‘What do you mean you met someone!’ Jess almost screeches. I rapidly reduce the volume on my phone and spit the toothpaste into the basin.Is it really that astonishing?
‘What if he’s roaming about outside the toilets, listening?’ I whisper loudly. ‘Although, if he’s roaming outside camping ground toilets, that would be very weird. Possibly borderline criminal—’
‘It’s just typical of you to meet someone and immediately cast him as a criminal, Audrey!’ Rach says.
‘He’s criminally attractive, if that helps?’
Clair’s eyes are as wide as saucers. ‘Buthowdid you meet him?’
I don’t know why they sound so shocked. ‘Oh, you know. The usual way?’ I brush my hair and pull it into a ponytail. ‘I caused thousands of dollars’ worth of damage to his property, then he cooked me birthday sausages.’
‘Is that some euphemism the cool kids are using?’ April knows full well I do not now nor have I ever belonged to that demographic.
‘Anyway, I’m pretty sure he’s in some sort of thing with a model named Harlow.’
The quartet stares at me, then says, in perfect unison, ‘Amodel?’
‘Yes, a model. Is it so hard to believe a criminally attractive man with a model girlfriend would have cooked me breakfast?’ There’s silence. ‘Don’t answer that. Of course he noticed me. My caravan and his ute became one flesh—’
We’re interrupted by Rach’s baby, Jasper, who has no sense of dramatic timing, crying from his cot. ‘Do not say another word!’ she demands as she pops to the next room and fetches him, scrambling to unhook her maternity bra and latch him on so we can return to the business at hand. ‘This baby neversleeps!’
‘Aw, he needs the aunties there!’ I declare. My past self would be astonished to know I am self-appointed aunty-in-chief. Being Rach’s birthing partner, and missing Parker so much, something shifted in my opinion of other people’s babies. Perhaps it’s inevitable when your best friend becomes a sole parent via IVF and you spend enough time in a rocking chair at two or three in the morning, just you, the baby and your thoughts.
‘Is this her?’ April drops another screenshot into the chat. I know she’s good at online sleuthing, but this must be some sort of record. There is Harlow’s arty black-and-white headshot, platinum hair falling over her shoulders in long, gentle waves, big eyes staring down the barrel of the camera, slight curl to the lips. Professional, beautiful, yet still perfectly attainable for someone like Beau.
‘That’s her! The Viper’s evening guest. To be honest, she’s even more glamorous when she’s damp—’
‘You met the boyfriend ofHarlow Sinclair?’ April follows up, chestnut eyes sparkling. She is off and away with this whole state of affairs.
‘Who is the Viper?’ Jess asks.
‘Who is Harlow Sinclair? What’s she famous for?’ I can’t keep up with my own rapidly developing situation.
‘She’s not just a model! She’s a film star! She’s in an upcoming movie they’re shooting in Tathra!’
‘How do you know all this, April?’ I don’t know why I’m so surprised. She’s connected to all of Instagram, somehow.
‘How do younotknow? Her rumoured relationship with that hot screenwriter is all over the internet! You know the one. He was a writer on that Oscar-nominated movie last year. Historical film. What was it?’
I have no idea what she’s going on about, except the bit about the screenwriter being hot—a rumour I am fully qualified to corroborate. I wish I’d never mentioned it, though, and that I’d paid as much attention to his insurance papers as he had paid to mine, because I barely know a thing about him.
I zip my toiletries bag and exit the block, only to find the man himself walking towards me in nothing but a pair of black running shorts, towel slung over one shoulder, tattooed chest glistening in the early morning sunlight. I can’t tell if he’s glistening from sweat, salt water or the powers of my overactive imagination, but exactly how we arrived here is irrelevant. The impact is glorious.
‘Audrey! Tell us you didn’t meetBeau Davenport?’ April practically shouts from my phone. I might as well have tethered it to a high-voltage speaker and blasted it through the entire campsite.
‘I have to go!’ I tell them, but what I really mean is I have to expire, instantly, from mortification. There is no way he didn’t overhear his name. All I can do is stand here helplessly as he dries his dark hair and rubs the towel across his chest under what seems to be my intense micromanagement.
‘I haven’t been googling you,’ I blurt out, even though he hasn’t asked.No, it’s worse. My friends and I have been gossiping about you in the toilets like we’re in Year Nine.
He laughs. ‘That’s a relief. Google is not kind.’
I’ll be the judge of that once April sends the dossier she’ll be preparing forensically as we speak.
‘I was actually just using you as an excuse to stop my friends from matchmaking,’ I explain. It sounded more sensible inmy head. ‘They sent me some man’s profile this morning, and he looks like a cannibal.’
Whatever Beau expected to come out of my mouth, it clearly wasn’t either of these points.
‘Met many cannibals?’
