by Elaine Viets
Helen took a deep breath and dialed.
“Helen?” Kathy said, as soon as she heard her sister’s voice. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing,” Helen said. “I’m calling with good news. I’m getting married. This time, I’ve found the right man. I met him at the Coronado. His name is Phil, and he’s terrific.”
She smiled at Phil. He smiled back and squeezed her hand.
“That’s wonderful,” Kathy said. “And about time.” She’d never liked Rob. “When do I meet this paragon?”
“Soon, I hope. This is kind of last-minute, but we’re getting married a week from Saturday, and I wondered if you could be here?”
“I’d be delighted.” Kathy sounded like she meant it.
“Can Tom and the kids come, too?” Helen asked.
“Yes,” Kathy said. “He’s teaching summer school, but Tom can call in sick if he has to.”
“Good,” Helen said. “I’ll send money for gas.”
“Helen! We’re not that bad off.”
“You can stay in my apartment. There’s a nice pool for the kids to play in.” That would save Kathy and Tom the cost of a hotel.
“Deal!” Kathy said. “What about Mom? Is she invited?”
“I’ll call her after I talk to you. She’ll go ballistic. She’s still trying to get me back with Rob.”
“I can break the news to Mom and invite her to your wedding,” Kathy said. “She can ride down to Florida with us.”
“No!” Helen said. “Don’t shut her in a car with poor Tom. He’ll go crazy.”
“Okay, she can fly. But I’ll tell her for you. That will be my present.”
“I’d like that better than a cut-glass candy dish,” Helen said. “I have one more favor to ask. Will you be my maid of honor?”
“Are you going to make me wear powder-blue chiffon with ruffles and daisies, like you did last time?”
Helen winced. Did she really do that to her sister? She’d wiped most of the details of her first wedding from her mind. “Nope. This time you can choose your own dress—any style you like, any color you want.”
“Short or long?” Kathy asked.
“It’s a backyard wedding. Short is fine.”
“Good. I’ll get more wear out of it.”
“That’s what all bridesmaids say,” Helen said. “I bet you never wore that dress again.”
“Oh, I did,” Kathy said. “We had an ugly-bridesmaid-dress party. We wore our worst dresses, got drunk on margaritas, then changed into shorts and burned the dresses in the barbecue grill. The neighbors called the police.” She sounded proud.
“Well, at least that dress provided a hot time. But you should have burned the groom,” Helen said.
“Instead, he burned you,” Kathy said. There was a long pause. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to stir up bad memories.”
“This wedding will have good memories,” Helen said. “Please be part of them. I can’t wait to see my niece and nephew.”
They said their good-byes. Helen hung up, weak with relief. Kathy really had given her a gift. She’d escaped the confrontation with her mother.
“Dodged that bullet,” she said to Phil. “Kathy’s going to call Mom for me.”
“Coward,” Phil said, unbuttoning her blouse. “I have just the thing to relax you.”
“What about the cat?” Helen said.
“What cat?” Phil said.
“Your shrimp-eating buddy, Thumbs, hasn’t had dinner yet.”
“He can wait a little longer,” Phil said. “And speaking of longer ...”
Helen was awakened by howls in the dark room. She stumbled out of Phil’s bed and tripped over her shoes.
Phil sat up and switched on the light. “What’s going on?” His silver-white hair was tousled with sleep.
“It’s Thumbs,” Helen said. “He’s screaming for dinner so loud I can hear him here in your apartment. What time is it? We fell asleep.”
“Ten thirty,” Phil said.
Helen slipped on her jeans and shirt, grabbed her purse and house keys, and ran barefoot to her apartment. Phil threw on his pants, picked up her shoes, and followed.
They were met at her door by an angry Thumbs. The big gray-and-white cat lashed his long tail, his yellow-green eyes burning with anger.
“If he weighed eight hundred pounds, he’d eat us,” Phil said.
Thumbs’ metal water bowl was flipped upside down to demonstrate his displeasure.
“All right, all right,” Helen said to the irate cat. “I’ll feed you. But you don’t look like you’re starving.”
