After the Fall.

by Kylie Ladd.

Trip over love, you can get up.Fall in love and you fall forever.-ANONYMOUS

KATE.

I had been married three years when I fell in love. Fell, tripped and landed right in the middle of it. Oh, I already loved my husband, of course, but this was different. That had been a decision; this was out of my control, an impulse as difficult to resist as gravity. Mad love, crazy love, drop, sink, stumble. The kind of love where every little thing is a sign, a portent: the song on the radio, his Christian name staring up at you from a magazine you're flicking through, your horoscope in the paper. Normally I don't even believe in horoscopes, for G.o.d's sake. Love without holes or patches or compromises, soft as an easy chair, a many-splendored thing.

At first I enjoyed it. A fall is a surrender; you can't help it, you didn't plan it. Maybe you could have been more careful, but it's too late for that now-you might as well enjoy the swoop and the speed, the unnerving sensation of having your feet higher than your head.

I fell in love with a man who had hair like silk. A man who said my name as if he were taking communion, who looked me in the eye while we made love, and even again afterward. He fell too, and there we were, clutching each other as the hard earth hurtled up to meet us.

That's the thing about falling. It doesn't go on indefinitely, and it rarely ends well ... plunge, plummet, pain. Even if you get straight back up, even when you regain your footing, after the fall nothing is ever quite the same.

LUKE.

Okay, it was the s.e.x. Or, okay, it was love. When Cress insisted we see a counselor I knew the question was bound to arise: Why did I do it? Why had I betrayed her? I couldn't work out which answer might be better received, so I turned to my best friend, Tim, for advice. Given that Cress was also going to be at the session I had to be careful. Did I say it was love, and appeal to her romantic side? Cress is the most sentimental soul I have ever met, and I had a hunch, ridiculous as it may sound, that pleading love or one of its lesser forms-a crush, infatuation-would be a better defense than straight l.u.s.t. Then again, given that she was such a romantic, maybe even mentioning the word risked alienating her completely-love, I suppose, being the sort of thing reserved for one's wife. The alternative was to plump for s.e.x, but would that leave Cress forever paranoid about the hoops she herself wasn't jumping through in the boudoir?

Either way I was doomed, though I was hoping Tim could come up with something plausible. Predictably, though, he just looked shocked. If Cress is the most sentimental person I have ever met, Tim is the most naive. Or the most moral-I'm not quite sure what the difference is. "Just tell the truth," he sputtered, looking moist and uncomfortable, checking his watch when he thought I wasn't looking. "How much longer do you want the lies to go on?"

Well, indefinitely would have been nice. For seven months I was the happiest man in the world. Who wouldn't have been? Two beautiful women whose faces lit up when they saw me, one always available if the other was elsewhere. I'll admit it was good for the ego, but that was just the fringe benefit, never the aim. And for that reason I can't feel guilty about it: nothing was planned or premeditated. I feel guilty enough about the conventional things, of course-guilty as h.e.l.l for hurting Cress, even some residual Catholic remorse for breaking my vows. Up till then I'd believed in them. But I never felt guilty for loving them both. Parents claim that they love all their children equally, and no one doubts this. Why can't it be the same for adults? Maybe I'm rationalizing what I did, but in a lot of ways I think everything that happened would have been far more objectionable if I had stopped loving Cress, transferred my affection rather than shared it.

In any event, Tim was no help, and I ended up telling the counselor that the whole thing had just happened. That sounds pretty lame for someone in advertising. I'm meant to be good at making words do as I please, but I could tell no one was fooled. Not Cress, sitting sniffing on one side of the office, eyes skittering away every time I glanced in her direction; not the counselor, mouth narrowing skeptically as she heard me out. Goaded by their disbelief, I abandoned any thought of appeas.e.m.e.nt and went on the attack. Forget love or s.e.x ... I blamed loneliness, frustration, all those long nights that Cress worked, then was too tired to talk, never mind touch, when she finally did get home. Bad move. My wife spent the session in tears and I wondered if I shouldn't have just gone with l.u.s.t and been d.a.m.ned.

