Black Bread White Beer by Niven Govinden

freshness of one’s early marriage years when everything about each other was still not known. That he would find beautiful mystery in the mundane everyday situations that drove the world. It was a sensible notion that should have stuck with him more than any of the Church teachings if he had not been so caught up with discussing bloody frescos. Even as a child he had always liked a mystery. But there have been three years of mysteries on both their parts and he is tired of it. Tired from not enough sleep, and from this constant process of learning. When do the lessons end? When can they finally settle into their marriage and start to be happy?
    There is something resolute in Liz’s manner that gives him hope. Claud has Sam’s bossiness but in every other way she is Liz’s mirror, a time-tunnel to her sixth decade: the slight frame that has thickened with age without turning to fat; the jawline that continues to defy gravity by curving to a gentle point under the mouth; the hair, of a darker copper than her daughter, but still with the same thickness and lustre. He watches her as she playfully creeps up behind Sam and pinches his bum whilst he is in mid-spiel to a group of tourists who have put down their cameras and cakes to listen to a five-minute lecture on local concerns. Sam jumps at the suddenness of the move, at which everyone ham-fistedly stifles giggles, as if this issome regional theatre being acted out before them. But he remains as is, not turning round once until he has finished his point. There is no need. He recognizes the touch like a fingerprint. So close to him, it is virtually his own. Now their hands are locked, her nestling closer to him, his body slightly curving to accommodate her, and as if connected to the same battery, she too starts to speak on the perils of the proposed centre. Whether husband or wife, one must always be ready to welcome the other and speak with their voice. That is his lesson for today. Amen.
    Left to his own devices, he finds himself doing a Sam and wandering alone around the Green. Passing a bench one of the older WI woman calls him to sit down.
    â€˜Come and have a rest. Too many children here.’
    â€˜Yes. Noisy, isn’t it? I won’t stop, though. I’m walking-off my cake.’
    â€˜People should only have one each, like they do in China. They’re exhausting the planet with these screaming monsters. Some shouldn’t have any at all. It’s overrated, parenthood.’
    He makes several laps as if he is being sponsored for his efforts. At every turn making sure he now avoids the old woman, whose words rattle him, he is drawn to the presence of the pole, no less phallic and authoritative than earlier. If there is any dormant belief left inside he should feel the gifts of pagan fertility bestowed upon him; some tiny seed to convince him that it is worth trying again.
    That what they have suffered is a minor hiccup in the history of their future family. His ears close to the sound of bells being jangled from a nearby table, rattling and ringing, an amateur medley to mark the Herald of Spring, where every farm animal and villager is primed and aching to reproduce. Just not them.

    He takes refuge in the church. The crowd has begun to leave their activities at the fringes of the Green and converge towards its centre. From the corner of his eye he expects to see the tug-of-war rope being coiled out, and suitable men conscripted into one side or other. Teeth-clenching rivalries between country houses and workmen’s cottages have long since lost their validity in the wake of the mass exodus of the late ’60s and ’70s. Now they are lucky to muster an army fit enough for a game that pits country versus visiting townies or, if the ranks have swelled, the village versus the rest of Sussex.
    We are scared of no man! Normans, Saracens, County Councils! We will take all comers!
    He hurries past the Green and down the path that leads