She filled his bowl with dry food, mopped up the spilled water and gave him fresh. The cat pushed Helen aside with his huge six-toed front paw and gobbled his chow.
“Are you hungry, Phil?” Helen said. “I can scramble some eggs.”
“Sounds good. I’ll make toast and have a bedtime beer.”
Helen poked around in her fridge and found a green onion past its prime, added some cheddar cheese and a slightly wrinkled green pepper. She didn’t trust the ham. It was nearly as green as the pepper.
Helen beat six eggs, folded in the cheese, chopped the pepper and onion, fried the mixture, then plunked half on Phil’s plate.
“Yum,” Phil said. “A Denver omelet.”
That was a grand name for scrambled leftovers, but Helen didn’t correct him. She ate the other half.
Phil opened a cold beer, gave Helen a slice of toast and put a jar of strawberry jam on the table. He poured hot sauce on his omelet. They ate in companionable silence while Thumbs twined around Phil’s leg.
“No shrimp for you, greedy guts,” Helen said to the cat.
Phil finished his omelet, carried his dishes to the kitchen sink and filled the dishpan with hot water and soap.
“Don’t bother with that, Phil,” Helen said. “I can wash those later.” She tried to suppress a yawn. “I hate to throw you out, but I have to work tomorrow. Unlike some people, I can’t sit around all day.”
“I’m on hiatus until after the honeymoon,” Phil said. “How can I help with the wedding?”
“Just round up a best man—or a good one, anyway,” Helen said. “And would you buy the booze?”
“Finally, a job I’m qualified for,” Phil said. “Want to sleep over at my place tonight?”
“Thanks, but I really need to go to bed—and sleep for a change.” Helen pushed Phil toward the door. They had a last, lingering kiss in the doorway.
“I can’t wait until we’re married,” Helen said.
“Me, either,” Phil said. “Good night.”
Helen fell asleep wondering how Kathy’s conversation with their mother went. If anyone could get through to Dolores, it was Helen’s patient, nearly perfect sister.
Helen’s alarm went off at seven thirty-eight the next morning. She tried to roll over for a few more minutes of sleep, but Thumbs jumped on the bed and yowled for breakfast.
“Hang on,” Helen said. “Let me find my head.”
She wandered into her tiny bathroom, looked in the mirror and winced. Sleep wrinkles creased her face. Her brown hair looked like an uprooted plant.
“Ugh.” Helen showered and washed her hair, then put on coffee and fed Thumbs. She drank her coffee while she blow-dried her hair. The hair seemed to take forever, but she thought it looked good. Maybe some of Miguel Angel’s genius was rubbing off on her.
Helen believed that all the way to the salon. The June morning was so humid, it was almost like wading through a swimming pool. She reveled in the blast of cool air as she opened the salon door. How did people live in Florida before air-conditioning?
“Good morning,” Helen said. Ana Luisa was talking on the phone, and waved at Helen.
Miguel Angel was at his station, putting his things back to rights. Helen didn’t think the cops had done any damage except for the broken jar in the back room, but Miguel Angel had a discerning eye.
“Sit in my chair,” he said. “Let me fix your hair.”<
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“I fixed it myself,” she said.
“I can see. What have you done to your bangs?”
Helen sat. Her hair had never looked so good since she’d had this job.
“If you don’t look good, you make me look bad.” Miguel Angel removed his hair-dryer from its holster and brushed out her long hair, pulling it taut with his strong wrists. Soon Helen’s hair was as dark and silky as a shampoo ad.
“I need a new assistant,” he told Helen. “I have to replace Phoebe. Are you sure you don’t want to get your license?”
“Thanks, but I don’t have the talent to work with hair,” Helen said.
“You’d be better than Phoebe,” he said.
“My cat would be better,” Helen said.
“Then Carlos will assist me,” Miguel Angel said. “He has a little trouble with English, but that’s not a real problem.”
“Mrs. Crane is here for her appointment,” Ana Luisa announced.