I don't know. It was was love, and it love, and it was was s.e.x, and it was fate and karma and reincarnation too. It was an epiphany and an epitaph. There, I'm making the words work now. s.e.x, and it was fate and karma and reincarnation too. It was an epiphany and an epitaph. There, I'm making the words work now.

CARY.

I don't think about it much. No, really. What's there to think about? It happened; it's over; I'll survive. What's the point in talking about it? It's not going to change what took place. I mean, I made my decision too, and now I'm going to live with it-all this blathering around in circles isn't my style.

I grew up in the country. Sometimes I think about moving back there, though I know there's little work. What appeals, though, is that out there you just do do. You don't debate, or discuss, or try to weigh up every angle.... There isn't time for it, and it's never helpful. You come off your horse or your bike; you get up, brush yourself down and get on with it. No point wondering if you'll ever ride again-it's not an option; you have to. It might hurt, but bruises heal. Bones too. Even hearts.

CRESSIDA.

For ages after I found out I tormented myself, wondering when it had started. Not the s.e.x, which was too much even to contemplate. Not even the kissing, but the thought, the desire, the possibility. They'd always clicked; that much was evident to anyone with half an eye, but it's still a fair stretch from flirting to f.u.c.king, particularly when you're both married to other people. That's crude, and I apologize. Luke would be shocked to hear such language from his virgin bride.

No, what I want to know is if such a thing can truly just happen, as Luke so ingenuously told the counselor. Surely people don't go around just falling into bed with others on a whim? Not, as I seem to be reiterating, if they are otherwise legally wed. Did they discuss it? Or did they just know, the way I sometimes know when I see a patient for the first time that he or she is going to die? It's something about their faces: something blurred or unfinished. There's no sense of the adult version lurking underneath, maybe because they will never grow old. I'm invariably right, though I wish I weren't. I'd rather not know at all, in case I then don't try hard enough with the ones I'm sure won't make it. Self-fulfilling prophecies frighten me.

When I first found out about that kiss, though, I wasn't frightened. Angry, yes, but I never felt threatened. It didn't even occur to me that this might spell danger. That probably sounds silly, but I knew my husband and the games he played. Luke is a flirt: a man who loves women and attention in equal measure, and preferably together. We had some stormy scenes over it when we were courting. It never did sit easily with me, but after a while it's amazing how one can adjust. Then too, I guess once I knew he loved me I could see it for the sport it was. It even validated me in some crazy way: he would spend all night at parties charming these beautiful women, succeed, and yet still leave with me. And after we did leave he would be so aroused by the thrill of the chase that we would rarely make it home without pulling over into some darkened street to heave and tussle on the backseat of the car ... my hair caught in static cling on the seat belt, my toes pressed hard against the misted windows. Those nights were the grace notes of my marriage. I truly didn't care where the desire had come from as long as it was spent on me. And it was, wholeheartedly.

Luke is a golden boy, one of those the G.o.ds have smiled upon. Everything comes easily to him, or at least it appears to. Head prefect at school, valedictorian at university, a cushy job full of long liquid lunches and long-legged girls. Even his birth was blessed: after three daughters his parents were longing for a boy, and hey, presto, that was exactly what they got. Golden too in his coloring. A cla.s.sical gold: hair the color of a halo in a Renaissance painting, eyes the blue of the Madonna's robe. Rich, vibrant colors. He isn't particularly tall or well built, but he stands out in a crowd.

Actually, I'm blond myself. I'm also good-looking enough, I suppose-I had to be to have attracted his attention in the first place. But my eyes are brown, my skin is fairer and my hair much lighter, a pale imitation of his, as if it has been washed once too often or left out on the line too long. When we stood next to each other it was his his hair, hair, his his features the eye was always drawn to, as if he'd sucked all the color out of mine. My parents thought we looked like brother and sister, and my friends used to tease me about the beautiful blond babies we would make. I wanted children, and G.o.d knows I thought about them too. But try as I might I could never quite see them, their faces as hazy as the faces of the patients I knew would die. features the eye was always drawn to, as if he'd sucked all the color out of mine. My parents thought we looked like brother and sister, and my friends used to tease me about the beautiful blond babies we would make. I wanted children, and G.o.d knows I thought about them too. But try as I might I could never quite see them, their faces as hazy as the faces of the patients I knew would die.

