by Janette Paul
‘Dee?’ Damon the Director waved his hand in front of her face. ‘Are you with us?’
‘Huh?’
‘I said take a break. We’re setting up for some stills.’
‘Oh, right.’ She rubbed absently at her arms, her head buzzing. She gulped from a bottle of water while her make-up was retouched, stretched her thighs, tried to loosen up.
‘When you’re ready, Dee,’ Damon called.
She took a slow lunge back into the Warrior Pose, arms outstretched, and concentrated her focus back on the beach.
This was assertive.
The Warrior Pose on a beach for a TV ad was assertive.
Okay, she’d been forced into it by a dire financial situation – but here she was. Being assertive. Making money. Getting her shit together.
She let out a long, slow breath. Pressed deeper into the lunge. Waited for her muscles to settle into the stronger stance.
Maybe it was time to stop wandering.
After all, wasn’t it the wandering that had landed her right where she didn’t want to be – in debt, facing a future someone else was planning and desperate for a way out.
Maybe it was time to point her feet in one direction. She didn’t have to know what was at the end of the road, or even around the bend because it was the journey that counted, not the destination, right?
Which direction, though? The money trail?
No, she didn’t want a bank vault, just enough cash for a bit of security. Enough to buy some furniture. Enough to prove to Val she didn’t need a mortgage. Enough to get her shit together and keep it there. Okay, Security Road it was.
She’d have to be assertive. But she could do that now.
And she’d have to … Actually, she had no idea what else she had to do. She knew nothing about business or making money or finding opportunities. All she knew was how to teach yoga.
And that wearing a sparkly dress to a Christmas party landed her the best paying job she’d ever had.
‘Trudy, I just saw you on the TV. The ad is wonderful and I love your outfit.’
Dee stared at her phone wondering when her mother had been possessed by a supportive person. ‘Thanks, Mum.’
Three minutes earlier, her new flatmate Pam, the loud one who worked with Leon and who’d moved in after Dee’s fit of assertiveness, ran through the apartment yelling that the commercial was on the telly. Dee was stupefied by shock as she watched herself twisting and turning on the sand, the pictures alternating between spectacular wide-shots of the beach and sensual close-ups of her body.
Leon was on the mobile before the ad finished. ‘If I was straight, I’d sign up for that health insurance in a second. You sex goddess, you.’
It was two weeks since the ad was shot and the first time Dee had seen it. When Val’s voice came down the line, she still had a hand clapped over her mouth, reeling from the overt sensuality of the pictures. It was meant to be promoting health insurance, not voyeurism.
Her mother obviously missed that angle. ‘Can you get me some copies, Trudy, so I can give them out to my friends? Maybe you could sign them. That would be nice, don’t you think?’
Had Val lost her mind? ‘I’ll ask Lucy and let you know.’
Dee spent the next few days in a state of astonishment. First, there was the giant billboard at the junction featuring a King Kong-sized picture of her in Tree Pose – the sight of which almost made her drive up the back of a bus. Then there was the stream of yoga students who’d seen the ad aired repeatedly over breakfast TV. The couple in the café who pointed at her made her feel pretty weird but the three schoolgirls in the shopping centre who asked for an autograph stumped her completely. For someone who avoided being the centre of attention, getting noticed never felt so good.
She had a coffee with Hollywood Jesus Tom and he said she looked ethereal – go figure – but he was concerned the commercial focus on yoga would undermine the deep, spiritual origins of the practice that the Western world could truly benefit from. No sparks there yet.
‘I knew you’d be great.’ Lucy beamed from her yoga mat on the floor of her office three days after the launch of the ad. ‘The client is over the moon and the interest is unprecedented. I’ve been taking calls about the “yoga girl” since Monday morning.’
‘Who from?’
‘Newspapers, magazines, radio, TV, everyone.’
Dee’s stomach did an anxious lurch. ‘What do they want?’