Helen didn’t know the woman’s first name. The crabby, charmless Mrs. Crane wore her pale hair in a helmet style forty years out of date. Helen wondered why she paid Miguel Angel’s prices when she could get the same style at a neighborhood salon. Mrs. Crane favored frumpy shirtwaists, stockings and low heels.
She plopped in Miguel Angel’s chair, demanded coffee with cream and sugar from Helen and said, “I have an important charity board meeting this afternoon.”
Carlos stood by, smiling happily. He was clearly thrilled with his new promotion. Miguel Angel gave his assistant instructions in Spanish. Helen could translate about every third word, but she knew Miguel Angel was telling Carlos what color to mix.
Mrs. Crane grew increasingly irritated, twisting in her seat. Finally, she erupted angrily, “We’re in America. The least you can do is speak American.”
Carlos looked hurt. Helen blushed for the woman’s boorish behavior. Why did rude people insist everyone “speak American”? Were they proud of knowing only one language?
“We were speaking Spanish,” Miguel Angel said in a cold voice, “which is the major language of the Americas. I did not want Carlos to make a mistake. But if you wish, I will speak English. Or Helen can translate for you.”
“Never mind,” Mrs. Crane said. “I can’t wait to get back to Wisconsin, where people still speak English.”
Miguel Angel painted the woman’s roots. Carlos put her under a color-processing dryer, carefully setting the timer.
Mrs. Crane tipped Miguel Angel a measly five dollars for her hair and gave Carlos a dollar. Both were elaborately polite in their thanks. No one asked her to return.
“I’m sorry,” Carlos said, after she left.
“Why?” Miguel Angel said.
“I should have spoken English.”
“Your English is better than mine,” Helen said.
“Quick!” Ana Luisa interrupted. “King’s death is on TV.”
Helen, Miguel Angel and Carlos joined her in the prep area.
“There have been no arrests in the murder of gossip mogul King Oden,” the reporter said. “This evening, Channel Fifteen will show King being threatened with death moments before his murder. Tune in for this exclusive at—”
“Turn it off,” Miguel Angel said.
“But we want—” Ana Luisa said.
“I don’t care what you want,” Miguel Angel said, turning off the television. “It’s my TV and my salon and I don’t want to know.”
But Helen did. She wondered why Miguel Angel was so anxious to avoid the subject, and who was in that video.
Chapter 13
“Miguel Angel, I want to look like Lindsay Lohan,” said the woman sitting in his sculpted chair. She tossed her long hair flirtatiously, an odd gesture for a sturdy brunette in her forties. She had pale, unlined skin and long fingers.
Helen guessed the woman was about six feet tall and weighed close to two hundred pounds. She seemed too smart to admire an airhead actress.
“Uh, how would you like to look like her?” Miguel Angel asked.
Helen had to force herself to keep from applauding his amazing tact.
“My bangs,” the woman said, and draped her dark locks across her right eye.
“I can cut you some bangs,” Miguel Angel said. “I can also add layers for volume.”
“Would you like some water?” Helen asked her.
“Tea would be better,” the future Lindsay look-alike said. “Hot tea, herbal, no sugar.”
“Coming up.” Helen headed toward the prep area to make tea. Miguel Angel joined her to mix the Lindsay look-alike’s color.
“I want to look like Paris Hilton,” Helen said.
“Shut up,” Miguel Angel said. “I can do it.”
He could, too. Like a wizard in a folktale, he could transform Helen into the sheep-faced heiress—without the money.
Helen said nothing more. She suspected Miguel Angel was reaching the end of his patience, and she didn’t want to push him further. His temper explosion over the TV news show was unlike him. He was no tyrant at the shop and rarely yelled at his staff.
Helen poured hot water into a cup, added a chamomile tea bag and slid three thin slices of lemon on a saucer.
Why did Miguel Angel become so angry? Who was in that video? Why did Miguel Angel insist on turning off the television? Was the story too painful? Was he afraid the police had found something damning? Worst of all, did he murder King?
Helen couldn’t ask him, and he wouldn’t tell her. The subject weighed on her mind all afternoon. She went through the motions, handing clients drinks, fetching magazines, dusting and sweeping up the eternal hair. She wished the day was over.
