The Reluctant Wag

Chapter 9


No one could account for it, but the shoot with Siggy Balstad was going badly. They were in the elegant Windsor Hotel and Merise was beginning to wish she had turned down the job. Alistair Groves, a renowned fashion photographer who had flown down from Sydney for the shoot, wasn’t happy. Merise and Siggy had descended the sweeping staircase about fifty times and not once had they got it right. Alistair was getting frustrated, and Merise was hot under the too-bright lights and uncomfortable in the too-tight dress, a spangled gold sheath that clung to every curve and hollow and was almost impossible to move in with grace.

‘Sorry, kids,’ he said two hours into the ordeal, ‘I don’t feel I’ve got anything I can use yet. I got some ordinary shots, but nothing magnificent, and Kask needs magnificent.’

Bev, who had been hovering on the sidelines, moved in. ‘Merise, what’s going on, darling? This just isn’t working,’ she added, clearly exasperated.

‘I don’t know. I’m trying.’

Siggy just stood there, looking aloof, bored and displeased. Merise felt totally responsible for the failure of the shoot.

‘Let’s all try to relax, shall we?’ Alistair suggested. ‘Why don’t you two take a break, then we’ll try something else? Bev? Do you have a moment?’

Alistair and Bev went off to confer while Merise and Siggy stood about; trying to find something to say to one another. She couldn’t sit down in the dress, and didn’t dare take a drink in case her stomach swelled by a millimetre. She couldn’t wait for the day to be over. Siggy was polite but distant. He seemed so wooden in front of the camera that she didn’t feel comfortable with him.

She couldn’t help but compare working with him to working with Cal. She had always taken that rapport for granted. They worked so well together, seemingly without effort. She had to admit it, she and Cal didn’t even have to try when they were together; somehow they just clicked, and it told in every photo. It was that strong chemistry between them that had leapt off the page when they’d made the headlines. Yeah, she knew perfectly well why she felt so awkward in this man’s arms – he wasn’t Cal and she didn’t want to be in anyone’s arms but his.

Well, that was just too bad, because if she ever saw Cal McCoy again, it would be by accident and there would be nothing intimate about the encounter. So she’d just have to pull herself together, act her heart out and get this job done, even – even if it meant pretending that Siggy was Cal. If that’s what it took to get through this, she’d do it, and no one would be any the wiser.

Alistair had decided that they should try a dancing shot instead.

‘Come on, kids,’ he urged, ‘on to the floor, we’ll give you some music and Siggy, you just sweep her off her feet – no, not literally, that’s not elegant – you’re not going to throw her; you’re going to raise her gently. Just gently now – yes, better. One, two, three, one, two, threes. Smile, Merise! Siggy, look down at her. There’s no one else on the floor, you’re not going to knock into anyone. With grace, thanks. That’sit, Merise; look up at him and just glow. Glow! Keep glowing! Good! That’s it. That’s much better.’

Merise was glowing, she realised, because although she was looking up at Siggy, she was imagining Cal. She could almost feel his arms around her, the way he placed his hand in the small of her back, the knock of his heart in his chest. She had conjured up that smell of eucalyptus and lemon that she always associated with him. The manly, fresh smell that she’d come to love. She imagined that half-playful, half-intense look that only Cal had, and the way his lips twisted in a half-smile. She closed her eyes, drifted away, felt Cal pull her to him, felt his breath on her cheek and relaxed deliciously into his arms.

‘That’s it! That’s the one!’ Alistair yelled, delighted, and broke the spell. Merise opened her eyes, looked up and saw the blond, handsome Swede looking down at her with eyes that had often been described as ‘magnetic blue’. But Merise wasn’t in the least drawn to this man. Siggy’s eyes just struck her as cold, especially when she compared them to the smouldering embers that lit Cal’s warm, hazel eyes. As she made her way to the room assigned for her to change in, she thought sadly that the memory of those eyes would be all that she’d have for the rest of her life.



It was the words on the giant billboard over the freeway that first caught his eye.


When Winning Isn’t Enough.


Above the slogan there was a glamorous shot of a man and woman waltzing across a gleaming ballroom floor, the man in a white tuxedo, the woman in a slinky, gold gown, and the woman was Merise! Cal almost ran off the road in the split second of recognition. And the man – the man who had his arms around her – was Siggy Balstad. Yeah, he had a vague memory of Paige saying something about Merise working for a watch company – and something about tennis players. He hadn’t paid attention at the time. He’d changed the subject, because he’d noticed the sly looks Paige would give him when the younger woman’s name came up. But now this dazzling image of the handsome pair was in his face, and probably all over Melbourne as well. He didn’t like it. The sight of her, seemingly swooning in that ridiculous way in Balstad’s arms, generated a feeling bitter as acid in his guts. How could she sell herself like that?

It looked like she’d really been sucked into the whole thing, and that he was part of the celebrity trap that she’d been caught up in. And even more, he hated the fact that men all around Australia would be drooling over her image today. It might be irrational and it might be primitive, but damn it, it hurt.

