10
‘AFTER THAT TRAINWRECK of a conversation tonight, please don’t let my parents interact tomorrow,’ Hayley says. She’s pacing, a bad sign.
I’m lying on the bottom bunk in my room, and nodding. While I was having my brief bathroom dalliance, Bobbi and Hayley’s dad, Gary, veered past small talk and into the minutiae of the cost of the wedding and Gary opened up the Spreadsheet on his phone. Hayley and Luke’s family started a joint spreadsheet for the wedding, in the name of transparency, so everyone could see exactly who was paying for what and how much it cost. It has been probably the biggest cause of stress in Hayley’s life for the past ten months but she doesn’t have the admin controls to delete it, and so it has attained capitalisation status of the Spreadsheet, a ticking time bomb, a Pandora’s box, the crown jewel I should have been guarding. Luckily Jean intervened before things got too heated.
‘I won’t let them even look at each other,’ I say.
I feel bad. I failed at my one job. ‘I’m sorry, Hayls.’
‘It’s not your fault, you were dealing with your own personal hell,’ Hayley says. She means Bianca. I told her about the argument with Joel, and me comforting Bianca, but not about kissing Mac. That felt…too embarrassing. Too out of character. Too surreal. I think of it and it’s like I’m watching a movie of someone else. I need a moment alone with Mac to make sure we can agree to lock those five minutes away in a secret vault labelled ‘Hot but unhinged’.
I assure Hayley I know the plan for tomorrow. We’ve been through it like it’s a bank robbery or a jewellery heist. Bobbi cannot interact with Gary again. If she has something to say about Gary’s speech (she will) or Gary’s wife Leone’s dress (she will) or Gary’s drinking (without a doubt) then she needs to write it in the group chat we set up for the wedding (that Hayley is not part of) or take me or Mum or Jean aside privately and say it to us quietly . Bobbi knows these rules. She has agreed to these rules. But she also agreed to the ‘no opening the Spreadsheet’ rule and that was cast aside very quickly.
‘It’s my main focus,’ I assure Hayley. ‘I won’t be distracted again.’
‘And Luke’s uncle.’
‘He is not getting near any woman under forty on the dancefloor.’
‘And Luke’s mum—?’
‘I know. Don’t let her talk to the DJ.’
‘And—’
‘Hayls, I have this.’
‘I know.’
‘I’ve been training for this my whole life.’
‘I should be marrying you.’
‘I’m open to it.’
‘At the very least, I should live with you.’
‘You do live with me.’
‘In a guaranteed forever way.’
‘You’ve seen my savings and you’ve seen the housing market. I think it’s as good as guaranteed.’
‘Did Mum show you her speech?’
‘Not yet.’ I had hinted to Bobbi she should show it to me. As a joke! In case she needs ideas! To spellcheck! And now I was straight up hassling her to show me. Hayley had insisted I needed to vet it.
‘What if she doesn’t show you?’
‘I’ll hack her computer.’
‘You know how to hack?’
‘Her password is Hayley123. So it’s not so much hacking as logging in.’
‘Okay. So everything is under control.’
‘Yes.’
‘Why am I so nervous?’
‘Because it’s normal to be nervous before a big life event. But you don’t need to be. You’re going to have the best day.’ I am using my most reassuring voice.
‘What if it rains?’
‘We’ve checked the weather app a hundred times. It’s going to be sunny all day.’
‘What if Luke changes his mind?’ she says. ‘And leaves me standing there alone in front of everyone?’
‘Well, he needs to be there before you, so technically you’d know he was gone before you walked down the aisle. No one would see you.’
‘Anna. I’m serious.’
‘You’ve been together for nine years. You have a mortgage. I think you’re safe.’
‘Can you check for me?’
‘Check what?’
‘That he still wants to marry me.’
‘No.’
‘Please?’
‘You’re being ridiculous.’
‘Anna. I need to know. I feel like I can’t breathe all of a sudden.’
‘Fine. Where is he?’
‘Outside with Mac and Joel.’
‘Okay. I’ll go ask him.’
I walk out into the backyard, where Joel, Luke and Mac are sitting together, deep in conversation. Joel is smoking a joint, which shocks me, but I vow to say nothing because we haven’t spoken since our fight and saying anything would be seen as starting something—it would be showing my hand, again, which I will not do.
‘Hey,’ I say.
They all look up. Joel looks relaxed and slightly stoned, a very un-Joel-like state. Has the stress of impending fatherhood driven him to drugs? Maybe he’s not happy after all. No, I can’t even think these thoughts, they’ll appear on my face. And I can’t look at Mac, because if I do, I’ll think of his mouth and his hands and his voice in my ear and—
No. My cheeks feel hot. Luke is the only safe place to look.
‘Luke, quick question. Are you still intending to get married tomorrow?’ I say to him.
‘Uh, what?’
‘Hayley wanted me to check.’
‘Oh. She’s at that level of spiralling. Should I go and calm her down?’
‘She said she feels like she can’t breathe.’
‘Right,’ Luke says, standing up.
‘And I should go and check on Bia,’ Joel says. Bia . The nickname. The tender way he says it. My eye twitches. Am I cursed forever to react to things he says?
They walk inside together and I look down at Mac. He shuffles over on the bench seat, elbows resting on the table.
‘There’s room here,’ he says. ‘If you want to sit.’
I sit next to him, trying to leave some respectable space but he immediately rests his knee against mine. The confidence is galling. Please. I am not that easy. (I am.)