KATE.

It wasn't as if I stopped loving Cary, not in the least. People don't believe this, but I did love them both, and at the same time. Luke claimed he understood, but then he would, wouldn't he? We agreed with whatever the other said, as lovers do. Luke even admitted that he still loved Cressida, something I found profoundly irritating, though I was professing the same attachment to my own spouse. He used to justify it by comparing us to parents, able to love multiple children equally. I was never convinced by that-like so much of what Luke said it had surface appeal, but didn't stand up to closer scrutiny. The love for something you've made and must protect is surely different from the love that wants to possess, devour, exclude? No, for me it was more like when you hear a great song for the first time. For weeks you walk around humming it to yourself, unable to get it out of your head, playing only that one tune out of your entire collection. It doesn't matter that there are loads of songs you love, whole alb.u.ms that resonate deeply with you-they can wait. That's not a great a.n.a.logy-Luke is the one who is good with words.

Maybe a better ill.u.s.tration would be a migraine. One moment you're well; the next you're in so much pain you can't open your eyes. Everything is changed. Nothing exists except the throb and fret between your temples, though underneath it all you're still perfectly healthy. I sometimes think I had a migraine of the heart. I suppose you could call it infatuation, though to me it was stronger than that. Eclipse Eclipse might be closer to the mark. might be closer to the mark.

It was a different story with Cary. When we tell others how we met he likes to joke that there were fireworks from the word go, though in truth it took me almost a year to fall in love with him. Still, there were were fireworks. We met at the Melbourne Cup. Cary's not a big fan of the races, but I love them. Dressing up, champagne, lots of men in suits ... what's not to like? Usually I went with a group from school, but this year was different. Cup Day fell in the middle of our finals, and everyone else was staying home to study. I'd thought I probably should too, but when Joan called and offered me a spot in her parents' marquee I couldn't resist. fireworks. We met at the Melbourne Cup. Cary's not a big fan of the races, but I love them. Dressing up, champagne, lots of men in suits ... what's not to like? Usually I went with a group from school, but this year was different. Cup Day fell in the middle of our finals, and everyone else was staying home to study. I'd thought I probably should too, but when Joan called and offered me a spot in her parents' marquee I couldn't resist.

Joan and I were childhood friends-or childhood allies, anyway. We weren't really similar, but had been thrown together by pushy mothers who partnered each other for doubles and thought how sweet it would be if their daughters did the same. Neither Joan nor I was even into tennis, but we quickly formed an alliance. I'd tell my mother I was practicing with Joan; she'd tell hers the same. We'd then go shopping or to the beach, where Joan would sunbake with her sneakers on so her tan lines would collude with her story. The ruse worked well, though our parents always wondered why we never made it to the second round in any of the tournaments they were forever entering us in.

Increasingly, though, as we got older, we spent more and more of our supposed practice time apart. Eventually, we gave up the game altogether. I did like Joan, but I never felt completely at ease in her company. Maybe it was because the friendship had been forced on us, or because, with her careful grooming and precise sentences, Joan always made me feel messy. I thought about declining her invitation, but the alternative of staying at home, trying to study while simultaneously resisting the urge to contact the guy I was in the throes of breaking up with at the time, was too terrible to contemplate. Besides, there were going to be free drinks.

It was one of those typical Melbourne days that can't make up its mind. I've been to the Cup a few times, and it seems it's always either scorching or pouring, never anything in between. That year, it was both. The morning had dawned hot and unsettled, and was quickly ambushed by a fierce north wind that pushed the temperature into the nineties before lunch and played havoc with sundresses and scarves. I didn't know many of Joan's family or friends, and as the day wore on, the atmosphere under the canvas became more and more stifling, till I felt that I was drowning in dead air and dying conversation.

By four o'clock I'd had enough.

"I'm going to place a bet," I told Joan. "There's one more race, and I need some fresh air."

"Do you want me to come?" she asked, fanning herself with a form guide.

"No, you stay here. It might take a while. I'll have that, though," I said, plucking the guide from her fingers.

"Put something on for me then," she said. "Are you feeling lucky?"

