C8 Hair Glam

There was a chorus of excited applause as Isabel and Cassie walked into the salon where Isabel had her night shift.

Hair Glam was a quirky little salon owned by two sisters who treated all of their staff and customers like a part of a big happy family. It was a charming salon that was decorated with varying shades of grey, blue, and gold. Two wide rectangular mirrors placed parallel to each other allowed the patrons to view their hair as it was being made. The line of midnight blue swivel chairs placed in front of the mirror was half occupied with customers whose hair was being worked on by various staff. The salon’s standing hair dryers and hair washing basins were currently not in use. The flat-screen television overhead was playing reruns of a reality television show. The room was illuminated by LED ceiling lights and tulip-shaped all lamps. In the furthest corner of the room, was a section that the patrons and staff alike referred to as the vlogging center as it boasted a faux grass-covered wall, a string of glittery fairy lights, and a short inspirational quote that changed weekly. There was a teenager currently taking pictures of her freshly done blowout in that corner.

In response to the applause, Cassie bowed and Isabel rolled her eyes at the theatrics her friend displayed.

The older of the two sisters, Robin, abandoned the long hair of the woman she was dyeing a vibrant shade of purple to envelope the two friends in a bone-crushing hug. “I’m so glad that psychopath didn’t hurt you guys.” She exclaimed. Following the events of the previous day, both she and her sister had offered to give Isabel the rest of the week off so that she could recover from whatever emotional trauma she would have experienced but Isabel had very politely turned down her offer.

“What psychopath?” The woman whose hair was being dyed replied.

“How do you not know?” The younger of the two sisters Fern asked waving a hair straightener in the air as she gestured to her customer. “Have you been living under a rock since yesterday, Maria?”

Maria, the woman whose hair was currently half covered in hair dye, shrugged. “I’ve been busy with work.”

“Well, yesterday these two.” Robin started as she pointed at Cassie and Isabel. “Were held hostage by two psychopaths that robbed a bank.”

Maria gasped dramatically, nearly falling off her chair in shock. “You don’t say!” She exclaimed as she watched Isabel tie an apron to her waist.

“I do say.” Robin declared firmly. The eyes of everyone in the salon were on her as she began to narrate the events of the previous day. “So apparently, these two guys had just finished robbing a nearby bank and the cops are on their ass so they decide to take cover and the nearest building and while they’re there, they also take hostages because, why not? Predictably, with the whole hostage situation, the cops have their hands tied so things weren’t looking good for Cassie and Isabel at the moment. But the two bank robbers were apparently idiots and thank God too as they completely forgot to search their hostages for phones. So Cassie calls the cops on them.”

“You guys are so lucky to be alive,” Maria admitted as she sank back into her chair. There was a murmur of agreement from everyone else in the salon. “What happened next?”

Isabel shrugged. “Nothing much. The cops came and saved us. Then some lady interviewed us for the news.”

“You guys were on the news?!” Maria shrieked causing everyone in the salon to wince at her shrill tone. “I’m so jealous.”

“Don’t be.” Cassie countered. “I mean being on the news is great and all but it would have been so much better if it was under a completely different circumstance. It was a blonde lady from Channel six news that did the interview, I think. They aired it last night but you can probably find a recorded version of the interview somewhere on the internet.”

Maria wasted no time in searching for the interview on the internet and then pleading with Robin, who still wasn’t done with dyeing her hair, to play it on the flat screen.

The short fifteen-second theme song of Channel six new filled the room. An immaculately dressed blonde woman flashed on the television screen. She was dressed in a modest red dress and had her freshly done nails curled around a microphone. “I’m Sarah Grant and this is Channel Six news. I’m standing here at the scene of the arrest of Robert Smith, who is a part of the armed duo who killed two security guards while robbing a bank earlier today.” The camera panned out from Sarah Grant’s face and zoomed into a very angry Robert at the back of a police car.

He was shouting obscenities and making so many rude finger gestures toward the camera that most of his words and actions had to be cut out. “In an effort to escape the law, Robert and his partner Tobias Knight took Isabel Gomez and Cassie Peters as hostages from a nearby strip club. Luckily, the two ladies are unharmed and are currently with me. Do you two have anything to say about your encounter?” The view of the camera expanded to accommodate Cassie and Isabel who had been standing close to each other.

Both ladies who had been too tired to watch the interview the previous night cringed at how awful they looked. Isabel’s makeup was smudged from how much she had been crying. A member of the news crew had been kind enough to lend her a jacket to protect her against the cold that had soon started to creep into her bones but she still visibly shivered. Cassie looked overly tired but had still tried to smile for the camera. It had ended up looking more like a loathsome grimace than a cherry grin.

“We were terrified. I cried a lot but Cassie calmed me down.” Isabel said smiling at her friend. “Then she called 911 with a phone that she had on her. It was about that time that the two guys started arguing about how to split the money that they stole.”

It was then that Cassie chipped in. “Yeah. Then Robert shot the other guy and was probably going to shoot us too then the cops intervened and here we are.”

Maria paused the video and hugged her tablet to her chest. The reality show rerun flashed back on the television screen. “You guys are so lucky to be alive. You should both take like a short break from that strip club until things clear up.” The other women in the salon nodded.

“Thanks for the advice Maria but we’re not taking a short break,” Cassie replied with a polite smile. “We’re taking a permanent break. We quit our jobs there.”

“No Cassie you quit your job.” Isabel corrected. “I’m still going back to Club Indigo.”

All eyes moved to the two friends. Both patrons and staff alike abandoned the drama on the television screen to watch the live drama that was unfolding right before their eyes.

Cassie blinked at her friend like she had momentarily forgotten how to understand English. “What do you mean that you’re still going back to Club Indigo?! The security of that place is absolute shit and Big Daddy is a complete asshole. Do you know that he called me last night to demand that I pay him for the drinks I spilled and the glasses that I broke when the shooting started? Apparently he’s going through the security footage of the club to see everything that happened so that he can collect money for anything that anyone spoilt.”

“I know. He called me last night to ask for his cut for the money that I made last night. He was pretty upset when I told him that I didn’t have any of the money that I made from last night.” Isabel explained with a bitter laugh.

Cassie made a disgusted face. “Then just get a job elsewhere.”

“I can’t just get a job elsewhere Cassie. Unlike you, I didn’t go to college. I can only do two things for money: stripping which eventually leads to fucking and making hair. I’ve got no other talents. And you know how hard it is to find a job in this economy. If I leave Club Indigo, who knows when next I’m going to get another job? I have bills to sort out, medicine to buy, and debts to repay. I need the money that Club Indigo brings in.”

“I understand,” Cassie said after a minute of tense silence. She looked at her friend with unbridled sadness. She had taken a huge risk by quitting Club Indigo but unlike Isabel, she had a university education and could possibly get another job if she searched hard enough.

“I should get going.” She mumbled as she checked the time on her watch. She was already late for her shift at The Bean House. As she had quit her job at Club Indigo, she couldn’t afford to be late to the Bean House.

“I thought you came here to get that horrible thing fixed,” Indigo said as she gestured to Cassie’s hair.

Defensively, Cassie ran her hand through her hair. “No. I came here to see you off. Nothing’s wrong with my hair. You’re the one that did the dye job.”

Exasperated, Isabel sighed. “Dyeing your hair is one thing Cassie; that’s my job. But maintaining whatever magic I work is your job. And you’re doing a terrible job of making your hair look like actual hair. It looks like the hide of a mangy dead rat was super glued to your head.” Isabel joked.

Cassie huffed but there was truth to what her friend was saying but so as not to further make herself late for work, she said her goodbyes and left the salon.