The Road Trip Rewind

Chapter 17 - Beatrix

Chapter 17

Beatrix

Wednesday, December 28, 2016

Isquint at myself in the mirror—my mirror, in the apartment I rent, as a grown adult woman in the year 2016—and wish my makeup bag had more than some middling mascara and blush and a bronzer I’ve still never figured out how to use. Sleep was impossible last night, which was . . . to be expected. Playing through every detail of the last week on loop, wondering how and why and what next.

Am I the same person I was before the trip, the same version of myself—the same collection of cells, carrying the same memories and thoughts? Did my body come apart on a molecular level to traverse through years and universes, then get remade, twice over?

Is this the same home it was six days ago? Yesterday morning? If anything had changed, would I even know?

I’m here, but am I? Rocco’s here, too, back in this old, new LA with me, but is he?

And if we’re here, are we here together?

All of it’s real, or none of it, and I look like proper crusty shit. Just in time for Lanie’s blow-out cast and crew holiday party in a few hours.

Wonderful.

The idea of calling out sick is tempting. But a larger piece of me needs to go, needs to bask in the familiar, to reassure myself that everything really might be okay.

Nothing lost, nothing altered.

Nothing aside from one new memory gained with my father, a perfectly contained moment in time that shouldn’t spill over into anything to come after. At least not for anyone but me. And Rocco. We’ll have a better movie for it. And I’ll have a better life.

I pick up my phone, scroll through my recent calls list, my finger hovering over Sylvie’s name. She’s missing the festivities tonight; she and Eden have had reservations at Nobu for ages, and Lanie’s party doesn’t top that. But she would whip me into far better than average shape in twenty minutes flat, make a masterpiece of me—maybe not an original work of art, but at least a reasonably high-quality knockoff.

She would ask questions, though. And I’m not ready to give answers.

There are no adequate words to explain our experience to anyone. If I even wanted to, and I’m not sure I do. At least not yet.

The longer I hold it in, keep it for just myself and Rocco, the safer it feels. It’s ours and it’s confusing and stunning and precious, and I’m not ready to share it with the world. Not even Sylvie. Partly, too, because she was there the first time around; she helped me pick up the many jagged pieces after Rocco, after my dad.

She knows exactly how hard my heart broke then, and she sure as hell wouldn’t want to give him an opportunity to do it again.

I close out of my calls, planning to scroll mindlessly through social media to ignore the problem at hand—the problem being my massive under-eye bags that all the fresh cucumbers in LA wouldn’t be able to contain—when a text comes in.

Rocco.

A frizzle of excitement flares through my veins, and I click to read.

Rocco: Wow, you owe me big time for the bleaching. The very expensive and hopefully very discreet hair stylist has been here for hours undoing your damage.

I laugh. I’ll miss my white fox. Before I can respond, another text lands.

Rocco: Anyway. I miss you. I’m excited to see you tonight. Less excited to schmooze at the party . . . too much too soon, I think only half my brain made it back to this decade. Honestly, if you weren’t going, I wouldn’t either.

He misses me.

That flare of excitement burns hotter, a buzzy warmth filling my chest. I miss him, too, even though it’s barely been twenty-four hours since I last saw him, and I managed to exist perfectly fine without him for the last seventeen years. But after these past few days, I’m not sure I want to anymore.

Dots pop up as he types, and I wait.

Rocco: So I got some weird messages on my phone that I don’t really understand. I need to tell you about them. After the party. Sleepover at my place?

Weird messages.The warmth disappears, a sinking dread taking its place.

Beatrix: Everything okay?

Rocco: Yes! Yes.

Beatrix: You sure? The double yes has me worried.

Rocco: Promise, it’s nothing you and I can’t figure out. By the way. Check your door. I think something just got dropped off.

Genius of him—distracting me at a time like this. I put my phone down and start toward the door. I don’t realize until I’m already there that I’m wearing nothing but my dad’s ragged old XL Arizona State T-shirt, the only pajamas that had felt right last night.

Sure enough, there’s a young woman at the door holding a tall garment bag. “Bea Noel?”

I nod, and she hands the bag over, smiling at me in a bemused kind of way before heading back toward the main stairs.

I carry the bag to my bed and then slowly unzip it to find a red sequined dress—not quite as mini as the one I wore on our adventure, but with a hemline still a good three inches shorter than anything else I’ve attempted in the last five years. Maybe ten. It’s stunning, though, and surely ten times the price of the one I thrifted, the red sequins stitched in tightly against intricate clear beads that amplify the shine. I set the dress down on my duvet, gently, scared of tugging a single sequin out of place, and go back to my phone.

