“It will be a velvet glove!” said Dominic.
The same smile had been slapped on Allegra since she’d arrived, and her face was starting to ache. She felt like a block of ice with teeth stuck in it; a rube and a loser.
The Missoni said, “You’ve been the Holy Grail around here.”
“Aw!” said Dusty. “That’s so sweet.”
“Welcome to the Bartok family,” said Anton.
They spontaneously applauded and Allegra thought, Oh my God, it will not stop! They were so far up Dusty’s ass you’d need a search party to find them. She wanted to rogue out. I’m gonna spray this fucking room like the self-radicalized homegrown lone wolf I am!
Dominic gushed about the most recent film she’d won an Oscar for — five years ago, already — and was echoed by a chorus of heartfelt, anachronistic congratulations.
“Aw, thank you!” said Dusty, as if she’d come straight from the ceremony. “You know, I always think of wanting to do a Woody and not show up. Can’t seem to pull that off!”
“That was your third, no?” said the Missoni. “Bit of a rare club.”
“Fourth time’s the charm,” said Dusty blithely. “Am I greedy?”
“We’ll be there when you accept the fourth,” said the chair.
“And the fifth,” said the “creative.” “And the sixth!”
“Let’s talk about the fragrance,” said the chair, down to unctuous brass tacks. “We are expecting to do very well.”
“You are going to do very well,” said Dominic to the star.
“Oh no! I can’t deal with the pressure!” said Dusty melodramatically. “But I want to do well. Like, White Diamonds well!”
“It is our high hope,” said Anton, “that it may be arranged.”
“Dusty, we are looking at this on a White Diamonds scale,” said Gertrude. “We believe we definitely have the same potential.”
“She was my hero,” said the actress, with a crestfallen little girl look.
“We used to go drinking in West Hollywood,” said the “creative.”
“Oh my God,” she shot back. “Me too! At the Abbey? Why didn’t we ever see you there?”
“You may have,” he said coyly. “I might even have bought you and Dame Elizabeth drinks.” He winked. “I am nothing if not discreet.”
“You are so not!” said Gertrude, and everyone laughed.
Dusty turned to her wife and said, “It’s important to me that Allegra is very much involved.” The crew nodded, almost gravely. “Her taste and her instincts are amazing.”
“Of course!” said Anton to Allegra. “You are in our family now!”
“Like mafia, one can never leave,” said the “creative.”
The Missoni ogled her and said, “Allegra, you have incredible style.”
The “creative” took in her biker jacket. “Rick Owens?”
“Yes,” said Allegra, more stiffly than she’d have liked.
“I love Rick,” said the “creative.” “Rick and Michèle.”
“Michèle?” said the Missoni.
“Lamy,” said Gertrude. “His muse.”
“I just saw them in Paris,” said the “creative.” “There’s a huge statue of Rick in front of Selfridges… and the furniture he designs — my God.”
They included Allegra in their space now, as if to cue her, and she hungrily took the bait, offering, “Aren’t his furnishings amazing?”
“So genius,” said the “creative.”
“We have some in the Zurich office,” said Dominic.
“I didn’t know Rick was fabricating furniture,” said the Missoni.
The “creative” swiveled toward her to enlighten. “Some of the pieces are… promethean. They’re incredible! Museum pieces — literally. They always remind me of Rodin.”
“We have a few,” said Allegra, très engagé, her cherry taken at last. “At Point Dume.”
“A bed in one of the guest rooms,” said Dusty. “It’s petrified wood, isn’t it, Allegra? Like, thousands of years old. You don’t actually go there to nap—you go there to die.”
Everyone thought the remark was beyond funny.
“And crazy expensive,” said the “creative.” “I mean, crazy-crazy.”
Some talk ensued about the scent itself… kudos to boutiques such as Le Labo and Byredo… the Osmothèque in Versailles. Legendary “noses” that might assist in creating DNA (none of whom Allegra recognized) were bandied about with cryptic, gossipy bluster, and even a little aside about Chanel No. 19 between Dusty, the Missoni, and Gertrude went over her head. The celebrity wife was at sea.
“Allegra’s been working on some amazing designs for the bottle,” said Dusty.
“They’re very rough,” said Allegra, adding, “They’re in the conceptual stage.” She thought that sounded dumb, but — too late.
“We’d love to see them!” said a bookish man who hadn’t yet spoken. He wore a green tunic and a gold Aztec-y medallion around his neck.
“We eagerly welcome,” said the chair, directing his comments to Allegra, “we solicit your help in this creative process.”
“What do you think about ‘Ecco’?” said Allegra boldly, to no one in particular. “With two c’s?”
“Ecco, Ecco!” said Dusty, in ludic enunciation, a bad actor “doing” an Italian. “I love it!”
“It is lovely,” enthused the Missoni. “We wanted to use it last year, didn’t we, Paco?”
“We did,” said a cherubic, self-effacing down-tabler. “We had some hassles with the ‘Ecco Bella’ lawyers, so didn’t pursue.”
“Maybe open it up with them again?” suggested Dominic, knowing the effort would be futile. “Do some reaching out?”
“They were fairly adamant,” he said. “But of course.”
“Then what about ‘Echo’ spelled E-C-H-O?” said Allegra, in brainstorm mode. Fun! “Can you get around it that way?”
“I like your mind,” said the Missoni, showing her canines.
“That belongs to a competitor,” said the chair. “But — it’s a process. Sometimes more of a process than we’d like.”
“How about a movie theme?” The ideas were flowing. “Something related to the cinema?”
(Dusty, proud mama, thought it so cute that, surrounded by Europeans, Allegra invoked “the cinema.”)
“Well, we love that,” said the Missoni.
“Something like ‘First Team’? Or ‘Final Touches’…”
(Dusty saw that the names had been in Allegra’s pocket all along — little secret weapons. Proud!)
“‘First Team’ might be a little sporty,” said Dominic. “But its energy is rather charming.”
“I love ‘First Team,’” said the Missoni. “And ‘Final Touches.’ Really great. But I’m wondering if they convey the glamour.”
“‘Final Touches’ is intriguing,” said the chair, though in truth, more conciliatory than intrigued.
Allegra was heartened and said, “What about ‘Last Looks’?”
“There’s a lovely poetry in that,” he said. “Though I think with both of these—‘Last Looks,’ ‘Final Touches’—we wish to avoid anything too funereal.”
Of course he was right and his clarity broke the bubble.