Halfway There (10 page)

It was a quick trip to the grocery store. I wanted to do it myself. I wanted the control. If I was going to be young again, I'd do it with my own two hands. I strode past the personal hygiene products, then the products for incontinence (stopping for a moment to wonder why Ensure was on the shelf next to the Depends), then on to the hair-care aisle. What an
incredible array of products! I began to feel a nervous ache in my stomach. This wasn't going to be as straightforward as I thought.

I looked over the options. There were too many to count, so I focused on the variations of brown. This seemed logical until I realized how many “browns” there actually are in the world: dark brown, dark auburn, medium brown, light brown, ash brown, light auburn, and on and on. It was too much. Maybe I should change the color altogether. No, that wouldn't work because then there would be even more options.

Time stood still as I stared at the seemingly infinite array of choices. Then, out of nowhere, my hand reached out and grabbed a box. Dark brown. This was it. This was the answer. I took my selection to the checkout counter and drove home as excited as a kid at Christmas.

It wasn't long before I was back in the bathroom thinking how much more fun I was going to have dyeing my hair instead of job hunting. I ripped open the box and took out its contents. They seemed innocuous enough—a couple of bottles, gloves, and instructions. I glanced at the instructions. They were pretty basic.

I stripped off my shirt and put on the gloves. With
steady hands, I shook up the mix. It was a really nice color. I started squeezing it on my head and rubbing it into my scalp. I wanted to make sure the color stayed with me as long as possible. I pulled it through my hair. I washed my hair in the color. It felt cool and made my scalp tingle. I looked up at the clock. The instructions said something about how long to leave the stuff on my head, but if half an hour was good, an hour would surely be better. I ran my fingers through my hair one more time and dropped my pants. It was time to color the lower parts as well. Once that was done, I settled down in front of the television to wait.

After about twenty minutes on the couch, I noticed some itching; then, my head felt hot. It was uncomfortable, but not really bad. I went back to the bathroom to see how the color was taking. I looked at my reflection in the mirror. Did my eyes seem a bit swollen? I scratched my head. It was starting to burn. I rubbed my hand across my forehead. This didn't seem right.

I pulled the instructions out of the trash. At the very top was a warning about allergic reactions. I looked back in the mirror. My eyes
were
swollen. There were some red blotches forming on my face. My thighs felt hot. I shimmied out of my pants.
What I saw was enough to get me to strip and jump into the shower. I wanted this stuff off my head and certainly off my crotch.

I turned on the shower. The cool water felt good on my burning scalp. I closed my eyes. When I opened them again, I realized I hadn't washed the stuff out so much as spread it all over the place. I was now streaked dark brown with rosy spots of red mixed in for good measure. To make matters worse, things were getting a bit blurry. I grabbed a towel and went to the phone.

“Beth?” I tried to keep my voice calm, but if there was ever a time I was glad to have close neighbors, this was it.

“What? You sound awful? What's wrong?”

“I'm dyeing my hair.”

“Well, what does it look like? It can't be as bad as you're making it sound.”

“Is my face supposed to swell up?”

“What? Don't answer. I'll be over in a minute. Mom's here so she can watch the baby.”

I didn't feel well. I went to lie back down on the couch. I closed my eyes.

“Oh, my God!”

“Beth?”

“We've got to get you to the emergency room. Come on, get up.”

“What? How did you get in?”

The rest of it is really a blur. The next thing I remember clearly was Ellen talking to someone.

“Hey, what are you doing home?”

“We're not home. We're at the hospital. You're
in
the hospital.” Ellen smiled down at me.

“What happened?”

“It appears, my sweet, that you weren't made to color your hair. You had the worst reaction to hair dye the doctor has ever seen.”

“I've always been an overachiever.” I sat up.

“How did it come out?” I lifted my hand up towards my head.

“Let's say, uh, it looks fine.”

“I want a mirror.”

“No, you don't. You'd rather hear me tell you about what happened.”

