The Greatest Love Story You’ll Ever Write
“Because when it comes to female friendship, the stakes are higher—and the rewards deeper—than any romantic entanglement.”
by Lillie Brown
We drove up the coast with the windows cracked, Erykah Badu and FKA Twigs curling through the speakers. We were heading away for two nights at Bangalay Luxury Villas—a sponsored stay, yes, but one that would quickly become far more than content fodder or a highlight reel.
Bangalay is named for the Bangalay Sand Forest. It’s a place designed to feel like a bush track leading to the sea, and it delivers—swathes of banksia hum with wattlebirds and the familiar screech of rainbow lorikeets. One night, a possum peeked over the roof as we ambled back from dinner, as if to check who was laughing so loudly under the stars. Over dinners that stretched into hours, beneath candlelight and a bottle (or three) of Pinot, we dissected everything from business strategies to the darker corners of our inner worlds. The venison was deliciously prepared but horrifying for me—a newly minted meat-eater whose moral conflict was laid bare for group debate. Emma regaled us with a hysterical tale from her days working the door at a club in Hawthorn. Her boss told her it was a dress-up night, but didn’t specify the kind of dress-up. She rocked up in a karate outfit—completely unaware that it was a club night for swingers—a la Cady Heron arriving at the Halloween party in Mean Girls as a zombie bride while everyone else is adorned in racy costumes.
“Be the one who texts first. Remember birthdays. Show up with coffee (and a pile of hot chips) on the bad days.”
Poolside Bangalay Luxury Villas
Laughter came fast and easy. But so did the vulnerable confessions and tears. And that, I think, is the point. Because when it comes to female friendship, the stakes are higher—and the rewards deeper—than any romantic entanglement.
From the time we’re little girls, we’re handed the narrative that romantic love is the pinnacle of our existence. We’re taught to map our lives around finding “the one,” to believe that our wedding day will be the happiest day we’ll ever know. And yet, amidst all the cultural pageantry that surrounds romance, it’s often in our friendships with women where we experience our truest, most unfiltered selves.
Science backs this up. Studies show that emotionally supportive friendships reduce stress and inflammation, improve immune function, and lower our risk of depression and anxiety (Uchino, 2009; Holt-Lunstad et al., 2010). Neuroimaging research indicates that social connection activates brain regions tied to reward and positive emotion—meaning that the glow we feel after a girls’ trip isn’t just psychological. It’s deeply neurobiological (Lieberman, 2013).
It’s easy to dismiss a girls’ weekend as frivolous—a splashy indulgence of matching robes, rosé, and Instagram reels. But at Bangalay, I was reminded that these moments are the very foundation of our emotional lives. They’re where we get to put words to the parts of ourselves we usually hide, to be held and seen and sense-checked in a way no lover or partner quite manages.
Friendship is built in these mundane, golden interludes
—a shared space to just be. Charms is napping on the couch exhaling into a rare pocket of stillness, while Bloss sits across the table tapping away on her phone, immortalising the trip’s memories into social content. Emma sits nearby feeding Banks, her new baby; settling him for the afternoon. I’m on the deck, legs propped on a concrete coffee table, reading the equally captivating and puzzling tale of Larrimah, a sun-scorched town in the Territory. There’s no pressure to perform. We are simply witnessing one another, quietly tethered by proximity and care.
“Want to be invited to dinner parties? Start hosting them”
Earlier that day, we’d spent hours moseying through the streets of Berry. Drifting in and out of boutiques, overcaffeinating ourselves with one too many soy lattes, buying cut-crystal butter dishes we absolutely didn’t need. Arms linked, laughing so hard we snorted, without a care for the passersby who overheard the undignified sounds coming out of us. That evening, we took a slow sunset stroll along Seven Mile Beach. Feet bare, not a phone in sight, we watched the sky blush and fade over the ocean. A rogue wave snuck up on Bloss and completely saturated her pants; cue our heads thrown back, cackling.
Female friendships are the rarest kind of love: one without obligation, where the only currency is love and presence. It’s the friend who knows the contour of your secrets, who calls you out kindly when you’re self-sabotaging, who lets you dissect the same situation for the sixth time and doesn’t keep score.
But here’s the piece that often goes unsaid: friendships don’t simply happen. They’re built, brick by brick, through effort and intention. I see countless people online lamenting how hard it is to make friends as an adult, as if friendship is a random cosmic gift that falls into the lap of lucky recipients. But friendship is an act of creation.
Want to be invited to dinner parties? Start hosting them. Buy the groceries, plan the menu, scrub dishes until midnight while laughter spills down the hall. Want friendships that feel like soul-anchoring safety nets? Be the one who texts first. Remember birthdays. Show up with coffee (and a pile of hot chips) on the bad days. Help someone move even when you’d rather stay in your pyjamas. Plan the girls’ trips that become stories you’ll still be telling when you’re old and soft and wise.
Because when I think about the people who fill my life with colour, who hold my secrets, and who remind me that love is not exclusive to romance—it’s the girls. And it always will be.
So take the trip. Book the villa. Order the venison or don’t. But above all, prioritise and tend to your female friendships.
They are the greatest love story you’ll ever write.
bangalayvillas.com.au
