Beneath a Starlet Sky Read online

  “Don’t worry, Julian, I’ll handle Chili, you just focus on getting those gowns designed,” I say, though I’m feeling queasy at the thought of being in the same room with that kid ever again. So Coz already knew we’d gotten the Luhrmann gig. I contemplate telling Julian about the epic disaster with Coz, Chili, and my father, but decide it can wait. Why is that damn Coz so set on ruining my entire life and Julian’s? She may have ruined things with Nic Knight, but I’m not going to let her ruin this Luhrmann movie.

  * * *

  “Honey,” I call out as I throw my bag and sunglasses on Lev’s couch and make my way toward the kitchen. The smell of garlic and lemon is wafting toward me, and I realize that I didn’t have time to eat today.

  “Hi, hon,” Lev says, putting down the wooden spoon he’s using to stir the chicken piccata and wrapping me in his arms.

  “I’m so happy to see you,” I say, nuzzling into his neck.

  “Me too,” he says.

  “How was your day?” I ask, grabbing a slice of carrot from the cutting board and pulling myself up onto the counter next to Lev.

  “Well, actually, it was kind of eventful. I got a job offer.”

  “What do you mean?” I ask.

  “Have you ever heard of Shonda Rimes?” he asks.

  “Of course, she created Grey’s Anatomy.” He gives me a blank look. I’m going out with the only Dr. McDreamy in the country who’s never heard of Dr. McDreamy. “It’s this incredibly popular medical show. Seriously, you’re like the only person who doesn’t watch it.”

  “Well, she’s got this new show called Para-Medic. Here, she gave me this description of it.” Lev slips a piece of paper out of his pocket, unfolds it, and hands it to me. I read it out loud.

  “‘A lovably irascible doctor treats victims of paranormal events—alien abductions and the like—while engaging in a will they/won’t they relationship with his comely, scrappy sidekick.’ Hm. It sounds like a spin-off of Grey’s Anatomy meets House, with a little X Files thrown in.” Lev gives me another blank look. “House is the one with the sexy diagnostician who gobbles Vicodin. X Files was the one with David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson, and the smoking man and … oh, never mind. So what does Shonda want you to do, anyway?”

  “She wants me to be the medical consultant for the show,” he says. “It would only be a few hours a week.”

  “Honey, that’s so cool,” I say, but I have a strange feeling in my stomach at the thought and I don’t know why. It’s probably just my own work anxiety creeping in. I brush it off to try to stay focused on Lev. “How did this happen?”

  “I actually ran into her at the ER the night I met your parents. She came in for food poisoning, and I guess she liked me. She called the ER to track me down today and made me this offer. I figure it’ll be good extra income to help pay off my medical school loans.”

  “Honey, it’s fantastic,” I say, leaning in to give him a kiss as he hands me my chicken and braised carrots and we head for the couch to eat in front of the TV. We’ve gotten very into watching Planet Earth, but then I remember I recorded Cut-Throat Couture.

  “I know it’s not really your thing,” I say, “but do you mind if we just watch this one episode? I’ve been trying to get Julian on as a guest judge designer. Coz turned me down, but I’m not giving up.”

  “Sure, babe, why not?” Lev says, and I cue up the DVR.

  “Welcome to Cut-Throat Couture,” intones a plummy voice over pulse-pounding beats as images of the contestants alternate with models high-stepping the runways. “In the competitive blood sport of high couture, designers’ reputations get cut, but the price tags never do. Which of these sixteen contestants is willing to pay the cost for achieving their dreams of designer deification—and which will see their ambitions slashed to ribbons?” The screen fills with sixteen faces; one by one, six of the images are electronically sheared away by a pair of lethally gleaming scissors as a violin offers screeching accompaniment. “Only ten designers are left to compete for our grand prize—one hundred thousand dollars from Vain magazine to launch their new line, a personal tour of Naomi Campbell’s closet, and—best of all!—a private fifteen-minute audience with editor-in-chief Grace Frost!” The camera pans back as the contestants gasp and swoon in anticipation of such a papal blessing. “Now it’s time to meet our judges! Vain’s creative director and one of the most powerful opinion-makers in the world of fashion, Coz Cahill!” Coz’s face fills up the television screen; she nods coolly, the studio lights bouncing off her platinum hair, as the ten wannabe designers clap wildly. “And one of fashion’s original supermodels—and still its queen—Naomi Campbell!” Naomi crosses and recrosses her miles of legs: “Hullo, dahlings!” “And legendary designer and muse, Donatella Versace!” Donatella gives a flick of her white-blond Barbie tresses and wiggles long, lacquered nails at the contestants, who beam with giddy joy. “Ciao, my babies!”

