The First Chair I Washed Her Hair In

The Set She Left Without

I did not say a single word to her. That is the part I am proudest of. My mother raised me better than to gloat, and a woman with her mother’s head in her hands has no business spending her breath on spite.

I just kept setting Mama’s hair. Roller after roller, taking my time, while the whole shop sat in that warm quiet and watched a daughter do for her mother what somebody had sworn she never would.

It was Renae who could not take it. She sat there maybe two minutes more behind that magazine, and then she stood up.

She pulled the dryer hood back off her head herself. She went up to the counter with the foils still in her hair, half done, looking like something was wrong with her.

She dug in her purse without looking at a soul.

“I’ve got to go,” she said to June. Her voice was not steady either. “Something’s come up. Here, for your trouble.”

She put a twenty on the counter and she did not wait for her change and she did not get her set finished. She went out the door fast with her head down, and the little bell rang behind her, and through the window I watched her get in her car with aluminum foil still in her hair and drive away.

Nobody said anything mean about her. Nobody had to.

The whole room had just watched the truth with its own eyes. And the truth does not need anybody to pile on.

Darlene reached over and squeezed my mother’s hand. The Simmons girl brought her a little cup of the shop coffee, light and sweet, without being asked.

June came over then and put her hand on my shoulder, and she looked at my mother in the mirror, and she said, “Opal, when this is set, I’m going to comb you out myself, and I’m not charging you a thing. For old times. First chair rates.”

My mother laughed. A real laugh. “First chair,” she said. “That was always the best chair.”