by Bronwyn Sell
‘Loser,’ Harry said. ‘Him, not you. I thought you guys were getting on well.’
‘Too well. He became my gay BFF, except most definitely not gay. And don’t say, “He didn’t deserve you.”’
‘Okay,’ said Harry, turning around to grab the Cognac. ‘But he didn’t,’ he called back.
Amy’s eye roll went to waste.
‘See?’ Carmen said, having said the same thing when Amy had reported in about the implosion. ‘Let’s find you someone this week. All the villas will be full, and most of the apartments, and a lot of them are wedding guests from Melbourne.’
‘You know what?’ Amy said to Carmen, linking her fingers together on the bar. ‘I think I need a break from all that. Maybe I’m better off with nothing than the wrong thing, coz it turns out losing the wrong thing can mess you up just as bad as losing the right thing.’
‘Unless you know it’s the wrong thing to begin with, and then you’re good.’
Amy did a slow blink. ‘Run that by me in the morning when I’m sober. No joke—I will break if I get hung up over one more guy who says, “It’s so cool to have a girl friend (but not girlfriend, ha ha!) who gets me and, hey, if I don’t find someone else tonight, wanna go back to my place?”’ Carmen reached over and squeezed her hand. Amy had meant to sound offhand and funny, but her sister was a tough crowd to fool. ‘And if you ever again hear me say anything along the lines of, “Yeah, we’re kinda sorta dating and I’m positive that he’s developing true feelings for me, despite what he says, and any day he’ll realise it …”’
‘I’ll stage an intervention,’ Carmen declared. ‘The cousins and I will fly the helicopter to Melbourne, rappel down and yank you out. And we’ll lock you in the spider shed while you man-detox.’
Amy shuddered. As kids, the cousins had repeatedly dared each other to spend a night in their long-gone grandfather’s fishing shed near the island’s mangroves. She was pretty sure that even the boys had never gone through with it. ‘I’ll settle for a driftwood hut on Stingray Island, a case of wine and a book.’
‘I’ll join you,’ Carmen said. ‘Seriously, though, you need to start asking for more and stop settling for less.’
Says the sister with the hotness gene. ‘You say that like I’m making a conscious choice.’
‘A choice, yes. Conscious? Maybe not. Either way, stop going down that path. It doesn’t have to be friends with benefits or nothing.’
‘It’s not like either of those options is my choice. It’s just what I end up with.’
‘Maybe that wouldn’t happen if you stopped expecting it to happen.’
‘Carmen, if you use the word “manifest”, I’m swimming back to Melbourne.’
‘You keep your expectations low so you don’t get disappointed. Maybe try setting the bar higher.’
‘Yeah, perhaps you’re right,’ Amy said, but only to shut Carmen up. It wasn’t that she settled for less. Less was the only thing ever on offer.
‘Beware of falling coconuts!’ Carmen cried, her spine snapping rigid.
Amy reflexively looked up. ‘Uh, we’re inside?’
‘No! It’s this parable I read on a blog. If a coconut falls on your head, well, that’s wrong place, wrong time, right? Simple bad luck. But if it happens twice, you’re just plain careless and bringing it on yourself and it’s you who needs to change and not the coconuts. And if it happens more than twice?’
‘Uh, we put up warning signs? And pay a guy to take the coconuts down?’
‘But don’t you see? You’ve got to stop letting the coconuts fall on your head! Stop taking naps under coconut palms!’
As Amy gaped at this baffling guru incarnation of her sister, Harry—blessedly—served their cocktails with a flourish and moved along the bar. Would it be a bad look if Amy scooped out a few ice cubes and shoved them down her jean legs? She’d spent much of her life holidaying here, but it was hard to conceive of heat while packing during a Melbourne winter, like your body had lost its memory of the tropics and your brain refused to accept that it was possible to go straight from winter to summer within a few hours.
She settled for sucking up an ice cube from the cocktail and clacking it around her mouth. Harry had gone strong on the bitters but the Sazerac was sweet and tangy with a welcome bite. She spun back to face the dance floor, where her parents and their partners were rumba-ing to the Strictly Ballroom soundtrack. ‘I want a guy to look at me the way Sanjay looks at Dad,’ she mumbled to Carmen. ‘He feels The Pull for Dad, you can see it.’