  “Hello contestants,” Coz says from the stage in a gilded dégradé crocodile-embossed skintight jersey minidress. “Only ten of you are left. Your work has been … adequate. We are expecting more from you. Which of you will step up? And which will be the next to get slashed?” I flinch involuntarily as the violins screech again. “Today we have an exciting new challenge for you.” A screen drops down behind her, which quickly fills with images of a towering, steaming … dump. The camera closes in on shots of festering garbage, screaming gulls wheeling around split-open bags and rusting appliances. “Everyone, reach under your seats and open up your gift bags.” As the challengers pull out bulky rubber boots, thick plastic yellow gloves, and gas masks, their expressions change from gleeful anticipation to grim caginess.

  “For your challenge today,” Coz tells them, “we will be taking you to the world-famous—or infamous, according to some—Fresh Kills landfill. As part of our ongoing ‘Green the Runway’ theme, you will have exactly ten minutes to collect as many items as you can and recycle them into a look that can go day into night. You will be judged on creative repurposing, originality, and attention to sanitary considerations. And joining us today as our guest judge is the totally original and way hot new designer and winner of Cut-Throat Couture last season.” The camera pans to the guest judge for dramatic effect as Coz pauses to introduce—“Our very own Chili Lu.” The contestants are all smiling ear-to-ear and clapping as though Chili is the next coming of Christian Dior, if Dior ever wore a leather newsboy cap studded with USB ports and satin-and-hemp manpris with solar panel pockets.

  “Hello! Don’t you all look positively hoot!” Chili shouts, bouncing up and down on the tips of his Air Jordans. “I can’t tell you how hoot it’s been working with Queen Coz. Thanks to her, my career is in the stratosphere! I cannot wait to tell you all the things that this Chili’s got bubbling!”

  That’s it. I can’t take it anymore. I quickly click over to Planet Earth, where a lioness, her pelt burnished almost to platinum under the searing African sun, ambushes a lone springbok. One quick slash and the prey tumbles into the long grass, its legs kicking their last.

  “‘Hoot’? Is that even a word?” Lev asks. “Why’d you switch channels? Don’t you want to see how it ends?”

  “I think I just did,” I say.

  5

  “Excuse me, miss, is it possible to get another Milo bar please,” I say to the redheaded Qantas stewardess.

  “I’m sorry, but there aren’t any left,” she says. “It seems you’ve eaten them all.”

  “All?!” I gasp in horror. “Are you sure?!”

  The slim stewardess nods her head. “I’m so sorry. We only had thirteen on board. Did you want any Tim Tams? Or some Jaffas? Or perhaps some Caramello Koalas? I could run to first class and swipe some.”

  “Oh, no thanks,” I say, shame stricken. I did start eating all that candy somewhere over Hawaii, and now we’re about to land in Sydney. But thirteen bars?! I really need to start redirecting my nervous, sleep-deprived, overworked energy somewhere other than food. Can you blame
me? There’s so much riding on these wedding gowns for Four Weddings and a Bris that Julian and I carried on the plane by hand. Especially now that Coz sabotaged the costumes for my own father’s movie.

  You’d think since I spend the majority of my life on planes these days I’d be able to actually sleep. But no. Not when we’re about to meet with Baz Lurhmann and I have all these reports due for LVMH and our company is on the brink—again. I used to catch up on movies and magazines when I’d fly; now I’m stuck writing sales reports, promotion proposals, e-mailing fabric vendors, trying to cut production costs, and praying to God, Ganesh, my guardian angels, and Oprah and Gayle that nothing (read Coz) screws things up on this Lurhmann movie.