Though the big race was over, outside the crowds still heaved and surged. If anything, they were even worse, turned manic and unpredictable by too much sun and alcohol. The wind threw dust in people's faces; whipped up the skirts of women pa.s.sed out on the lawns. Men laughed and nudged one another at the sight, then turned their backs and had another beer. A cool change wasn't far off. I really did plan to place a bet, but the queues for the bookies were so long that I gave up as soon as I saw them. Instead, I decided I'd watch the final race. I'd been there since nine without seeing a horse, and it would kill some time before I headed back to the tent.

I pushed my way to a spot by the fence, picking my way over p.r.o.ne limbs and through the middle of picnics. The horses were going into their barriers on the other side of the track, small black dots with no idea that they were the excuse for such baccha.n.a.lia. A man on my left swayed and laughed, belching uncomfortably close to my ear. I stepped back to avoid him, b.u.mping into another suit.

"Sorry," I mumbled, briefly conscious of the warmth of his chest.

"That's okay," he said pleasantly; he was possibly the only other person along the rail who wasn't drunk. "Are you all right?"

Before I could answer him, a loudspeaker screamed the start of the race. As one, every head along the fence swiveled to the left, craning to catch a glimpse of the pack as they came around the turn and along the straight toward us. Just then the wind swung around violently, suddenly freezing where a minute ago it had been hot. The change moved up the course almost in line with the horses, the sky rapidly darkening, a few drops beginning to fall. I watched its hasty progress: women clutching desperately at their hats; tents sinking inward, then filling with air as if they were breathing; the crowd at the turn running for shelter as the first thundercloud burst. As the field galloped past, the change was upon us too, almost as if the horses were dragging it along behind them like a great silvery sheet. The rain hit, and I turned to flee.

Of course, I didn't get far. Everyone had had the same idea, and the lawns were in chaos. Almost immediately I knocked into two people, and tripped over a third. Then my heels caught in the wet turf, and I broke one wrenching them free. I stood there cursing, dripping wet.

"Hey-are you all right?"

It was the guy from the fence, repeating his question of ten minutes ago. I held up my broken shoe in mute reply.

"Come on, then," he said, tugging my hand as the rain beat down. "Can you walk?"

I swear I tried, but with one high heel and one bare foot I could barely manage a hobble. The fence guy suddenly lunged forward, scooped me up over his shoulder, and carried me at a run through the pelting rain, expertly dodging gamblers and debris. I wondered if I should scream, or pummel his back. Instead, I started to giggle.

He jogged like that for a good five minutes, me jouncing inelegantly over his shoulder. Past the bars, people lined up five deep trying to get in; past the restaurants and the awnings and the public toilets, all suddenly bursting at the seams. When he slowed down we were in one of the small lanes of stables at the back of the racecourse.

"I used to work here when I was studying," he said, depositing me gently onto a bale of straw in the comfortable gloom of what seemed like a feed shed. "Mucking out stables, cleaning tack ... It was that or wait tables, and I liked the company here better."

He held out a hand, warm and large. "I'm Cary," he said.

"Kate," I replied.

"Sorry-I didn't ask you where you wanted to go. I thought we should both just get out of the rain. Is there somewhere I can take you?"

We looked out at the rain, now coming down in sheets. I thought of the tent, its stale air, the stagnant conversation. Joan would be waiting for me, her skirt still pressed, lips pursed as she checked her watch.

"There's nowhere I need to be," I told him.

Girlfriends have looked at me askance when I've told them this story. There I was, they point out, soaked to my skin, no doubt freezing, perched on a hay bale in some dingy shed at the back of a racecourse with a total stranger. Wasn't I scared? Apprehensive? Or at the very least uncomfortable?

Well, no, on all counts. The way Cary sat beside me, careful not to make any accidental contact, told me that he meant me no harm. Plus he loaned me his jacket, which was as wet as the rest of our clothes, but stopped the chill. We talked, and he told me he was a geneticist at the Royal Children's Hospital; he had been at the Cup with a group of colleagues before they got separated in the crush on the lawns. At one stage he ducked out briefly and returned, improbably, with some strawberries, a tea cake and a rather warm bottle of wine.