‘They want to know who you are, where you’ve come from, everything about you,’ Lucy enthused. ‘I’ve given out a few scraps to keep them keen but they want more. It’s fantastic.’
Dee wasn’t so sure. A scarier kind of centre of attention was coming at her at warp speed. ‘But aren’t they meant to be interested in the health insurance?’
‘Sure but while they’re talking about you, they’re talking about the ad and our client. It’s great. Sooo’ – she kneeled up on her mat, felt around on her desk, waved a card about in front of Dee – ‘there’s this advertising industry dinner tomorrow night and we’re taking Leonard and his wife along as our star clients, so I thought it’d be a great opportunity to show you off too.’
Was this it? A sparkly dress moment. A chance to be assertive. A step on the path to security and new furniture. She couldn’t afford to pass it up – the ad had paid for Leon’s car and his half of the bond, but she still had no sofa (although Pam’s hot pink bean-bags made sitting easier) and there was the car registration and the telephone bill and … God, it was endless. Although how a fancy dinner would secure her future, she had no idea.
‘What would I have to do?’
‘There’s always a bevy of media waiting to snap photos of the latest advertising stars so we can squeeze you into some of them, put your face in the social pages. We’ll get you shaking hands with a few big-wigs, then you can drink champagne, shoot the breeze with some famous names, dance a bit, that kind of thing.’
Dee winced. A swanky party. Like an annual student Christmas party without the yuletide conversation to fall back on. She was hopeless at small talk. She never knew what to say when discussions inevitably turned to high-brow topics. No one ever talked about stuff she knew. And then there were the uncomfortable comments that made her feel like teaching yoga was a sideshow act – The Amazing Bendable Woman. But it might be worth it if her ‘earthy chic’ outfit scored her another job offer. ‘So I could wear the sparkly dress from your Christmas party?’
‘Definitely not. Half of the invitation list was at my party. We want you to make an entrance and you can’t do that in last season’s dress. I know.’ She suddenly grabbed her phone, hit speed dial. ‘Gina. Lucy. I need your help.’
Gina was Lucy’s gal-pal, a yoga school student and magazine fashion editor with access to a large number of designers and their sample gowns.
Lucy hung up. ‘She’s on her way.’
By the time Dee was bringing Lucy to the end of her meditation session, Gina was walking through the door with an armload of gowns. At the swish of silk, Lucy was out of her meditative state, throwing dresses across the furniture. ‘These are fabulous.’
‘That’s Jennifer and that’s Lilly and Brian’s latest and of course Zack,’ Gina was saying, pointing to each dress, naming the designers like they were her nearest and dearest.
Dee had to admit the gowns were gorgeous – and brief. She didn’t realise ‘black tie’ meant bow tie for men and barely covered breasts for women. Lucy and Gina made her try each one on and model them around the office and yelled at her to stop hitching at the straps. Dee tried to convince them a green high-necked, backless one was best but they outvoted her with a black sequined number with a neckline that plunged to her navel.
‘My boobs’ll fall out,’ she complained.
‘Nothing a little glue can’t fix,’ Gina said. ‘Hope you’ve got some skyscraper heels or you’ll be tripping over the hem all night.’
Did Amanda’s cast-off shoes count as skyscrapers? They felt
like the Eiffel Tower but after today’s fashion show, it was obvious she knew nothing.
While Dee changed back into market-stall, Gina said, ‘So has Lucy lined you up for the weekend at the Lake yet?’
‘What weekend?’
Lucy explained the ‘weekend’ was a getaway she’d organised for a group of friends at her holiday house on Lake Macquarie. ‘We had this bright idea to turn it into a yoga retreat. Get the inspiring girl from the TV ad to be our yogi for a couple of days. What do you think?’
‘Oh, gee, a house party,’ Dee said. Half of her wanted to jump up and down – a big job without even trying. The other half of her wanted to crawl under a rock.
