you do.’
‘Ha! So are you seeing anyone else?’
‘No,’ Paige answered before she’d even noticed Mae’s change of tack, or the knowing gleam in her eye. Dammit.
‘Do you want to?’ Mae asked.
Paige sat up straighter. ‘Where’s Clint?’
‘At the bar.’
‘Good, I need another drink.’
‘I’ll bet you do.’ Mae gave Paige’s foot a quick nudge under the table. ‘I know you, Paige. You are doing your absolute all to avoid even considering it, but I’m living proof that happily ever afters can happen, even to those who don’t believe in them. And that’s the last I’ll say about that.’
Mae mimed zipping her mouth shut tight as Clint returned with a beer for himself, another pink drink for Mae, and a Midori Splice for Paige.
‘You looked like you might need it,’ he said, before he slumped back onto his stool and closed his eyes as if he was seriously about to have a nap right there in the middle of the bar.
Paige should have thanked her lucky stars that Clint’s arrival had saved her from answering any more of Mae’s questions. But watching Mae’s eyes constantly swerving back to her fiancé, her finger running distractedly across the rim of her cocktail glass, her cheeks warm and pink, a small smile curving at her mouth, Paige felt as if she was witnessing something so intimate she ought to look away.
But she found she couldn’t.
Did Mae really believe they could love each other through everything? Through fights and ambivalence? Through having kids and demanding jobs? Through the times they were in each other’s pockets every minute of the day and the times they spent apart? Through the times they’d inevitably hurt one another in moments of boredom, exhaustion, self-absorption?
Her parents hadn’t. Not even close. For them it had simply been too hard. So Paige just couldn’t make herself believe. Even when Clint opened one eye and gave Mae a warm lazy smile, and it was like being this close to the real thing Paige could almost touch it.
She took a hard gulp of her cocktail, barely tasting it as her mind shifted to the one secret she hadn’t dared share with Mae, the secret she’d refused to even admit to herself until that quiet moment in the noisy bar.
She felt things for Gabe. Soft, gentle, warm things.
She didn’t believe it would last. She didn’t believe it was about anything other than chemistry. But it terrified her to the soles of her boots.
In the end Gabe was gone a little over a week.
Paige was thrilled at how much she got done with all that extra time! She’d done her tax. She’d rearranged her lounge-room, twice. Made her way through every level of Angry Birds. Caught up with Mae, and Clint, another two times. And she’d thrown herself into work with a gusto she hadn’t felt for months, shining up her proposal to shoot the summer catalogue in Brazil until the thing about glowed.
Time apart had been a good thing for sure. She was in a good place. Sure again about what she was doing. And that she could handle it. Yet there was no denying the nerves that skittered through her belly the morning of the Monday he was due back.
She donned the new black lacy underwear she’d bought specially, then practically skipped into her walk-in robe to get dressed for the day and—
Instead of reaching for the work outfit she’d hung out the night before, her hand went to the white garment bag poking out from the deepest darkest corner of the cupboard and before she could stop herself she’d unzipped the bag containing her secret wedding dress with a rush.
The moment the weight of the daring concoction of chiffon, pearls, and lace filled her hands, something flipped a switch inside her and she had rough-housed the gown over her head. The satiny lining slid over her curves, cool and soft against her bare skin, then the hem dropped with a gentle swoosh to float over her bare toes. Her fingers shook as she guided the zip up her back until it stopped just below her shoulder blades.
Eyes closed, knees trembling, she turned to face the mirror behind her wardrobe door. She hoped desperately the thing swam on her, or the colour made her look jaundiced, or that she looked as if she belonged on the top of a toilet-paper roll like the doll her mum had in her downstairs bathroom.
‘It’s just a dress,’ she whispered, her voice echoing in the cosy space. Yet when she opened her eyes it was to see herself through a sheen of tears.
Was this how Mae felt when she tried hers on? Beautiful, and special, and magical, and romantic, and hopeful? She didn’t know, because she’d never asked. It was always Mae who brought up the wedding. Mae who came over to her place with bridal magazines. Mae who booked meetings with caterers and bands. Mae who had to work so hard to get Paige to even pretend to sound enthused.
Mae had motivation. Mae had found the thing they’d spent so many years convincing one another didn’t exist. A man to trust. A man to hold. A man to love.
As if she were having an out-of-body experience, Paige watched her reflection with a feeling of detachment as a single tear slid down her cheek. And then everything came into such sharp focus she actually gasped.
Paige knew the moment it had happened. The moment her work had ceased to satisfy her. The moment she’d stopped dating. The moment her life had lurched out of her tightly held control.
It had happened with the first flash of Mae’s pretty little solitaire as Mae had giddily told her Clint had proposed. The diamond dazzling her as the sun caught an edge, piercing her right through the middle, tearing every plan, every belief, every comfort she had that she wasn’t alone in believing love wasn’t priority number one.
She pressed the heels of her palms into her eyes, heat and tears squeezing past them.
What was wrong with her? Her best friend was in love. Getting married. Actually happy. Because of that her world had crumbled?
She’d always thought the hot spot that flared in her stomach whenever she looked at Mae and Clint together was fear for her friend. She’d been kidding herself. It was envy. Deep, torturous, craving certainty that she’d never experience even a tenth of the love and affection they shared. It had run so deep that for months she hadn’t even been able to face going on a date that would only remind her she was destined to be alone.
The tears came so fast she began to sob. And then to choke. And then she couldn’t breathe. Her lungs felt as if they were being squeezed from the inside out. The only way she’d ever breathe again was to get out of the damn dress.
She tugged at the straps, but they dug into her shoulders. She yanked at the deep neckline, but it wouldn’t budge. Her trembling fingers wrenched at the zip at her back and—
She stilled, one foot braced indecorously on an ottoman, her arms doing some crazy pretzel move behind her.
The zip was stuck.
Like something out of a movie, the next hour of her life flashed before her eyes. She had to leave in ten minutes if she had a hope of getting to work on time. And first up that day? The final presentation of her Brazilian proposal.
Determination steeling her, Paige took a breath, sniffed back any remaining threads of self-pity, gripped the zip between unwavering fingers, and tugged.
Nada.
Argh! What was she going to do?
Mae and Clint lived only a couple of suburbs over, but in peak-hour traffic it would take for ever for one of them to get to her. The neighbour next door was in hospital getting a nose job. If she called on Mrs Addable upstairs her predicament would be all over the building before she even left the apartment.
Maybe she could wear the thing. She could cover most of it up. Her chartreuse beaded cardigan. Her cropped chocolate jacket. Her fringed grey cowboy boots. And accessories. Lots of fabulous