  Why didn’t I take an Ambien like Julian? He’s been passed out next to me since before the wheels even went up. Lucky him. He gave up on hypnotherapy, Vedic meditation, Reiki, acupuncture, and ujjayi breathing to get over his fear of flying, and got his shrink to prescribe him a clutch of pills, not to mention a note to the airline that he must travel with his “emotional support service dog.” Tom Ford’s been curled up in his lap since takeoff. He spent weeks perfecting his “Winehouse,” a near-lethal Ativan-Xanax-Ambien cocktail that he’s taken for the last three days in preparation for flying all the way to Australia. And he still tried to back out this morning. Or was it yesterday morning? How many freaking hours have we been on this plane?

  I turn my attention back to my MacBook where all the numbers on my Excel spreadsheet start to blur together.

  “Rise and shine, Princess,” Julian says, shoving me awake.

  “What?!” I say, wiping the drool from my face.

  “Did you have a good sleep?” Julian asks.

  “No, I didn’t. I think I was only asleep for five minutes.”

  “I told you you should have taken a Winehouse,” he says. He takes out a mirror from his black woven Bottega carry-on, spritzes his face with rose water, and smoothes back his dark hair.

  “Julian, I don’t think I’d ever wake up if I took all of that. I have no idea how you can even formulate a sentence right now,” I say, rubbing the sleep from my throbbing eyeballs.

  “Well, no offense, Lola, but you look like shit. Next time I’m forcing you to take something.”

  “How bad is it?” I ask fearfully.

  Julian holds his mirror in front of me. “Oh god,” I say, squinting at my reflection in the mirror. “Is that really me?! I look like I belong on True Blood. What’s scarier is that I actually feel even worse.”

  “Do you want to borrow my fedora and aviators?” Julian offers.

  “It’s useless,” I say, looking at myself again. “But it doesn’t matter how horrendous I look; all that matters is how gorgeous the two wedding gowns look and that Saffron and Baz love them, which they will. Lynda said she saw it. And she hasn’t been wrong yet.” I mean, Mom’s phone psychic totally called my ideas for retro Flashdance torn sweatshirts and organic braces made from reclaimed toaster oven heating elements. Not to mention my sensitivity to quinoa.

  “Lo, I’m a little concerned about how often you’ve been calling Lynda.”

  “This coming from the man who paid someone to meditate for him,” I say.

  “I did feel way more centered and Zen,” Julian says. “Until I got the bill.”

  “Lynda’s so amazing, she keeps giving me free sessions.”

  “I bet your mom is paying her and just not telling you,” Julian says.

  “You think?”

  “Yes,” Julian says. “But who cares as long as she keeps seeing good things for us. Thank you again for getting Chili to stay in NYC. Did Lynda see that?”

  “That was all me. There’s no way I was letting little Chili Lu near Baz and Saffron again. Anyway, he brought it on himself. What did he expect when he put solar panels on the veils? Of course they were gonna catch fire. I told him his penance was staying home and making new ones.”

  “Brilliant, Lo,” says Julian.

  “Thanks,” I say. “I think. He asked if he could build miniature video cameras into the veils with a live feed to Facebook.”

  “He really is a technical genius. I have no idea what he’s talking about half the time, and some of his ideas are brilliant but some of them are completely unworkable,” Julian says. “What bride wants a train that Twitters? Or a Goretex gown? He told me, that way, if the bride cries, the dress won’t get stained. I tell you, Lo, if someone made me wear Goretex on my wedding day, I’d cry for sure. Ridiculous! Plus I’m just so fed up with this kid. He’s constantly messing up—taking in Saffron’s dress too much, spilling on the gowns. I can’t wait until he’s out of our lives.”

  “Try not to worry about Chili, Julian. I need you on your A game for this meeting.”

  “Do you think it was safe to leave him in the studio all alone?”

  “I didn’t. I told him we had termites and the fumigators were coming and he’d have to complete the veils at home.”

  “What would I do without you, Lo? Thank you,” he says, planting a huge kiss on my cheek. “Now let’s go nail this meeting.”

  And as the tires hit the tarmac, I can’t believe that we have to turn around and get back on this plane in twenty-four hours because Julian and I need to be back in L.A. for a Lucky magazine shoot (“Sexy and Streetwise: Hot New Designers You Can Afford Right Now!”). It’s certainly not Vain but I feel lucky to have any publicity at this point.