"They were just about to throw it away," he said, gesturing in the direction of the corporate tents. I didn't care-I was suddenly starving. We ate and talked, laughing as we pa.s.sed the bottle back and forth between us. Occasionally I thought of Joan drumming her fingers, ringing my cell phone and giving up in disgust. I hadn't charged it before I left home, and it lay lifeless in my bag, fogged with moisture. But the parking lots would be boggy now, if not flooded. They wouldn't be leaving for a while yet.

Around us I could hear movement ... horses being boxed for the night or prepared for the trailer ride home; the low, rea.s.suring tones of grooms soothing nervous animals. It was dusk, then dark. The rain had stopped. Cary pulled me to my feet and I felt a pang of disappointment that our idyll might be over. But he simply wanted me to see the city skyline, lights left on in the office towers hovering in the distance like fireflies. After its long day, Flemington was almost still.

"I love it like this," said Cary, almost reverently. "Quiet, returned to itself. That relief you feel at the end of Christmas Day when everyone's gone back to their own homes."

I wasn't sure that I knew what he meant, but it didn't matter. Cary's hand brushed against mine, and without really knowing who initiated it we were leaning toward each other. As our lips touched there was a burst of sound and the sky lit up around us. Fireworks, probably part of the package at one of the corporate tents. I gasped as a flotilla of blue and white sparks floated gently to earth around our heads; then Cary was kissing me again, his mouth tasting of strawberries and cinnamon.

CARY.

Kate can't help but give the romantic version. She swears she's a realist, but I've seen how she pouts when other women get sent flowers; how her eyes cloud over at diamond commercials on the TV. I'm not big on flowers, but she got her jewelry and a husband, and for most women that would have been enough. Marriage isn't just about romance, is it? It's about family and companionship and teamwork, not just bouquets and fireworks. The advertising industry has a lot to answer for.

Still, that November night when we met did have its share of romance. Kissing Kate under a sky full of Catherine wheels is a memory I'll take to the grave, no matter whom I'm buried beside. But she didn't mention that the feed shed smelled like horse p.i.s.s and wet straw, that the hay bale scratched, that the drenching had left us both freezing and her eye makeup was halfway down her face. I wonder if she remembers, or has she conveniently blotted those things out? A woman who claims she's a realist but still checks her love horoscope in Cosmopolitan Cosmopolitan is a dangerous mix: she'd rather die than ask for what she wants, but she'll sulk when she doesn't get it. Although sulking would have been the least of my worries. is a dangerous mix: she'd rather die than ask for what she wants, but she'll sulk when she doesn't get it. Although sulking would have been the least of my worries.

Yet when people ask how we met I tell a version just like Kate's. No stink, no scratches, just champagne and pyrotechnics. I guess I'm as guilty of romanticizing as she is, though at least I know how it really was. Deep down she probably does too.

LUKE.

As winter draws a gray cloak around Boston I find myself thinking more and more of Melbourne. I wouldn't call it homesickness. Maybe it's simply that the adrenaline of the sudden move here, the sh.e.l.l shock of packing up and relocating to an unknown city half a globe away, is wearing off. And really, there's no particular place I miss as I pick my way to work on footpaths obscured by salt and grit and snow. Rather, it's the feel. Sunlight on the back of my neck on the days I used to cycle to the office, the suburbs slipping past in a fog of dewy lawns and people walking dogs. The city as ripe and fresh each morning as the apples wrapped in tissue paper at the Queen Vic market.

To be honest, I resisted those suburbs for a long time. When Cress and I first married we had an inner-city apartment, not far from the one I'd rented in my bachelor days. Both places were tiny, but I loved them, loved the city and the energized hum that was the backdrop of each day. Later, when the lease ran out, we moved to a four-bedroom home that her sister had chosen, Cress being too busy at work to house-hunt. I'd argued against its size; Cordelia had calmly informed me that we'd need those rooms for children before too long. Cress proposed a compromise: we'd stay in the city if I could find a house equal to her sister's offering. I looked, but such a thing didn't exist, of course, at least not within our price range. Some compromise.