At two thirty, Ana Luisa reminded Miguel Angel that Sandra would be in at three. Miguel swore softly in Spanish.
“What’s wrong with Sandra?” Helen asked, as she dusted a nearby counter.
“Wait and see,” Ana Luisa whispered back.
Sandra was a flirtatious divorcée in her midforties who dressed like a teenager in tight white jeans and a belly-baring top. She carried a small, silly pink purse. Her breasts and hair were artful fakes, and she moved in a choking cloud of perfume.
“Miguel Angel, I have a new man. I need to look perfect tonight,” Sandra said. “Work your magic on me, so I can work my magic on him. He’s a rich one.”
Soon Sandra was wearing silver highlight foils that looked like a crown of leaves. Each hair section had been painstakingly painted by Miguel Angel.
After twenty minutes, he checked the color, then told Carlos to remove the foil and wash Sandra’s hair. Then she was back in Miguel Angel’s chair, draped in a styling cape. He dried her hair, pulling the frizzy curls into the straight, sophisticated style currently favored by network news anchors—and nearly impossible to attain in the Florida humidity.
“Nice,” Sandra said.
Ana Luisa presented her with a bill Helen thought could have been the down payment on a car, and Sandra paid it without blinking. Then she reached into the tiny pink purse and pulled out a wad of bills.
Miguel Angel reacted quickly. “Carlos!” he ordered his assistant. “Go clean up the prep room.”
Carlos hesitated.
“Now,” Miguel Angel commanded.
Carlos looked startled, but obediently walked toward the back room.
Sandra handed Helen a five-dollar bill, then took a fat roll of cash and shoved it in the change pocket of Miguel Angel’s jeans, running her hand suggestively along his crotch. The stylist flinched.
“And there’s more for little Carlos,” she said in a husky voice, stuffing more money in the other pocket and running her hand along Miguel Angel’s zipper.
Eeuww, Helen thought. A stripper tipper. She’d heard of these women. They tended to be over forty. Some were seventy or more. They copped a feel when they tipped the stylist, as if they were at a Chippendales show.
Sandra left the salon, swinging her jeans-clad rear end seductively.
“Yuck,” Helen said. “That was nas
ty. Is that why you sent Carlos to the back?”
“Yes,” Miguel Angel said. “He doesn’t need to be molested by that woman.”
“Does she know you’re . . . uh . . .” Helen stopped, unable to think of a tactful way to continue.
“She doesn’t care if I’m gay,” Miguel Angel finished. “Or she thinks her so-called beauty will overcome my nature. She acts like I’m some sort of pet and have no feelings. I hate being touched by people I don’t like. Hate it.”
Anger flashed in his eyes. “Let me give Carlos his money,” Miguel Angel said. “At least he didn’t have to go through that.”
Helen had no doubt that he disliked the humiliating way Sandra had pawed him in his own salon. And the murdered King did more than touch Miguel Angel—he’d threatened the stylist and his livelihood. Did Miguel Angel kill the gossip columnist for that?
Half an hour later, a young model named Tara rushed in, out of breath. Yards of taffy-colored hair trailed behind her. A tiny scrap of fabric clung to her breasts. Her jeans were so tight, Helen wondered how she could walk.
“Help, Miguel Angel!” Tara cried.
“Do you have an appointment?” Ana Luisa said, barring her way.
“This is an emergency,” Tara said.
“And what is this emergency?” Miguel Angel said, sounding amused. “Should I call an ambulance?”
“You can see my roots,” she wailed, pointing to her nearly perfect hair.
Only with a microscope, Helen thought.
“You have to save me,” Tara said, as if Miguel Angel was armed with six-guns instead of hair-dryers. “I have a shoot with Gold Coast magazine tomorrow on South Beach.”
“Well, let’s see what we can do,” Miguel Angel said. “Sit down.”
Helen brought Tara bottled water and the latest issue of Vogue, then swept the floor one more time. Miguel Angel gave her a nod that she could go, and Helen left gratefully at five thirty.