The Mane Attraction

          A word of advice to anyone that has a mother: If she ever uses the words “home” and “permanent” in the same sentence, run far away. For the sake of your dignity, hide and never come out. I didn’t. This is what happened, down to the very last curl.
          I’m not a girl that pauses in front of every mirror. I am not that fussy with my hair, but there are limits. My mother found these limits and trampled them mercilessly.
          She always found something unique for me when she shopped, but her silly smile made me nervous. I wasn’t ready for the bomb she had that day.
          “I found something really fun this week.” She said.
          I put down the bags I was carrying, peeking in each sure to find treasures.
          “Yeah? Are you sure I will like it? Remember the last big surprise you found for me?” She had come across some bell bottom jeans with a huge flower stitched on the leg. For some insane reason, she thought I would like them. Um, not so much.
          “I think you will like it and it will give us some together time, too.”
We didn’t get much of that these days.
          She pulled a small box out of one of the bags and handed it to me. On the cover of the box was a woman with luxuriant, flowing curls.
          “What is it?” I asked as I turned the box over in my hands.
          “It’s a home perm kit. Now before you freak, hear me out. It will be fun to do, and if you don’t like it, it will wash right out.”
          I was too stunned to freak. This was intended for my head?
          “Mom, doesn’t this qualify as girly?” I had drawn the line in the sand on that issue years ago. I was as much a tomboy as my mom was girly. We were definite opposites. She could never leave the house without makeup, when I couldn’t even see a time I would try makeup. I appeased her from time to time, just to keep the peace. Once, I let her paint my fingernails. Unfortunately, this was the same summer I was on a mission to fix my bike. The nice pink nail polish lost some of its appeal when caked with greasy dirt.
          “Oh no, it doesn’t have anything to do with that. I just thought it would be fun, that’s all.”
          I still had my doubts. “It will wash out if I don’t like it, huh?”
          “Yes, it says so on the box. See?” She showed me the instructions. I couldn’t imagine washing my hair thirty times.
          “When did you want to do this?”
          “How about this afternoon?”
          “Sure, why not?” I tried to sound enthused.
          My mother literally clapped her hands and giggled. That, alone, scared me the most.
          Like a woman on a mission, she painstakingly rolled each of the rollers. After an hour of tugging and yanking and a few mild cuss words, my mother had all of my hair rolled up.
          “There, the hard part is done.” She said as she wiped her hand across her own loose hair.
          The next part was similar to water torture. She poured this terrible smelling chemical onto my hair. The liquid dripped off the rollers onto my scalp, running in rivulets along my head to my neck. The smell made my nose burn and my eyes water.
          After sitting for the prescribed time, we rinsed the chemical soup from my hair and removed the rollers. My head never felt so relieved.
          I stood in front of the bathroom mirror. I had in my mind the picture on the box of all of that shiny, flowing hair. I opened my eyes. Looking back at me was a lion. My mouth fell open. It was my eyes, my face, my shirt. There was no way that was my hair! I stood dumb-founded. My mother put her hand to her mouth. To this day, I don’t know if she was covering a gasp or a laugh.
          “Well, what do you think?” My mother smiled weakly.
          “What did you do? Did you make a mistake? This can’t be right.” I poked at the mass of brown curls that engulfed my face.
          “No, that’s the way it is supposed to look. It will relax in a while and not be so curly.”
          “I look like a giant dirty Q-tip. How am I supposed to face anyone like this?” I had a strange urge to stomp my foot.
          “I am going to my room and I am not coming out until this stuff relaxes.”
          Once I was safely barricaded in my room, I looked for my calculator to figure out how long it would take someone’s hair to grow back if they shaved their head. Thinking of the calculator made me remember the algebra test I had the next day. Now I had to go to school. There was no way I could let Susie Wilson get a higher G.P.A than me. I decided that staying in my room for the rest of the day would have to do as a proper pouting tactic. Then, my mom pulled out her secret weapon. I tried to resist but was caught like a cobra under the piper’s spell. She knew I couldn’t resist the smell of popcorn. No matter what I was doing, I always showed up for popcorn. I decided that maybe the silent treatment was as good a plan ‘B’ as any. By the end of the night, even that plan failed.
          I woke up the next day and stumbled to the bathroom. In my sleepy daze, I had forgotten about my hair. One look in the mirror changed all of that in a second. If it didn’t look bad enough yesterday, a night of sleeping on it made things worse. Now, I only had half a mane. It looked like my head should be tilting to the right, with all of my hair over on that side.
          Once in the shower, I lost count after washing number twenty. My arms felt like lead, I could hardly lift them.
          I found one of my brother’s hats. I was able to tuck all of the hair under it. Now, I looked like a miniature gangsta. That was better than a lion crossed with Buckwheat, from the Little Rascals.
          Once at school, I got a few stares but nothing I couldn’t handle. Class was started when my homeroom teacher asked me to step outside.
          “Arleta, you know we have a hat policy here at school.”
          I looked at my feet. “I know Mr. Green. But aren’t there any special circumstances that can overlook the rules?”
          “I don’t know about that. Why, what are your special circumstances?”
I removed the hat.
          Mr. Green just stared. He had taken the hat from me, at first. Now, he just silently handed it back to me. His announcement to the class that I was allowed to wear the hat for the rest of the day was the talk of the school.
          Another big talk going around the school was about the new boy. He came from California, which automatically made him cool. The girls were all giggling and whispering. I hadn’t seen him yet, and wasn’t all that interested anyway. Then, in my history class, I met him. We literally ran into each other in the doorway.
          “Oh sorry.” he said as he stepped on my foot.
          Without looking up I said, “That’s ok, I walk on the bottom of them, you can walk on the top.”
          I looked up and was facing a beautifully tanned face with the bluest eyes I had ever seen. His perfect face was encircled by a mass of curly blonde hair,curlier than mine. I could see that he was embarrassed, as the tips of his ears flamed red.
          He smiled and held the door open for me. I took my seat and promptly removed my hat. This mane wasn’t as bad as I thought, after all.
          After school, I scanned the ocean of faces. I wanted to get one more look at him, that’s all. I finally spotted him and my heart sank. He was standing there talking to Susie Wilson! She was being her usual sickening sweet self, laughing at something he said. I turned away and hugged my books to my chest and headed for home.
          “Wait, Arleta, Hold up.”
          I turned in time to see him brush past Susie Wilson and wave at me. I stopped in my tracks and smiled back at him, trying not to look too excited.
          “Hi,” was all I could safely say without stammering like an idiot.
          “Is it too old fashioned of me to offer to carry your books home?”
          “Sure, be my guest.” I offered my books to him and our fingers brushed each other. A chill ran up my spine.
          I was thrilled to learn that he lived only a block away. On the walk home, I found myself wondering what kind of lip gloss he would like.
          I exploded through the front door, grabbed my mom in a half-circle hug/dance sort of thing.
         “Oh Mom, Thank you, thank you, thank you.”
          “You’re welcome. What ever I did, I hope I do it again real soon.”
         I gave her another quick hug and dashed to my room to experiment with my new hairstyle. It was the beginning of the end to my tomboy days.