The Versions of Us
Language: English
Pages: 416
ISBN: 0544634241
Format: PDF / Kindle (mobi) / ePub
The one thing that’s certain is they met on a Cambridge street by chance and felt a connection that would last a lifetime. But as for what happened next . . . They fell wildly in love, or went their separate ways. They kissed, or they thought better of it. They married soon after, or were together for a few weeks before splitting up. They grew distracted and disappointed with their daily lives together, or found solace together only after hard years spent apart.
The Poor in England 1700-1850: An Economy of Makeshifts
The way.’ It is only then, as they get off the bus, that Eva tells Jim she is sorry: she can’t spend the evening with him; there is something she has to do. Jim protests: after tomorrow, he says, they won’t see each other for four whole weeks. Eva says she knows. She really is sorry. Then she leans forward, kisses him, and turns and hurries away, though Jim is calling her, and it is all she can do to lift her heavy feet. She doesn’t stop until she reaches King’s Parade. The tall towers of.
Made coffee, and then Jim asked her to go back inside, bring out the book she’d find on the table beside his armchair. ‘You might recognise it,’ he had called through the French windows, and she did: a Penguin paperback, bordered by two thick red stripes. Brave New World: A Novel. She had carried it out to the garden. ‘I found it when I was clearing out some things,’ he said. ‘You know, preparing.’ He didn’t need to say what for. She had watched his dear, familiar face, and felt so filled with.
Baked by Miriam. ‘Have we missed the food?’ Eva says, kissing Thea lightly on each cheek. ‘I’m so sorry we’re late.’ Thea dismisses her apology with a manicured hand. ‘Please. Don’t worry. We’re only getting started.’ Anton is in the kitchen, dispensing rum punch from a metal tureen. ‘Meine Schwester! Have some punch. Your husband’s had a head-start.’ He nods in the direction of the hallway, where Jim is talking animatedly to Gerald – where, in that case, is Penelope? Eva accepts a glass from.
Room, turning on lamps. But it’s no good: in the artificial light, the colours seem flat, uninspired; the paint is too thick in places, the brushstrokes too clearly visible. His father never painted by night: he rose early, went up to his attic studio to make the best of the morning. ‘Daylight never lies, son,’ he’d say. Sometimes, his mother would mutter back, her voice low, but still loud enough for Jim to catch, ‘Unlike some people around here.’ He puts the palette in the basin, wipes off his.
His own standards. But he can see no donkeys now, and the town itself appears to have doubled in size: new houses – some still unfinished, metal struts rising up from bald concrete blocks – line the upper tiers, and the bars and tavernas have proliferated. A few feet back from the quay, a couple dressed entirely in white are sipping cocktails in the shade of a striped awning, to the sound of an Elton John record spilling from the bar’s open door. He has a sudden memory, bright and clear. He and.