‘I can’t figure that out. I mean, Dad’s the best, but he’s not … I mean, look at …’ Their father attempted a shimmy, his belly jiggling against his shirt, and they both groaned. ‘But Sanjay gazes at him like he’s Chris Hemsworth.’
‘If he were the one with the money, I’d assume that’s why Sanjay’s into him. But Sanjay really loves him for him. For what’s on the inside. Can you imagine?’ If Amy was in a position to raise her standards, that was what she wanted. A man who knew his world was richer with you in it, in a way it wouldn’t be with anyone else.
‘Imagine what family Christmases will be like if Sanjay’s with Dad, and Mum’s hooked up with the silver surfer.’
‘I’ll have to volunteer at a soup kitchen all day. It’ll be the full Hallmark movie. Sanjay in the morning over pancakes, the silver surfer in the evening over cocktails. I’d need counselling for the whole of January.’
‘That’s your Christmas present sorted for the next decade or two.’ Carmen threw up the hand that wasn’t holding her drink, forcing Amy into evasive action. ‘Oh my stars, would you look at that? There’s another one.’
The sliding doors from reception were closing behind a guy about their age. He lowered a backpack to the floorboards, looking around. His hair was thick, jet black and just long enough that he’d have to flick it out of his eyes occasionally. Amy’s favourite kind. Sanjay strode off the dance floor with his arms open wide and they full-on guy-hugged, all shoulder knocking and backslapping. Sanjay stepped back and gripped either side of the new guy’s head, looking for a second like he might kiss him.
‘Just when you thought this room couldn’t improve on tall, dark and gay, the late boat docks,’ Carmen said.
‘You think he’s gay?’ Amy couldn’t keep the disappointment from her tone. What was with that? Literally five minutes ago she’d sworn off men. Well, she’d sworn to take a break from them. She wasn’t ready to join a convent just yet, or to move up here, which was almost the same thing, romantically speaking.
‘Oooh. You think he’s hot.’
‘It’s hardly a groundless accusation.’ The guy carried off a grey marl T-shirt and faded jeans with the panache of James Bond in a tuxedo. And he appeared to be attending a wedding alone, which was something you avoided unless you were incurably single.
‘Not my type,’ Carmen said.
Amy snorted. ‘Your type doesn’t exist.’
‘What does that mean?’
‘I mean that your type is “perfect”. No guy is ever going to be as perfect as you.’
‘Nothing wrong with setting your sights high,’ Carmen said imperiously, though her jaw twitched as it fought off a grin. No one was allowed to tease Carmen like Amy was allowed to tease Carmen, and vice versa. ‘Especially when you have a small child to think of.’
‘True.’ Amy’s gaze turned back to the hot stranger. She inhaled like she could smell him from there but caught body odour instead. Possibly her dad’s. ‘Nothing wrong with that at all.’
‘He’ll come along, Aims, for both of us. But hopefully not the same guy.’
‘Don’t tempt the universe. We already have enough factors working against us.’
Rosa stopped dancing so Sanjay could introduce the newcomer, and hugged him. ‘The brazen hussy,’ Amy murmured to Carmen, who laughed, seeing as their mother was nothing of the sort. Viggo left his arm slung around Rosa’s lower back, like they came as a pair. Geoff pointed out his daughters at
the bar and the new guy looked straight at them.
Amy and Carmen both swore.
‘Were you looking?’ Amy said, still looking.
‘Yep. You?’
Amy groaned. Twice in one night.
Geoff set out for the bar, beckoning the new guy to follow, but he was waylaid by a rumba-ing footy teammate. He gestured at the guy to keep going.
‘Uh-oh,’ Carmen said. ‘Is Tall, Dark and Hopefully Straight coming to us?’
‘It does appear that way.’ For no good reason, Amy stood. There was something about this guy. And now she couldn’t sit again without it looking awkward. ‘Does he look familiar to you?’
‘Only in the way models in magazines look familiar because they look like all the other models in all the other magazines.’
As he drew closer, the details came into focus. His eyes were dazzling—light green or maybe hazel—but he didn’t quite pull off smouldering because his smile was a little too open. No big mysteries. No secrets. An endearing goofiness, even. Amy laid a palm on her chest. Suddenly, the oxygen had thinned.
