She thought of Sophie, who had encouraged her to say these things, to be clear. Sophie, who would be Cap’s widow though she could be his wife only in name. She would bear the loss, and so could Anna.
She said, “I break the law on a regular basis, and without remorse. And I will continue to break the law as long as I am able.”
“Contraceptives.”
She let out a small sigh of relief at his matter-of-fact tone.
“Yes. I make information available in certain very strict circumstances and I also provide . . . recommendations, where possible. We—I am uncompromising about my patients’ privacy and my own safety because I can’t help anyone if I’m sitting in prison.”
He was watching her. “You’ve just confessed a crime to me. You trust me.”
“I do,” Anna said, her voice catching. She waited until he nodded for her to go on. “I do trust you. Am I wrong?”
“No.” No hesitation, no doubt.
She went on. “So you must know that whatever situation I find myself in eventually—with you or anyone else—I will use contraceptives. Until.” She stopped herself.
“Until.”
“Until the time is right.”
He drew in a deep breath. “I see.” And after a moment he said, “It’s better than the alternatives.”
“Do you think so?” Anna wanted to touch his face but stopped herself. “Do you mean it’s better than bringing an unwanted child into the world, or it’s better than abortion?”
She had finally unsettled him.
“Both.”
He was still talking to her, which gave her the courage to tell him the rest.
“I agree with you that it’s better than the alternatives. But again, you should know—” Her voice was suddenly hoarse. “You should know that under certain circumstances I would perform an abortion. I haven’t yet, but I might someday. I don’t know if you realize, but I would guess that at least a hundred successful abortions are performed every month, in this city alone. Poorer women care for themselves, but hundreds of procedures are done by doctors and midwives, and done safely. You only hear about the cases that have gone wrong.”
“Is that something you see a lot?”
“All the time. Usually when a woman comes to the hospital after a badly done abortion it’s already too late. But I have never reported the few who survived. And I never will.”
“And their doctors?”
“I ask, but so far no one has ever given me a name. I’m not sure what I would do in that case. It depends on the circumstances.”
Jack looked away over the river to the west. He was breathing deeply and evenly, and his arm stayed where it was, around her shoulders. As a minute passed and then another, a deep sadness began to gather in the corners of what Sophie would call her heart. Her vulnerable heart.
He started to say something, paused. “Would you—” he began. “Would you yourself—”
Anna interrupted him. “I can’t imagine a situation where I would want an abortion for myself.” She heard Sophie saying, Leave no room for misunderstanding, and she went on, reaching for the right words. “But that is at least in part because I have reliable access to contraceptives and understand how they work.”
She held herself very still against him, aware of the pulse in his throat and wrists, the beat of his heart. In the next minutes she might have to walk away or watch him walk away, but until then she could be glad of his strength and warmth and the solid fact of him.
The breeze turned cool as the sun slid over the edge of the world. Anna recited to herself the simplest truth: there was nothing more for her to say; she would not argue or reason or persuade.
? ? ?
NOT YET. JACK had heard himself say those two words. They were nothing but the truth, and still he hadn’t meant to speak them aloud. Not yet. And now she sat beside him, waiting for him to admit that she had been right. He had aunts who lived their lives in cloistered convents, a first cousin who was a Jesuit. He was a police officer sworn to uphold the law. She was not wrong to worry; if there were no more to him than those two facts he would have no choice but to wish her well and go. Touch her face one last time, trace the line of her brow and jaw, the curve of her cheek.
She was looking at him with such solemn purpose. If he left her now he would never be able to cross this bridge without seeing her sitting on this bench, her hair undone by the wind and loose curls falling across a cheek burnished red in the cool evening air. But he wouldn’t leave her. He didn’t want to.
“Well,” she said, shifting as if to move away from him and stand up. But he held her firmly and shook his head when she glanced at him.
“Don’t run off,” he said. “There are things you should hear about me before you abandon ship.”
That got him a smile. Tentative, dimple-less, but a smile nonetheless, and she let herself be coaxed back to sit beside him, tucked into his side.