Love Actually (Love By Design 5)

1

Louisa

“Damn girl. That is one hell of a dye job.” Kristen Calloway, a close friend from high school eyed up the new girl who stepped inside my shop looking like Medusa. I turned around so my eye roll wouldn’t be seen in the floor length mirrors. My business, the Vodka and Wash was my baby, and I spent every moment learning cosmetology and every penny I saved building the shop. Customer service was my jam.

I sneaked a peek in the mirror and had to duck pretending to pick up a comb off the floor. Standing up I pushed my thick black framed glasses up my nose. “Holy shit.” I muttered under my breath in half shock and half horror at the train wreck limping into my station. It was bad. Actually, I don’t think bad quantified the unexplainable frizzy disaster and unknown mishmash of color and bleached streaks. My hairdresser heart bled for the poor soul attached to what I hoped was possibly a wig, a dead animal, or a poorly executed joke.

Kristen lamely attempted to occupy herself from behind the latest issue of People magazine and another royal escapade. Her low whistle definitely did not denote appreciation and I immediately felt awful. No one with the exception of a few mean girls, the biddies who beat me at Bridge club, and my ex deserved a bad hair day.

I secretly prided myself on fixing the unfixable and making everyone who walked out the door feel and look like a million bucks. I considered myself the Countess of Clairol, The Duchess of Dyes, and the Queen Bee of Balayage. The front wall showcased my awards and considering I was a level five stylist, I commanded a pretty decent pay. Heck, in the state this walk-in presented, I would do her solid and charge her as a level two stylist if it meant fixing the horror story on top of her head.

Clearly, my altruism for good hair everywhere trumped my need for accolades.

The woman in question carried herself with a sad look that bypassed the all-night-bender with her besties and went straight to the bad hair.

Well–whatever she had attempted.

I caught her looking around nervously, a scarf wrapped around her head like a pin up girl from the forties. It did nothing to hide to the chunks of badly dyed killer clown color and bleach that had stripped the hair. Frizzy ends didn’t help the growing mound of whatever the hell was under the scarf, but curiosity ate away at me.

As an experienced hair artist, I wanted my hands all over this woman’s head. Frankly, I wanted my hands all over her period, but that was a thought for another day.

I didn’t do clients.

That was how I got into the mess with my ex. Sydney sucker punched my ability to trust and I was still unearthing myself from that legal mess.

As for the pretty woman sporting a shag carpet on her head…her skittish movements didn’t suggest she was my type. Considering she was in crisis mode, I didn’t think a conversation opener during work hours should start with, “Hey, I know we just met, but here’s my number.”

Yeah, nope, not so much.

“Help me, please!” Anxiety rolled off her shoulders like a runaway train and I pointed to the open stylist chair next to me. She barely moved inching closer.

“Girl, you got something frightening going on under there.” Gemma, my second stylist on staff hooted and ushered the girl to the seat next to my current station where Lia Faust sat, hair blown out in violet waves freshly done by yours truly.

“Where’s Tommy?” I looked around for my brother who was a highly sought after color specialist. I could use his thoughts on fixing this chemical implosion of color.

“He’s coming in later to…do Francesca.” Gemma smiled. The implication was clear. My brother had a huge crush on the slightly older woman who stopped in every six weeks between visiting her family here and living in New York City. Tommy tended to be exceptionally timely when Francesca was on his client roster, but for some reason he was missing this morning.

My assistant ushered my timid client to the chair. Gemma was harmless, but she had a brash way of barging in and I didn’t think this poor girl was up for her antics.

“Her hair or Francesca?” Snickering, Kristen chimed in over the pages of her magazine from under the dryer. I shushed her with a look and she rolled her eyes waving me off.

Who was I to judge Tommy’s obsession with the cougar that had been coming regularly for the last year. Tommy was an expert stylist who happened to be easy on the eyes. He had quite a few ladies eating out of his palm between the collection of tattoos, skinny jeans, and slightly goth apparel. Francesca Wilson was only a handful of years older than my jailbait brother. His relationship or lack there of wasn’t for me to police, but I wished those two would bang and get over it with so we

could get back to some normalcy in the shop.

I shifted my focus back to the client, “Come on over babe, we don’t bite.”

I might have thought twice about my instant attraction to the clown head sitting down, but her sharp eyes and thin angular features drew me in. There was a depth behind them I hadn’t seen in anyone before. Smiling, I patted the chair and nodded to Gemma.

“Thanks, Louisa.” Lia whirled around in the chair taking the mirror I held out. She nodded appreciatively eying the lighter violet color I added throughout her dark hair with deeper purple hues. The well blended ombre highlights made her eyes pop and gave her an edgy look.

I wrapped up my time with Lia saying, “I hope Whit likes it.” At the mention of her lumberjack boyfriend, her face lit up like a firework. She’d been faithfully coming to the Vodka and Wash since I opened and I was happy to help out a fellow girl in need of color.

“I’m not sure what he would do if I didn’t keep it up. I don’t think he’s seen me without it.” The mischievous smile told me everything I needed to know and more I didn’t want to know about my straight friend’s active sex life. I’d make sure we kept her color Purple Reign in stock and leave it at that.

“Nothing like a little refresher to boost your spirits. Now let’s see what we’ve um…got…under here.” I urged the new nameless client to take off her head covering, but she shook her head no.

“It’s really bad.” She said, her lip quivered and I shut my eyes trying to imagine other things than the instant attraction and desire to bite her plump lip.

“Err…it’s going to be hard to…” I said waiving my hand at the mess. I was puzzled since she came to my salon. I couldn’t wave a wand and make it poof disappear, she was going to have to help me out. She hesitated with those large eyes, a soft hazel color that popped from under her less than delicately arched brown brows. We were going to have our work cut out for us chiseling underneath this blank slate of marble if she let me.

It was no secret I was into chicks, had been since eighth grade and I realized Noah Pettigrew kissed like a frog. It didn’t matter that he was my prom date years later and the one and only guy I slept with. I still thought guys were toads, sexually.

I couldn’t get a read on this one, so I kept myself extra professional in case I was totally wrong. My radar wasn’t perfect after my last break up. Sydney had done a number on my self-esteem. I didn’t mind flirting, even with my straight friends, but I would never make someone feel uncomfortable. That wasn’t my style and if all I wanted was a quick hook up, I had plenty of places I could go for that and a favorite club in the city. Poaching clients was not the way I went about it and I needed to halt the hormone coaster that directed my heart careening toward bad decisions.

“Go ahead, Louisa is the best. She can fix anything.” Lia was sweet to give me a recommendation. Slowly she untied the fabric and pulled it from her head. The salon was quiet as we all held our breath.

The proverbial pin dropped.

“Ekkk, maybe not that.” Gemma squealed and ran to the front door to lock the shop up and threw the closed sign over the glass door facing the street. Sighing deeply, I agreed that no one needed to see this hair crime if we could help it, but not at hurting this poor girl’s feelings. It would be worth shutting the shop down to fix this hair disaster, besides, Tommy had his own set of keys for whenever he came in later gracing us with his presence.

“Gemma.” I warned.

My assistant scurried to the front counter and scrolled through the appointment book.

“No other appointments until 3pm.”

She winked and I huffed.