“Not really. Give me a damned mirror.” Ellen brought a rolling table over and lifted the top. I looked at my reflection. My face was swollen and brown. My hair was brown, black, and red. I lifted the sheets and pulled up my hospital gown.

“Yeah, the doc got a real kick out of that. They had
to give you a shave, to, ah, well, anyway—the swelling's gone down.”

I dropped the sheet and pushed the table away. I started to laugh. I couldn't help myself.

Ellen shook her head and laughed with me. She sat down on the edge of the bed.

“Something like this could happen only to you. It's kind of funny.”

“No, it's all pretty horrible, but what the hell am I going to do about it now? I guess being shaved is one way to feel young again.”

“You should have seen it with the ice pack.” Ellen touched my hair. “I'm just glad they didn't have to shave your head.”

“Now I know you're lying. I think I might have to, just to be consistent.” I cringed. “When can I go home?”

“You're out of here tomorrow.” She paused and looked directly at me. “I just want you to know that it worked.”

“What worked?”

“I don't see one gray hair on your head”—she lifted the sheet—“or anywhere else for that matter. Besides, it's a lot better than the perm you had when we first met.”

“I've known you way too long.”

“Love you too, honey.”

Getting gray hairs is inevitable. We all know it. We've all seen it. We all fight it in different ways despite knowing full well it's a losing battle. What we never hear about, what people don't talk about, is that getting older for women means that—I'm not sure how to put this—but getting older for women means we are slowly turning into men. Yes, this sounds shocking, but someone should say it. So there, it's been said. This realization started with my annual “boob squish,” otherwise known as a mammogram.

Let me be upfront. There's a lot for the technician to squish. The size of my boobs has convinced me God has a sense of humor. I mean, seriously, why does a somewhat butch lesbian need a set of double Ds? The contradiction between their size and my
personality is too much to be mere coincidence.

Anyway, I went in for my mammogram, and I'm standing there in front of what looks like a medieval torture device, half-naked with that stupid paper shirt on when the technician asks me if I've had any problems or changes in my breasts. I look down inside the paper folds. There are my breasts. They are still big. They are sagging without their necessary support and they have hair.

Oh my God, my breasts are growing hair! When did that start happening?

It shouldn't have been a surprise. I had plucked a few stray ones now and then, but who really pays attention? It wasn't until someone
asked
me if there were changes that I actually noticed. My breasts are hairy! Visions of my father's near-fur coat of chest hair floated through my mind. I looked up at the technician and tried to keep the alarm from my voice.

“Well, there are a few more hairs than I'm used to.”

“You'd be surprised how often I hear that,” she laughed and then began the process of making a sandwich of my hairy appendages between two plastic slabs.

As I waited, winced, and tried not to move, I began to wonder how far this was going to go. Should I get
electrolysis? Did I have a hormone imbalance? Just what the hell was happening?

A soothing and well-deserved Choco-Mocha iced latte later, I was at home tuning out the world with some mindless television: Blah, blah and more blah. Ellen was lying on the couch petting the cat. I think she was talking, but I have no idea what she was saying. I sat there looking at the television, not seeing a thing.

“What are you doing? Have you heard a word I said?” Ellen's voice finally made it through the haze.

“Not really. Sorry. What did you say?”

“I asked what you wanted for dinner.”

“I don't care. Are you cooking? Do you want to go out?”

“What are you doing?”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean you're pulling at your eyebrow.”

My finger stopped mid-pull. I was holding onto an inch-long eyebrow hair.

“Jesus Christ! What the hell? Hold on. I gotta pluck this thing.”

“Okay, but when you come back, let's talk about dinner.”

I went to the bathroom and rummaged for a pair
of tweezers. Not in the medicine cabinet. Not in the closet. Not anywhere.

“Where are the tweezers?” I shouted.

“In the medicine cabinet.”

“I looked!”

I heard the cat peep and then Ellen's footsteps coming up the stairs.

She stepped between me and the mirror, opened the medicine cabinet, and pulled out the tweezers.