House parties were a bit like the Hindenburg – great idea but likely to crash and burn at any moment. The last time she’d been recruited for one, she spent the entire weekend trapped in a small house with four couples while the heavens opened in the worse storm in decades. Her students got more and more inebriated as the weather deteriorated, ended up in a drunken brawl over Trivial Pursuit, exiled themselves to their bedrooms to sober up and left at the first hint of sunshine. Dee vowed never to do another one, but that was before she decided to walk the path of security.
Perhaps if she took her own car, she could leave when hostilities broke out. And if things went smoothly, she’d get a mini break while she paid off a few debts.
‘Sure. Sounds interesting. Have you got some dates?’
Why did Security Road have to be such an obstacle course? Dee thought as she waited for the lift back down to the lobby. A house party was manageable as long as the weather held but a swanky party was a minefield of small talk and society etiquette. How would she assert herself through that?
As the elevator dropped, she noticed how her wrap-around Indian skirt looked like a tablecloth alongside the crowd of suits already on board. Two floors down, the doors opened to reveal the urbane form of Ethan Roxburgh. He acknowledged someone in the back with a fleeting lift of his brows and stepped in beside her, elbow to elbow. He smelled of fresh coffee and musky aftershave.
His voice was low when he spoke. ‘So you sail?’
She glanced at him, not sure he was talking to her. ‘Huh?’
‘I read in this morning’s paper you love sailing. And surfing too, apparently, although you settle for walking on the beach in winter.’
‘I never said that.’
‘Thought it sounded like Lucy.’ A small smile played at his lips as he smoothed his tie with the flat of a hand.
Interesting, Dee thought, how the espresso brown of his suit brought out the cafe latte swirls in her skirt. ‘I can’t sail or surf.’
He nodded once, like it was a mental strike against that skill. ‘Will you be at the dinner tomorrow night?’
‘Yes.’
‘As a guest?’
‘Yes.’
‘Probably safer that way.’
She wanted to laugh out loud but followed his example with the sensible, low-key elevator speak. ‘I plan to avoid dessert altogether.’
‘And large platters.’
The doors slid wide. He stepped out, watched her for half a second, straight-faced, eyes twinkling. ‘See you tomorrow night, Dee the TV Star.’
Chapter Eight
Dee selected a glass of champagne off a tray and took a long gulp. She was standing alone on the edges of the biggest, swankiest party she’d ever been to, so nervous she had to keep the glass in constant movement to and from her mouth to stop the contents from spilling – and conscious that any sudden movement might expose a breast in the deep-V that was laughingly called a neckline.
Where the hell was Lucy? Dee had walked the block twice hoping to be fashionably late and have Lucy waiting for her. No such luck.
‘Grab a glass of champagne,’ Leon had told her. ‘It’ll give you something to do if you have to wait for Lucy.’
Now what? Two glasses of wine drunk leisurely over a meal was enough to make her silly and giggly. If Lucy took much longer, she’d be drunk and slumped in the corner before the night had even started. She raised the glass to her lips again and reminded herself to sip.
‘TV stars aren’t meant to drink on their own.’
Dee turned and looked into the dark eyes of Ethan Roxburgh. She’d never been so relieved to see a man in a suit. Actually, he was looking every bit his tall, dark and handsome reputation in a crisp white dress shirt, black bow tie and dinner jacket. Her belly did an excited little flip – which was strange, really, considering how lowly she usually rated those qualities.
‘Just enjoying a moment alone before the rush of fans,’ she grinned, and felt herself blush as his gaze lingered momentarily at her plunging neckline.
‘Lucy’s chatting up a client so she asked me to find you,’ he said. ‘Come and I’ll introduce you around. But let’s get you another drink first.’ He signalled to a waiter and while he swapped her empty glass for a full one Dee hitched at her dress to force a bit more coverage into it and reminded herself about responsible service of alcohol.
‘You look lovely, by the way,’ Ethan said as he steered her through the crowd.
