Free Tempting Fate by Jane Green Page A

isn’t dear.
She
wasn’t dear.

Matt – what a lovely surprise to receive your email. I’m glad you got home safely and I know what you mean about the seasons here. California is a place I sometimes dream about, but I couldn’t live without the spring and the fall.
Of all the seasons, fall is my favourite. I’m picturing it now: the leaves turning all those vibrant colours, the trees with their red and orange blankets spread on the grass beneath them. And after the hot summer days I always look forward to feeling a chill in the air, because nothing’s better than lighting fires. I’m always up early, and usually downstairs with a fire lit by seven. Sometimes six. We go through wood.

    No. She deletes it.

I go through wood like crazy from October onwards. I also turn into something of a sloth – I could curl up on the sofa with books for the rest of my life.
But having said all that, spring is wonderful too. There’s a freshness after the winter months and with all the new growth everything is bright and colourful. I’m looking out of the window now at a huge old dogwood tree whose canopy spreads over the entire front yard, and it is a rich mass ofdeep-pink blossom. It is really quite beautiful. If I knew your address, I’d send you some …
How exciting that you’re coming back, and the blossom will still be glorious in two weeks.

    She pauses. She should invite him over for dinner, have him meet Elliott? Isn’t that the way to have a proper friendship?
    Does she, in fact, want a friendship? Isn’t she the one who always said that once you are married you do not get to make new friends of the opposite sex? Ever. You are allowed to befriend other couples, and if you get on particularly well with the husband that is allowed, but single members of the opposite sex?
    No. It’s just not done.
    But why not? Why should she not have a new friend? He’s by far the most interesting and glamorous person she’s met in ages. Elliott would be fascinated by him, even though she doesn’t yet want them to meet. Matt met her on her own, and this friendship has to develop on that basis before she is ready to reveal her true self.
    She doesn’t want him to see her as a wife, a mother, a middle-aged housewife. For just a little while longer she wants to keep the illusion going that she is, as he thinks, clever and strong, with sparkling green eyes.

My schedule’s so crazy, I don’t know if I’ll be able to get away for a drink, but if I can I definitely will. It would be fun.

    She takes a deep breath.

Just as long as you promise not to get me drunk and take advantage of me … :)

Gabby x

    One kiss. That’s enough. That wasn’t flirtatious, was it? Maybe just the tiniest bit, but, well, Gabby’s only having fun. It isn’t as if she’s going to actually
do
anything – she isn’t the slightest bit interested in actually doing anything – but what fun to play at being the sort of woman that men, other than their husband, want. What would be the harm?
    Two emails arrive, back to back, three minutes later. The first:

33624 Malibu Cove Colony Drive, Malibu, CA. 90265. xxx

    The second:

I can’t promise anything of the sort … ;)

    With a spring in her step, Gabby grabs a Ziploc bag and runs out to the front garden, grinning as she stuffs the bag full with the most perfect dogwood blooms. Sealing it up, she slips the Ziploc into an envelope, scribbles Matt’s address on the front, then jumps in the car to drive over to the post office, feeling younger than she has in years.
    After handing in the envelope at the counter, Gabby walks out, checking her email, hoping there might be anadditional response. She holds the phone in her hand for the rest of the day, glancing at it every few minutes, wanting to feel the exhilaration she felt earlier, when she first saw his lovely, and unexpected, email.
    By nine fifteen, sitting on the sofa with her family to watch television, present in body but a million miles away in her