LITMIR.BIZ

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Day,” Sarah joked.

      The girl gave her a long look. “It’s Valentine’s Day.”

      Sarah smiled. “I wondered if Debbi is available.”

      The blonde regarded Sarah doubtfully. “Are you a client of hers?”

      “Not yet.”

      Moments later she was escorted to a chair at the far end of the room and seated before a mirror. A towel was draped around her shoulders. Debbi would be with her in a few minutes, she was told. A blond stylist to Sarah’s left, in red jeans and a fluffy white sweater, was telling a customer that Valentine’s Day was the sole reason more babies were born in November than in any other month. To her right, the topic was those clueless types who walk into restaurants on Valentine’s Day without reservations expecting to get a table. “That’s my husband,” someone said. “We’re going to end up eating pizza tonight, just like we did last year.”

      Sarah had the strange sensation that she’d landed from some distant planet. Was an aversion to beauty shops genetic or learned, she wondered. Maybe both. Her mother had once calculated the time and money saved over a ten-year span by wearing her own long, untrimmed hair in a knot at the nape of her neck and allowing it to turn iron-gray

      Debbi smiled when she saw Sarah. “I didn’t think you’d really come by. I thought you were just being polite.” In the mirror, her face above Sarah’s was round and doll-like, smooth pink skin framed by a dark shiny bob. Her own face looked angular, Sarah thought, her skin tanned but on the verge of leathery. She felt a tug of guilt for neglecting it. Maybe Debbi had something for rejuvenating forty-two-year-old faces.

      “Wow, how long did this take to grow?” Debbi asked, lifting the heavy braid.

      “Forever. I keep thinking I want to do something different, but I don’t like messing around with it. “

      Debbi’s lip jutted thoughtfully as she unbraided Sarah’s hair. “I could cut some layers into it. Maybe put in some highlights to give it body.” She made a few exploratory moves with the comb. “And you’ve got some gray.”

      “Cut it all off and dye it…fuchsia,” Sarah said, only half joking, then lost her nerve. “You know what? Just trim the ends.”

      “You don’t want me to cut a little more? Shoulder length would look good on you.”

      “A trim’s fine for now.” After Debbi had finished shampooing and escorted her back to the chair, Sarah spotted the row of pictures in Lucite frames on the narrow shelf beneath the mirror. Most were of a dark-eyed toddler with a mass of black curls. “Your little girl?”

      “Yeah.” Debbi smiled as she went to work with the scissors. “Alli. She’s two. The terrible twos they say.”

      “How is she?” Sarah asked, recalling Curt’s comment about an intestinal problem.

      “Pretty good. She gets a lot of tummy aches, but Curt said it’s because I feed her too much processed food. He’s so smart. He wanted to be a doctor, but he doesn’t have the patience to sit in a classroom all day. Plus he’s totally turned off to the way most doctors think.”

      “I got that impression,” Sarah said wryly.

      “He’s a really good dad. I mean, he loves Alli to death. But he’s got this idea that he can treat anything that comes up and sometimes it kind of worries me. It’s his way or the highway.” Debbi snipped the ends, then, brandishing a purple hair dryer, directed a blast of hot air at Sarah’s scalp. “There’s no in-between.”

      “That’s what I want to do,” Sarah said. “Provide the in-between. Conventional medicine doesn’t have all the answers, but alternative medicine can’t do everything, either. I want to have a practice that uses both approaches.”

      “Cool.” Debbi smiled. “When can I sign up?”

      “I’ve still got some things to work out. There’s another doctor, a pediatrician who’s a good friend of mine. We grew up together. He’d be perfect.”

      “What’s his name?”

      Sarah hesitated. “Well, I haven’t discussed it with him yet. We used to talk about this kind of thing years ago, but—”

      “There aren’t that many pediatricians in Port Hamilton anymore,” Debbie said. “It’s got to either be Dr. Cameron—”

      “Yep.”

      “He’s fantastic. I used to take Alli to see him. Until I met Curt.”

      Sarah felt a vague sense of misgiving.

      She watched Debbi try to turn a lock of wiry, recalcitrant hair into something resembling a curl and wanted suddenly to be somewhere else. “Hey, listen, that’s fine. Really.”

      Debbi looked doubtful. “You’re sure? Want me to spray it?”

      “No.” Sarah stood. Her shoulders felt damp. She followed Debbi to the front of the shop. What did a haircut cost these days? She had no idea. She dug three twenties out of her purse, set them on the counter….

      “You need some good conditioner.” Debbi took two of the twenties to the cash register, and returned a ten and a five to Sarah. “The next time you come in, I’ll do a hot-oil treatment.”

      “Probably a good idea.” Sarah left the twenty and the five on the counter. “Good luck with your daughter,” she said.

      CHAPTER THREE

      “CHOCOLATE CHIPS.” Lucy snapped her fingers, a surgeon demanding an instrument. “Butter. Two sticks.”

      “Coming up.” Matthew held out a bag of chips, semisweet, as she’d requested when she made the shopping list for him. He watched as she carefully measured flour into a bowl. Her long dark hair, pulled back into a ponytail, was dusted with flour. More flour had fallen like snow around her feet; a dusting of white covered the granite counter tiles.

      He couldn’t have been happier.

      “Want some music?” he asked.

      “Your kind or mine?”

      “Since I don’t think of that stuff you listen to as music, it would have to be mine. And if you’d really listen to the words, you’d realize the Eagles—”

      “Oh, Dad, no. Please. Not the Eagles.”

      He grinned and wrapped his arm around her shoulders in a quick hug. “Do you know how much I like having you here?”

      “No, but hum a few bars,” she said.

      “Old, old joke.”

      “I learned it from you.”

      “I guess that makes me an old, old guy then.” He pulled out one of the bentwood dining chairs, sat on it backward, his chin propped on the curved wood. “If I decide to go with the Seattle company that’s moving onto the peninsula,” he told her, “you could spend every Saturday with me.”

      “Do it,” she said.

      “Would you like that?”

      She beamed.

      He grinned back at her. Ultimately, it might not take much more persuasion than his daughter’s approval. “I’m thinking about it. It’s just…” The phone rang. “Hold on,” he told Lucy.

      “Pleeese, pleeeese, don’t let it be a boring old patient,” she muttered.

      He picked up the phone from its hook on the wall. “Hello.”

      “I have no pride,” a female voice said. “I leave you messages—”

      He burst out laughing. “Sarah!” No salutation, no polite preliminary chitchat. No acknowledgment that it had been fifteen years since they last spoke. “My God. You haven’t changed.”

      “Yeah, well, there’s

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