"That's definitely Janelle. She's been patronizing this salon for years." She gave me a sympathetic smile, probably assuming I was in the latter stages of Alzheimer's. I was beginning to wonder about that possibility, myself.
"My goodness! You're absolutely right! That is Jan!" I exclaimed after removing my glasses as if they were hindering my vision. "I really do need to get my peepers checked. My eyesight has deteriorated so much in the last year, I can barely distinguish between a field mouse and a hippopotamus."
The befuddled lady stared at me for a few seconds. "You really do need glasses if you can't tell the difference between a mouse and a hippo, given one is like a zillion times larger than the other."
I merely chuckled, not sure how to respond to her inarguable statement. Then I pointed to the vacant styling station next to the one Janelle was seated at. "I would like that gal next to Jan to do my hair, if possible."
"Sure. If that's who you want." She sounded uncertain, but not nearly as uncertain as I felt. "Her next client doesn't come in until eleven."
As I walked toward the empty chair, I studied the gal I'd chosen to do my hair. I considered saying I didn't have time for a new hairstyle after all, and then bolting from the small building like there was a wrecking ball about to crash through the window. Even though my impulse to flee was intense, I managed to resist the urge. I sat down facing the mirror with a sense of dread.
My hair stylist had light blue hair with vivid orange tips. The hair on the right side of her head was about the length of the bristles on your toothbrush. The hair on the other side, however, was more like the bristles on your straw broom. It was hard to judge the left side's length, though, because it was secured on top with some kind of stretchy-scrunchy band. The best visual I can offer is to picture a grown-up Pebbles Flintstone after a run-in with a couple of open cans of paint. To top it off, everything that could possibly be pierced was pierced. There was enough metal bisecting her body to build a Mini Cooper convertible—the tiny, original model, of course.
And her outfit was nearly indescribable. A combination of stripper, color-blindness, and flea market enthusiast is the best I can do. With a skirt that short, if she were to drop her brush, she'd just have to dig in her drawer for another one. No way she could bend over without flashing everyone in the room and taking the risk that one of her breasts might pop out of her way too tight, and way too plunging, tank top.
She introduced herself after I had done the same. Her name was impossible to pronounce, and I'd forgotten it before she'd even draped a cape around me. She ran her fingers through my hair and asked what kind of style I wanted. I hadn't given it much thought, so I looked across the room and saw an older woman who had hair about the color and length as mine. The cosmetologist was rolling her hair and chatting with her. I assessed the woman in the chair for a few seconds. She passed my inspection, appearing relaxed and, more importantly, sane, so I pointed at her. "I'd like what she's having done."
"If you say so," my stylist, who I'll simply refer to as Freak, remarked. "Let's go wash your hair and get started then."
Walking to the sink basin, I passed Jan Dorsey, a.k.a. Laundry Room Jan, who had just arrived for her ten o'clock appointment. She sounded very chipper as she greeted me. "Hey, Rapella! Long time, no see!"
I smiled and nodded, realizing I'd totally misjudged her. She was not the Jan rumored to be having an affair with Boonie Whetstone, after all. Just a friendly lady who happened to share a nickname with the woman who was seeing Boonie on the sly. Most likely, Jan truly was a widow visiting Buffalo, Wyoming, for the very first time.
Freak washed my hair and I believe in giving credit where credit is due. Her scalp massage was calming, and I'd have been content to have her continue kneading my hair for another hour or two. But soon we were back at her station and she removed a tray of tiny curlers from a cabinet below the mirror. While she gathered all the other necessary items, I scanned the four small framed photos propped up against the back of her counter. I assumed the four individuals in the photos, three girls and a boy, were her children; a fact Freak later confirmed.
All four children, aged from about seven to fourteen in my estimation, looked perfectly normal. They had typical hairstyles and outfits for children their ages. I wondered if they were ever embarrassed by their mother's out-there appearance. I could see them asking her to drop them off three blocks from their school every morning. I know I would have if she were my mother.