‘So,’ I say.
‘Yes?’
‘About earlier.’
‘Mmmm.’
‘I was feeling a bit emotional.’
‘I know.’
‘I wasn’t’—what did Bianca say to me earlier?—‘I am not normally like that.’
‘I get it.’
‘I wasn’t using you.’
‘It’s okay if you were.’ His knee touching mine is really very distracting.
‘Hooking up with me is easier than putting in the work with the celebrant, right?’ I say, joking, but also, I think that’s probably true.
He doesn’t say anything to that.
‘Anyway, what I am trying to say is that I don’t usually grab random men and kiss them. So I apologise.’
‘Am I a random man?’
‘You’re semi-random.’
He gives a small laugh, a puff of air.
‘Anyway, I’m over it now.’
If he would move his knee, I would feel more sure of this statement. Obviously I could move my knee away from his, but he put his knee there first so the imperative is on him to move it.
‘Plus, Patrick,’ he says.
‘Yes! Patrick,’ I say.
I had forgotten, briefly, about Patrick. My destiny. We’d spoken again before he left the dinner. He said he was looking forward to seeing me tomorrow, and he touched my arm. I was pink-cheeked and smiling at him in a way anyone watching would have interpreted as flirtatious, in a way Patrick must have interpreted as flirtatious, but in reality was a spillover of the bathroom situation with Mac.
‘So, no hard feelings, and we are over it and we don’t need to mention it to anyone at all?’ I say.
‘Sure, if that’s what you want,’ he says.
I want him to take me to his bed.
No, I don’t. Because that’s messy. For me, and everyone here. And Patrick. I could have the beginning of something wonderful, something foreseen by fate, with Patrick tomorrow.
‘That’s what I want,’ I say.
‘Done.’
‘Tomorrow is about Hayley and Luke.’
‘I agree,’ he says.
‘It’s about family. And friends. And being a good bridesmaid.’
‘And Patrick?’
‘Well, Patrick is a good opportunity for me.’
Mac laughs. ‘Is he a person or a job?’
‘I just mean, at my age—’
‘Aren’t you thirty?’
‘Yes.’
‘That’s young.’
‘It is and it isn’t.’
‘No, it is.’
‘I’m halfway to sixty.’
‘Exactly, only halfway. And sixty isn’t that old.’
‘How old are you?’ I ask.
‘Thirty-one.’
‘And you don’t feel old?’
‘Sometimes. I have officially aged out of most teenage roles.’
‘Well, I just mean now that I’m thirty I’m trying to figure out what I want from life and make sensible decisions and be with someone like Patrick.’
Now I have his attention.
‘Someone like Patrick? As opposed to someone like…me?’
‘No. That’s not what I mean.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Well, just that Patrick lives here, he co-owns a business, he seems really nice—’
‘And I don’t seem nice.’
‘You’re nice! Ish. I mean, you’re making me sleep in the bunk bedroom on a mattress that’s about two centimetres thick.’
‘You are welcome to share my bed.’
‘I don’t think that’s a good idea.’
‘It’s probably not.’
‘You’re here for a weekend. You wanted to sleep with the celebrant. You churn through women.’
‘Churn! I churn through women?’
‘That’s the impression Luke has given me.’
‘Luke thinks anyone who sleeps with more than two people in five years is churning.’
‘That’s true. I just assume handsome actors churn through women. My apologies.’
‘I object to the word churn.’
‘But not the word handsome, right?’
‘No, I’ll allow handsome.’
‘I will never say churn again.’
‘Also you were the one who wanted me to sleep with the celebrant.’
‘You’re the one who wanted a list of available women.’
‘That was just for information purposes.’
We smile at each other.
‘You don’t seem like the settling-down, having-a-family kind of guy, is what I meant,’ I say.
There’s a pause, while he considers this.
‘Yeah, I guess I’m not.’ He clears his throat. ‘So you’re making sensible decisions from here onwards, huh?’
‘Yes.’
Mac is looking right into my eyes.
‘Good for you,’ he says.
Still, he doesn’t move his knee. There’s something about his body touching mine that is utterly irresistible in a way I’ve never experienced before. I want to devour him. I can barely contain myself. And that is not a healthy thought. I don’t want to devour Patrick. I want to have a nice Devonshire tea with him. That’s healthy. That’s sensible.
Mac stands up.
‘You’re going in?’ I say.
‘I’m going to lie in the hammock and smoke a joint,’ he says.
I watch him walk back out through the garden, disappearing behind the trees and bushes, and I sit at the table alone, playing on my phone for a while. I should go in and go to sleep. I need to check on Hayley. I need to make sure my bridesmaid dress is not creased. I need to check in with Mum. I need to put on teeth-whitening strips. I need to lie in bed and think of a plot for my next book. But I can’t convince myself to get up and do any of this.
When I do finally stand up, I go in the opposite direction, into the overgrown garden. There’s a full moon, that’s the problem. That’s what is happening here. Because I am drawn to him like I’m in a trance, like he’s a vampire and I’m under his spell (if that’s even how vampires work, I am not well-versed in vampire lore). My legs are walking me to the hammock.
He looks up when I stand in front of him.
I don’t say anything and neither does he.
I hate the smell of weed.
It’s almost like he’s reading my mind, because he leans over and squashes the butt out on the side of the tree and then he stops the hammock with his foot, blowing out the last of the smoke as he looks at me.
‘Let me show you what I was going to do before,’ he says.
‘Okay,’ I say.