Chapter 39 Georgia
Georgia
A few days later, I sit in the passenger seat of Cece’s Jeep wearing one of Tina’s wigs and holding a box of live cockroaches.
I’m the only one not too chicken to do it.
“Where did you even get a box of roaches anyway?” I ask Cece.
“The auto shop,” Cece says.
“Ain’t nothing shady available in this town that doesn’t come from that place.” Tina tsks from her spot in the back seat.
“Not that I have a single problem with you branching out from hair, but I think you’re too good for that place.”
“Well, I think you’re too good for Randy,” I say.
I can’t help myself. I’ve been back in Whitetail going on two weeks now, and it’s the first time I’ve let a single (direct)
comment about the moocher in residence slip. It’s been on my mind since Tina announced yesterday that she was officially in on the pie stand at the fair in less than a month now. She mentioned some preliminary planning she’s been up to, part of
building up her confidence, as she described it, and with every word Tina shone a little brighter. It just makes Randy a more
obvious stain on her life.
“She sure turned that on you,” Junie says to Tina.
She and Eddie must’ve smoothed things over, because they’ve been back to day dates and smiles over the past couple days.
“Honestly?” Tina raises her dropped gaze. “I’m starting to think you gals are right. I know you don’t say it outright, but
I can tell how you feel. He does take advantage. And I’m starting to get tired of it.”
Junie reaches out and squeezes Tina’s hand. “You deserve so much better. You’re as good as gold. And Randy?”
“He’s not up to snuff,” Cece adds. “Whatever help you need untangling yourself, the Good Hair Days ladies will report for
duty.”
Our focus is stolen as we pull into the strip mall that houses All-Star Cuts, the final destination for our roaches, at least
one of which I surely hope is pregnant. Aside from one shiny new storefront, the place looks mostly abandoned. Several businesses
fill the spaces, but the lights look like they’re off in a permanent way. Like there’d certainly be dust-covered merchandise.
Like they wouldn’t have change and definitely wouldn’t take a card for payment.
Most of it looks like it couldn’t survive today. Besides All-Star Cuts.
Their sign is double lit, brand new. The windows have been replaced with glass so shiny, it almost looks like a mirror. Inside,
small lights dot the space—professional, like it’s sleeping, not dead.
“Why on earth would someone open this up right here?” I ask.
Cece drives around the corner to the back alley behind the shops.
“I thought the same when I first came by,” Junie says. “But I just figured corporations use computers to figure out what locations
work. Not an actual person hightailing it out here to see for themselves.”
“Sure feels personal,” Tina says as we creep along the narrow driveway in back. “Now, what happens next with the box?”
We all look to Cece, who masterminded this stunt as payback for the lice debacle. Fortunately by now, all the Silvers have been checked and are back to regular programming. They each came into June’s for their head checks, and we promised to double-check at each future haircut.
“We can’t just march right in and set ’em loose,” Junie says.
“Obviously,” Cece says. “I was thinking we’d set it out back, where the trash is. Hopefully they’ll set up camp, and every
time they take the trash out it’ll be a roach fest.”
“Alright, here’s their back door,” I say. “I’ll drop the package—but get as close as possible.”
Cece flips her Jeep’s auto lights off.
“It’s midday. Turning the lights off is not helping anyone,” I say.
“This is my first revenge stunt,” Cece grunts back.
“Can’t say I believe that,” Tina barks in a very bold, very un-Tina manner.
“Hush!” Junie whisper-yells. “Y’all think if they hear a ruckus and a vehicle pull up out back, they won’t come out to check
the scene?”
By then the Jeep is fully entrenched in the intimidatingly slim alley behind the storefront, only feet from the back entrance
of All-Star Cuts. Each of us is silent in the shady corridor. Nerves surge through my chest as my blood pulses in loud thumps
in my ears.
Now or never.
I pop the door open and leap out, scurry to the door, and set the box down between it and the dumpster. I knock it open with
my toe and sprint back to the car.
When I’m in my seat, I turn to Cece and screech, “Floor it!”
She cackles and hits the gas, barely avoiding a tire squeal that’d give us away. We take the corner hard around the side and
to the exit. Finally, we make it back onto the main road and I breathe.
“I never knew mischief could be so fun!” Tina says.
I turn and release a joyful laugh from deep within.
Junie matches me.
And it strikes me: This laugh is one I thought belonged to Junie, one for people named June living their life at June’s Beauty Shop.
But now I have it too. It’s grown inside me during this visit, spending time among these women.
It feels like a benediction of belonging.
Proof, finally, that maybe I could make this home my own once again.
And because I know this is the moment, if ever, I say it to all of them. “At this rate I’m not sure I’ll ever be able to leave this place.”
“Music to my ears,” Junie says.
“You wouldn’t miss Atlanta?” Tina asks. “All that life you’ve got there?”
I think about what it’d be like if I just told them the truth. If I told them I never got a flashy job and that I don’t really
miss the one I settled for. If I told them I never really wanted to go, but I couldn’t let Mama’s dreams for me die like she
did.
Maybe it might feel like relief—
“If there’s anything we can rely on from you, it’s that urge to go on and make something better of yourself. Even if we don’t
like the goodbyes,” Cece says. “June didn’t build you to stay.”
And that decides it: Now is not my moment.