Читать онлайн «The Valentine-Free Zone: A Love...Maybe Valentine eShort»

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First published in Great Britain by HarperCollins 2015

Copyright © Fiona Gibson 2015

Fiona Gibson asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

A catalogue copy of this book is available from the British Library.

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

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Ebook Edition © February 2015 ISBN: 9780008136079

Version: 2015–01–23

Table of Contents

‘I just think,’ Michael says, as we stroll around the gallery, ‘it’s a load of commercial twaddle. ’

‘Yes, I know it is,’ I say, and he’s right: do couples who exchange Valentine’s cards and presents love each other any more than those who don’t? Of course not. While I don’t have any statistics to back this up, I’d bet that the vast majority of cards are sent out of duty or guilt.

‘I mean,’ Michael goes on, taking my hand, ‘a gift means so much more when it’s thought about, rather than being bought in a tearing hurry at five o’clock on February 13th because you’d thought, shit, I forgot, better rush out and grab any old thing …’ Okay, okay, you’ve made your point, no need to over-egg it, darling … ‘And there’s nothing imaginative about a box of chocolates grabbed from the corner shop,’ he adds.

‘No, I s’pose not,’ I say, my stomach rumbling due to the fact that I forgot to have breakfast before heading out to meet my boyfriend in the foyer of the new art gallery.

‘You don’t expect me to be Milk Tray man, do you?’ Michael asks with a grin.

‘Of course I don’t. ’ A tinge of annoyance has crept into my voice as we browse the artworks on display. Is this why he hasn’t mentioned the card I sent him by old-fashioned post? I feel a bit stupid now. Maybe his failure to acknowledge it suggests that I’ve broken some kind of unspoken rule, and he’d rather pretend it hadn’t arrived. Or maybe he thinks it’s from someone else? He works as a producer at our local radio station, and is very handsome in an impeccably groomed, grown-up kind of way; I bet lots of the girls there have crushes on him. However, although I didn’t sign it Love Sally, I did write, Thanks for being so wonderful. So who else could have sent it?