Finding It (6 page)

“They’re celebrating the success of their new series, Brash Brits.”

Ladies of London? I imagine expressionless women with ridiculous fascinators perched atop their heads sipping tea while discussing the weather. Yawn.

“I haven’t heard of it.”

“They’ve been courting me for months now.” Poppy leans in and lowers her voice to a whisper. “They want me to be on the next season. Can you imagine?”

I stare at her with my mouth hanging open. Cultured, classy Poppy Worthington the next Bravalebrity? Isn’t that one of the signs of the apocalypse, right before the appearance of the horsemen?

“Anyway,” she says, “it supposed to be a big, splashy affair. They’ve invited several celebrities. David and Victoria Beckham. Wynona Pathlow. Hugh Grant. Bishop Raine.”

“Bishop Raine?”

“Yes. Why?”

Is it too soon to confess my unadulterated affection for bad boys like Ronnie Radke of the band Falling in Reverse and the sexy leather-clad comedian Bishop Raine? I think it might be.

“Readers enjoy articles about celebrities like Bishop Raine because he’s smart, politically astute, and funny.”

“You should come with me.”

“Are you serious? That would be awesome.” I hop to my feet. “Oh, Poppy! I could kiss you.”

Poppy holds up her hand. “I’m British. I don’t do kisses.”

I laugh. “How about hugs?”

Poppy grimaces. “Only on terribly special occasions.”

I laugh again and am about to pull perfectly pressed Poppy into a sisterly squeeze when I remember my interlude
romantique
with Luc. I hunch my shoulders and exhale slowly. I’m like a slow leaking balloon.

“What?” Poppy asks. “Oh, yes, the shag fest.”

“The shag fest,” I repeat, crinkling my nose. “What should I do?”

“Don’t ask me.” Poppy holds up her hands. “I will not be responsible for the French dis-Connection. It’s your decision.”

Poppy is totally cool, but I wish Fanny were here. Fanny would know exactly what to do. Fanny always knows what to do. My goal-setting, type A, itinerary-drafting best friend would organize another story and have me on a plane headed for Paris before sunset.

“Let me just check something.” I pull out my iPhone.

I open Safari and type Ryanair into the search bar. Maybe all of the flights to Paris are already booked, which would mean I am stuck in London until morning—and if I am stuck in London until morning, why shouldn’t I go to Poppy’s party?

“If you are checking on a flight to Paris, don’t bother.”

I look up from the glowing screen. “Why not?”

“I’ll have my assistant book you a seat on a British Airways flight out of Heathrow.” She whips out her smartphone and taps the screen. “How about the six fifty flight? You will arrive in time for breakfast.”

“Oh, thank you, but I can’t ask you to do that.”

“Too late.” She slips her phone back into her purse. “It’s done.”

Either Michel slipped a few mushrooms into my spotted dick or I’m already suffering pangs of guilt, because my stomach aches.

“I’ll still have three days and two nights with Luc,” I say, trying to rationalize my selfish decision. “Besides, we would have been asleep for most of the night anyway.”

I mentally calculate the profit versus the loss and decide it’s worth the risk. Luc might be a tiny bit irritated, but Big Boss Lady will probably give me a raise.

“Okay, I’d love to be your plus one, Poppy.”

“Splendid,” Poppy says, standing. “Now, we really should do something about your hair.”

Hips Don’t Lie

Text from Camilla Grant:

It’s your mum. I finally joined the Facebook. I was going to like the donut shop’s page, but I hit enter too soon and typed Happy Ho instead of the Happy Hole Donut Shop. Can you believe there are 173 Happy Hos on the Facebook? I am thinking of friend requesting one and inviting her to church.

Text to Louanne Collins-London:

Fab news! I’ve been invited to the Brava party celebrating the first season of their new show. Bishop Raine, Wynona Pathlow on guest list. Would you like me to write a piece about it?

Text from Louanne Collins-London:

Sure.

I am not sure which text fills me with more dread: my mother’s expressed desire to send a friend request to some random perky prostitute or Louanne Collins-London’s tepid one word response to my exciting Brava party invite.

Sure.

Maybe I am reading more into it, but Louanne’s text was distant and dispassionate.

Would you like a cup of Earl Grey?

Sure.

Wanna listen to Josh Groban’s new album?

Sure.

How could an editor of a hip and happening magazine be so blasé over a splashy, celeb-filled party piece?