Carmen stared at Amy’s hand like it had sprouted green fur. ‘Seriously?’
‘Oh yeah.’
‘The Pull?’
‘Like you would not believe.’
Carmen raised her chin. ‘Are you sure that’s the best way to judge a potential boyfriend?’
‘Yes, I am.’
‘And how has that worked out for you so far?’
A circling waiter—a ring-in from Airlie Beach—offered the stranger some bruschetta from a tray, and he paused to grab a couple, giving Amy a chance to remember how to breathe. How could she put this in a way Carmen could understand? ‘Remember Ricky Galanos from uni?’ she said.
‘You had The Pull for Ricky? He was my boyfriend.’
‘No, I didn’t get The Pull for him, and neither did you, and that’s my point. You spent way too long trying to talk yourself into being attracted to him because he was such a “nice guy” and everyone said you were perfect for each other, and he worshipped you. But no matter how hard you tried, it was attraction-factor zero and after way too much wasted time you broke the poor guy’s heart.’
Carmen pursed her lips. ‘We all make mistakes. Well, I don’t, not usually. Okay, maybe one or two significant ones. But I don’t get how that is at all—’
‘You can’t fake attraction. You can’t manufacture it. Other problems are fixable, but not that.’ Amy lowered her voice and sped up as Please Don’t Be Gay resumed walking. ‘If it’s not there, it’s not there. Attraction is fundamental to the survival of the human race.’
‘And if you have this infallible hardwired alert system to identify Mr Right, why are you just as single as I am?’ Carmen hissed.
‘Not by choice, as previously established.’ Carmen went to object, but Amy ploughed on. ‘Admit it, you felt The Pull with your baby daddy.’
‘You know I did, but it may well have been the alcohol. I didn’t even know his surname and, besides, do you see him here now?’
‘But you felt it.’
‘Well, yes there was a strong attraction, but that’s—’
‘Shhh.’
The new guy’s eyes narrowed in scrutiny as he took a last slow step toward them.
Amy smiled. Please be single and straight. Please don’t look at me and think ‘friend’.
‘Carmen?’ he said, holding his arms wide, palms up. Amy suppressed a groan. Of course he’d make a beeline for Carmen—their mother was currently taken. He leaned forward and attempted a hug but the angles were all wrong and it was like watching two triangles embrace. He stepped back and pivoted so he was looking down at Amy. Her breath caught. He was the perfect height—she’d have to tiptoe to kiss him. ‘Which means you must be the Amy I’ve heard so much about.’
He had? Amy went to offer her hand but suddenly he was hugging her, her cheek squashed against a solid shoulder covered by soft cotton. No incompatibility in those angles, possibly because she didn’t have angles. She filled spaces like a liquid. He smelled sweet and woody, a rumpled end-of-the-day scent like he’d spritzed with an earthy cologne before disembarking at the jetty. She went ahead and shamelessly inhaled.
‘Stoked to meet you at last,’ he said, his deep voice rumbling against her ear.
At last?
He released her and stood back, looking from sister to sister as if he couldn’t believe his luck. Carmen shot Amy a what-is-this-guy-on? look. Amy shot back with I-have-no-idea-but-I’m-withholding-judgment.
Starting as she meant to continue, Amy assumed her best I’m-not-just-a-good-friend posture. Whatever that was. A little fluid, a little casual. Chest forward, head tilted? One hand on the bar stool, leaning over slightly?
‘Oh man,’ he said, running both hands through that glorious hair and hooking them there, ‘you have no idea who I am. I’ve just come in from Melbourne after a double shift, which means I’ve been up since approximately three days ago.’
Carmen raised her eyebrows at Amy. He lived in Melbourne. Too perfect. Amy was a second away from figuring out the catch. Up close, his jaw was dusted with an eight o’clock shadow that roughed him up just right. His eyes were hazel or light brown rather than green, but she’d need to do far more study in various lighting conditions to establish the exact shade.
‘I’m Josh,’ he said, as if that would clear everything up. He slung an arm around Amy’s shoulder and pulled her in beside him, upsetting her precarious balance and forcing her into tricky footwork to stay upright. He looked at her with an expression of wonder—the way men looked at women who weren’t her. Yeesh. The Pull. It was like having sea legs. In a minute she would fall right over, or at least collide with his chest.
