Helga leads me to a back room behind the store that is illuminated by a single bulb hanging from the ceiling. The room is basically a storage room, filled with items that are clearly rejects from the rest of the store. There’s a large amount of clothing, piled into cardboard boxes, several lamps with crooked shades, and a mannequin wearing one dress on top of another and a purple wig. The mannequin is very much creeping me out.
Helga closes the door behind us. Then she locks it. A tiny part of me is scared that Helga’s game the whole time was to trap me in this room and keep me here as her hostage—possibly to teach me a lesson for forgetting to wait on her tonight. Then again, it’s not like nobody knows I’m here—I told Bessie I would stop by. Also, I think I could take Helga in a fight.
So I’m not too worried. But I am a little worried. “Sit,” Helga instructs me.
She points with her gnarled hand at a wooden chair in the center of the room. There’s a small table set up next to the chair, and on top of it is a pair of kitchen scissors, several hair ties, and an electric razor.
I hesitate, looking at the array of equipment that Helga has assembled.
Do I really want this watch chain that badly? Maybe this is all a mistake. “Sit!” Helga barks at me.
“Listen,” I say, “I’m not sure if I want to do this…”
The old woman stares up at me with her cloudy lenses. “It is up to you. Someday you will think back on this Christmas and how your vanity got in the way of buying a meaningful present for your husband.”
I take a deep breath. She’s right. Justin would love that watch chain, and the fact that I have to sacrifice something so meaningful to get it for him makes it even more special.
This will be the best Christmas we will ever have.
I settle down on the hard wooden chair and remove my coat. Before I even have a chance to hang the coat on the back of the chair, Helga is getting to work undoing my bun. Despite her arthritic-looking hands, she is quickly able to smooth out my hair and gets to work tying the thick blond strands into six separate braids.
I’m doing this for you, Justin. Because I love you so much.
The braids run up to the root of my hair, close to my skull. “Do you have to brain them all the way to my scalp? I don’t know if I want my hair to be that short.”
“Yes,” Helga says in a clipped tone. “This is how it must be done.”
I can still stop her. She has not used her scissors yet. But it feels like I have reached the point of no return. I am doing this. And I don’t want to stop her. I want to give Justin this gift. I want to make this sacrifice for him.
Helga reaches for the scissors. The first snip tugs on my scalp, and it feels so strange after the hair comes free. With five more snips, my head feels much lighter. Like I might float away.
This is actually quite nice. I love my hair, but it feels good to be free of it. And think of all the money I will save on shampoo!
The buzz of the electric razor interrupts my thoughts. I jerk my head away. “What are you doing?”
“I must even it out,” Helga tells me like I’m stupid for asking. “Now you look like a crazy person. I will fix it.”
And then I feel the electric razor running over my scalp, much closer to the surface than I would like. But I suppose she’s right. It needs to be evened out.
A few minutes later, the razor shuts off. Helga takes a step back, admiring the finished product. “I am finished.”
I reach into my purse to take out my phone, eager to see how this looks. I’ve been growing out my hair for ten years, and it’s very nice to have a change. I should have done this years ago! I bring up the camera app on my phone, turn it around so that I can look at my reflection, and…
Oh my God.
I look terrible.
I hadn’t quite realized how short she buzzed my hair. I had imagined a stylish pixie cut, but this is not that. The strands of my hair are universally about a centimeter long, and the lack of hair framing my face makes me look almost gaunt. And the short yellow hairs on the top of my head resemble the peach fuzz of a baby chick.
Then again, I’m not sure what kind of amazing haircut I was expecting from a half-blind lady in the back of a pawn shop.
Still, it’s much worse than I even imagined. My eyes fill with tears as I stare at my reflection. What did I do to myself? What a horrible mistake. And for what? A stupid Christmas present?
“Do not be sad,” Helga says in that sage-like way of hers. “This is love. You sacrifice for him. He sacrifices for you.”
She’s right. If Justin and I are married for the next fifty years, we will always remember the sacrifice I made for him. My hair will grow back.
“Thank you,” I say.
She nods. “Merry Christmas, Stella.”