I struggled to come up with a way to chat with Janelle Tyson-Simms, who I now knew to be the gold-digger whose first two wealthy husbands had met with ghastly ends. Then, I had a clever idea. Most people love to be praised, especially about their appearance, so I turned to her. "Excuse me, ma'am, but I have to say you have the loveliest hair I've ever seen."
"Thank you so much," she replied with a broad smile. Her voice was much different from Laundry Room Jan's. Deep and sultry, it had a southern drawl to it. My guess was she was one of the Naughty Pine Playhouse's most loyal customers. Janelle studied me briefly before replying."You have, um, well, you, um—"
"Yes?"
"You, um, have hair too." She stumbled through her response. Although she apparently had no problem being deceitful when it came to men, she clearly found it impossible to lie about my hair by returning the compliment.
"Thank you for noticing I have hair," I said, as if I weren't already aware of that fact. "You sure do look familiar."
"I do?"
"Yes, I'm trying to think of where I've seen you before." I tapped a finger on my chin and pretended to be in deep thought for a few seconds. "I've got it! You remind me of a lady I saw cuddling with the guy who owns the RV Park my husband and I are staying at. Your boyfriend, I assume, is quite handsome. Don't you think?"
As her stylist turned toward me in astonishment, Janelle gulped, not sure what to say. "Hmm, I'm sure you must be confusing me with someone else. I really don't know who owns the Rest 'n Peace campground."
"I didn't say which RV park we were staying in, but you're absolutely correct about the name of it." I could think of a number of other campgrounds in and around Buffalo. Her mentioning the one Boonie owns was all the verification I needed to know the rumors about their illicit affair were true. So I plunged in. "You've surely heard about the missing woman whose body was discovered in the forest a couple of days later. As I'm sure you already realize, the park owner I'm referring to was the victim's husband."
Kerri, Janelle's stylist, made her client turn her head so that she was looking straight at the mirror, and Janelle seemed more than happy to comply. I'm certain Kerri did so to try and prevent an ensuing catfight in the middle of the hair salon, but I found it easier to fib to someone when you aren't looking them directly in the eyes, anyway.
When Janelle, with her back to me now, remained silent, I asked, "You were aware of that, weren't you?"
As if she were composing her response, and then re-evaluating it, she eventually replied, "I do kind of recall hearing about her death. What a horrible thing to happen."
What a horrible thing to do, I wanted to reply. Charly Brown said she and Janelle were only a year apart, and both had attended Buffalo High School. Was it instinct that made Janelle mention the Rest 'n Peace RV Park rather than her schoolmate's Sweet Sixteen RV Park, or the popular Deer Park Campground? Why had she automatically assumed I wasn't referring to the owner of the Buffalo KOA or the Indian Campground, two other highly-regarded RV Parks in town? It could be coincidental, but I didn't think so.
And in a town the size of Buffalo, with no more than five-thousand residents if you counted a few of them twice, incidents like that didn't occur often. In a huge city like New York, news of a missing person found dead in the woods would be forgotten as old news by the next day. But it'd be "water cooler" conversation in Buffalo for weeks, if not in all of Johnson County. Given the demographics of the town, it seemed too big a deal for someone who'd been a local citizen for many years, possibly forever, to
make a remark like, "I do kind of recall hearing about her death."
So, I plunged deeper. "I heard they've determined the woman's death wasn't the result of an animal encounter after all."
Janelle's head turned toward me so fast she was fortunate Kerri didn't snip her left ear off with the sharp scissors. She was intense when she asked, "What do you mean?"
"Just that. Someone killed her. Before my husband retired, he was the sheriff of Aransas County, in south Texas. He has an 'in' with the local detectives, you see." Rip had no such thing and it was a state of affairs that irked him so much he was seeing red and berating Sheriff Jaclyn Wright every chance he got. But Janelle was in the dark about that situation and I wanted her to think we were privy to all the juicy details about an intense investigation going on within the local police department.
Janelle gulped once again, quite audibly this time. "Do they have any suspects?"
