“Do you want to go look?” She seemed nervous, and I wondered what she thought of being here with me, which made me realize something.
“No one has been in the kitchen since Mom died,” I said, “except for my Uncle Travis.”
Mayra took a half step back, and I heard her gasp. I stood from the stool and moved around her with my eyes on the ground. Once in the upstairs bathroom, I turned my eyes to the mirror over the sink. My hair was noticeably shorter. When I turned my head to the side and looked at it more closely, I determined it wasn’t as short as the lady who usually cut it would have made it. Actually, it was better—less of a change but still a little shorter so I didn’t have to worry about it getting too long. I was smiling when Mayra appeared in the mirror behind me.
“Is it okay?” she asked. “I didn’t take much off.”
“It’s…just right.” I looked at her eyes in the mirror and smiled back at her.
“Great!” she exclaimed. “Anytime you need a haircut, Matthew, just let me know.”
“You’d do it again?” I asked. I could kind of wrap my head around her doing it this time. After all, she was here. I was here. And I needed a haircut. Could I consider the idea of Mayra Trevino actually coming here again with the intended purpose of shortening my hair? I couldn’t fathom it.
“Of course,” she said. “I like cutting hair.”
I dropped my gaze from the mirror and thought about it, but I still couldn’t see her coming back here and doing this again. Mayra moved up beside me, and I leaned forward on the sink, grasping the edge of it tightly. If I let go, I might run. She was right next to me.
“You don’t really like things to change very much, do you?”
“No,” I whispered.
“It’s really okay, though?” she asked. “Your hair, I mean?”
“It’s really okay.”
“Can I ask you something else?”
“You just did,” I reminded her. “That was a question. Did you mean it to be rhetorical?”
Shit, shit, shit.
I shut my eyes a second. I was pretty sure that wasn’t an appropriate response. I remembered the school counselor’s voice in my head.
“Focus and concentrate, Matthew. Try to think about the response before you say it. Is it appropriate for the situation? Does it fit the theme of the discussion?”
Mayra mashed her lips together, and I felt my shoulders tense up a bit.
“I was going to ask you if you didn’t think something was okay, would you tell me it was?”
“Yes,” I said truthfully. “At least, probably.”
“Is your hair really all right?” she asked again. Her voice was full of concern and anxiety. “You can tell me if it isn’t—I can change it a bit or at least know better next time.”
“It’s really okay,” I told her. I watched my hands curl around the edge of the sink. My knuckles had gone white.
“I’m going to get going,” Mayra said as she put her hand on my shoulder.
“I’m itchy,” I said.
Mayra laughed.
“That would be from the hair I cut off, you know.”
“I know. I need a shower.”
“Well, I’m definitely going, then.” Mayra snickered and headed back downstairs.
I watched Mayra walk through the front door, waving as she left. I shook my head to clear it and then took a quick shower. My head stayed in a bit of a fog for the rest of the afternoon. It wasn’t a bad fog—just strange. I felt a little lighter or something. I cleaned up the hair on the kitchen floor and decided to do a load of laundry as well.