Spare Brides by Adele Parks Read Free Book Online Page A

the magazines set on the table until Sarah reminded her, ‘Not everyone wears gloves nowadays.’ Even though Lydia did wear gloves, for warmth and form, she instantly drew back, sat down and rested her hands on her lap.
    There was no good news.
    Dr Folstad was tall and slim, fitter than most men his age. His moustache, white and thick, drew Lydia’s eye as it danced with his lip, probably made all the more fascinating by the contrast with his head, which was entirely bald and shone so audaciously that Lydia believed it quite possible that he had it polished along with the wall cladding and shelves. However, for all his reputation as an experimental, forward-thinking doctor, he had nothing new to offer Lydia, who had hoped for a miracle at best, innovation at least. Whilst he looked very different from all the other doctors she’d met, he sounded the same. He took her temperature, asked about her menstruation, made her lie down on her back as he put his hands on her belly. Just as all the other doctors had.
    ‘Have you ever used contraception?’
    ‘No.’ Lydia was mystified. She was here to learn how to get pregnant. Not once in her eight years of marriage had she ever used contraception. Why would she?
    ‘There are women who do, early on in their marriages, and it damages them in the long term.’
    ‘Oh.’ Lydia had heard this before. When she’d repeated it to Ava, Ava had laughed riotously and talked about the guff that men spouted in an attempt to terrify women. She’d commented that it was criminal, and then added that she only wished contraception had such long-term effects, as it would save her a lot of time and effort. Lydia had been too stunned and shy to ask exactly what Ava had meant by this.
    Lydia had received several pieces of dubious advice during her desperate pursuit to conceive a baby, and had sat through many chastising lectures too. One doctor advised her to drink a pint of Guinness every day, as he was adamant that she lacked iron. For a year she’d waded through the thick, creamy beer every morning at breakfast, even though she wasn’t keen on the burned, sharp, almost lactic flavour, and it often caused her to have a headache for the remainder of the morning. She only gave up the habit when another doctor advised her that the drink was making her less feminine and thus reducing her chances of conceiving. She’d been told that wearing high-heeled shoes had thrown her uterus into displacement; for several months she was unfashionable, bordering on the dowdy, and had only returned to heels when Ava had once again sprinkled her wisdom by commenting, ‘Good God, woman, you’re a fright. Lawrence isn’t going to want to make love to you if you insist on dressing like a farm labourer. Then you’ll never get pregnant.’ Lydia thought she might have a point: heels were so much more flattering for the ankles and calves.
    She nervously fingered the lace hem of her skirt, which sat a smidgen below her knee. She wondered whether she might get ticked off for that too. She’d once been told that short skirts were responsible for her infertility. Admittedly, that choice piece of idiocy hadn’t come from a doctor; it was a great-aunt of Lawrence’s who’d insisted that draughts ‘up there’ led to problems.
    ‘Do you exercise?’ Dr Folstad asked gruffly.
    ‘I dance,’ Lydia admitted carefully.
    ‘Dancing. Hmm.’ His tone was condemning.
    ‘I ski in season, and play tennis and golf too in the spring and summer,’ she added defensively, in case dancing was to be disapproved of on moral grounds, as well it might; one never knew what doctors despised.
    ‘For sure. As all you young ladies do.’
    Patronised and alarmed, Lydia asked, ‘Is it wrong?’
    ‘Not necessarily. Some doctors say excessive exercise in women is a problem. Others say it isn’t.’
    ‘What do
you
say?’ asked Sarah. Her concern over the enormous fee this doctor was charging had shocked her out of her normal