked at the intent back of his neck. Was he listening? ‘We could adopt.’
    There was a silence.
    â€˜Ken, say something.’
    Bubbles rose soundlessly in the aquarium. He didn’t turn. ‘I don’t know what to say.’
    â€˜Have you thought about it?’ she asked.
    He nodded.
    â€˜You have?’
    â€˜Oh yes,’ he said, ‘I’ve thought of precious little else all week.’
    â€˜Really?’ Her heart quickened. She went over to him.
    â€˜Yes,’ he repeated.
    â€˜I could do it, I could love it, I –’
    â€˜Ann –’
    â€˜Black or white or brown . . . it would be ours.’
    She stood beside him. Then he turned. ‘I’m afraid . . .’ He stopped.
    â€˜Don’t be afraid. We’d both love it. We’d –’
    He said slowly: ‘I’m afraid you have a larger heart than me.’
    There was a silence. The fish swam on serenely, their tails flicking.
    Later that evening he went for a run. He thudded past pubs, their lit windows, the roar when the doors opened. He thudded past houses, their glowing, curtained interiors, the changing flicker of their TVs; he veered off along the high street, his breath rasping now . . . past the shuttered shops and the drifted litter and the all-night minicab office, a blare of neon and radio . . . past the takeaway kebabs and chips, a glimpse of plants and chrome, a whiff of grease . . . oh, the whole sordid city, it passed in a jagged blur; how his feet hurt, how his lungs ached, the freezing air rasping in and out like a saw . . .
    . . . He ran until he was running along unknown streets,under a railway bridge, past the stench of urine, and then buses were passing and lights dazzled and he thought his lungs would burst.
    Then he sat down on a bench. It was cold and wet. He buried his head in his hands.

_____
Four
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    THAT NIGHT ANN dreamed she had a baby called Jonquil. She wheeled the carrycot to the supermarket; it was Saturday and crowded and she had a lot of shopping to buy if only she could remember it all. She knew time was getting short and her sister Viv was expecting her – she was waiting for her somewhere far outside London.
    She