  * * *

  Saffron Sykes looks like she’s riding that crane to the moon. Julian and I are standing off to the side of the cavernous soundstage of Baz Luhrmann’s musical extravaganza, Four Weddings and a Bris, watching the stunning actress film her big scene. Her raven mane topples down to her waist in perfect, stick-straight lines as she traverses across the sky in a faded Parma violet, billowy chiffon gown that looks like God, or Karl Lagerfeld, draped it himself. When the crane stops at her mark, she begins singing a love song softly, her flawless golden skin glowing dreamily against the backdrop of a perfect azure sky. The magical realism is quintessential Luhrmann at his best. Entering this set is like walking into Alice’s Wonderland. It’s like being transported to a fantasy world in hi-def color, and if you touch it with your finger it might disappear. It’s like being on mushrooms without having to endure that horrific taste or that gummy film on your teeth.

  I can’t take my eyes off Saffron. She’s completely mesmerizing. And to think Saffron owed it all to Ron Howard—and exceptionally good genes. She started off as Ron’s dog walker to pay off her school loans from Juilliard. When Natalie Portman fell out of his American Graffiti remake, he decided to give Saffron a break. Saffron still sees Ron’s dogs. She lets their new dog walker bring them over to swim in her pool since the Howard’s house is a few doors down on Carbon Beach in Malibu.

  As Saffron’s sublime song ends, the crane swooshes her down to the ground and places her in front of Cricket, who looks positively radiant.

  The hairs on my arms stand on end as I watch my BAF acting across from the biggest star in the world in a Baz Luhrmann movie.

  “I just can’t stop thinking about you,” Cricket says.

  “I know,” Saffron responds. “I don’t know if I can go through with the wedding.”

  And the thing is, Cricket’s totally holding her own. I know that Cricket could make reading the phone book interesting and that she could create chemistry with a doorknob—or a chihuahua. But now the world will, too, I think to myself at the sight of Cricket looking at Saffron with dewy eyes. Saffron wipes away Cricket’s tears with a delicate finger and then suddenly leans forward and kisses Cricket—on the mouth. Yes, mouth. Baz has been keeping the plot of the movie totally under wraps. And now I know why. No wonder we had to sign all those confidentiality agreements before we could even step foot on set. What could be juicier than the queen of the screen in a lesbian wedding? Whoa. I can’t believe that Cricket didn’t say a peep to me. Or Kate.

  “And cut,” Baz says from behind the camera. “That was wo
nderful, ladies. I think we got it.”

  “Lo,” I hear a whisper from behind me. Cricket has a gorgeous billowing aqua gown that seems to be floating on her skin. She seems to be floating, too. No doubt absolutely in heaven being in Australia and on Baz Luhrmann’s set. She throws her arms around me and exclaims, “I’ve never been so happy in my life!”

  “Oh sweetie, I’m so happy to hear that. That scene was—incredible,” I say.

  “I’ve been dying to tell you about my part but I just couldn’t. I’m so sorry, but now you know why the plot of the movie has been so top secret,” she says, leaning in and then whispering, “I’m a lesbian in it,” she says.

  “Yeah, I kinda got that part after I saw you put your tongue down the throat of the biggest movie star in the world.”

  “How was I?” she asks.

  “Amazing. Totally convincing. I’m so proud of you, Cricket,” I say, thinking about how much she’s been through to get here, all of those commercials for diarrhea and sexual dysfunction, all of those years at Juilliard and with the Royal Shakespeare Company, all of it to barely make the rent every month. “How are your ribs feeling? Being up on those harnesses flying around in the air can’t be good for you.”

  Cricket rubs her sides gingerly. “The doctor told me they’d take a long time to heal, but I had no idea they’d take this long. They’re absolutely killing me, but it’s a true exercise in mind over matter. Which basically means, I’m taking lots of Advil,” she says.

  “Whatever you’re taking is working for you. You look absolutely glowy,” I say.

  “That gown is what’s killing me,” Julian says. “My god, it’s unbelievable!” He stoops to inspect the delicate pansies trapped beneath nude netting on the bodice of the gown and the breathtaking pansy details in the lace underlayers of the skirt that are echoed in lace ankle-wrappings in Cricket’s sandals.