The Bread of Angels

It only took a second for my life to change. It was the second I stepped into the hair salon on an otherwise ordinary August day, never imagining it could pull the thread to unravel my existence.

Laminate wood floors and an open floor plan met me as I opened the door to Hair Nation, a training school for cosmetologists. A student at the reception desk offered a welcome, and after taking my name, she sent me to a row of chairs. I grabbed a magazine from the rack on the wall, hunkered into a seat, and started perusing.

The hair on the models was perfectly styled, of course, and their smiles lied that it would be just as easy for me to do. Page after page, I considered my options. My face was too round for a pixie; I wasn’t sophisticated enough for an inverted bob; I didn’t have enough inner turmoil for a spike, and, hopefully, I was fifty years from the short, curled grandma do.

I pushed the magazine back onto the rack as students dispersed from their huddle. At the reception desk, each student picked up her assignment card and, after calling the name, led the client to her station.

One by one, people were escorted back, and the waiting area cleared. My girl was fumbling with something in her pockets while staring at the sheet. When she finally came toward me, I realized her hesitation.

“Meghan?”

She didn’t call my name. She asked, as if to say, “Are you sure you want to do this?”

I wasn’t.

“Are you ready?” she asked flatly, as if I had purposely planned this meeting.

“Becky?” I asked pensively.

“You’re Ben’s wife, I assume.”

For all of my married life, and for a few months before I was married, Becky was a name and a person to be avoided. She was the only other human to have known my husband in the biblical sense. It was a cruel joke, one that left me wrestling with God. He, working through the powers that be, had assigned my newly pastored husband to her hometown, the only town that had in its clutch the leverage to make his ministry ineffective.

She led me to her chair, shook out a folded black cape, and wrapped it around my neck, no doubt considering how long of a prison sentence she might face if she strangled the life out of me.

It had been nearly five years since I saw her briefly in a restaurant in Ben’s arms. She had been slender then, with long, dark hair and glasses. She was heavier now. Her hair was short with sideburns and a whole lot of rebellion on top.

“What were you thinking?” she asked matter-of-factly.

Did she not realize I had no say in our destination, that if it were up to me, we’d be at least a thousand miles from here in any direction?

“Your hair,” she said, pulling me from my thoughts.

“I’m not sure,” … I want to be here, I confessed. In truth, I was very sure I did not want to be there. “I was hoping for something easy that looks halfway decent.”

“Do you want to keep your length?” She was all business now.

“I like to put it up when I run.” Not that she cared.

“What color highlights did you want?”