The Big Fudge Cake #2
“Are you going to say something to make me feel better soon?” Rebekkah asked, very calm in the way of a person who might soon throw a cake.
“Oh, yes!” Emma-Lou said, catching herself. “Rebekkah, do you know what started to make me feel better about my advancing age?”
“How old are you? If you don’t mind me asking,” Rebekkah said, already wary of the answer. After all, she knew sharing your age could be a delicate subject.
“I’m thirty. And four months,” Emma-Lou answered honestly.
“You’re thirty and four months and you own a radio station?” Rebekkah asked, despair and admiration wrestling. “And you’re an equestrian?”
“Yes,” Emma-Lou said softly. “But I’ve never won the grand prix at the Royal Agricultural Winter Fair. I’ve only come in second.”
“Okay, I’m not sure anything you say is gonna help me,” Rebekkah decided, managing to swing her legs around and steady herself enough for an ascent.
“It’s not anything I can say, it’s what Carrington can do!” Emma-Lou declared. “When I was approaching thirty, I was feeling bereft, like my prime fertility years were flying away fast.”
“I didn’t know you wanted children?” Suwarna asked with growing curiosity.
“I don’t,” Emma-Lou said. “But the thought that something like my age was going to take away my choice? Now that bothered me. Just like the thought of never entering a barefoot water-skiing competition was relentlessly tormenting me for months, keeping me awake at night.”
“Did… did you want to?” Carrington asked, half appalled, half intrigued at imagining their boss in this new adrenaline filled aqua arena.
“Oh no! I only swim in pools,” Emma-Lou assured them.
“But the idea that my age and brittle bones might not permit me to glide across a lake shimmering with the sun, like someone had scattered diamonds across its surface–in my bare feet but dancing on the water like an ice-skating queen like Tara Lipinski…”
“Or Shae-Lynn Bourne! But without Victor Kraatz,” Carrington continued, piling onto the daydream as it grew in grandeur.
“Or Elvis Stojko doing a triple Salchow… in jeans! So cool. But Emma-Lou, you’d be in your bathing suit (and a lifejacket!) of course,” Suwarna added, safety always top of her mind.
“I’m not sure what any of this has to do with me!” Rebekkah cried. “It’s my birthday and I’m… I’m not ready to be thirty!”
“As I was saying,” Emma-Lou pressed on, “there’s nothing I can say to make you feel better or to accept your station in life.
But when I was having a mini meltdown at the thought of turning thirty, I was standing here at Carrington’s desk, right where you are now and I was a puddle of tears. And do you know what happened?”
“Please tell me! What?!” Rebekkah begged.
“I looked up and Carrington was coming at me with a pair of scissors,” Emma-Lou said.
“You were gonna…?” Ronald side-eyed Carrington scandalized and intrigued.
“Oh no! I would never. I’m not a Ferrari,” Carrington said, hand over heart. “I just suggested that whenever I feel down, I do a little makeover. And I always wanted to give Emma-Lou bangs.”
“And look at her now,” Suwarna said, admiring the fringe. “That valance and drapes are to die for. Sorry. Living for it!”
“Thank you,” Carrington and Emma-Lou said together with a shared smile.
“So instead of crying into your fudge cake…” Emma-Lou suggested, turning back to Rebekkah.
“No one likes a cake that’s been left out in the rain,” Suwarna pattered, unable to resist.
“Let’s do a makeover!” Emma-Lou finished triumphantly.
“I have everything ready… just in case someone suggested this,” Carrington said, sliding a chrome caddy of tools out from under the desk like a secret weapon.
“Rebekkah, I have three sample styles for you to choose from. I took the liberty of reading through every 1999 issue of People and Us Weekly, which kept me from a lot of other work.”
“Mmm hmmm,” Suwarna hummed with a hint of judgment.
“Suwarna, am I or am I not the stylist to WWJD’s stars?” Carrington asked archly.
“You are,” Suwarna conceded.
“So, staying up on the latest trends is part of my job,” Carrington concluded.
“Rebuttal accepted. Proceed,” Suwarna said, amused.
“Though it was arduous, I have narrowed it down to three celebrity hairstyles that I’m confident will fit your somewhat long face,” Carrington said, already lifting a comb.
“I’ve been crying!” Rebekkah squeaked.
“No, I mean… never mind,” Carrington said quickly. “Okay, we could do a longer bang like Julia Roberts–a classic, very loose fringe that falls away naturally from the face.”
“Beautiful,” Rebekkah breathed.
“Or something more like Anne Heche. She’s really doing a kind of pixie cut with like… what would you call those long bits over the ears? Like the flaps on a deerstalker hat?” Carrington tilted the magazine so Rebekkah could get a better gander.
