I turn toward the doorway.Memaw.
“Alex!” she says with a smile that reaches straight to my heart and embraces me like the best of hugs.
“Memaw!” I shoot off Laura’s chair, rushing across the colorful room into her arms.
“My, my,” Memaw says, stepping back and bracing me, her hands on my arms. “Don’t you look as beautiful as ever.”
“You do too.”
“Oh psh. Don’t start in with your flattery. We all know I look like a crumpled piece of paper these days. I stopped counting wrinkles a while ago. Now I just live with them like an old friend.”
“You look beautiful,” I repeat.
“You hear that, Mabel?” Memaw shouts back toward the dryers. “Alex thinks I look beautiful.”
“Well, I say we keep her,” Mabel answers.
“Fine by me,” Memaw answers her. “What do you say, Alex?”
“I’m warming up to the idea,” I admit.
Memaw links our arms and pulls me over to Laura’s station. I spend the next hour getting a trim. At one point, Shannon comes in and starts giving manicures at a little desk set up as a nail station. Laura insists on giving me a blowout. By the time she’s done, I’ve learned the names of each woman in the room, and I’ve been privy to more stories than I can count. It feelslike a sort of initiation—an unofficial rite of passage. I’ve been officially welcomed amidst hairspray and laughter. I walk out of the Dippity-Do looking more date-ready than like a woman heading to her second day on the job.
Jesse and I start cruising town a half hour after I arrive at the station. He keeps glancing over at me.
“Do I have something in my teeth?” I flip the visor down, catching my reflection and a flicker of nerves.
“No. Your teeth are fine,” he says. “You just look …” He trails off, words snagging somewhere between duty and a line he obviously doesn’t want to cross.
“Oh. My hair? I went to Laura before work.”
“Nice. She did a good job.”
“You think?” I take my hand and make a show of fluffing under my hair with it.
“I do. Really nice.” He clears his throat, glances at me quickly and then returns his eyes to the road as if something extremely interesting just darted out into the intersection. A flush of color rises up his neck.
My cheeks heat reflexively. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.” His eyes stay on the road and his head bobs once in a curt nod. Professional. He’s being professional.
Thankfully, the crackle of the police radio followed by Jeanie’s voice slices through the awkwardness. “Well, maybe the second time’s a charm,” she says, vaguely.
“What’s up, Jeanie?” Jesse asks.
There’s an easy brightness in him today, like someone flipped the lights back on behind his eyes. I’d love to know the source of his happiness.
“Mr. Dobbs is accusing Mrs. Hawthorne of cutting his light cords.”
“Welp,” Jesse says with a half-grin, “It wouldn’t be Christmas without a little décor war, now would it?”
Jeanie’s laugh carries through the radio. “No. I guess it wouldn’t.”
Jesse and I stop at the Dobbs/Hawthorne houses. The cord looks chewed, not cut. We suspect either raccoons or mice.
“Doesn’t look clean enough to have been shears or scissors, Stuart.” Jesse says, crouching to inspect the cord.
“I told you I didn’t cut it!” Mrs. Hawthorne shouts. “If I wanted to sabotage you, I wouldn’t hide the fact.”
