The Aftermath Of You

Chapter Twenty

How could so much go wrong in such a short space of time? Drawers were yanked open with force and disembowelled, their innards spewed across her lurid mats. Toni scrabbled for scissors. Blue goo smothered the roots of her hair and a good fifteen inches more - then she'd run out of bleach. The large dreadlock at the back of her head remained untouched, leaving Toni with two options: wait till hair turned lovely blonde shade, wash out goo, pull on beanie and skulk back to grocery store, or option two (which she'd taken to like a duck to water) - cut the black bits off. Finally she wrenched a pair of poultry shears out of the drawer. Granny Smith had told her they were all the rage for making those fiddly little chicken stir-fry's, and then showed her on a chicken wing how sharp they were. But it made Toni feel slightly ill and she'd never used them again.

Now she picked them up and brandished them at the light. They had found their reason for existence! She picked a bit of dry chicken skin off the blade, and then snip, snip, snip - chunks of knotted black hair fell to the floor as her heart fluttered. I'll leave the front bits long, it will give the illusion of length, she decided. She could hardly breathe, she was so nervous.

The phone rang as Toni was hiding her shorn locks in a plastic bag. "Hello?"

"GRANDDAD SAYS YOU'VE CUT YOUR HAIR OFF," Granny Smith cried.

Toni peered out the window; she wouldn't put it past Granny Smith to be out on the street in surveillance mode. "Does he like it?"

"HE THINKS YOU SHOULD PROBABLY GET SOMEONE TO TIDY IT UP A BIT. ANN MALCOLM'S DAUGHTER TRAINED AS A HAIRDRESSER YOU KNOW." Two subtle clues interwoven meticulously in one sentence: "See a hairdresser" and "hairdressing could be a suitable career". Granny Smith ought to have a PHD in Subtle Hints.

Toni caught sight of herself in a nearby mirror. "It is a little orange. But it kind of has a sci-fi look about it. Sexy, edgy, you know?"

"OH," Granny Smith shouted doubtfully.

"I think it could become quite fashionable."

Her hair was mostly a bright shade of tangerine, but closer to the roots where the hair had become nice and warm it was a light blonde color. The two bits in the front reached her waist. At the top they were pale straw, and they then went through every shade of orange until they reached the rusty black ends. It wasn't what she'd wanted, or expected – but what was meant to be was meant to be, right?

Jack was impressed with my hair cut. "It's awful," he breathed proudly. "It's like you've been attacked by a shark!"

The fringe was cut far too short to be fashionable and the bob was too long to be sexy. It had a choppy look to it that under other circumstances no one could possibly achieve. "And the colour!" he exclaimed.

"Do you like it?" I'd asked in interest. I was eating a fairly big Snickers bar and there was chocolate all over my teeth.

"You look like a mad scientist," he exclaimed. "I love it."

I blushed at his high praise and lowered my eyes modestly. I had decided once and for all to get rid of the long black locks. I was struggling to find a proper job with my long black hair and white, sun-reflecting skin. Clearly all of the prospective employers thought I'd skip work as soon as a metal band came to town.

"Purple is completely your colour, and the orange streaks are very you. Do you know that you have exceptionally red cheeks?"

I nodded because I knew. As soon as I'd let the crazy woman attack my head with a bottle of purple paint and a bowl of peroxide I had my first glimpse of my awfully red cheeks. Or exceptionally red - as Jack had said... he always made things sound amazing. Whereas most people said things with coloring pencils, Jack said things with the brightest acrylic paints he could find.