Page 5 of The Wedding Forecast

She was hopeful. Hayley had grown up with a mother who revered books, and she liked the idea of being someone’s muse, of being immortalised in art.

‘No. Everything is fictional.’

‘That’s disappointing.’

Joel and I had been broken up for a while when The Hike came out but he came to the book launch. I saw him, at the back of the crowd, and he raised a glass to me. We hugged, briefly. He bought the book, but didn’t ask me to sign it, and then I never heard anything. I haven’t seen him since that night, six weeks ago. He hasn’t bothered to read it, I assume. He’d read parts of it when I was writing it, very early drafts, but then we’d fought over his feedback (‘Is the main character supposed to be so annoying?’) and I stopped showing him.

Maybe he’ll mention it this weekend. Maybe he’ll say, ‘Anna, I was wrong about my feedback. Your main character goes on an incredible journey of emotional growth. Oh, and I’m still in love with you.’

I don’t want him back, but I want him to want me back.

I turn into the driveway of the rental house, and steel myself. These are the last moments I can let my face show my real emotions. I’m not good at poker face. At our poker nights, my tells were legendary. Blinking, darting eyes, nervous smiling, lip-chewing, frowning, deep breaths, head tilts. ‘Are you actively trying to lose?’ Luke once asked with gentle concern as he took all my chips.

But this weekend, from the minute I cross that threshold into the house, it’s going to be a happy face, all the way. Nothing but happy face, happy face, happy face. I’m going to smile, and my smile is not going to waver. Nothing is going to rattle me. I can handle my mother and her bras. I can handle Joel. I can handle Bianca. I can handle Joel and Bianca. It’s fine.

I park in the driveway. There’s no other car here, thankfully. I need time to get changed from my driving clothes into my ‘meeting Bianca’ clothes (which are basically identical to the untrained eye but they feel different), to put on a second layer of mascara, a third layer of deodorant, to practise my nonchalant, breezy ‘oh hi, nice to meet you’ face in the mirror.

Hayley texted me earlier to say she and Luke were ducking out to the winery where the wedding is taking place, and would be back soon, and she’d left the back door unlocked for me if I got there before they returned.

I open the door and wheel my suitcase in. The house is big and airy and rustic looking, with lots of heavy wood and seemingly random beams, a huge kitchen and two lounge rooms and a spa and a ping-pong table, as well as four bedrooms. Hayley and I planned out who was having each room when we booked it online. Hayley and Luke would have the private upstairs room with the spa ensuite, and I would have the next biggest bedroom which also has its own ensuite bathroom, which technically should go to Joel and Bianca, but Hayley has deemed will be mine as a consolation prize for having to share a house with Joel. The third bedroom is regular size, with a queen bed, which Joel and Bianca can have, and the fourth has twin single beds. That one will be for Mac, who isn’t arriving until tomorrow, so he’ll only have to endure the bad bedroom for one night.

I walk through the house, wheeling my suitcase and carrying my bridesmaid dress in its garment bag over my arm, headed for my room. The door is shut, and when I swing it open, I am greeted with the sight of a naked man. Well, a semi-naked man. He has a towel around his waist, but it’s precarious. His back is to me, and he’s bending over a suitcase. I can see just the very top sliver of his butt crack.

I scream, a regrettably very high-pitched squawk of a scream, because I was really not expecting a nude stranger in my room.

The man swings his head up in fright and whacks it against a wooden beam with a disturbing thunk.

‘Fuck,’ he yells, clutching his head. His towel has gone from riding low and loose to slipping off, and he grabs it and holds it in front of himself, and now I can see the full glory of his naked buttocks.

‘Sorry!’ I say, turning away, but I’ve caught enough of his face to realise it’s Mac. We’ve met twice before, many years ago in our early twenties. Once at a party, and once in passing when he came to pick Luke up for something. But that’s not really where I recognise him from. Mac is an actor, not an especially famous one, but an actor all the same. He’s been in things. He had a notable two-episode arc as a patient on Code Blue during its highest-rating season, and he played a supporting character on a little-known sci-fi drama called Arcadia Rising, and he was in a funny indie movie that came out several years ago. I know his face very well from these roles, but I am not going to mention that. From Luke’s stories about him, I’ve always had the sense that Mac might be a little bit full of himself (he is an actor, after all, there are certain professions where one expects a minimum level of ego) and I don’t want to begin our interactions with him assuming I am an adoring fan.

‘Mac?’ I say, as if I’m unsure. I’m a couple of steps down the hallway now, with my back turned.

‘Yes. Anna?’

‘Yes. Hi,’ I say.

‘You can come back now,’ he says, and I retrace my steps to see he’s reinstated the towel around his waist. One hand is holding it there, and the other is touching the back of his head and checking for any sign of blood.

‘Sorry about the scream.’

‘You scared the shit out of me,’ he says.

‘Well you scared the shit out of me,’ I say. He is the naked one. I am the innocent bystander.

‘You threw open my bedroom door and screamed.’

The ‘my’ has me bristling. No. He can’t lay claim to the room.

‘Sorry. I walked in and saw a naked man and feared for my life.’

He’s still gingerly touching the back of his head so I walk back out to the kitchen, grab some ice from the freezer, wrap it in a tea towel and bring it back to the bedroom for him.

He’s put on a T-shirt and is zipping up his jeans when I walk back in. The thing about Mac is he almost looks like an ordinary guy on TV, not short but not especially tall, not skinny but not especially muscular, brown hair, and brown eyes. He has a face that slides a little more towards interesting than classically handsome, with an ever so slightly crooked nose and notably sharp incisors (no veneers), but now I realise my understanding of him as ordinary is skewed because everyone on TV is beautiful, which shifts the range of what is normal. In person, Mac is definitely handsome, yes, but more than that, he has a magnetism that I can’t put my finger on. His posture, maybe, is part of it. The way he holds his whole body. Even his exposed butt had a certain charisma. Also, his voice. I knew about the voice. He has an excellent voice, kind of scratchy sexy without trying to be scratchy sexy. An Australian accent lightly infused with the sense of having lived elsewhere for a decade. For the last ten years, he’s lived overseas. Mostly LA, but currently New York.

‘Here,’ I say, and I reach up and hold the ice against his head. He looks at me, and then takes the tea towel from my hand and holds it himself.

‘Thanks,’ he says. ‘I appreciate it.’