I'm adjusting to Boston. It's good to be back in a city, good to have left behind the constant lawn mowing and gutter cleaning of a suburban home. The locals are friendly, better educated than most Yanks, more sophisticated than most Australians. I guess that comes from being forced to spend so many months indoors, from having to entertain themselves with books and movies and restaurants rather than just sport.

One thing I'm still getting used to, though, is snow. Snow is funny stuff. Most of the time it is ugly and difficult, turned black and brown and yellow by the actions of pa.s.sing cars and dogs. It goes slushy or icy, coagulates with grit and ends up walked into every shop or office in town, melting into grimy puddles. But when it is freshly fallen, white and pristine, it looks wonderful. Snow softens the edges on everything: buildings, litter, noise. For some reason it's far less cold when it snows, and I've come to antic.i.p.ate those days as a respite from the cruel bite of the usual negative temperatures. Underfoot, really fresh snow is crisp and makes a squeaking noise as you walk on it, just like sand on the beach. Maybe that's what makes me think of home.

CRESSIDA.

I wasn't quite a virgin bride, but I almost made it. That seems an incredible thing to admit in this day and age, and for a while I was as ashamed about my pure prenuptial state as I would have been by its converse just a century earlier. Certainly friends have looked surprised when I tell them-not that it's the sort of thing you put on your resume. Relatively unsullied: only one s.e.xual experience prior to marriage Relatively unsullied: only one s.e.xual experience prior to marriage. Considering I was twenty-seven at the time, who'd believe me?

That isn't quite true either. Really, I'd had my fair share of s.e.xual experience; it just hadn't quite reached the natural conclusion. Nothing was consummated; the deed wasn't done. Penetration, I mean, to be blunt. For all those years I remained intact, then threw it away less than forty-eight hours before my wedding. I'm a doctor; why do I find this so hard to talk about, for goodness' sake? I reminisce about falling in love and end up using words like penetration penetration and and intact intact instead. instead.

I wasn't always so clinical. When I first met Luke I even eased up on my studying for a while, much to the horror of my parents. My father is a doctor too, an anesthesiologist. It's an appropriate choice, given that bedside manner has never been his strong suit. All those years spent sitting by comatose flesh have atrophied his social skills, nothing for company but the hiss of the gas and the plink of machines. He's polite, but small talk is like j.a.panese to him, and etiquette as useless in his world as calligraphy. I never felt pressured to study medicine, but I never considered any alternative either. Somehow it was just communicated to us that that was what we would do, the fact inhaled with the scent of furniture polish in our carefully tended home. We all followed in his footsteps, my two older sisters going into rheumatology and dermatology, respectively. Joints and skin ... I wanted something a little more personal.

Pediatrics was a natural choice, as I'd always loved children. "That's lucky, because you married one," jibed a friend when she overheard me saying this once at a ball. I laughed dutifully but was slightly stung, though a quick glance at Luke ill.u.s.trated her point. In the corner, a band was trying to pack up, having finished their set. Luke, however, had a microphone, and despite the best efforts of their female singer he wasn't going to give it up. A little drunk, but higher still on the crowd around him, he circled the stage, alternately posing as Mick Jagger, Elvis Presley, Bono-responding to any suggestion that was thrown at him. In between he'd return to tease the singer, crooning at her in character so that the anger left her heavily rimmed eyes and she became as giggly and light-headed as the rest of them. I have to admit, it was funny-he's always been a showman. In the end I think the drummer got tired of waiting around, grabbed the mike and the girl and hustled them both off the stage. Luke finished his act without even looking embarra.s.sed. The singer, of course, was still trying to catch his eye.

KATE.

I'd love to be able to say that after that magical first kiss Cary and I fell hopelessly in love, then had sublime s.e.x, the perfect wedding and babies straight out of a diaper commercial. But it wasn't quite like that. For one thing, at the time we met Cary was interested in someone else, a girl at work whom he had been hoping to see at the Cup. I was embroiled in a pretty painful breakup myself. We exchanged numbers and chatted on the phone once or twice but nothing really came of it. The evening of Cup Day had been magical, but that was the problem-it was so exquisite it seemed like a dream, not something that could stand up to daylight. When I spoke to Cary on the phone he seemed withdrawn, even uninterested. And after a few how-are-yous, what was there to say? It wasn't as if we had a history, or even mutual friends to talk about.