But he’d have to get over it. He was due at the Hartley Centre in ten minutes for a crisis meeting. Hart Hunter, Yarraside’s best in-and-under player, had torn a hamstring at training the previous day, and they needed to rejig the team to cover his loss before Sunday’s game against the Frankston Foxes. But as Cal sped towards the city, trying to concentrate on the Wolves’ midfield options, he realised that for the very first time in his life, he was seriously struggling to keep his mind on his footy.



Merise was staggered when she saw the billboards and the image of herself and Siggy plastered all over Melbourne’s iconic trams. Somehow she hadn’t expected those photos to see the light of day for some time, but it had taken less than a week and already they were everywhere. As she waited at the tram stop that morning she studied the photo on the side of a tram travelling in the opposite direction. It didn’t seem like her at all. She felt completely separated from that woman who was leaning back, staring enthralled into Siggy’s face. It seemed so totally convincing – the love, the desire between that glamorous couple so evident. Only she knew the truth. Only she knew who had inspired that look of worship.

She was aware that he would be playing again that weekend, and she longed to watch him. But she didn’t dare go to a game for fear of the attention she’d doubtless get from the media, because she just might give herself away. She couldn’t help it; her eyes would follow Cal, not the action. She’d realised that at the opening game. She’d tracked his every move and it had been noticed. ‘Great job,’ Bev had said at the time. ‘You never took your eyes off McCoy. That’s exactly what they wanted.’ ‘Yeah, I did my best,’ Merise had responded, then she’d quickly changed the subject. She definitely couldn’t risk turning up at another game.

But that wouldn’t stop her watching it on TV. Every Yarraside game was televised live, so on Sunday afternoon she put her phone on silent, closed the blinds of her living room and curled up on the couch to watch. For almost three hours she indulged in the luxury of watching Cal, and the cameras seemed to be on her side. It was a fast-moving game and Cal was involved in everything. Even when he was resting on the bench, or lying on an exercise mat having his calves massaged by a physiotherapist, the cameras were on him, and she drank in every moment, every image.

It was a tough game for the Wolves and just before the second half got underway, Cal gathered his team into a huddle in the middle of the ground and spoke to them. She couldn’t tell what he was saying, but the fire in his eyes had his teammates riveted to his every word, and when the whistle blew they raced off into position and started the quarter with renewed verve. She loved that in him – the passion he displayed and the way he was able to inspire others with the same commitment. If only he could feel one-tenth of that passion for her, she’d happily give her life to him.



It was seven o’clock the following Monday morning and Cal and his teammates were standing shivering in the water off St Kilda Beach. It was an unusually cold morning for autumn, and many of the boys were wearing hoodies over their bathers. Cal was freezing, but he stood bare-chested, enduring the icy water that helped so much in recovery, because they needed all the help they could get this morning. Yesterday’s game had been tough. They’d won in the end, but only after a fierce battle with the Foxes, and most of them were battered and bruised after the encounter.

Cal turned his back on the promenade and on the media pack that regularly gathered here, hoping for bare-chested shots of the country’s top footballers. He wasn’t in the mood to humour the press. He was angry at himself, angry and baffled, because for the first time in his career, he hadn’t enjoyed the game, and he hadn’t played his best football. He’d been feeling down all week, but usually on game day he could put aside anything that was troubling him and concentrate on getting the job done. Not this week. It’d been a real struggle. It wasn’t that he’d run or tackled any less than usual – the endeavour was there – he was just a shade off his best, and that troubled him. It wasn’t like him.

He thought about the moment he’d led the team on to the field the day before. He’d glanced towards the seat reserved for Merise and he saw it was empty. He’d known it would be, but he immediately felt let down, and that drove him mad. He’d been playing professional football since he was eighteen, and now he was off his game because a girl who knew nothing about footy, and who only ever attended under duress, was absent. Pathetic. What made it worse was that he was captain, and he was letting his personal life affect his work. He hadn’t realised how distracted he’d been until he’d missed a sitter in front of goal ten minutes into the first quarter. It was the kind of error you’d expect of a first-year player. Then he’d dropped an easy mark, turned the ball over and the Foxes had goaled.

‘Forget about it, mate,’ Tom had told him at half-time. ‘Everyone has off days.’ He’d pulled himself together and played better in the second half, but his output was still far below his usual effort. They’d been lucky to win in the end. It just wasn’t good enough. He was short-changing the boys, the club and the barrackers, and he was short-changing himself. He was better than this, and he wouldn’t let whatever he felt for Merise Merrick get in the way of his job again. He hadn’t come this far to slump into a patch of bad form just when the Wolves were having the best season they’d had in years.

‘Hey, boys,’ he yelled suddenly, splashing water over his shivering teammates, ‘who fancies a dip? Race you to the end of the pier!’ He threw himself into the water, and although the Wolves grumbled and cursed him, every one of them cast off their tops and beanies, immersed themselves in the icy water and made off after their captain; and a score of happy photographers snapped eagerly away.