Beatrix: You didn’t have to do that. But it’s perfect.

Rocco: Yeah? You like it?

Beatrix: I love it.

Rocco: I’m glad. I know it’s a strange day, and I wanted you to feel special. So that sleepover . . . ?

Beatrix: Resounding yes. For the record, would have been a yes even without the dress.

Rocco: Pick you up at 6. And don’t worry, I called a nice doc for Delilah. We can take her in tomorrow. She’ll be her old self in no time.

I grin at the screen. Maybe everything will be okay, this new normal. Better than okay even.

But . . . shit.

A dress like this one deserves proper hair and makeup, doesn’t it? The blush in my makeup bag that’s always been two shades too peachy for my complexion would be a total affront to this gift.

I let out a long sigh. Sylvie it is.

Beatrix: Hair and make-up SOS!!!

Her reply is immediate—a voice note because she’s always doing too many things at once to allow for anything as menial as typing:

Be there in an hour, bitch. What would you do without me?

Hopefully a few little white lies and the cheap champagne from the back of my fridge will help get us through.

I’ll tell her everything. Probably.

But not today.

It’s a good thing Rocco had a driver escort us, because I wouldn’t trust him on the road.

He can’t take his eyes off me.

We don’t say much on the ride to Brentwood, but we don’t need to. It’s more important just to see one another, a reminder that this is now, we are here, solid and whole and together.

If it weren’t for his driver seated just a few feet in front of us, someone on his payroll, not a stranger we’d never have to see again, I don’t think I’d be able to resist kissing him. But a kiss, once we started, wouldn’t be nearly enough. There might be no stopping us.

For now, we hold hands.

We stare into one another’s eyes, our hot palms pressed tightly together, clasped against his thigh, his thumb rubbing slow circles against mine, and . . .

Goddamn.

Why are we going to this party again? What time is it socially acceptable to leave?

We pull up to Lanie’s house—if one can call it a house, given that it’s sized more like an airport—and slowly make our way up the cobbled path lit from above with a canopy of twinkly lights.

It’s not until we’re at the door, arm in arm, that the fog of our car ride lifts and realization sets in—anyone here would positively lose their mind in bewilderment to see us stroll in together. My surly set behavior toward him was surely not that subtle.

“Rocco,” I start, “should we perhaps not—”

But before I can finish, the door is thrown open. Lanie’s there, luminous in a floor-length second skin of a golden gown that leaves absolutely nothing to the imagination. “Welcome, welcome,” she proclaims, loudly, reaching out to usher Rocco inside. Our arms come apart, quickly enough that I’m sure no one noticed, not even Lanie, who is too busy parading her star through the gilded two-tier foyer as I fall in step behind.

We’re winding our way through crowds of crew members, all huddled around servers with their flute-and-tumbler-filled trays, Lanie clearly on the hunt for someone or something in particular. It’s no easy feat to stay on them.

“Ah!” she says finally, pulling Rocco to a halt. I stop, too, nearly catching myself on the heel of her six-inch stiletto. “There she is! Our dear Catherine Noel.”

Catherine Noel?

My mother? I must have heard her wrong. My mother has never once visited LA.

I step to the side for a better view, and no. It’s not my mother.

It’s Piper Bell.

Radiant, of course—even more radiant than in the glossy magazines, which should quite frankly be impossible—in an emerald-green corseted bodice that’s as flattering and as tempting as any corset in the world has likely ever been, paired with a frothy pistachio green tulle skirt that flares out just above her knees. Her golden hair is done in simple waves, dangling above her perfect cleavage, and her tanned skin seems to glow. Her makeup is simple, but in the deceptive way that surely took hours to perfect. Or maybe not. Maybe she’s just this stunning with little to no effort.

Why the fuck are you here, I ask, in my head.

Or so I think.

But the way Lanie and Rocco and Piper stare at me, it would seem it slipped out aloud. Whoops.

“Sorry,” I say, hoping that Sylvie’s generous application of various cremes and powders is masking my blush. “I was just surprised, that’s all.”

Lanie’s expression, already aghast, turns even sharper. “Why on earth would you be surprised to see one of our stars here? She’s going to be racking up the award noms for this, mark my words. The way she fights, a veritable lioness, to keep the family together when you . . .” She shakes her head, giving me another pointed look before focusing back on Piper. “Anyway. It’s exquisite, Piper, really remarkable, the work you’ve been doing. The work you’ve both been doing,” she says, tightening her grip on Rocco and angling him so that the three of them are in a tight triangle formation. “Top-tier stuff. You’re taking this project to the next level, and we are all so grateful.”

