Chapter 11
ELEVEN
KIRA
I barely have time to shove some breakfast salad in my mouth before I make it to the skin place. That’s how I think of what I put myself through on these days: skin, hair, make-up. It takes all day long.
And yes, I said breakfast salad .
I’ve sat through enough lectures from my mother about how antioxidants from greens are simply required for glowing skin. Theoretically, I would have been just juicing all week, but I decided a long time ago I’d only put myself through the bare minimum when it comes to showing up to these rituals for my mother. I was ED-adjacent all through high school because of that woman, and I’m not going back there just because she loves control and has never cared what it’s done to me.
As I sit back and allow a woman to pluck and tweeze the life out of every stray hair on my face before applying a light chemical peel, I remind myself—it’s just today and a couple more times before the wedding.
“You really should have come in at the beginning of the week,” the aesthetician says with a frown. “There’s a lot of sun build-up here, but I’m only going to be able to get the top layer off because you need to be make-up-ready tonight.”
“I’ll remember that for next time,” I mumble through the mask on my face.
I’m going to have to employ my breathing exercises because god knows Carol’s going to keep testing me. Especially with the fucking dress. She literally ordered a size smaller than I am and told me to get my body wedding-dress-ready to fit into it. She recommended Piloxes, the newest thing. It’s a mix of pilates and boxing, apparently.
I only barely kept myself from telling her to fuck off. I just have to play nice a little longer. Eight more weeks, and then I’m free.
Truly free. No more of these bullshit games.
“Just tell your mom we could only do so much. I know this is a really important day for her, and she wants you to look perfect.”
I barely stop myself from rolling my eyes. Instead, I smile and nod like the obedient little girl I am. Appearances, Kira Belle . I can all but hear Carol’s voice in my head. Always keep up appearances.
Of course. It’s an important day for Carol . Then again, she is the one paying these women. And she’s the regular, in here every four to six weeks for peels, Botox upkeep, lip filler, and god knows what else women are doing to their faces these days.
Just get through today .
“You know we could fix these little lines here.” The woman brings a mirror up and points at my forehead.
I frown at her.
“Exactly, these lines here and here.” She uses her gloved hand to point at small lines that have popped up above my eyebrow.
“That’s because I’m frowning at you. I’m making an expression. I’m only twenty-two. I don’t have wrinkles yet.”
She tilts her head at me sympathetically. “Those grooves will only get deeper as you age. Many of our clients are taking preventative measures. We can make you as smooth-faced as you were at sixteen and keep you that way. It’s just a couple quick injections.”
How about I take that injection needle and stab you in the eye? Stab. Stab. Stab. Stab. Stab.
I push the mirror away. “No thanks.”
“Are you sure? I noticed that your lips are on the thinner side, too. A lot of mothers and daughters are concerned about keeping the family resemblance similar. We could do some filler, and you’d only be a little sore for tonight’s dinner.”
Now I know that’s bullshit. I’ve heard from friends that lip filler hurts like a bitch.
“No thanks,” I say more firmly, fuming internally. I’m sure Carol put them up to this. Family resemblance, my ass.
I can barely sit still for them to finish applying the other million-and-a-half products they scrub, spray, and massage onto my skin.
Finally, it’s time to go.
They shove a cold green juice into my hand on the way out. “Per your mother’s request,” says a perky little blonde in the white uniform and cute little pink apron. “Have a pampered day!”
Isaak is on my heels as we exit. He waited in the hallway outside the small, curtained-off room where they do facials only because there were no windows inside. I obediently put the straw in my mouth and suck on the honeyed wheatgrass, which is just as disgusting as it sounds.
“Did that lady just wish you a happy diaper day?”
I snort and almost spray my green juice. “No, it’s a day of pampering. You know, getting your face and hair done. Doesn’t my face look different?”
I pause on the sidewalk and turn my face to him.
His nose scrunches. “I dunno. Kinda shiny, I guess.”
“Just goes to show,” I huff, shaking my head and stomping toward the car my mother sent to chauffeur me around for the day. “Women scrub and pluck themselves numb for the male gaze, and you can’t even tell the difference.”
I yank open the back door of the car just as the chauffeur comes around to open it for me and scoot in. Isaak follows me, making me move further across the back seat.
“Seems like a whole lotta torture when I thought you were gorgeous asleep on my chest this morning.”
I balk, my mouth dropping open. I see the chauffeur’s eyes catch mine before he shuts the door behind Isaak. I smack Isaak on the shoulder.
“Now Carol’s going to hear that. Thanks!”
Isaak’s head swings around to where the chauffeur disappeared to walk around to the driver’s seat. “Shit. Sorry.”
“Plus,” I hiss. “You didn’t tell me I was sleeping on you again.”
“Again?” he smirks. “So it’s happened before? You can’t help climbing me in your dreams, huh, Red? What’s your subconscious shadow self got to say about that?”
I make an offended noise even though inside, I’m a little chuffed. He actually listened to my lecture? I thought he was just there assessing threats.
“Don’t say anything else about it,” I whisper right before the driver gets back in the car. I glare at him to make sure he gets my point, and he nods, hands raised in surrender.
I don’t stop glaring. He loves getting under my skin and I just bet he’d think it was funny to keep saying things to get me in trouble. He doesn’t realize what Carol’s really like, and I seriously don’t need any more stress tonight than I’m already dealing with.
