Notes From the Backseat

by Jody Gehrman

  “Well, ladies,” Ohm said. “There’s a party at my cousin’s if you want to get serious about this bachelorette business.”

  Portia squealed her approval. Miranda said, “Sure, why not?” Joni said, “Ice, ice, baby,” which appeared to be an affirmative. Dannika just shrugged. She’d apparently managed to find her clothing, because she was dressed again, but her white blouse now had a large footprint on it and a couple of the buttons were missing.

  I was barely listening. Coop’s face, blank with astonishment, was etched into my brain and my heart was pounding like I’d just run a four-minute mile. I’d left without saying a word to him. Even if I could have gotten to him in the midst of all the chaos, what would I have said?

  “That okay with you, Holly Golightly?” Ohm asked.

  “Roger that,” I said.

  Ohm’s cousin lives in an astounding house on the bluffs, a sleek, contemporary, big-windowed place with bamboo floors and modern Danish furniture. There were huge abstract paintings on the walls, glass coffee tables, plush suede couches and two big, fluffy cats who slinked through the sea of legs with haughty disinterest. The living room was packed with people, most of them in their twenties, though I spotted at least three grey ponytails. The air was thick with marijuana smoke and reggae poured from the stereo. Kids in ratty layers played hacky sack out on the porch. Beyond their silhouettes, past the deck railing, the sea stretched out under the moon, her voluptuous swells silver as mercury.

  I was happy enough to lose myself in the loud mayhem of the party. Of course, I didn’t know anyone and at that moment I didn’t have enough mental vacancy for small talk with strangers, so I kept moving through the jungle of red plastic cups, smoke and anonymous limbs, hoping that I looked convincingly purposeful. I don’t think anyone was sober or interested enough to care. As for me, my buzz was starting to wear off, but my head was still back at the Tip Top, replaying those last moments. I could feel the zipper vibrating slightly under my fingers as I slid it all the way down my body. Prince’s quirky rhythm was directing my hips. There was the sound of a piercing wolf whistle and a unanimous roar as I let my dress fall away. Coop’s face was a snapshot I couldn’t get rid of and still I couldn’t quite decode what I saw there. Was that laughter at the corners of his eyes or anger? Did his slightly parted lips signify shock, amusement or disgust?

  I went to the kitchen and got myself a glass of water. The drinking portion of the evening was over, as far as I was concerned. You know me—beer number five would send me off on some terrifying trajectory and I wasn’t ready to launch that rocket. At the sink, I ran into Joni, who was finally wearing something other than her black lacy bra. She had on a pink fluffy mohair sweater and in place of her hiking boots someone had dressed her in a pair of turquoise Uggs that looked at least three sizes too big.

  “Nice outfit,” I said. “Where’d you get it?”

  “Melissa.” The three syllables gave her a bit of trouble.

  “Who’s Melissa?”

  “Ohm’s…cuz,” she said, leaning against me.

  “You look good,” I lied.

  She looked down at herself. “I look like shit, but who cares?” The exuberance she’d displayed on the way here seemed to be replaced now with a sullen fatalism.

  “How are you feeling?” I grabbed another plastic cup and filled it from the tap. “Do you want some water?”

  “Water?” She made a disgusted face, as if I’d just offered her a cup of horse piss. “My last night of freedom, and you want me to hydate?” She was dropping crucial consonants.

  “You’re getting married, not going to Sing Sing,” I said.

  She just let out a world-weary guffaw and started rummaging through the cupboards until she located a half-full bottle of Jack Daniel’s and a shot glass.

  I winced. “You sure you want to hit that? I could make you a cocktail.” My plan was to make her a very weak Jack and Coke, but she saw right through it.

  “Forget it,” she slurred. “You just want me to be respecable.”

  “Not at all,” I said, “I want you to be your wild, woolly self.”

  “I’m not wooly.” Suddenly her face fell. “Oh, shit, I didn’t shave. Was I woolly?”

  I put an arm around her shoulder. “Not at all. It’s just an expression.”

  She looked at me, then, and her caramel eyes filled with tears. “Am I a loser?”

  “No, Joni,” I told her, sincere. “Why would you even ask that?”