And would that be so bad?
‘I’m Sanjay’s son,’ he said. ‘Your new brother.’
What?
He squeezed her shoulder and, with a hot jolt, she saw the embrace for what it was. A brotherly hug. Josh. Joshua Brennan, Sanjay’s son, who’d just moved from Perth.
His grin widened. ‘I’ve always wanted a little sister.’
3
Carmen, bless her, filled the silence Amy was in no state to fill. ‘I’d assumed the Joshua we’ve heard so much about was a kid.’
‘I get that a lot,’ Josh said. ‘My parents had me crazy young—and you know Sanjay’s immortal, right? In a few years, I’ll go from looking like his brother to looking like his father and we’ll have to invent a whole new cover story.’
Yep, a smidgeon of goofiness, a touch of eagerness. Amy couldn’t seem to step away from his body, it was that solid and warm. Not that she needed any help in the warmth department.
‘Immortal,’ Carmen echoed. ‘That explains a lot. Still, I guess it means he’ll be around for Dad for the long haul.’ She turned to Amy. ‘That’s why he looks familiar. The photo of him on Dad and Sanjay’s wall.’
Josh screwed up his beautiful face. ‘Sanjay really should update those photos.’
‘He really should,’ Amy said, more dreamily than she intended.
As Josh tried to get Harry’s attention, a curvy blonde with a smear of dark makeup along one cheek slapped two vouchers onto the bar beside Amy, making her jump. ‘Bollinger, please,’ she called.
Harry sauntered over, slid the vouchers over like a croupier and lifted the corners to read them. ‘And for your new husband?’
Amy leaned toward Carmen. ‘I swear,’ she hissed, ‘everyone on this island is in a state of coupling up, getting married, honeymooning or just living out their happily-ever-after.’
‘Everyone except anyone in our family,’ Carmen replied. ‘Apart from Dad. And now Mum. And Nan has Reg from Maintenance, so …’
‘Is she still pretending nothing’s going on there?’
‘Yup. It’s amazing how often she needs one-on-one meetings at the operations compound. I suspect the only thing being maintained is her.’
‘My what?’ the bride shouted at Harry, louder than the music
warranted. Not her first champagne of the night, evidently. ‘Ohhh, my husband. My husband … Yes, he’ll have a … Veuve Clicquot. Thank you.’
As Harry turned to the fridge, the bride downed her Bollinger in one go. Amy, Carmen and Josh shared surprised looks. What kind of happy honeymooner treated Bollinger like that? Harry returned with the Veuve and a second flute. He paused just long enough for a double take at the empty glass. He’d barely finished filling the new flute before the woman slid it from his hand and slugged it. She wiped the corners of her mouth, glancing at Amy and Carmen, who turned away a beat too late. Because being caught staring was a Lowery thing now.
‘My husband doesn’t appreciate champagne,’ the bride declared, ‘or other things of quality.’
‘No explanation needed,’ Carmen said. ‘I hope you … enjoyed it.’
The bride spun, bringing her palm to her mouth to cover a tiny belch. The French polish had peeled off several perfectly oval fingernails. As she swayed off, Carmen leaned over the bar. ‘How much has the honeymooner had to drink?’ she asked Harry.
‘That’s the first I’ve seen her. If she’s been drinking tonight, it hasn’t been in here.’
‘Maybe no more, eh?’
‘For sure.’
‘And you’d better declare happy hour on the rest of that champagne.’ Carmen’s phone bleeped, and she checked it and clicked her tongue. ‘Message from Nan,’ she said. ‘Mika’s awake again, asking if it’s morning yet and can she play with her presents from Aunty Aims.’ She slid off her bar stool. ‘I’d better go. If she doesn’t get a good sleep, the entire island will have a bad day tomorrow. I have to work on the placeholders for the tables, anyway. And the gift bags. And my speech. And Mum and I need to finish planning the choreography for the wedding dance number—though I think she may be preoccupied tonight. Great to meet you, brother,’ she said, patting Josh’s shoulder, ‘and welcome to our crazy family. I can see already we will all become extremely close.’
As she left, Josh dropped onto Carmen’s bar stool. Amy abruptly sat on hers, realising too late how inappropriately close the stools were. She angled away, her leg muscles straining to avoid connecting with his thigh.