‘Thanks,’ she smiled, then almost fell as her heel became tangled in the hem of her dress. Oh no, boobs on the move. She grabbed onto Ethan’s forearm, spilling some of her champagne on his sleeve. ‘Oh, sorry, sorry.’ She didn’t know what to do first – wipe his jacket, tuck in her breasts or cover her embarrassment with a nonchalant swig of her drink.
Ethan shook off the champagne like it was stray dust then cupped his hand under her forearm and held her eyes with his. ‘Relax, Dee, it’s a party.’
Yeah, that was the problem.
He stopped at a circle of guests who opened their ranks for him. ‘Leonard, I found your yoga girl.’ He turned to her. ‘Dee, do you remember Leonard Frost, director of Health Life, and his wife, Rosemary?’
It was the same Leonard who watched her peel lemon tart off her face. She expected something condescending but he shook her hand warmly. ‘Congratulations on the ad, Dee. I hope you’re as pleased with it as I am.’
She smiled tentatively. ‘Yes, I am.’
‘I’m tempted to take up yoga myself after watching you do all that.’ He stuck his hip out, raised a hand over his head in a bad imitation of one of her poses, getting a laugh from the others in their circle. Dee chuckled too, relaxing just a little.
Ethan introduced her to the rest of the group, all Health Life executives. She shook hands, accepted more congratulations and drank happily in a toast to their new commercial.
‘Sorry, guys, she’s hot property tonight. We’ll see you at the table.’ He found another cluster of guests.
‘I’m amazed we haven’t seen you before,’ a man asked. ‘How long have you been modelling?’
‘I’m not a model. I’m a yoga teacher.’
He raised his eyebrows. ‘No wonder you’re so good. What else do you do?’
It was one of the more annoying questions she was asked at parties, as though teaching yoga wasn’t enough on its own. ‘Nothing. I’m just a yoga teacher.’
‘That must be great,’ he said. ‘Give me a call some time. I’d love to pick your brains about business opportunities in that market.’
Dee’s mouth opened and closed in surprise. Not a sideshow act but a brain to pick. She smiled jauntily and sipped more champagne as Ethan led her onwards.
‘So what’s your game plan?’ The question came from a highly polished thirty-something woman with a handshake like a vice.
‘What do you mean?’
‘The yoga teaching is a great idea, gives you a bit of a back story, probably an edge on the standard model-singer-actor thing. But now you’ve got our attention, what’s your game plan?’
‘I, um, don’t have one. I’m just going to teach yoga.’
The woman smiled conspiratorially. ‘Yeah, it’s not good to look too greedy. Well, I don’t know what you’ve got planned but I can tell you, you could have a big future if you’
ve got the right moves.’ She flipped a business card out of her evening purse. ‘Give me a call if you want some advice.’
At the next group and the one after that, Ethan introduced her to a bunch of other people whose names she couldn’t remember, mainly because she was so stunned.
‘You’ve got a great figure. Is that the yoga?’
‘Do you do private classes?’
‘How do you manage to look so serene?’
Dee felt like she was in a parallel universe where yoga geeks were gods and everyone wants to be short and muscly. She’d never had so many compliments in so short a time. No, she’d never had so many compliments period. She was in danger of being flattered into a good time.
‘More champagne?’ Ethan took her empty glass and replaced it with another.
Had she finished that one already? She sucked up his smile, took a sip, admired him over the rim of her glass. She’d been aware of him watching her as she shook hands and attempted small talk. At first, it made her nervous, expecting him to draw her aside, tell her how better to handle herself. Then she realised he was just watching – not critiquing. After that, the bemused look on his face made her feel pretty cool.
‘Enjoying yourself?’ he asked as they moved across the room again.
‘I think so.’
He laughed and it was as though he’d reached right inside her and sprinkled around some kind of feel-good herb. Her stomach tingled and her mouth curled up. If he ever gave up his suits, multimillion-dollar business and glamorous lifestyle, she wouldn’t let him out of her sight. Ha, ha, like that’d ever happen.
A photographer hovered in front of them. ‘Mr Roxburgh, can I get a shot of you and Ms Nichols?’