“I’m serious,” I bite out under my breath.
“I got ya, Princess,” he whispers back.
I stomp on his foot for that. He looks at me, eyes big, but then he chuckles and leans back in the car with his hands relaxed behind his head.
Ugh, he’s not exactly man-spreading, but does he always have to take up so much space ?
He stays quiet a couple blocks over to the hair salon, though. Quiet, but he’s still such a big, looming shadow over my shoulder as I check in for my appointment.
“And, uh, who’s… this?” the cute brunette receptionist behind the counter asks.
“I’m her personal protection officer,” Isaak answers for me, leaning in with an elbow on the counter and flashing his white teeth in a flirty smile at the receptionist. “What’s your name?”
She blushes and starts acting like a flirty idiot right back, reaching out to brush her fingertips across his muscled forearm. “I’m Lana. Wow, so you’re like a bodyguard?”
Isaak just keeps grinning. “That’s right.”
“Cringe,” I mutter under my breath as my stylist waves me over to one of the open stations behind the counter.
The next two hours include a painfully slow balayage process involving what feels like a million little pieces of foil that start to weigh my whole head down. After a few aborted conversation attempts—I’m in no mood—the stylist just comments here and there, “Whoa, you’ve got a lot of hair.”
Yeah, I’ve got a lot of hair, and it feels like she’s putting about ten pounds of foil on it.
“Are we almost done?”
“Nope. Got another fourth to go.”
I try to slump down in the seat, but she immediately chirps at me. “Sit up straight.”
So I do, and she continues working her way around my head.
Once all the foils are finally in, she tells me to go sit under the heat lamp, where I have a direct line of sight to Isaak, still flirting with the receptionist. He stands off to the side whenever a customer comes through to check in or pay, but otherwise, he’s got his damn elbow on the counter, regularly eliciting the most godawful high-pitched giggle out of Lana that I’ve ever heard.
Meanwhile, I’ve got ten pounds of torture metal on my head that—oh yeah, did I mention?—is currently being set ablaze by the damn heat lamp thing they’ve now got me sitting under.
“This is kind of hot,” I mention, calling out to the salon at large.
No one seems to hear me.
By the time I finally flag someone down, my head feels on fire.
“Oh, you should have told someone sooner,” says the stylist as she pulls me over to the hair wash station.
I can only glare at her at this point as another trilling giggle from the front sets my teeth on edge.
The stylist quickly pulls all the foils off my hair, which at least feels like a relief. It’s even better when she starts to wash it. Okay, this part feels nice.
The stylist takes me back over to her station with the towel on my head.
“Your mother sent a picture of the updo y’all want. Is that still the plan?”
She sets up a picture on the vanity. I barely glance at it.
“Whatever she’s picked is fine.” It’s always easier to agree than fight her. I pick my battles and hair isn’t one of them.
“Wonderful.”
She proceeds to blow-dry and straighten my hair with a flat iron. Ugh, I should have paid more attention to the picture. I’m pretty sure the woman in the picture has naturally straight hair. Of course, Carol would choose this style. I hate straightening my hair.
Carol adores it straight. If she had her way, I’d do this bullshit all the time.
The stylist can’t help murmuring about what a lot of hair I have several more times as she works her way through the mass of wet curls, spraying shit on it as she goes.
What a lot of hair you have, what a lot of hair you have, what a lot of hair you have, what a lot of hair you have, what a lot of ? —
“Are you alright, hun?”
She’s looking at me like I’m crazy, straightener in hand. Shit. Was I looping out loud? I only do that when I’m really fucking off.
What a lot of hair you have . I squeeze my lips together and jump up from the chair, finally managing to blurt, “Bathroom!” before sprinting off to the restroom in the back corner of the shop.
When I’ve got the door closed, I collapse against it, the frantic nonsense whispering immediately starting up. “What a lot of hair you have. What a lot of hair you have. What a lot of hair you have.” I stare at myself furiously in the mirror but can’t stop. “What a lot of hair you have.”
It gets faster and faster, becoming more of a nonsense string of sounds as I sit on the closed lid of the toilet. “What-a-lot-of-hair-you-have, what-a-lot-of-hair-you-have, what-a-lot-of-hair-you-have, what-a-lot-of-hair-you-have, what-a-lot-of-hair-you-have, what-a-lot-of-hair-you-have.”
My hands squeeze into fists, and tears burst out of my eyes as I fight the stupid compulsion. “What-a-lot-of hair-you-have, what-a-lot-of-hair-you-have?—”
A knock on the door startles me mid-whisper.
“Busy!” I call, swiping at my stupid tears.
“You okay in there, Red?”
All the air whooshes out of my chest at his voice, and when I suck in my next breath, it fills my chest all the way back up. My fists unclench and I’m able to take in several more deep breaths.
“Fine,” I call back. I stand up and make it to the door, breathing deeply again as I go.
I crack it open, and Isaak’s concerned face is on the other side.
He frowns as soon as he sees me. “You sure you’re okay?”
“Can’t a woman piss in peace?” I snap at him and shut the door in his face.
But just seeing him has calmed me down even more, and I lean my forehead against the closed door, knowing he’s still on the other side, and continue to breathe.