Excerpt from LOVE IS A FOUR-LETTER WORD
by Vikki VanSickle
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I make it through breakfast and most of the morning without having to revisit the double date debacle with my mom, until she knocks on my bedroom door and says, "Are you still in your pyjamas?" Followed immediately by, "It's time for a cut."
I run my hands as best as I can through the tangled mess that sticks out from my head in all directions. "I like it this length."
"A trim, then."
To the untrained ear my mother's voice seems light, but I can hear the iron in it. It's no use. I'm caught. "Okay," I agree, and follow her downstairs to the Hair Emporium.
Normally, Mom would flip on the radio and hum along (off key) as she sets up her arsenal, but today she gets right down to business. I climb into the chair. The leather squeaks under my thighs. It's the only sound in the otherwise creepily silent salon. Mom runs her fingers through the length of my hair — a little forcefully, if you ask me — barking instructions. "Tilt your head. Now to the left. Look straight ahead. Hmmm . . ."
I so desperately want to make conversation about something, anything, but the only thing I can think about is the double date, which is exactly what I'm trying to avoid, and so I don't say a word, even as Mom spritzes my face instead of my hair and digs the comb into my scalp. There is nothing worse than a silent salon. Mom says it's a sign of mistrust between the stylist and her client.
I clear my throat about a million times, but the only thing I manage to get out is, "Not too much off."
"Don't worry," Mom says breezily, "you're in good hands." She fans the apron around me and snaps it tightly around my neck. The thing about getting your hair cut is there's nowhere to go. You're trapped in the chair at the mercy of a woman with scissors. And sometimes a razor. "So. How is Mattie?"
"Fine. We had hot chocolate."
"When was this?" Mom asks.
"Last night."
"What time last night? Because I seem to recall seeing you at Pizza Hut around seven-thirty."
Well what do you say to that? "I guess it was closer to eight-thirty."
"So this is after you went to Pizza Hut . . ." Mom presses.
"Yes."
". . . with Michael . . ."
"Yes."
". . . who is your badminton partner."
"Yes."
"Interesting." Mom cuts furiously. I am worried about the amount of hair that is piling up on the floor at my feet. "Aren't you going to ask me how my night was?" she asks.
"How was your night?" I say obediently.
Mom smiles, but it's a little too maniacal to put me at ease. "Wonderful. I had a lovely time with Doug, who is just as sweet as pie. We had dinner and saw a movie. Thank you for asking."
I squirm in my seat. It's hot under this apron. "So, you're dating? For real?"
Mom stops cutting and looks at me in the mirror. "Yes. We're dating. For real. Are you dating?"
"No!"
Mom narrows her eyes. "Are you sure? Because it certainly looked like you were on a date."
"It wasn't a date. We had to use up those gift certificates, otherwise they'd go to waste. You can't not use gift certificates. . ." I trail off, painfully aware of how lame I sound.
"Will there be more dates?" Mom asks.
I shrug. "Maybe. No. I don't know. It's not like you and Doug."
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"I mean I'm not going to spend all my time talking to him or about him or bonding with his stupid dog."
Mom puts both hands on the chair and turns it so we're face to face. "What is wrong with you? So you get to go gallivanting with a boy I barely know and I can't spend a few hours with Doug, who has been nothing but kind to you? Don't I get to be happy, too?" she asks.
"So I make you unhappy?"
"Clarissa, don't do this. You're twisting my words. Of course I'm happy with you. Maybe right now I'm not ecstatic with your behaviour, but I've never been anything but thrilled about you. But I am an adult, and I get to go on dates and have fun and fall in love if I want to."
"Fall in love?" I repeat.
"Yes, fall in love. Haven't I earned that?"
"Yes," I say.
"Good. Then we agree." For a second I think that's it and she'll go back to being the stylist and I'll go back to being the client and in ten minutes I can run as far away from this salon as possible. But she continues. "Honestly, the way you've been behaving you'd think you were the most hard done by kid in the world. Have I ever, to your recollection, brought a man home for dinner?"
"No."
"Or gone out on a real, bona-fide date?"
"No."
"Exactly. You know, there are some single women out there who never let their kids get in the way of their love lives. I could have had a whole string of men, but I didn't. That's not me. This is my life, you and this salon, and that's fine with me. But then someone like Doug comes along and you think, maybe there could be something more, you know?"
I don't know. This isn't really the kind of conversation I want to have with my mother. I don't like to hear how the salon and I are suddenly not enough for her. A wild wave of rage like I haven't felt in ages washes over me and I have to grip the sides of the chair to stay calm. I'm not mad at her, not really; I'm mad at the universe or God or whatever supposedly greater power it was that poisoned my mom's body with cancer and wrecked everything. Before the cancer, we never fought like this. Before the cancer, the salon and I were enough for her, there was no Doug. So what if the surgery is done and the chemo is over and her hair is growing back; here we are, a year later, and cancer is still ruining our lives.
"Like you and Michael. What's going on there?" my mom continues. "I didn't even know you played badminton. How do you think it feels to learn about your daughter winning a badminton championship in front of someone else? I'll tell you how I felt: I felt like a bad mother."
"You're not a bad mother."
"But I felt like one."
"I'm sorry."
Mom stops cutting and sighs, looking at me in the mirror. "What happened to us?" she asks. "We used to tell each other things."
I shrug. I don't know what happened. Somewhere along the line, some things became too hard to say out loud. It's easier to not say anything at all.
Mom tucks a damp strand of hair behind my ear. "I want us to be able to tell each other things again," she says. "Don't you?"
I shrug. I start to say I guess, but the look on my mother's face is so heartbreaking that I change my mind and say as firmly as I can, "Yes, I do."
She smiles and loosens the waves of my hair with her fingers. "There. I feel better. Don't you?"
"Yes," I lie.
From Love Is a Four-Letter Word. Copyright © 2011 by Vikki VanSickle. All rights reserved.
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