With songs from the sixties and seventies playing, Rita got out the Valentine’s decorations she’d found at the estate sale and went to work filling the front windows. She had just plugged in the strings of hot-pink heart-shaped lights, which looked absolutely perfect, when she spied Zinnia striding up to the salon like she was on a mission.
“We’re not open,” Rita told her after she unlocked and opened the door.
“That’s okay. I’m not here to get my hair done.” Zinnia laughed like this was funny.
“No, I didn’t think so.” Rita stepped back. “Want to come in?”
“Thank you.” Zinnia walked in with an air that seemed to suggest superiority, but maybe Rita was just being judgmental again.
Remembering what Johnny had said last week, Rita was determined to be more gracious. To break the ice, she explained about how the chairs had been recycled. “Everything had to be done on a shoestring budget,” she told Zinnia. “But it was fun. And I think my mom will be pleased.”
“Well, it’s quite a transformation.” Zinnia frowned. “But that’s not why I’m here. I have a bone to pick with you, Rita. Several in fact.”
“Really?” Rita folded her arms across her front. “What’s that?”
“I don’t like that your brother’s been sniffing around my salon, attempting to steal my patrons and flirting with my employees and—”
“What?” Rita felt immediately defensive of her baby brother.
“That’s right. I saw him out there handing out flyers. And I know that he’s been talking to Melinda.”
“Ricky and Melinda are both interested in each other, Zinnia. Surely, you can’t tell your employees who they can or cannot date.”
“And what about stealing my customers? Not to mention my employees?”
“What are you talking about?”
“I overheard a couple of my girls talking, Rita. I know that you’re trying to lure them away.”
“We’re not trying to lure anyone away. We simply want this salon to thrive like it used to thrive.”
Zinnia narrowed her eyes. “I know what you’re up to, Rita.”
“What am I up to?” Rita calmly asked her.
“You’re trying to get back at me. To get even.”
“Get even?” Rita studied her closely, watching as Zinnia nervously picked at her cuff. “For what?”
“You know what.” Zinnia put her hands on her hips and stuck her chin out.
“Are you talking about how you used to treat me?” Rita tipped her head to one side, waiting. “Back when I was still in high school and you worked for my mom?”
“Johnny told me all about it.”
Rita took in a sharp breath. Really? Was it possible that Johnny had betrayed her confidence like that? How dare he!
“Don’t act so surprised, Rita. What did you expect him to do? Johnny and I are very close. Why wouldn’t he tell me?”
Rita slowly shook her head, trying to sort out all the crazy conflicting feelings that were raging through her. “Zinnia,” she said evenly. “Why exactly are you here?” There was a long pause and Rita silently counted to ten, willing herself to remain calm.
“Look, I know I was horrible back then,” Zinnia said unexpectedly. “I can admit that much. But I was young and dumb…and besides, that was a long time ago. Can you really hold that against me all these years later? What about letting bygones be bygones?”
Rita shrugged. “Hey, I’m happy to forget about all of that.”
“Good.” Zinnia nodded with a slightly triumphant twinkle in her eyes. “And I’m sorry I was such a witch back then. But I have changed, Rita. I really have. You need to give me a second chance.”
“I’ve been trying to do that.”
“And I know you’ll be gone soon…back to sunny Beverly Hills and all your celebrity clients. Lucky girl.”
“Right…” Rita felt slightly off balance, like something about this conversation wasn’t quite on the up and up.
“All right then.” Zinnia looked around the salon again. “So you’re really not trying to get even with me?”
“I’m not trying to steal anyone’s employees or customers, Zinnia. But it’s a free country. Surely you recognize that people will come and go.”
“I suppose. But that’s not the only thing I thought you were trying to steal.”
“Really?”
“Oh, Rita, I’m not blind. I know that you’ve been after Johnny ever since you got back here. Even Marley suspects you’ve been crushing on him.”