  “I just—you know…” She ran a hand over her face, forehead to chin, and blinked like a sleepy child. “I thought I was, like, ready for this shit.”

  “For marriage?”

  She nodded sadly and the tears spilled over her bottom lashes, cascading down her cheeks. “I wrote a poem about it. And now look. Get me drunk, I’m just a slutty little stripper. Don’t even have nineteen-year-old tits anymore.” She went to unscrew the bottle of Jack, but she had some trouble with it.

  I took the bottle from her and unscrewed the top. “I don’t think those guys had any complaints about your tits.” I poured her a very stingy shot.

  She downed it and held her glass out to me again. “Were you…?” She didn’t finish her sentence, but somehow I sensed what she wanted to know.

  “Surprised?”

  “Yeah.” She jiggled her glass at me impatiently.

  I hit her again. “I was impressed.”

  We both laughed, remembering the scene at the Tip Top. I wasn’t sure if she knew about Dannika and me making our debut. I decided not to mention it. Maybe if enough people were too drunk to remember, it would cease to exist. Unfortunately, the one witness I really cared about had looked dead sober.

  “When I lived in North Beach I had seven different wigs. I wasn’t Joni, I was Bella.”

  “I love wigs,” I said.

  “Wigs are the pinna…” she looked confused, but pressed on “…the tip-top of human evolution.” She held out her shot glass again for a refill.

  “Are you sure you want more?” I asked, hesitating.

  “Just pour,” she said, “or I’ll get someone else to do it.”

  I did as I was told.

  She drank half of it, sighed, and furrowed her brow at the remaining amber liquid like it contained a message she could barely discern. “I just don’t know where my edge went. I used to be streety. Now I’m all soft.” She curled her lip in disgust, then tossed back the other half of her shot and looked at me pleadingly. “Phil wants a kid. That’s like the last straw. My friend in Santa Barbara had a kid and she looks like she got run over by a truck.”

  “Come on,” I said. “It’s not that bad, is it?”

  “I won’t dance on a bar with stretch marks, I’ll tell you that.”

  Before tonight, I would have said, who wants to dance on a bar? but after trying it myself, I could see why she missed it. It gave you a taste of power that could easily be addictive. A cliché popped into my mind that seemed to fit. “Maybe you should just go with the flow.”

  “Great,” she said, “that’s how I got here—wasted, in a pink sweater and turquoise Uggs, waiting to get knocked up by a bald anarchist. Fuck this, man.” She slammed the shot glass down so hard on the counter that a few people looked at us disapprovingly. “Fill me up,” she said.

  “Joni, seriously, I think you’ve had enough.”

  “Give me the sdupid bottle,” she snarled.

  “Really.” I held the bottle away from her while she tried to grab it. “I’m only saying this because I’m your friend.”

  She squinted at me. “If you’re my friend, you’ll give me the damn bottle.”

  Just then I heard a laugh that stopped my heart. It was a sound that reached down into the murky depths of my childhood and stirred until my insides were opaque with half-forgotten memories. It distracted me, and my grip on the bottle must have loosened, because when Joni lunged for it and grabbed hold it came away in her hands too easily and she fell backward. The laugher turned around
in time to catch her in his sturdy arms and prop her back up.

  I found myself face-to-face with my father.

  “Gwen,” he said, his mouth flaring into a confused little grin, “my God, what are you doing here?”

  “Hi.” My hands shot out from my sides in an embarrassed little ta-dah.

  “Got it!” Joni declared as she stumbled away from us, gripping the bottle of Jack. I knew it was irresponsible to let her walk away like that, but there was a whirring sound in my head now and my father’s face was suddenly so big and so real, close enough to touch, I felt clammy and a little nauseous.

  “This is such a surprise, Gwenny.” My father took two steps toward me. I knew he was going to hug me, so I braced myself, but I wasn’t prepared for the surge of angst and longing that washed over me when he pulled me into his arms. He smelled of wool and marijuana and traces of the cold night fog. Probably the same could be said for ninety percent of the people in that room, but what my father did with those scents was altogether unique.

