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“How’s the water temperature, Carol?”
“It’s fine,” Carol said. “I mean… it’s good. Nice.”
She was bent forward over the kitchen sink, a towel around her shoulders, as Zosia gently guided her head under the tap until her hair was soaked. Carol hadn’t had a haircut in well over a month and it was starting to get longer than she liked, brushing just past the tops of her shoulders.
“We can give you a haircut,” Zosia had said that morning, and Carol had agreed, because of course they could. They’d do anything if they thought it would make her happy. Besides, what else did she have to do that day.
It had only been two days since she used a long-handled paint roller to scrawl COME BACK across the cul-de-sac. Two days since Zosia had waited patiently at the end of the driveway as Carol slowly walked toward her. Two days since she’d thrown herself at Zosia, her body clutching desperately at another, the first she’d seen in weeks, the closest she’d gotten to anyone since…
Carol had been touch starved before but she had no idea it could be like that. Thirty-six days of golf and firecrackers and howling with the wolves. More than a month with just her thoughts and the only means of escaping them blocked by her own stubbornness.
And when Zosia’s arms had come up around her, keeping her close, thumb rubbing gentle circles across her shoulder, occasionally brushing her cheek, Carol couldn’t help the cry that finally escaped her lips.
Zosia was warm and smelled of vanilla and sandalwood, and Carol broke the surface of her own isolation by taking great gulping breaths and pressing her nose to Zosia’s sweater. Zosia’s lithe figure was surprisingly steady and strong as she held Carol up. Her even heartbeat and measured breaths were reassuring and grounding. Having Zosia wrapped around her felt like a life preserver. It scared Carol, just a little.
But not enough to pull away. Zosia practically had to carry her back into the house and she’d barely left Carol’s side since. Carol was always reaching for her, making sure she was still nearby. Sick of the sound of her own voice, she let Zosia fill the silence with inane fun facts—about Golden Girls, about the social hierarchies of pack animals, about the geography of beautiful places Carol had never been, about rule variations to popular lawn games, about the history of fireworks…
The first night Carol almost couldn’t sleep, she was so sure she’d be alone by morning. It was only after Zosia lay down beside her and laced her fingers through Carol’s, letting their hands rest on the sheets between them, that she’d finally been able to drift off. In the moment, she hadn’t even had the emotional capacity to think about how it should’ve been Helen next to her in bed.
Now, Zosia’s slender fingers massaged the mint and eucalyptus shampoo into her scalp, working the lather up to thoroughly coat her blonde tresses before turning the water back on and carefully easing her under the tap to rinse. As she started on the conditioner, Carol let herself relax a little more, leaning heavily on the rounded porcelain edge of the sink. Zosia was pressed against her right side, warm and comforting, and Carol realized she felt overwhelmed in the best way.
Somewhere between the moment when one of her golf balls shattered the thirteenth window of the office building downtown and the split second when the firecracker whizzed by just an inch from her head, Carol had started to understand the true magnitude of her loss. And while she knew she could never save Helen and that saving the world was going to be far more difficult than she’d previously allowed herself to acknowledge, she could, at the very least, swallow her pride and save herself.
And so she’d gone from the parched wasteland of her loneliness directly into this soft, lush domesticity with Zosia, who Carol knew nothing about except that she looked like the supermodel pirate lady version of Raban who had once only existed in her dreams. Oh, and that she was also the entire world. And also that Carol had almost killed her. Four times.
Even after all that, Zosia had come back. As the one chosen by the hive to connect them to Carol, she likely had no choice in the matter. Carol, utterly repentant and still drawn to Zosia as she was, didn’t quite know how to feel about that.
With practiced ease, Zosia moved the towel from Carol’s shoulders and wrapped her hair up in it, twisting and tucking the soft terry cloth into place at the nape of her neck. Carol stood upright and felt her handiwork as she tilted her head side to side, working out the stiffness from the awkward position over the sink.
“I guess you’ve done this before,” Carol said.
Zosia laughed. “We have had some practice, yes.” When Carol offered up a smile small enough for plausible deniability, Zosia nodded toward the hallway. “Upstairs?” she asked.
“Ah. Yep.”
Carol led the way up and through her bedroom into the primary bath, where Zosia had already set out the necessary tools: scissors, clips, brushes, blow dryer. Carol sat on the low barstool that had also been procured for the occasion. Zosia settled a larger towel around her shoulders before pulling loose the one wrapped around Carol’s head. Damp hair tumbled down, and Zosia smiled and gave her an affectionate ruffle, causing it to stick up at all angles. Carol let out a surprised laugh.
“Are you sure you don’t want to try anything different today?” Zosia asked.