I feel dizzy and disoriented. Frantic.

Frantic to understand what the hell is happening. Why Piper is in my movie. Playing my mother. Where is Darla? This is Darla’s role. She was perfect for it. Equal parts fierce and tender, switching between the two in a blink, just as my mother did. Darla is pretty but not flashily so, more “prettiest mom in the PTA” than “prettiest star on the red carpet.”

Piper—she’s all wrong for this.

And even if she weren’t, there’s no way I would have agreed to watch her and Rocco together—playing my parents, a fact that cannot be overstated—day in and day out on set. Rocco had been enough of an unpleasant reminder. Rocco and Piper, a package deal, would have been an unthinkable new form of torture. I would have found another route to that green light.

“Rocco, can I have a word?” I ask, reaching out to tug at the arm unclaimed by Lanie. “It’s, er . . . exceptionally urgent.”

He turns then, the first time I’ve seen his face since we came upon Piper, and his eyes are showing me so many things at once. Shock and confusion, of course. But it’s more than that. Panic, maybe.

Or . . . guilt?

But what could he have to feel guilty about? He couldn’t have orchestrated this himself. Not on our disjointed timeline.

“Wait, wait,” Lanie says, tugging him back. “I was looking for Piper because I have a sneak peek of some footage, and I wanted you both to see. It took my breath away, really. I was going to ask our screenwriter and muse to watch as well, but she seems to have arrived at the party missing half of her mind, so . . .” She shrugs, and I feel hot anger rising up from the pit of my stomach. Why did I ever think partnering with Lanie was the right idea? She was flashy, sure. Hard-assed and intimidating enough to push things through, not only get the movie made, but get it made well. Right now, though, I have regrets. Many of them.

Lanie snaps her fingers, and one of her three on-rotation personal assistants appears out of nowhere from the side of the room, tablet in hand.

“Right, here we go. The scene when the police have come to escort William away, and Catherine vows to do everything she can to clear his name. . . .” She pauses, releases a loud, overdone sniffle. “See! I get choked up just thinking about this scene.”

I burrow myself further into the group, between Rocco and Piper, the triangle now a wobbly square. I need to witness this for myself. Piper, in footage I’ve never seen. Even though I must have been there. Rocco, too. We were there, but we weren’t. I clutch Rocco’s arm more tightly, the only thing keeping me upright.

Lanie hits play with a long, red-tipped nail, and the scene unfolds—a scene that is both very similar to one I witnessed the other week, and also very different, because it’s Piper instead of Darla, and her presence is so magnetic it’s like she’s the only one on the screen. Which is nearly impossible when Rocco is present, too, but somehow she’s doing it. She’s sobbing and screaming, and she is both so desperately sad and so viciously angry all at once, professing her love for William while railing against the police with each alternating line. Seamlessly.

It’s her conviction, though, that is a razor to my heart. The absolute faith that William is innocent; no matter what the evidence may suggest, no matter what any witnesses might say, she knows the truth, the only truth.

She’s done it perfectly. In this moment, she is my mother.

She is my mother, and I am my horrible, guilty self, reminded yet again of all the mistakes I made, the person I should have been.

That should have been my conviction, too. The end result would have been the same—my father arrested, held in jail for those long months awaiting the trial. He still would have been exonerated and released, still would have been too sick already by that point, too far gone for freedom. Still would have died. But he would have done all those things knowing I believed in him. And my mom and I, we would have been in it together. We still would be today.

I watch, numb, as Piper throws herself at Rocco on-screen, even though I really should look away because I know what’s coming next.

They kiss.

Just as he did with Darla. But this—this kiss is entirely different. With Darla, it had been passable, wracked with a bittersweet desperation. But this kiss now with Piper, it’s fire and ice, the raw need of it clawing at me from the tablet screen. It’s a scalpel skimming the skin off all my old wounds.

The scene ends and I’m barely able to stay upright, but Rocco’s arm is suddenly the last lifeline I want.

How could he have done that?

How could he have kissed her like that?

“I need to go,” I say quietly, not that anyone seems to be listening.

Lanie is in raptures again, talking about how that scene alone might be enough to bump Piper from supporting to lead when awards season rolls around. Rocco is a statue, the tight mask on his face entirely unreadable. Piper’s gaze is flicking between Lanie and Rocco, questions in her eyes that I don’t want answered.

I spin around, with no idea where to go, but needing to be anywhere but here. With them. Him.