  When he pulled away, we looked at each other for a long moment. He’d aged some in the four years since I’d seen him last, but he still looked good. It seems funny you’ve never met him, Marla, but I guess by the time you moved to Sebastopol he was already heavy into researching his third book—traveling a lot, that sort of thing—and then, after awhile, I was so mad at him, I no longer felt that sheen of pride when I introduced him to people, so what was the point? Tonight, though, facing him for the first time in ages, I could sense again the charisma that used to make me so proud to be his daughter. He’s handsome, but only in an offhand way; there’s nothing fastidious or vain about him. People are always mistaking him for Michael Douglas; he’s got the same stocky, wrestler’s build, the same steely blue-grey eyes. He’s the sort of man who smiles sparingly, but when he does, he makes you feel like you’re basking in the warm light of an unexpected second sun.

  “So, wow,” he said, “look at you. You look great.”

  I nodded, chewing on my lip. “Thanks. So do you.” I was annoyed to discover there were tears stinging at the back of my eyes.

  “What are you doing here, anyway?” He clapped his hand on my shoulder like we were old football buddies.

  I cleared my throat. “Bachelorette party. Friend’s getting married tomorrow.”

  He looked confused. “This is a bachelorette party?”

  “No, I just—I mean, we ended up here.”

  I felt a hand on my arm and turned to see Dannika smiling so hard it looked painful. “Who’s your friend, Gwen?” She cut her eyes at my father quickly, then resumed beaming at me.

  “Um,” I hesitated, “this is my dad, actually.”

  Her lips formed a tight little O of surprise. “Really? What a coincidence, running into him here!” She turned to him. “And do you go by Dad?”

  He stuck his hand out. “Martin Matson. Nice to meet you.”

  “Dannika Winters,” she purred.

  There was a sick, poisonous feeling taking shape in the pit of my stomach. I tried hard to keep my face completely blank, though. “Dannika drove us up here from L.A.”

  She laughed. “Just a glorified taxi! Actually, I’m really close friends with her boyfriend, Coop. You know Coop, right?”

  Dad shoved his hands into his pockets. “No, I haven’t met him.”

  Dannika’s pretty forehead wrinkled in confusion for a moment, then smoothed out to its usual flawlessness. “Oh, right, well they haven’t been dating for very long. But you should meet him! In fact, you should come to Joni and Phil’s wedding tomorrow.”

  I wanted to shove her across the room. I pictured myself suddenly acquiring bionic powers and pushing her so hard she’d shatter the sliding glass door on contact. “Well,” I said, “he’s probably busy.”

  “Actually, I was—”

  “Hey.” A slender brunette in a fisherman knit sweater materialized beside Dad and slipped an arm around his waist. She had pretty green eyes that sparkled now with possessive interest. “Glad to see you’re making friends.”

  “Kelly.” Dad kissed her forehead and nodded at me. “This is my daughter, Gwen.”

  Her eyes widened and her lips parted in astonishment. “You’re kidding!” She wasn’t as young as the girl he was dating when I visited him four years ago. That one was twenty-seven, tops. Kelly was probably a well-preserved thirty-eight; at least she had the grace to wrinkle a little when she smiled. She was definitely my father’s type—dark hair, creamy Irish skin—but she was missing the cosmetic perfection of his former girlfriends, that doll-like vacancy I’d always found unnerving.

  “Nice to meet you,” I said.

  Before I knew what was happening, she’d pulled me into a hug. She smelled of eucalyptus or tea-tree oil—something hippie-ish and vaguely medicinal. “Your dad’s told me so much about you.”

  I glanced at him, surprised, and I was suddenly aware of my cheeks burning.

  “And this is Donnika,” Dad said.

  “Dannika,” she corrected him, her eyes flashing.

  I choked down a nervous giggle.

  “I was just telling them, I think we’re all going to the same wedding tomorrow.” Dad looked at Kelly. “Aren’t your friends named Joni and Phil?”

  Before she could finish, a heart-stopping scream ripped its way through the ambient party noise.

  Joni.

  “Excuse me,” I said, and made my way in the direction of the scream, which had come from down the hall somewhere. Dannika was right behind me. When we got to the hallway, the bodies thinned out, though a few curious rubbernecking types were, like us, trying to locate the source of the trouble. We stood there a moment listening, waiting for another outburst. In just a few seconds we were rewarded: a low, tormented sob erupted just to our left, behind a closed door.