Rita felt betrayed again—this time by Marley. She also felt confused and couldn’t help but remember how mean and manipulative Zinnia used to be. Was it possible she was doing it again? Somehow Rita had to get to the bottom of this. If that was even possible.
“Johnny has been a good friend to me,” Rita said in voice much calmer than she felt. “I never could’ve finished this renovation without his generous help. I’m grateful to him. But that’s where it ends.”
“Johnny helped you redo this place?” Zinnia looked seriously aggravated, and for some reason that was satisfying. Childishly satisfying.
“I’m surprised he didn’t tell you.” Rita studied Zinnia as she spoke. “Didn’t you wonder why Johnny had been so unavailable this past weekend?”
“We were both busy…” Zinnia glanced away.
Now Rita was getting even more suspicious. “Just how close are you two anyway?”
“I don’t think that’s any of your business.”
“Except that Johnny is my friend.”
“He’s my friend, too!”
“I know. Johnny has made it clear to me that he is your friend, Zinnia. And Johnny is a very loyal friend. He’s Marley’s friend, too. And he’s even my mom’s friend. Come to think of it, Johnny has quite a number of friends.” It was like a lightbulb was going on inside her head. “Is it possible that you and Johnny are only just friends, Zinnia, but perhaps you’re trying to make it into something bigger?”
Zinnia’s features tightened—as if Rita had hit a nerve.
“Marley gave me the impression that you have some pretty high expectations of your relationship with Johnny,” Rita persisted. “Is that true?”
Zinnia shrugged, sauntering toward the door as if she was finished with her confrontational visit.
“Or did you say those things to Marley simply because you knew she would tell me, and you knew that would make me back off…kind of like protecting your property?” Rita got in front of Zinnia, making it to the door first.
“That’s perfectly ridiculous.” Zinnia glared at her.
“What was your real reason for coming down here, Zinnia?” Rita kept her hand on the door, blocking Zinnia from exiting. “Did you think you could intimidate me? About this salon? About my brother? About future customers and employees? About Johnny? Because that’s what it feels like to me.” She sighed. “I’m happy to let bygones be bygones and to forgive and forget, but I don’t think that’s what you really had in mind. Did you?”
With narrowed eyes, Zinnia shook her finger in front of Rita’s face. “You should talk. Despite what you say, I know you’re doing all this to get back at me. You never liked me. You always thought you were better than me just because your mom owned this shop. Admit it!”
“That’s ridiculous. I’ve never—”
“You came back here thinking you could ruin my life, Rita. But you’ll see that it’s not that easy—”
“If anyone’s going to ruin your life, Zinnia, it will probably be you.” Rita opened the door. “Thanks for stopping in.” As Rita locked the door, she couldn’t help but feel she’d just been hijacked onto an emotional roller-coaster ride. But she also felt like she’d finally stumbled onto the truth. Johnny had been partly right about Zinnia being jealous of Rita way back then. But, perhaps more importantly, Johnny was no more involved with Zinnia than he was with Marley or her mother or even Rita herself, for that matter. Johnny was simply being Johnny—a good guy and a lo
yal friend. He had too much sense to get pulled in by someone like Zinnia. And, as she turned off the salon lights, Rita actually felt a small wave of pity for Zinnia. Maybe she’d changed a little since those old days, but she still had a ways to go.
Chapter 14
Rita insisted on helping with her mother’s hair and makeup on Friday morning. “I know you’ve been practicing doing it yourself,” Rita said as she ran the smoothing iron over the last strand of her mom’s platinum hair, “but it’s okay to be pampered sometimes. You deserve it.”
Donna muttered a fairly intelligible thank you. “Your speech is really improving,” Rita told her. “But I hope you won’t feel the need to converse with everyone today. I’m sure it’ll be overwhelming. Just try to enjoy. We all understand that you’ve been through a lot these past three weeks. The girls are just excited to see you.” She straightened the collar of Donna’s pale pink blouse. “You look so pretty, Mom. No one would guess that you’d recently suffered a stroke.”
Donna pointed to her limp right hand and sadly shook her head. “This…arm. Not good.”