It’s a blur around me, sparkling glasses, twinkling lights, beautiful people and their loud laughter, soft string music filtering in from some corner of the maze-like first floor. Everywhere I go has too many people, which should be impossible in a place of this size: a billiard’s room where Lanie’s husband Dylan is holding court, a small glassed-in conservatory where a group of people are smoking beside an open window, another living room that is somehow both fancier and more jammed with bodies than the first.

Of course it only seems right when the first empty room I stumble into is a library-like office. Much grander than my dad’s had been, but far more sterile. The books look untouched, spines in perfect condition, arranged in tidy rows, no wobbling towers or triple stacks.

I take in a long gulp of air, my first full breath since seeing her.

“You weren’t easy to chase.”

I startle and turn, and he’s there, Rocco, red-faced and huffing.

“I would have expected you to be in better shape,” I snap back, which is easily the most unimportant and absurd thing to say in this moment. But I’m at a loss for anything better. My mind is more maze-like than this house.

A brief smile tips up his lips before they retighten. “I took a few wrong turns. Had to double back.” He steps further in then, shuts the door behind him. “I’m really sorry. About . . . all of that. I hope you know this is just as surprising and confusing for me.”

“You didn’t remember that kiss?”

“Of course not.” He rakes his fingers through his perfectly tangly hair—as dark as it always was, a perfect replica of his natural color. “I remember Darla. I have no idea why . . . she . . . is here now.”

“Okay.” Of course it’s not, though.

“How are you feeling?”

I laugh. “How am I feeling? Pretty damn terrible, as a matter of fact. Having you play my dad was punishment enough—before now, that is—but having her involved, too? As my mom? Doing a bang-up job of it, clearly, based on that nice sneak peek we just got? It’s way too much. This movie—it was supposed to be my safe space, my nightmare turned dream come true, the most important project of my life. And now . . .” Tears spill down my cheeks; I’ve lost all of my usual capacity to hold them in. One more change this week has forced on me. I swipe at the tears, not caring how messy my made-up face might look. “It’s ruined. For me, anyway. I’m sure it’ll be an amazing movie, a critic’s darling, the awards will rain down on you all, etc. But every minute of the experience will be pure torture for me. I guess that’s what I deserve, isn’t it? For taking so long to get it right.”

“Bea,” Rocco says gently, edging closer until he’s pressed against me, his arms wrapping around my shoulders. It feels so natural, leaning into him like this, letting him take me in. Too natural. “We’ll get through this. Together. I don’t remember that kiss, but it doesn’t mean anything. Not to me—the me now, the one standing here with you. I promise. You’re the only person I want to be kissing.” He stops then, and I tilt my face up toward his. His eyes are clouded; there’s more to it. More that he’s not saying.

“What is it?” I ask. Because whatever this is, whatever we are, we have to trust one another. That trust is the only thing that feels real.

His brows pull together. “You’re not going to like this. But I don’t want to keep any secrets.”

“Okay.”

“I had . . . texts on my phone when I powered it back on. A voicemail. From Piper.”

“Okay.”

“It seems we . . . kissed? Aside from the one we saw on set. Not for the cameras.”

My whole body goes stiff in his arms.

“I don’t know the details. Don’t know anything about it. It wasn’t me! Or it was, but it wasn’t this me, and I don’t know, Bea. I am so fucking confused about all of this, but I’m not confused about you. About us. And I need you to—”

“I need to go home,” I say, lifting his arms from around my shoulders. “This night has been too much. Nothing makes sense.”

“I know it’s a lot. But it’s a lot for me, too. This isn’t my life either, Bea.”

I know that, I do. Deep down. It’s not what he chose. It’s nothing this Rocco that I know and quite possibly love—do I, is that what this is?—did or didn’t do.

But it also is, isn’t it?

Because even if the memory isn’t imprinted in this Rocco, here and now, it was still essentially him who went down this path. Who kissed Piper, not just as a job, but for more than that. For pleasure.

He picked her last time, and how could I believe he won’t pick her again? She’s here, in all her beautiful, brilliant glory, the obvious choice. Anyone’s obvious choice.

Laughter drifts in from the hall, and the door opens, Dylan poking his head in. “Ah, sorry! Didn’t know anyone was in here. I was just popping in to grab my old yearbook to show Tom here, apparently we were the same year, fancy that, but neither—”

“Tom,” Rocco says. “Tom.”

“Tom?” I repeat. “What about—”

“Yeah, what about me, Rocco?”

He’s in the office now, Tom Richards, standing next to Dylan. Seventeen years older than I last saw him, hair far more salt than pepper now, lines more pronounced, but looking much more put together than his previous incarnation. “What are you kids getting up to in here?” His eyebrow is raised for effect, though he looks more amused than curious.