  I knocked loudly. “Joni? Is that you in there?”

  More sobs. Behind me, Dannika said, “Try the door.”

  I did. It was locked. “Joni?” I said, pressing my mouth close to the door. “It’s me, Gwen. Please let me in.”

  A couple of kids stood behind us, looking on with interest. One had a blue Mohawk; the other wore a ski cap and his septum was pierced with a thick silver ring, which looked slightly damp with snot.

  “Do you mind?” Dannika said.

  “We’re just looking for the john.” The kid in the ski cap employed a defensive whine, his eyes locked on the gap created by Dannika’s missing button.

  “Well, go find another one. This one’s taken,” she sneered.

  They shuffled off, mumbling insults at us.

  “Joni,” I called, trying a sterner tone this time. “I’m serious. Let me in right now.” When she didn’t answer, I whipped a bobby pin out of my purse and fiddled with the lock until it opened. I was surprised that I could still pull this off; I used to do it all the time when I lost my keys, but ever since you suggested stashing a spare in the aloe, I’ve been out of practice.

  “Cool,” Dannika said.

  Joni was sitting on the toilet, her face in her hands. All around her on the white tiled floor were clumps of her dull brown hair. Somehow, removed from her person and disembodied like that, the dreads looked sinister. She, on the other hand, looked like Sinéad O’Connor. She’d shaved her head right down to a startling stubble. Once you got past the concentration camp associations, it was easy to see that her skull was perfectly shaped. As she looked up at me, her brown-sugar eyes were bigger and more striking than ever.

  “Holy shit,” Dannika said.

  “Whad I do?” Joni whimpered.

  I stepped around the little piles of hair and ran my hand over her stippled scalp. “I love it,” I said. “It’s a great look for you.”

  For a moment she looked hopeful. “Really?”

  “Really,” I said. “What inspired you?”

  Joni leaned over and seized the bottle of Jack sitting on the edge of the bathtub, still partly full; she took a halfhearted swig, followed by a shudder. �
�I was standing in front of the mirror going, ‘My hair…my hair.’ I wanted it all off. You know? Like I just didn’t want it anymore. Next thing I knew I had a shaver in my hand—instant baldie!”

  Dannika shook her head, still staring at Joni in disbelief. “Damn.”

  Though it rather disgusted me, I started picking up the severed dreadlocks scattered across the floor and sticking to the bathmats. I glanced at Dannika. “Let’s just clean up a little. Then we’ll find the twins and get her home.”

  There was a soft knock on the bathroom door, and I heard my father say, “Gwen? Is everything okay in there?”

  This was too surreal. If someone would have told me two days ago that I’d find myself gathering up dreads while my father hovered nearby, offering assistance, I would have laughed. “It’s fine, Dad.”

  Of course, Joni chose this moment to be loudly and explosively sick in the bathtub. Dad pushed the door open and stepped inside. “Why don’t I help?”

  Kelly appeared behind my father, then Ohm, who said, “Jesus Christ, Joni.” I shot him a look and he shut up. The five of us worked together to clean up the bathroom, trying not to retch. Then my father wiped the vomit from her mouth with his own handkerchief and carried Joni out to the twins’ Subaru. He didn’t offer commentary, which I appreciated. Every now and then our eyes would catch and I’d feel again the bewilderment of seeing him here, under these strange circumstances, after four years of chilling silence.

  Once we’d rounded up the twins and everyone except me was packed into the Subaru, Dad pulled me aside and said, “Is it okay with you if I go tomorrow?” When I just looked at him blankly, he added, “To your friends’ wedding?”

  “Oh,” I said, “yeah, of course.”

  He stared over my shoulder and clenched, then unclenched his jaw. “I won’t go if you don’t want me there.”

  I hesitated. I could hear waves crashing in the distance, and the fog felt good against my face—damp and cool. It was enough of a pause that he filled it in with, “Right. That’s what I figured. I’ll just tell Kelly I can’t make it.”

  “No! You should come. Really.”