"I dunno. But the detectives told my husband they were looking into a tip they got over the hotline. It has something to do with some local woman who was having an affair with the victim's husband. In fact, she's the woman I mistook you for. It's not clear to us whether they believe it's the husband or his mistress, or both, they're zeroing in on."
Janelle's eyes were as big as half-dollars. She seemed unable to speak. So I added, "As far as I'm concerned, if that skanky whore had anything to do with the woman's death, she should get the needle. Don't you agree?"
I don't particularly like the "W" word, and had probably only said it out loud once or twice in my entire life. I've said the word to myself, in reference to some shady lady, or another, more times that you can count. But that's beside the point. In this instance, I wanted to get under Janelle's skin, and my plan seemed to work. She obviously didn't like being referred to as a skanky whore—but then, who would?
"Just because Boonie and this woman were involved with each other doesn't mean she was a 'skanky whore,' as you put it. Maybe Bea didn't fulfill Boonie's needs. Perhaps they'd grown apart and were living separate lives. They could have even had an open marriage, where each of them was free to see other people. You don't know what went on behind the Whetstone's door."
"No, I don't. But you sure seem to! Especially for someone who professed to not know who owned the Rest 'n Peace Park just a few moments ago. Yet you just mentioned both of the park owners' names." I had intentionally not said their names and my intuition had paid off. "The tipster told the dispatcher the mistress in question was a tall, slim, brunette woman named Janelle. Does that name ring a bell with you?"
Janelle glared at me for a few seconds before ripping the plastic cape off and throwing two twenties on the stylist's station. "I'm done here. I'll see you next week, Kerri."
"If you say so, Jan," Kerri replied. The stylist stepped back, stunned by her client's reaction to the exchange she'd just overheard. Me, not so much. But I was a little surprised she'd walk out with only half of her long hair trimmed. The mane hanging down her back was lopsided, one side three inches longer than the other. But then, I suppose Boonie could easily even the sides out with a pair of office scissors the next time she saw him. I had a feeling that would be very soon. In fact, I'd have guessed she was heading straight to the Rest 'n Peace RV Park to tell him what some interfering old lady in the hair salon had just told her.
Kerri's eyes followed Janelle out the front door, as did mine. Then she and I locked eyes. I just shrugged and looked away. I'd have left then had my hair not been wrapped around numerous curlers. I will concede it was time I tried something different with my hair, and Rip was pleased earlier to hear me say I was planning to get a new style. I didn't, however, appreciate his quip. "A new one? I didn't know you had a style to begin with."
Freak led me over to a waiting area with a stack of magazines on the table next to it. "I'll be back in about fifteen minutes to rinse your hair and apply stabilizer."
"All right." I sat down and watched as Kerri swept up Janelle's hair from the floor. Barb Harris had indicated that Kerri thought Janelle was a con artist and only interested in hooking up with Boonie for monetary gain. I went over my conversation with Janelle in my head. Even though I knew it might turn out that neither Boonie nor Janelle had any part in Bea's death, I still felt no remorse about the way I'd spoken to the woman. Taking up with another woman's husband was a low-down thing to do. I thought she had a dressing-down coming, no matter if she were guilty of murder or not. And I'd bet you, my dear reader, feel the same way.
Twenty minutes later, I was back at Freak's station. With my back to the mirror, she used the clippers, the hair dryer, a curling iron, a fistful of gel, and a couple of different kinds of spray. Still musing about my conversation with Janelle Tyson-Simms, I sucked on a peppermint candy I'd dug out of my purse, and paid little attention to what she was doing. In retrospect, I should have taken heed to the expression on Jan Dorsey's face earlier when she'd glanced over at my hair as Freak was laboring over it. The look on Jan's face had been one of shock, as if she'd just witnessed a loved one's hand reach out from under their own tombstone to pick a dandelion.
