Notes from the Backseat. Jody Gehrman

The freak-out I went through yesterday is a distant memory. It’s early morning, I’ve had my tea and I’m all packed. The light in Los Feliz is unusually golden and (here’s the real miracle) I managed to fit all my clothes for the weekend into the leopard-print luggage set: one large case, one medium, a handbag and a hatbox. Not bad, eh? I’m sure Coop will be impressed that I travel light.

      Of course, the shoes had to go in a separate trunk, but so what? I’ll just slip that in casually when no one’s looking.

      All in all, I’m the picture of the elegant, poised traveler.

      Hope your journey to Paris goes well today. So exciting! I can’t wait for you to come home so we can swap stories.

      Kiss, kiss,

       Gwen

      Thursday, September 18

      8:45 a.m.

      

      Shit! Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God!

      Okay, I know, breathe. If I hyperventilate back here they won’t even notice. I’ll be a blue-faced corpse and they’ll have no idea until we hit the first pit stop. Marla, I don’t want to die alone, in the backseat, wedged uncomfortably between a surfboard and a trunk full of my best shoes!

      Then again, at least my white go-go boots will be with me in my last hours.

      They suck. Totally, utterly.

      Coop and Dannika that is, not the go-go boots.

      Why did I ever think I could seriously be with Coop? If he’s in league with this Satan in Organic Cotton, I want nothing to do with him.

      Oh, there they go laughing. Ha ha ha ha ha. The world is so deliciously funny when you’re a big, gorgeous guy riding shotgun with your delectable supermodel hippie chick behind the wheel. Never mind the lump of a girlfriend pouting in the backseat. She’s just there to keep the surfboards from flying away.

      Marla, what am I going to do? I’m being held hostage by a couple of excessively beautiful bohemians with no appreciation whatsoever for fine luggage, vintage travel wear or—in short—me.

      Right. I know what you would say. Just back up, slow down, start from the beginning.

      I’ll try. Thank God I never get carsick. I have a feeling putting pen to paper at the moment is the only thing between me and double homicide.

      So, back to the beginning. Let’s see…where did I leave off?

      As I mentioned, early this morning my outlook was bright and my outfit was impeccable. I was wearing my low-belted chemise suit in autumn green, my leopard-print car coat, and my signature leopard-print kitten heels. I’d tied a green scarf over my hair and at the last minute I added those huge, Jackie O sunglasses you love. No point in modesty here, I looked positively elegant. I surveyed myself in the mirror and was convinced that no matter how glamorous Coop’s best friend might be, I’d give her a run for her money.

      Dannika was driving up from San Diego, and since I live farther south than Coop, she was picking me up first. I heard her car pull up, but by the time I got to the window, she was already out of view. I waited for the doorbell, took a deep breath, turned the knob and pulled.

      There she was. All the air left my lungs and I stood in the doorway dumbstruck. I know you have her yoga tapes and she’s enough of a D-list celebrity, what with her new show and all, to warrant casual recognition from most people, but seeing her in person is a different experience entirely.

      She’s stunning. There’s no other word for it.

      I wish I could say her teeth are showing signs of decay or her boobs need propping up—that the way she looks onscreen is all make-up, lighting and flattering camera angles—but the truth is, in person she’s five million times more beautiful than she is on TV. Is that just slit-your-wrists depressing or what? Her hair is so shiny-blond, so long and healthy and shampoo-commercial-bouncy, it hardly seems real. I swear the Los Feliz light was caressing every strand, spilling sparkles into the air around her until her whole head was surrounded by a lemon-hued halo. Her skin was dewy-fresh, lightly tanned and radiant. Her eyes were a deep ocean color—Malibu on a good day. She was at least five foot eight and her body was so fit and toned, it’s hard to imagine any inch of her succumbing to sag or cellulite. She was wearing a tank top—one of those sporty little REI numbers with spaghetti straps and a built-in bra—and loose-fitting, wide-legged yoga pants that hung just low enough on her slender hips to reveal an inch of brown belly and a pierced navel. Flip-flops on her feet, sunglasses propped in her hair, a few fleamarket silver bracelets on her arm, a string of jade beads around her neck and a tiny diamond stud in her nose; those were the accessories that set off her features with the irritating minimalism of an all-natural hippie bombshell.

      Her fashion choices are diametrically opposed to my own. She’s Zen simplicity, I’m Catholic excess. She’s flip-flops, I’m kitten heels. She’s hemp and organic cotton, I’m wool gabardine and cashmere. She’s green tea lip balm, I’m candy-apple-red lipstick.

      I wish I could feel disdain for her aesthetic, but let’s face it: the look works for her. And then some.

      The moment I laid eyes on her, I could feel the ugly tide of envy and insecurity poisoning my blood. She just stood there, beaming at me. She took a step toward me and before I knew what was happening, she had me wrapped up in a hug that smelled of some heady essential-oil mixture—maybe jasmine cut with ylang-ylang. When she pulled away, I could see her lips moving, but I couldn’t quite make out the words. I was in shock, I guess. Somehow I managed to mumble a generic response that I hoped would match her greeting in some vaguely logical way. She went back to beaming at me, so I guess I succeeded.

      When she saw my luggage, her big, radiant, white-toothed smile died on her lips.

      “You taking…all this?”

      I nodded. “It is a wedding, right? I couldn’t very well go to a wedding without a hat or two.” I patted my hatbox affectionately.

      “Well, it’s a…casual wedding,” she said, looking worried. “Are you sure you’ll need this many suitcases? Phil and Joni are pretty low-key. They live in the woods.”

      “I brought casual, too. I like to be prepared for every circumstance.”

      “Yeah,” she said, still eyeing my cases uneasily. “Right. Well, let’s just drag it all out to the car and see what we can do.”

      You know how I’ve always wanted a convertible—obviously an enormous, gas-guzzling beast from the late ’50s? Of course, the fact that I can’t drive and have no desire to learn puts a slight damper on this yearning, but occasionally I peruse eBay’s classic car pages anyway, just for fun. Well, when I saw Dannika’s car, my heart, already dangerously close to failure, dropped two stories and bounced hard in the pit of my stomach. It was the most beautiful vehicle you could possibly imagine: a ’57 Mercury convertible, fire-engine red, totally cherry. Propped up in the backseat with its fins in the air was a slightly battered lemon-yellow surfboard. The whole tableau was achingly California, right down to the chrome hubcaps glittering in the sun like precious gems.

      I should have been excited. Here I was, about to ride shotgun in the car of my dreams. In a matter of minutes we’d be heading up the coast to spend the weekend in a rugged seaside village, where I’d bond with my new beau and his incredibly hip, glamorous friends. Dannika’s car should have filled me with hope. I should have been thinking about how great my leopard-print car coat and oversized glasses were going to look peeking out of that Mercury with the top down.

      But that’s not what was running through my brain. The single, white-hot, stomach-churning thought that was tearing through my consciousness was this: if you like the same car, you like the same guy.

      Period.

      Dannika had popped the trunk by now and was wrestling with my suitcases. Her shoulders were pure, sculpted muscle and they rippled as she heaved the largest case into the cavernous trunk. I could see no problem; the boot on that