“Because you totally blew the Prince Harry story and now she’s blasé about you,”
whispers my inner Regina George.

Yes, I have an inner Regina George. The manipulative, deceitful, belittling queen bee in the movie Mean Girls talks smack, giving my self-esteem Ray Rice beat downs. Don’t judge. I’ll bet you have an inner Regina George, who makes you feel like crap because of your thighs/boyfriend/job/laugh. We all do. Some are just better at silencing their Reginas before she inflicts real damage. My Regina is telling me I am going to lose my job.

Fishing in my pocket, I pull out my iPhone and scroll through my contacts until I come to Jean-Luc de Caumont. I select his name and his tanned, handsome face pops up on my screen above his contact info. I look at his thick eyelashes framing his smoldering brown eyes and suddenly feel weepy.

What if I jeopardize my relationship with Luc for some silly insipid story about Bravalebrities, and Louanne still fires me?

I select his mobile number and hold my breath. The phone rings five times before sending me to voicemail. A lump forms in my throat as I listen to Luc’s deep voice and smooth, sexy French greeting.

“
Bonjour. C'est Jean-Luc. Veuillez me laisser un message et je vous téléphonerai aussitôt que possible. Merci
.”

“
Bonjour, Mon Cowboy. C’est moi
…Vivia,” I say, my mood and tone falsely chipper. Spending the evening at some narcissism and martini-fueled soiree with a bunch of self-impressed Flat Stanleys suddenly seems pointless, shallow, and tragically selfish. “Something has come up here and I won’t be able to make it to Paris tonight. I’m catching the British Airways flight leaving Heathrow tomorrow morning at six fifty. Luc, I’m…really…sorry.”

By the time I speak the last sentence, my voice is as painfully thin and shaky as Rachel Zoe. I wonder what Luc will think when he listens to my message. To borrow a Zoe-ism, I must have sounded bah-nan-ahs, starting off airy and ending up weepy. Torn between my career and romance, I feel like I am having a bipolar breakdown.

Jesus, Mary, and Joseph Gordon Levitt! Did I really just quote Rachel Zoe, a woman I find about as annoying as woolly boogers on a cashmere sweater?

I look in the mirror at my pale, gangly legs, bare beneath them hem of a black tent dress with white puritan collar and cuffs, and then up at my red-rimmed eyes.

“How is that Alexander McQueen working for you, Vivia?”

True to her word, Poppy is getting me “sorted out”—rather, she is having her devoted minions sort me out. She put me in a taxi and gave the driver directions to her favorite hair salon for an “emergency wash and blowout.” My ginger fro has been flat-ironed, glossed, and pulled into a sleek, chic high ponytail. Now I’m in Demimonde, her cousin’s ironically named chi-chi boutique.

“Umm.” I blink away my tears, open the purple velvet curtains, and do a little spin. “What do you think?”

Carolena tilts her head, and her chestnut curls spill over her Versace bustier. I only know the dress is a Versace because Fanny pinned a picture of it to her “Covet It” board on Pinterest.

“It’s too…” She struggles to find the perfect word to describe the part hippie, part habit dress swathing my body.

“Ecclesiastical?”

“No.”

“Voluminous?”

“No.” Carolena studies me intensely. “Insolent,” she finally says. “The gown is simply too insolent. It does rude things for your figure.”

How can you not love a woman who uses a word like insolent to describe a—I lift the price tag and gasp—two thousand three hundred and thirty five dollar dress?

Who would pay two thousand three hundred and thirty five dollars for a dress that looks like a Project Runway unconventional challenge gone wrong? An image of Tim Gunn standing with his hands pressed together in a downward triangle pops into my head and his Snagglepuss voice plays in my ear,
“For this challenge you will be sourcing your materials at a convent. Make it work, people, and if all else fails, pray!”

I grapple for the side zipper, anxious to remove the ludicrously overpriced dress before I break out in a cold sweat and ruin it.

Carolena reaches over and slides the zipper halfway down.

“Thank you.”

“Not at all.”

She pronounces at all just as Poppy does, blending the two words together to form a single
veddy
British-sounding portmanteau.

I step back into my fitting room, close the velvet curtains, and carefully remove the dress, hanging it on the padded silk hanger. Seriously, who spends two thousand dollars on a simple dress?

Fanny. Poppy. Carolena. My friend G.