Looking pleased with her work, Freak finally whipped my chair around so I could admire my new hair style in the mirror. Suddenly I understood the reason behind Jan's incredulous expression. I was so stunned by my appearance, I inhaled the peppermint and it got wedged in my throat. For a few seconds I was afraid I'd need someone to administer the Heimlich maneuver to dislodge it. I hacked several times and at last the candy broke free. The peppermint disc shot out of my mouth, ricocheted off the mirror, and began rolling across the floor behind me. As I turned instinctively to follow its path, the sticky disc began gathering loose strands of clipped hair as it slid across the linoleum to the far side of the salon. For the second time in as many days, ever eyeball in the room was fixed on me.
I looked back at the mirror, hoping my hair didn't look as outrageous as my first glance had indicated. No such luck. Like Freak's, the hair on the right side of my head was cut short. Not as short as hers, but definitely shorter than the opposite side. She'd given me an extremely tight perm on that side. The loops were so tiny and taut, I was certain the right side of my head would adhere to the hook side of a Velcro strip. On the permed side, she'd left about two inches of the hair closest to my face much longer. Running the length of that longer hair were fluorescent purple streaks.
I glanced over at the woman whose hair style I'd asked Freak to duplicate. She had a tight perm, but none of the other, crazier features I'd been treated to. I pointed at the older woman, looked up at Freak, and muttered, "But—"
My hair stylist smiled, patted my shoulder. "No worries. I'm only charging you for the perm. The other special touches I'm throwing in for free. I know how elderly ladies tend to like the color purple, so I knew you'd appreciate that extra flair. And I was correct in thinking this new style would make you appear much younger."
"But, but, but, I wanted to look like I was in my fifties, not sixteen! Because, after all, I'm pretty sure the remainder of my body would have let the cat out of the bag, anyway. I look absolutely preposterous!"
"Awesome! I knew you'd love it!" I'm not sure what Freak thought the word preposterous meant, but she was obviously as daft as she appeared.
"Uh-huh. I wish I could tell you how much." I knew if I did tell her what I thought, I'd probably be driven away from the salon in a paddy wagon. I wanted to laugh, sob, throw up, and slap the self-satisfied smile off Freak's face all at the same time. I would have thrown a hissy fit and demanded to have something done about my hair if not for the fact I knew it was probably beyond repair and my own stupid fault to begin with. If I'd made myself clear and paid more attention to what Freak was doing, I wouldn't look like a freak now, too. Getting arrested for a public disturbance would only delay my investigation into Bea's death, and too much time had passed already. Not to mention, having to bail me out of jail had a tendency to turn Rip into a cranky sourpuss.
I was so shocked and dismay
ed by my appearance, I could barely catch my breath. I might prefer a little color and "flair" on the outside facade of the Chartreuse Caboose, but I had absolutely no desire for "hair flair". My knees were shaking as I stood up from the chair, but I felt an overwhelming sense of relief when Freak warned me, "Don't wash your hair for two or three days or it will not only loosen your perm, it will wash out the color, as well."
I paid the sixty-dollar tab, which I felt was seventy dollars too much, left the Snip Joint Salon, and sprinted to the truck. If I hadn't wanted to be seen by as few people as possible, I'd probably have stuck around a few extra minutes; just long enough to caution them about the repercussions of overcharging their clients. They surely wouldn't want patrons to refer to the salon as the "Gyp" instead of "Snip" Joint behind their backs. It wouldn't be very conducive for positive word-of-mouth advertising.
I drove twenty miles over the speed limit on my way back to the campground so I could wash my hair as soon as possible–a dozen times if need be. I prayed I could wash some of the perm and all of the purple dye out.
We'd been planning to attend Willie's two o'clock ball game that afternoon. If I couldn't come up with a feasible reason to stay home, other than being humiliated by my atrocious hairstyle, I'd have to try on all of my various hats to see which one covered up my hair the best. I knew Rip would be adamant about me attending the championship baseball game because it meant so much to our nephew.
As I walked through the trailer door, I braced myself for Rip's reaction. I stepped inside and faced my husband stoically, as if daring him to make a smart remark about my hair. As expected, he rose to the occasion and laughed heartily. "Well, you most definitely have a new style now, my dear!"
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