“I’m glad you found us, because you’re just the man we need to talk to,” Rocco says, his voice sounding unnaturally upbeat. “It’s important. And, er . . . a rather sensitive topic.”

“Color me intrigued then.”

“I’ll leave you to it,” Dylan says, stepping back. “I’ll grab that yearbook later.”

“Could you explain,” Rocco starts when the door is shut again, “why Piper Bell is my costar in this movie?”

Tom smiles expectantly, like this is a joke and he’s waiting for the punchline.

“I’m serious, Tom.”

“How could you possibly be serious, Rocco? As if you and I didn’t endlessly dissect the pros and cons—all pros, from my perspective, not a con in sight—before we got her on board, too. It was a no-brainer.”

“Why would costarring with the ex who ruined my family life for a decade and a half be a ‘no-brainer’?”

Tom isn’t smiling now. He’s staring wide-eyed at Rocco in bewilderment. Maybe frustration. “What is this all about? Are you having second thoughts? Is this about”—his eyes flick to me—“another woman? Old Rudy issues dredging up? Talk to me straight.”

“Take me to the beginning,” Rocco says, “back to when the idea first came up. When, who, how.”

“Well sure, that was all me. You know that. The jacket, the one I last wore at some holiday party in ’99, some shitshow I don’t remember. Except it somehow left me with that magazine piece from the future! Well, not the future anymore. But it was.”

The tabloid.It was the tabloid.

We knew, didn’t we? That it could be our undoing.

I’ve never wanted to be less right.

“Fuck,” I say, eloquently. Rocco looks too shocked and horrified to speak. “When did you find that?”

Tom turns from Rocco to me, back to Rocco. To me. Squinting, like he’s trying to puzzle through our line of questioning. “Surely Rocco has told you this story. Or maybe not, since you two have . . . whatever you have. Anyway, I was moving last year, organizing my disaster of a closet, and I found a ripped jacket in the back. Out of style, dirty, useless to me, but still worth a small fortune, so I was going to toss it in the thrift store pile, a nice little treasure for someone else. But I heard a crinkle in the pocket, reached in, and . . .” He laughs, shaking his head. “It’s hard to explain this, but there was a ripped and scribbled on magazine page. A piece about Rocco and Piper being a power nostalgia couple, how great it would be to see them together again, on or off screen. Anyway, it was the date that caught my eye. December 2016. But, you see, the day I found it, it was only October of 2015.”

A pause, for dramatic effect.

I suppose he expects me to be stunned. And I am, but not because he found an article from the future. More that it managed to stay hidden for nearly sixteen long years—only to be found just in the nick of time to turn my life into a waking nightmare.

“Anyway,” he continues, unruffled despite the lack of a satisfying reaction, “I thought it must have been a joke. I mean, of course. Why would I have a magazine page from a year ahead? I’d been wasted to oblivion the last time I wore that coat, but surely I’d remember if I’d lived through Back to the damn Future! But. On the other side of the page, there was a year in review piece. One by one, at the beginning of 2016, things kept . . . happening. Like a checklist. The most impossible, improbable checklist in the world. So I figured, ‘hello, this is your grand sign, Tommy.’ Nostalgia’s more hot ticket than ever, and Rocco and Piper? The hottest ticket there is. The stars all aligned for this reunion: Rocco wanted indie tearjerker, Piper was looking for the right mom role to help her be taken more seriously in Hollywood, bombshell that she is, so . . . here we are. Rocco got on board. Piper hopped right on, too, needed very little convincing. You grumbled, but ultimately saw the light. The bright green light. In the end, even you couldn’t deny the atomic power of the casting—especially once you watched the chemistry read. And there we have it, so the story ends. Ta-da.”

“Ta-da,” Rocco repeats woodenly, still looking blank-faced.

“Yes. Ta-freaking-da.” Tom claps his hands together hard in front of Rocco’s face. “You there, kid? You’re starting to scare me.”

Rocco nods. “Yeah. Just . . . processing. That story. It’s uh. Bizarre, isn’t it?”

“Fate is what it was. The golden ticket to take you to the next level. Matted and framed in my office now. Anyway. I’ll leave you two to process, reprocess, whatever you need. I’m gonna go grab a seltzer. Seventeen years off the hootch this January, you believe it?” He laughs, pats Rocco on the shoulder, and walks out.

“We did this,” I say quietly.

He nods. “We did.”

Of all the risks, of all the mistakes, of course our meddling in time would lead to this:

Piper and Rocco, together again.