Still, I was a little piqued when it appeared that nothing would come of the whole encounter. I had found Cary attractive and interesting, and thought the feeling was mutual. Plus it seemed a terrible shame to waste such a romantic story. On my way home that night I was already dreaming of how one day I would tell our children that their parents met in a rainstorm and kissed under a sequined sky. Despite herself, even sensible Joan was quite taken by my tale, once I had apologized about a hundred times for being so late. I dined out on the story for a few weeks, and I have to admit it was embarra.s.sing when nothing eventuated. But that was all. I wasn't crushed by it, and after six months it was difficult to believe it had ever really happened.

That might have been it if it weren't for glandular fever. My best friend, Sarah, was getting married, and my ex, Jake, had also been invited to the wedding. The three of us had met in college, where we all began in cla.s.sics. We still moved in roughly the same social circle, though ellipse ellipse was perhaps a better term, given how hard Jake and I worked at avoiding each other whenever our paths crossed. I'd remained single after our breakup, though I'd heard through the grapevine that he was seeing some blond Amazon whom no doubt he'd bring to the wedding. Knowing that I'd hate to be there alone while Jake was flaunting his new chick to all our friends, Sarah had suggested I attend with her cousin. was perhaps a better term, given how hard Jake and I worked at avoiding each other whenever our paths crossed. I'd remained single after our breakup, though I'd heard through the grapevine that he was seeing some blond Amazon whom no doubt he'd bring to the wedding. Knowing that I'd hate to be there alone while Jake was flaunting his new chick to all our friends, Sarah had suggested I attend with her cousin.

I agreed immediately. Ryan and I had met a number of times over the years, at Sarah's family beach house and her various birthdays, and we got along well. Better yet, he wasn't planning on taking anyone to her wedding. Maybe he was gay, I wondered, and was cheered by the prospect-at least that way he was less likely to pick up at the wedding and leave me all alone.

It all sounds a bit sad and desperate, doesn't it? I guess in truth it was, but I was still a bit sad and desperate about the way Jake and I had ended. Ryan was the best face I could put on it ... at least until he called to tell me he'd just been diagnosed with glandular fever.

I hung up the phone in a panic. It was the night before the wedding, and the outlook was grim. Who would be available at such short notice?

I was toying with the idea of asking Joan what her brother was doing when I thought of Cary. Cary looked okay in a suit. He was easy to talk to and respectably employed. Even if I had to explain the situation to him, he seemed nice enough to go along with me for a night. I dug around in my purse for his number, still scribbled on a sc.r.a.p of napkin from our impromptu picnic on the hay bale.

The phone rang five times before it was answered by a machine.

"Hi, this is Cary, and here's the beep." I liked the message. No theme tunes, no zany sound effects, no time wasting: just concise and to the point. No games, I thought to myself as I stammered out something about please calling me urgently. You'd always know where you were with this one. Then I went to bed at the ridiculous hour of eight thirty, depressed, thinking about how at the same time the following night I'd be sitting alone in a sea of couples, adrift and unclaimed.

Jake was introducing me to a woman with b.r.e.a.s.t.s the size and color of cantaloupes when the phone rang. Relieved, I turned to look for it, then woke up confused and angry when it wasn't in my handbag. For a moment I lay there disoriented until it dawned on me that somewhere a phone was still ringing. As I retrieved it from under my clothes on the floor the digital clock flashed eleven twenty.

"h.e.l.lo?" I mumbled, still half-asleep.

"Hi, Kate. It's Cary." The voice at the other end was wide awake, confident, even amused. When I didn't immediately respond he prompted, "You called me earlier tonight."

"Oh, G.o.d, yes, I'm sorry," I said, sounding dazed even to my own ears. "I just woke up," I added, aware that I was effectively admitting that I had no life to be sound asleep before midnight on a Friday.

"If you want I can call back some other time," he offered.

That brought me around. "No, no, don't hang up," I practically begged. "I have to ask you for a favor."

To his credit Cary didn't burst out laughing at the whole sorry tale of Ryan, the wedding and the glandular fever.