“I’m not sure…” Rebekkah answered, touching her ears subconsciously, and trying to imagine what it would feel like to have built in ear-warmers teased out of her own tresses. “Does the pixie cut have to come with the ear flaps?”
“Fair question. I’m not sure. But I also want to show you the Carrey,” Carrington said, pointing to the picture next to Anne Heche.
“Jim Carrey?” Rebekkah blinked.
“You have a very similar bone structure,” Carrington said, earnestly.
“Oh,” Rebekkah said, deciding to take that as a compliment.
“He’s doing a high and tight on the sides and then a super fun, super wacky, but also super stylish messy look on the top. If I had to choose for you…” Carrington flipped back through the magazine, but Rebekkah stopped their hand and turned back to the Heche/Carrey page.
“That one!” Rebekkah blurted.
“Really?!” Carrington said, delighted.
“I believe in you. I mean, you made Emma-Lou look like this. Gorgeous. You’re the stylist to the stars at WWJD–do it!” Rebekkah said, squeezing Carrington’s hands with encouragement.
“Okay, everyone,” Carrington said, clapping once. “Close your eyes. I work best without a lot of pressure. Wait, Rebekkah, before we start you should really make a wish and blow out your candles!”
“Yes!” Ronald agreed, enthusiastically. “Make it a good one!”
“Good thinking,” Suwarna said. “As head of parking and building maintenance the last thing we need is a fire when we all have our eyes closed!”
“Okay,” Rebekkah whispered, “Wish made and sent upon angels wings from my lips to God’s ears.” She leaned and blew; the candles sighed out in a single warm breath.
“Okay, now, everyone close your eyes!” Carrington sang. “And no talking while I work please!”
The snip, snip and clip of the scissors danced in each of their mind’s eye as they all waited with bated breath for the big reveal of Rebekkah’s magazine worthy new do. An electric clipper buzzed and hair shushed down onto the pink speckled tiles at their feet.
“Oh no,” Carrington breathed.
“What?!” Rebekkah said, freezing.
“Nothing. Nothing!” Carrington lied, their lips a thin, straight line across their worried face. “Keep your eyes closed!”
More scissor work and clipper buzzing busied around Rebekkah’s head. She tried to think good thoughts, but the worries started to push their way through the affirmations. She held onto the chair arms tightly and finally couldn’t help herself from asking, “Are you or are you not a real stylist?”
“I’m a receptionist! With great style!” Carrington said brightly.
“Okay, I really am very excited to see your work. I trust you, I just, you know, get in my head from time to time,” Rebekkah laughed self-consciously.
“Obviously, it’s important that my hairstyle is iconic.
I’m representing WWJD, after all. I’m in a position to really influence a lot of young people to possibly give up their pagan ways.
Teens and tweens and cool twenty-somethings who will look up to me and think, ‘I want to be like her.’ I was thinking, it would be cool if Trinity could get a few billboards around town, or bus shelter posters, or maybe we could work with some local restaurants to have flyers tucked in with their delivery meals?
Oh! Japheth works at Saddles ‘n’ Spurs, there’s an easy ask! ”
Her mind drifted back to the haircut and realizing the clipping and buzzing had halted, Rebekkah whispered, “Are you almost done?”
“Uh… I don’t think I should do any more,” Carrington admitted, swallowing.
“What does that mean?” Rebekkah demanded.
“Do you like hats?” Carrington offered.
“Carrington!” Rebekkah yelped.
“Hats are going to be very 2000,” Carrington insisted. “In the new millennium, everyone will be wearing hats.”
“Can we open our eyes now?!” Suwarna asked, voice light, hands already lifting away from her face to peek.
“Maybe just keep one shut and squint a little with the other,” Carrington advised. “If you do, she looks just like a mash-up of Anne Heche and Jim Carrey.”
“Cool!” Ronald said, genuinely delighted at the idea of a hairstyle mixtape.
“What?!” Rebekkah cried.
“I forgot which reference photo I was looking at!” Carrington confessed. “So, you have the high and tight and messy look over here… and on this side you kind of have a Pixie cut with those ear flaps. Well flap. Just one flap.”
“That is awesome!” Ronald said, grinning with his dimple as deep as it could possibly go.
“Really, Ronald?” Rebekkah said, narrowing the one eye she’d been told to open.
“I’ve never seen anything like it. Carrington, you’re a genius,” Ronald said, and Carrington’s pinched smile relaxed half a notch.
“I can’t trust Ronald, he’s all gooey eyes for Carrington!” Rebekkah muttered. “Japheth, don’t lie to me. How bad is it?”
“You were very eager, so I wasn’t going to say anything to stop you, especially on your birthday,” Japheth said gently, “but now I wish I had!”
“What? What were you going to say?” Rebekkah asked, bracing herself tightly on the arms of the chair.