Page 13 of The Wedding Forecast

‘I’m fine,’ I say, before she can say anything. ‘I’m fine.’ If I keep saying it, can I make it true?

‘You’re not fine,’ Hayley says. Our faces are very close. There’s no hiding from her.

‘I’m going to pretend I’m fine, and I need you to pretend to believe me okay? Otherwise I don’t know if I can handle this.’

‘Okay.’ Hayley is nodding. ‘We push it all down this weekend, and pretend you’re fine, and then in three days, you have a breakdown and be a total emotional wreck with my full support.’

‘You’ll be on your honeymoon.’

‘I’ll cancel it.’

‘Hayley.’

‘Anna.’

‘I appreciate it, but I can fall apart on my own.’

‘I know you can. But I don’t want you to. And this is all my fault. For making you stay here with him, and her. I would never, if I thought—’

‘I know. And I told you I could deal with it. And I can! I can. I just need a second. Alone.’ I squeeze my eyes shut.

‘Be alone with me.’ She wraps her arms around me. ‘I’m not going to leave you right now.’

It helps, having her beside me, but it also hurts more, because it’s harder to hold it together with her. Hayley makes me go mushy, she sees the real me, and I need to be cold as ice, hard as steel. I need armour on armour on armour.

She kisses my cheek.

‘I love you, and I love you for doing this for me,’ she says.

‘You are the only person in the world I would do it for.’

‘We can’t be mean to Bianca now,’ she says. ‘You can’t be mean to a sick pregnant woman.’

‘We were never going to be mean to her.’

‘I know, but we were going to say something bitchy behind her back, weren’t we?’

‘Were we?’ I am acting innocent. Of course we were. And I know Hayley actually quite likes her and would have only been doing it for me.

‘Well, I feel like I need to look after her now.’

‘Go and be a good host, look after her. Get her a ginger biscuit or whatever it is you give sick pregnant people.’

‘I’m not leaving you.’

‘It’s better if you do. I need to think. And regroup.’

‘I’ll send Luke.’

‘No.’

She squeezes my arm and leaves, and I use my foot against the tree trunk to set the hammock swinging. I lie there until it stops, then I push it again, and I do this three times, thinking, if I can just stay here and do this all night, I will be okay.

‘Anna?’

I open my eyes and Luke appears above me.

‘Come on, we’re going food shopping. Let’s get out of here.’