Rita knew her mom was uneasy about being in public again. And she just wanted her to relax and feel at ease. “People only notice your arm if you point it out.” Rita picked up the fluffy blush brush, giving her mom’s cheeks one last swoosh of color. “Even your face is pretty much back to normal. Have you noticed how much it’s improved? Unless you smile really big, it’s hard to see any paralysis.”
“It’s better.” Donna gave her a small smile. “See…”
As Ricky drove them to the mall, Rita tried to play down the improvements they’d done at the salon. “As you know our budget was pretty limited,” she told her mother. “But we did our best. I just hope you like it.” As Ricky drove through the mall parking lot, Rita warned her mom that they were going to blindfold her. “I don’t want you to see it until you’re all the way in there.”
At the back door, Rita pulled out a silk scarf. “Close your eyes, Mom.” Donna giggled as Rita loosely tied the scarf around her head. “No peeking.”
“I haven’t seen it either,” Ricky admitted as the three of them went inside. “Not since I finished painting, anyway.”
“We’re just going through the back room now,” Rita explained. “And here we are in the salon.” She grinned at Charlene and Jillian and Yolanda. “The gang’s all here.” After Charlene nodded that her camera was ready, Rita untied the scarf and watched as her mother’s face lit up.
“Oh—my—oh—my!” Donna started to cry. But Rita knew they were happy tears. Donna continued to exclaim “oh my!” as she went around the salon, touching the chairs and examining everything. She was more than just pleased, she was ecstatic. And Rita could not have been happier.
“You really like it?” Rita finally said.
“Love…it.” Donna tightly hugged Rita with her one good arm. “Thank you, Rita.”
“I have something else to show you. In fact, I want you all to see this.” Rita led them up to the reception desk, where she opened the appointment book. “Eventually you will be able to enter appointment bookings just on the computer,” she explained. “But for now we can do both.” She opened the book and showed them how many appointments had been booked for the next several weeks. She pointed to Saturday. “As you can see we have a busy day tomorrow. Lots of new customers, too. So everyone will get a full eight hours.”
Donna pointed to the column where Rita had inserted her own name. “You are working, too?”
Rita grinned. “That’s right. We were so busy that I decided to take appointments, too. Hair and Now is getting back on its feet, starting tomorrow.”
Donna’s eyes filled with tears again. “Oh…my…” She shook her head in wonder. “This is good. So…good.”
As Rita closed the book, she noticed a delivery man at the door. Although the salon wasn’t officially open, she unlocked the door and was pleasantly surprised to see that he had an enormous bouquet of bright red tulips.
“Whooo?” Donna asked Rita, sounding a bit like an owl.
Rita peeked at the card. “Congratulations to Hair and Now on your grand reopening, from Jolly Janitors,” she read.
Donna slowly nodded. “J-John.”
As Rita placed the pretty arrangement on the reception desk, she told herself that this gift was simply from a business to a business—but she wished it was something more. Although she knew she didn’t deserve it.
Everyone snacked and visited for more than an hour, and Donna was holding up pretty well, making some really good attempts at conversation. But as it got closer to the time for the sneak peek party to begin, Rita grew concerned. “I invited all of your old clientele, Mom. And I’m sure they’d love to see you, but I don’t want to wear you out.”
“I don’t know…” Already Donna had declared she wouldn’t stay for the rest of the festivities, but she’d been having such a good time that Rita wanted to make sure.
“We’d love to have you stay, Mom, but if you’re tired, we understand.”
Donna looked slightly torn, but finally turned to Ricky. “Home…” she told him. “We’ll go home…that’s good.”
Everyone hugged and said goodbye and Rita reminded Donna that it wouldn’t be long before she’d be spending whole days here again. “You just need to get stronger, Mom.” She kissed her cheek. “Keep working at your exercises.”
Donna linked her arm in Ricky’s. “Yeah. I will. Ricky will help.”