“Now that you're here, could you pull it out for me?”

In one quick and only mildly painful tug, the offending hair was gone.

“Do you want me to do your mustache too?”

“I don't have a mustache. Why are you being mean?”

“I wasn't being mean. I got this wax kit and I want to try it out.”

“Why me?”

“Because you take pain so well.”

“We both know I suck at pain.”

Ellen smiled. It was a little scary. She was a little scary because she was already taking all the stuff out of the closet. I was trapped. I wasn't going to get out of this.

“Okay, I have to plug in the bowl to heat the wax. This is going to be so cool! Don't be scared, honey. It's going to be okay.”

Ellen pulled me close and nuzzled my neck, then pulled back. It was weird.

“What?”

“Nothing.”

“Bullshit.”

“Uh, you smell different. Musky or something.”

“I don't know what you're talking about. I took a bath this morning. Deodorant and everything.”

Ellen looked down and started stirring her witch's brew. I didn't want to admit it, but she was right. I had noticed my new aroma too. It was musky, like dry wood and wet moss. I had tried different soaps, new deodorants, better perfume. Some stuff made a dent, but nothing really lasted. I hadn't counted on someone else noticing.

“Okay, we're ready.” Ellen held up the stick, its end swallowed in thick, steaming goo. She waved it at my lips. I pulled back.

“Stand still, silly.”

I stood still. It was hot and sticky. Kind of nice, actually. It had a strange effect I was beginning to explore and maybe even enjoy when Ellen pushed
two cloth strips on either side of my upper lip and rubbed. We stared at each other. We stared at each other deeply, like two fighters pacing in a ring—one wary and the other triumphant. Her eyes twinkled.

In one quick motion her hand came up and a strip came off my lip. I fell to the floor.

“Ouch! Shit! Stop! What the hell did you do to me? What the hell was that? No! Get away from me. You're enjoying this. I hate you!” I was curling into a fetal position when Ellen sat on top of me. I brought my hands to my face. She pulled them away. I shook my head back and forth. She followed, fingered, got hold, and pleasured herself at my expense. She looked at the strips then at me.

“See, that wasn't so bad. Pretty cool, huh?” She held out her prize for me to see, which I couldn't appreciate because there were tears in my eyes. I could only nod. She said something about caterpillars I didn't quite catch.

“So, what do you want to do for dinner?” She stood up and began clearing away the portable torture device. I began to make plans to ensure that it got lost permanently.

“Let's go out. How about a burger?” I figured I could start by hiding the offending paraphernalia
while Ellen was getting ready.

“I'm good with that.”

The burger place we frequent is the aforementioned local lesbian haven on Manchester (affectionately, Man-Chaser) Avenue in the Grove, called Novak's. It's big, but somehow manages to feel like your neighborhood hangout. You know the place—the place where everyone knows your name. The food is good, and it usually never seems too crowded. This night was no exception.

We took a table in the bar area, towards the back so we could see everything. The waitress came by. I ordered a beer and so did Ellen.

“Your lip is red,” Ellen said. She wasn't doing a good job of hiding her glee.

“I suppose if you buy, I would feel better.” I picked up my beer when out of nowhere this image popped into my head: a pair of lips, wet, rosy, kissable lips, cherry Chapstick lips, leaning closer, closer—I took a drink of beer.

“Are you two ordering?” Our waitress was young. She was wearing a tight, little, tee shirt and slim jeans.

“Let me have a Novak's burger and fries.”

The tee shirt was nice, very nice. It didn't look as if she was wearing a bra.

“And for you?” she asked Ellen.

“I'll have the same thing.”

The waitress picked up our menus and turned back toward the bar. She had a nice little butt.

“What are you thinking about? I mean all day you've been somewhere else. What's going on?”

“I don't know. I can't keep my thoughts straight.”

We started talking about mundane things: work, the cats, the dog, house maintenance, the usual day-to-day stuff. Our waitress came back and replaced our beers.