Margo thought about the man limping out of Paula’s clinic and grinned “That’s terrific!” She fluffed her own hair. “What can we do about this? Everyone says I have to dye it.”
Paula studied Margo for several moments. “Yes; but we won’t want to go too dark, unless you want her looking as funereal as I do?” She glanced at Malcolm. “Black hair with that skin tone will look terrible. Even dark brown is going to make her look anemic.”
”Can’t be helped. Use your judgment on how dark, but she can’t go scouting looking like that.”
”No,” Paula agreed. “Definitely not. Red hair was associated with witches throughout most of the Middle Ages. Probably one reason red hair is relatively rare today-the gene pool was reduced through burning at the stake. All right, Margo, let’s get started. Malcolm, you’re welcome to sit in the waiting room. This will take a while.”
How long could it take to dye one head of very short hair brown? Margo’s answer came when Paula revealed her intention to dye every bit of Margo’s hair: bodywide.
”You can’t be serious!”
”Dead serious. And you’ll need to touch up the roots every four weeks.”
”But, but” That seemed to have become virtually the only thing Margo was capable of saying, lately.
Three hours later, Margo emerged, forlorn as a wet cat. She took one look into the waiting room’s mirror and burst into tears-again.
”Hey,” Malcolm said, rising hastily to his feet, “you look great!”
”No, I don’t!” Margo wailed. “I look …I look awful!”
The mirror revealed a pinched, pale face like an orphan someone had beaten and left for dead in some unspeakable sewer. She’d have died before revealing the ignominy of having hair dye applied elsewhere with a cotton swab.