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I drop the diaper bag on the chair next to him. “Okay. She should nap for about another hour, she just had lunch. She usually sleeps good after eating, but if she wakes up or gives you any trouble just come get me.”
“Shoo. Go get pampered. We’ll be right here, and if I need you, I’ll holler.”
I nod and start toward the back. Quiet pop music sounds from somewhere, and Andy’s softly singing while she folds towels.
There are four stations, all of them sit empty, so I don’t know which chair to take.
“Hey, girl. Just take a seat and I’ll be right there.” She nods to a station as a tall Black man with a closely cropped faux-hawk comes out of a room in the back.
“And who is this beauty?” he asks Andy.
“Maisie, this is Jenner. He runs the barber side of the salon with me and is my business partner. Jenner, this is Maisie and that cute little cherub out front with Jedd is her daughter, Audra.”
“Nice to meet you,” I say while sitting in the salon chair. Andy finishes up the last towel and snaps the door closed before coming over to me. She grabs a cape and whips it open before covering me and snapping it closed at my throat.
Her hands immediately dig into my hair massaging my scalp. Fuck that feels good. I haven’t had anyone do my hair in … too long to think about. “What are we doing with all this hair?” she asks while running her hands through the length and moving it to the front of my shoulders.
I shrug, tilting my head to the side. “I usually just trim it myself…”
A horrified gasp comes from behind me. “You’ve been cutting your own hair, sugar?”
I nod. “Yeah. I mean. I’ve gotten it trimmed a time or two, but sometimes it’s just easier to take a pair of scissors to it when it gets in the way.”
“Oh. Wait a sec. You’re the woman who wrecked her camper out on the interstate, aren’t you? Staying at Sheriff Sexy’s place until you get back on your feet?” Jenner turns to Andy. “She’s the Maisie doing the website overhaul for us?”
There’s no judgment or pity in his voice, though the way he said it makes my shoulders hunch and he notices.
“Oh fuck. Don’t mind me, babes. There’s no filter between my brain and my mouth. Something that my honeybee, Kent, is always yelling at me about.”
Andy snorts. “Kent is his husband — and I’m on Kent’s side of this argument — per usual — where Jenner is concerned.”
“Don’t you sass me, Andy. I haven’t had any coffee this morning, and I’ll gladly ask you to not.”
Andy rolls her eyes at me in the mirror, a playful scowl covering her features. “Well go get a damned Mocha then, you grumpy ass. And yes, this is the same Maisie.”
Jenner shakes his head. “You see what I have to deal with? Also, I loved what you did with the color scheme. And the online booking system you integrated will save my sanity not having to answer the damned phone all the time.” He taps his head and nods in my direction. “You’re a smart cookie. I don’t know why we didn’t do that before.”
“I’m glad you like it.” I wasn’t aware that Andy had a business partner, but it makes sense, the two businesses in a small town would be smarter combined. Less operating costs and similar enough markets that it makes sense.
“Back to your hair. I can trim it up for you, no problem. Clean up the ends and then maybe add a little layering or face framing in there?” Andy asks, but her nose is scrunched, and she doesn’t look like she’s in love with the idea of a low maintenance haircut.
“Or you could let me play a little bit?” she continues.
“Uh,” I hedge.
“Don’t worry, I’m not going to scalp you, regardless of what the barbarian in the front says. Do you prefer your hair longer?”
“I heard that, Mischief.”
Andy rolls her eyes at Jedd’s holler.
I nod. “Yeah, it’s easier for me to pull back since Audra likes to yank on it or it gets in the way when I’m hunched over my keyboard.”
She smiles. “Okay. So trust me for a second.” She grabs a hank of my hair and makes a chopping motion — way higher than I expect her too. Like lots of inches higher. “I really want to shorten it, it’ll lighten the weight — because, girl, you have a shit ton of hair — but we’d leave it long enough for you to pull back — while tossing in layers to give you more volume so it doesn’t lay so flat all the time if you style it.”
She pulls her phone from her pocket and swipes through the screen to show me a picture. The image of the woman on the screen has cute fluffy hair, little kicks of it around her face with deep side swoopy bangs, and I want that. I want to have cute hair that doesn’t just hang down my back or end up in a ponytail when it gets in my way.
I’m already changing so much about my life. I want Harlan. I want the town. And I want pretty hair.