Heiresses spend thousands of dollars on a single garment. I, however, am not an heiress, and even if I were an heiress, I wouldn’t spend two thousand three hundred and thirty five dollars on a dress! I am quite happy making it work in skinny jeans and my vintage Guns N’ Roses T-shirt.

“Hand me that beastly thing and try this instead.”

She sticks a slinky mini dress between the curtains. I take the heavy beaded dress and hand her the hippie habit.

“I have the perfect shoes for that dress,” Carolena declares. “A beaded mini-dress simply demands a marvelous pair of heels. Wait for me to get them. I won’t be a minute.”

Silver and gold bugle beads cover the mini dress like sparkly, swingy fringe. It’s very Gatsby-esque. It’s Daisy Buchanan circa now. Classic, but current.

I slip the heavy beaded gown over my head and do a little shimmy. The beads capture the light like a disco ball, creating a constellation of stars on the fitting room walls and velvet curtains. It’s mesmerizing.

I summon my inner-Shakira, shaking my hips side to side. The beads make a pleasant rhythmical noise similar to a rain stick when it’s turned upside-down. It’s like having my own backbeat, a hip personal soundtrack. Shakira. Shakira.

Inexplicably, unbelievably, I recognize the pangs of love at first site. I am falling in love with a dress—a designer dress that probably costs more than my entire collection of my Rock Ts and skinny jeans. How can this be happening? I’m not a fashionista like Fanny and Poppy.

Take it off, Vivia. Take it off while you still have the strength.

It’s not just the sparkly beads that make this dress so fantastic. The gown hugs my body, amplifying my assets—bosom—and minimizing my deficits—slight muffin top—
merci, pain au chocolats
!) The fringy beads conceal the evidence of my recent over indulgences without making me look like a shapeless Teletubby.

I do another little shimmy, and the metallic beads bounce tiny circles of light all over the fitting room walls.

Look away, Vivia. Look away from the light.

I can’t. The beads are whispering to me, casting a mind-altering spell with their hypnotic song: “Why such stress? Just buy the dress. Buy the dress! If you use your Visa you can buy the dress. Make us shake and shimmy whenever you want. Buy the dress.”

“Vivia?” Carolena’s voice comes to me from a distant place. “Vivia?” she repeats. “I know you’re in there because I can hear the beads clattering together. Do you like the dress?”

I pull the curtains back and give the beads a little shake.

“Oh, baby, the hips don’t lie,” I sing, mimicking Shakira’s vibrato.

Carolena stares at me blankly.

I swivel my hips and make wavelike motions with my arms, to no effect. Poppy’s posh cousin continues to stare at me blankly, her perfectly painted pout hanging open, strappy heels dangling from a single crooked finger.

“The hips don’t lie?”

Nothing.

“Shakira, Shakira,” I sing.

“Right then.” Carolena snaps out of her reverie. “Don’t do that. Ever. Especially not tonight, at Boujis.”

Heat flames my cheeks as I suddenly imagine what I must have looked like to the staid Brit, singing and shaking to Shakira.

“Is it posh?”

“Very.”

“Lots of beautiful people?”

“Loads.”

My inner-Regina buzzes in my ear, telling me I’m an idiot for going to a Brava party, that I am not posh, not one of the beautiful people, not even a Bravalebrity.

“Maybe I shouldn’t go to Boujis.”

“What? Why not?”

“Hello, Carolena,” I say, thrusting my hand out. “My name is Vivia Perpetua Grant. I am a brash, clumsy American with a penchant for raunchy rock music and spicy Chinese takeout. I am not posh.”

“You’re posh-
ish
.”

I tilt my head and give her my best get-the-fuck-outta-here look.

“Well, you’re beautiful.”

I roll my eyes.

“You are,” Carolena argues, handing me the strappy heels. “I would kill for your legs and your hair.”

“My hair?” I bend over and slide my feet into the high heels. “You’re joking. It’s an ugly rusty blond and frizzy. I have a ginger ’fro.”

“Have you lost the plot entirely?” Carolena walks over and spins me around to face the mirror. “Look at yourself! Gorgeous hair, endless shapely legs. You will fit in with the beautiful Boujis crowd.”

“Thanks, Carolena. That’s kind of you to say.”

“Not at all.” She looks at me in the mirror. “Now, do you like the dress?”

“Are you kidding me?” I shimmy my hips with each syllable. “I would shank my best friend for this dress.”

“What is shank?”

“Never mind.” I laugh. “It means I covet this dress.”

“Does that mean you would like to buy it?”

“Would I?”