She picked up a bottle of leave-in conditioner and started lightly spritzing at Carol’s hair. She used one hand to shield Carol’s eyes from the spray when she did the front part, and Carol felt herself warm at this simple consideration.
“We could do a pixie cut,” Zosia continued. “Or you could finally try a mohawk like you wanted to as a kid!”
“No, nope.” Carol shook her head as Zosia idly combed her fingers through. “Just a trim. Same cut I’ve had for years.”
Zosia nodded and smiled. “As you wish.”
Carol watched in the mirror as Zosia worked quietly. Her regular stylist in Albuquerque had known she wasn’t a fan of chit-chat while she was in the chair, so of course Zosia knew this too. As she combed and snipped and sectioned off and snipped some more, Zosia’s expression turned into one of deep concentration. A faint smile still lingered, but occasionally the tip of her tongue would appear between her lips. Was this adorable blep some quirk of the individual Zosia breaking through? Carol was fascinated.
It was certainly better than staring at herself in the mirror. She always hated that about getting a haircut, having to either face herself head on or else keep her gaze down or let it wander the small distance it could, confined as she was to one spot and unable to turn her head.
Without fail, whenever she entered a salon, she would always recall one specific time when her mother took her for a haircut. She’d been about 10 or 11 years old, still compliant and agreeable but starting to grow into herself and slowly figuring out what she liked and didn’t like. She could vividly remember sitting in the boosted-up vinyl chair, the chemical smell of hairspray clouding the air around other patrons, the metallic swish of scissor blades as the stylist worked around her while her mother watched from nearby.
What she’d thought was a neutral expression of boredom must’ve actually been a scowl of some sort, because at some point her mother spoke up and said, “You know, it doesn’t matter how good the haircut is, darling, you still won’t be pretty if you don’t smile.”
The stylist had laughed, not unkindly, but to Carol’s young ears it was a harsh accompaniment to her mother’s words.
“‘Happy girls are the prettiest girls,’” the stylist quipped.
“Didn’t Marilyn Monroe say that?” her mother asked.
“I think it was Audrey Hepburn,” the stylist said.
Her mother had shrugged and then smiled, gesturing at the corners of her own mouth while looking pointedly at Carol in the mirror. And Carol, just young enough that she was still eager to please, had smiled back, because she wanted her mother to think she was pretty.
Carol mentally shook herself back to the present. Zosia seemed to be nearly done, checking both sides to make sure they were even. After a moment she came to stand in front of Carol, between her knees, and bent close to trim some shorter pieces to frame her face. Carol watched her dark eyes, glanced down at her full lips just as the tip of her tongue poked through.
Zosia pulled back and smiled. “Time to blow dry,” she said. She reached for Carol’s usual styling mousse and worked a small amount into the freshly cut strands. Then she picked up the dryer and used her fingers to rough dry Carol’s hair before using a round brush for the smoother finishing touches.
Again, watching her work, Carol caught glimpses of her regular stylist, in the way Zosia tilted her head just so, or how she sometimes let her gaze wander elsewhere in the room as she let the heat from the dryer set a wave of hair against the brush. But there were still quirks that didn’t feel like Zosia drawing on interchangeable personalities of individuals familiar to Carol. She hummed to herself, the note sometimes pitching just enough that Carol could hear over the drone of the dryer. She met Carol’s eyes in the mirror, just for a moment, and smiled before refocusing on her work. Her fingers pressed firmly up through the hair at the back of her skull, or gently twisted one tress until it fell just so, or softly brushed across the sides of her throat…
Carol hadn’t been able to suppress the shiver that went down her spine at that last one. As reassuring as the firm full-body press of their reunion had been, Carol craved the gentler touches too. They ignited something inside her with regard to Zosia that she still didn’t want to look at too closely.
Once that was done, Zosia stood in front of Carol again to check her work. With the tips of her fingers, she tilted Carol’s chin up and then ran her hands through Carol’s hair, fluffing it up and letting her short nails lightly scratch at her scalp.
“All done.” She moved aside and Carol met her own gaze in the mirror. Zosia went to stand behind her, resting her hands on Carol’s shoulders.
Carol, her lips pressed together in a tight line, nodded her agreement and looked at Zosia in the mirror. “Looks good,” she said. “Thanks.”
“Of course.” Zosia smiled. She moved to lean against the counter to Carol’s left. One hand reached out to tuck a few strands behind one ear and Carol found herself leaning into the touch. “You’re very pretty,” Zosia added, looking down at her fondly.
Happy girls are the prettiest girls…
Carol looked up at her and smiled back, because she wanted Zosia to think she was happy too.