Louise and The Men of Transit

Same Curls

Louise settled herself into the salon chair with its black leatherette seat and back and its leatherette-padded tubular steel arms. Her feet, shod in their sensible walking shoes, found their place on the steel footrest that angled out from the chair. She was talking already. Marvyn whipped an enormous nylon black apron over her front and velcroed it neatly behind her neck, their black eyes reflecting in the mirror opposite them into Louise's brown ones. Louise nattered to their reflection: "It's an amazing job, Marvyn. I can't believe I landed it."

"And so quickly, too," Marvyn murmured as they pulled their cart closer to the chair and selected a comb from the funky blue jar of Barbicide. They flicked it dry as Louise chatted like a Christmas train steaming to the party. "Yes! It was so quick. I can't believe it. I have to pinch myself every morning. You remember how I was saying to you only last week when I was here —"

"For your weekly trim," Marvyn murmured into Louise's flow.

"— and I still had no job. I didn't think I'd get one after three months — three months! I've never been jobless for so long, but that was because the right one hadn't come along. The right one was the one I've been searching for. Oh Marvyn, I finally got it! I got into the TTC. It's my dream place, and I'm there. I'm there, Marvyn, I'm there!"

"I know, sweetheart, I know. Now let's focus on your cut for a second. You want your curls trimmed today or let's let them grow out a little bit, put a little lazy corkscrew into them, hmm?"

"No, I like them the way they are. They landed me this wonderful job. My haircut must've been perfect. You always make me pretty, Marvyn. You cut my hair like no other." Louise paused as memories of frizzy and flat cuts rose their ugly heads into her mind. Louise shook her head free of the memories, pulling her curls out of Marvyn's contemplative comb.

Marvyn said, "You need never worry about a bad cut again, sweetheart. I've got you."

"I know. I know, Marvyn," Louise affirmed to Marvyn's reflected alabaster face with their finely arched eyebrows, long, long eyelashes, enormous dusky eyes like the juiciest black amber plums, and delicate mouth subtly turning up at the corners. "And now I'm at a job that has me, too. It's like the best job ever!" Louise threw her arms wide, the shiny apron slithering down her outstretched arms and revealing her dark brown sweater sleeves underneath.

"Come with me, dear. We're doing shampoo today."

"Okay." Louise hopped out of the chair and followed Marvyn past the cold, sooty Victorian fireplace with its three-tiered bronze grate in front of it, past the other two chairs, empty of customers, to the far end where the black porcelain sinks sat waiting for heads to be shampooed and conditioned. Louise turned and sat down, her back to the sink, and Marvyn, with their right hand on Louise's neck back, gently guided her head backwards into the bowl. They turned the tap on and water gushed out, deafening any conversation. Louise closed her eyes and breathed into the pleasurable experience, of the warmth of the water soaking through her hair, of Marvyn's hands massaging shampoo through her curls, their fingertips squeezing into her scalp then softly rising up before descending again over and over rhythmically, as Marvyn found the right spots on her head to gently push down on, releasing tension, releasing memories, releasing worries. Louise purred within herself and drifted off to visions of being the person in the Head Office that the TTC team looked to for wisdom and customers to for their convenience and safety.

"Up you come," Marvyn interrupted her dreams as they wrapped Louise's hair in a small rectangular white towel like a shrunken turban. Placing one hand on Louise's upper back, and one hand on the chair arm to push it towards themself to bring the chair upright, Marvyn helped Louise sit up. Louise blinked and returned to the reality of the black-painted salon with its gold-brushed dentil cornice mouldings and picture rails, its window- and fireplace-reflecting wall-length mirror on her right, and its arched mirrors that faced every chair on her left. Spidery chandeliers with delicate gold arms and tiny exposed LED lights hung along the ceiling, all in a row, over the chairs. Semi-translucent covers let LEDs glow around the chair mirrors. Marvyn waited, hands clasped in front of them, while Louise returned to reality.