The rest of the afternoon was spent meeting and greeting old customers, many who hadn’t been into the salon for years, giving them personalized tours, making them feel welcome, replacing appetizers and refilling glasses, and booking yet more appointments. By the time the last of the guests left at around six, Rita felt socially exhausted, but happy.
She took her time cleaning up the remains of the party and putting the salon back into working order. It wasn’t until she was taking a trash bag out to the Dumpster that she realized she was stranded. Because Ricky had driven them here and then taken Donna home, she was without wheels. Not only that, but she knew that Ricky was taking Melinda out tonight. She considered calling her dad to pick her up, but knew he’d be home by now, probably with his feet up.
As she went back inside, she called Marley, explaining her situation.
“No problem,” Marley assured here, “but I have to stay here until closing. I’m by myself, too, or I’d offer to run you home.”
“That’s okay. I’ll just stick around until nine.” Rita peered out the front entrance as she unplugged the Valentine lights.
“That’s two hours,” Marley pointed out. “What’ll you do?”
Rita looked out at the ice rink, where, to her surprise, several people were already skating. “I think I just found something to occupy me.” She giggled. “I will be putting myself On Ice.”
“What?”
“Skating. I’m going ice skating!”
Marley laughed.
“So, I’ll see you around nine.” Rita eagerly grabbed her coat.
“Be careful,” Marley said. “And don’t break anything.”
It wasn’t until Rita reached the On Ice entrance that she noticed the “closed” sign. Standing by the gate, she felt like the hungry kid with her nose pressed against the candy-shop window. “Are you really closed?” she asked a gray-haired man who was walking through the darkened lobby area. “I saw skaters out there and thought…”
“We’re not officially open,” he explained.
“Oh…sorry to bother you.”
“It’s just our On Ice employees and some mall employees, sort of testing it out.”
So she explained about Hair and Now’s reopening. “And it’s so fun to coincide with On Ice. I love that the ice rink is back. I used to skate here all the time as a kid.”
“You a pretty good skater?” He grinned as he unlocked the gate.
“I was okay.” She felt a surge of hope.
“Come on.” He jerked his
thumb toward the rows of skates behind him. “What size you need?”
“Elevens.” She laughed. “Yeah, I know. Bigfoot.”
He smiled as he set the skates in front of her. “I’d never call such a beautiful young woman Bigfoot. Have fun, kid.”
She did feel like a kid as she sat down to lace up her skates. She extracted her leather gloves and the silk scarf she’d used to blindfold her mom, before she deposited her handbag and boots in a locker. Tying the scarf around her chin, she realized her corduroy skirt and tights weren’t the best outfit for skating, but if she moved fast enough, she’d probably stay warm.
At first she felt a little unsteady on the slippery ice, but before long she was moving along fairly gracefully. She could feel the wide smile on her face as she swayed from side to side, gliding happily around the gleaming ice. This was wonderful, amazing—the next best thing to flying. The other skaters all seemed to be enjoying themselves as much as she was. It was like a small private party. To her delight, she still knew how to skate backward, and after awhile, she even attempted a spin and was relieved to remain upright. Skating, it seemed, was like riding a bike…one didn’t forget.
After about an hour of vigorous skating, she felt herself wearing out. She slowed down, deciding it was a good time to take a break. She was about to exit the rink when she heard someone coming from behind—and moving fast. Unsure of which side the skater would pass on and worried they might collide, she glanced over her shoulder and was shocked to see it was Johnny! In that same instant, her skates slipped and she felt herself falling backward—straight into Johnny’s path. It was going to be ugly.
Hoping she wasn’t about to wipe out Johnny, she braced herself for pain. But instead of slamming onto the rock-hard ice, she felt a strong arm swoop around her, and, as Johnny pulled her snugly next to him, she remained on her skates.
“Sorry to startle you like that.” With his arm still wrapped around her waist, he guided her to the side rail, where she stared at him in wonder.
“I can’t believe you actually kept me from falling.” She laughed nervously. “I thought I was a goner for sure—and probably taking you down with me.”
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