The time I interviewed the man I thought I’d marry
Never before had I been so nervous to interview someone for work. But this wasn’t just anyone, this was the former love of my life.
I could feel my heart thumping as the deer in the headlights expression framed in the Zoom video stared back at me.
I’d clambered across the spare room in my parent's home — clunky laptop open in hand — to find the best lighting. Of course, it was seated cross-legged on the ground, with half of the laptop precariously perched on the bed in front of me.
Never before had I been so nervous to interview someone for work. But this wasn’t just anyone, this was the man I thought I would be the love of my life.
No memory from my youth is more vivid than afternoons spent sitting on a bench during a beachside family holiday, armed with a Barbie magazine and head full of wild daydreams.
I’d convinced myself that Taylor Hanson, the long-haired hunk of MMMbop fame, would just so happen to stroll past, spot me looking mature and mysterious with my serious literary reading material, and instantly want me to be his girlfriend.
So strong was my naive conviction to this fairytale meet cute, I didn’t spare a thought as to why the hottest American star would be, alone, in a small WA tourism town. Let alone why he might find a 14-year-old in denim shorts and Supre boob tube so compelling that he’d fall head over heels at the very sight of her.
I also used to sing to my mum, hidden behind the couch, and ask her who she thought was singing, Celine Dion or I and was genuinely surprised when she guessed correctly.
It’s fair to say I had quite the imagination.
It will come as no surprise that he never walked by, and the crush and my talent for dreaming up PG fantasies were left on that park bench.
Yet as I prepared myself to interview Taylor ahead of his Perth shows, fixing flyaways and wondering if I had time to pluck a few rogue brow hairs, the dreams of that pubescent teen flickered back to life.
Visiting my parents at the time, I’d banished them from their own home for 30 minutes with my wonderful (yet endlessly nosy, they take after their aunty) nieces. No one was coming between Taylor Hanson and I, this was 20 years of manifesting in the making.
And then, there he was, sitting on a tour bus in Denmark. The man, once a boy, who I had pictured a glossy life with. And there I was, as close to the heart-eyed emoji as a human can get, attempting to utter a question I’d poured over putting together.
Now I’m always going to look back on this call with the rosiest pair of glasses on the market, but the conversation was all I could have hoped for.
His answers were kind and thoughtful, he asked me questions and shared personal tidbits about his life. He also did that thing that charismatic people do when they warmly say your name and look at you earnestly in conversation, melt.
It didn’t hurt that he’d barely aged, his locks a little shorter but his boyishly handsome face just as I’d remembered it.
At a turtle's pace, my nerves dissipated, and around 20 minutes in there was a comfortable flow.
That was, until I heard the creak of the door.
With lightning quick speed, my arm slammed it shut as my eyes never veered from Taylor’s baby blues. Despite my pleading, my family of course had snuck back in, my mum thinking she’d “quickly poke her head in”.
Just as the early flutters had emerged at the sight of Taylor, as did the teenage petulance of having my mum cramp my style. I’ve forgiven her now, just.
Ours wasn’t the love story I’d anticipated. Our meeting was two decades too late, Taylor has seven children and I’m engaged, sigh.
But for just a wee moment, the 14-year-old Because You Loved Me singing, Taylor Hanson adoring teen had all of her dreams come true all while sitting on the floor in Mandurah.