Salon de Belleza

u-tiful.” Jordan sits tall in her chair to peek. The platinum band with its chunky knotted
strands is the last thing she’d have picked for Carla’s tiny hand.
“It’s like a little lock.” Estevan teases, wagging a finger of mock warning.
Lily leans over the counter. “Carla’s new boyfriend has her locked in his heart.”
“You guys . . .” Carla blushes.
Estevan looks bedazzled by Carla’s beauty. Her skin has a copper-bronzed sheen, her
wide brown eyes accentuated by dark lashes and eyeliner. “Girl,” he winds a lock of her
hair around his finger, “when are you going to let me do something with your hair?”
Carla dismisses him with a wave of her comb.
Estevan adopts a stance of mock helplessness, looks to Jordan for support. “Carla’s
had the same haircut in the twelve years she’s been working here. It’s time for a change,
Carla. Big hair is so eighties.” Carla waits until he turns back to his needlework before
fretting in the mirror at her mass of brown curls.
Jordan puts a finger inside the rim of the cape and yanks at it, her face flushing red as the hand of the
wall clock jumps forward three full minutes.
“Too tight?” Carla unbuttons the cloak and eases it back. Jordan shakes her head like
a dog let loose from its collar.
Estevan calls over his shoulder. “I know a good jeweler who can size that ring down
for you, Carla. You should wear it on your ring finger—as a symbol of love.” He admires
the emerald he wears on his own hand, a large square-cut stone set in a heavy gold
surround. Over the winter holiday Estevan flew to Las Vegas to elope. He still has the
wedding photos pinned on the board in the salon: he and Jeff at the Luxor in matching
suits; the newly-weds with their arms linked as they toast Moët & Chandon vintage
champagne. Estevan sports his new emerald while Jeff opts for a simple gold band.
Jordan twists her own gold band around its finger, the precious metal dulled from a
decade of marriage.
Not soon enough, the hairdressers return their attention to hair. A lull falls over the
salon while the background music of Sunny 95.1 love songs drifts across the room.
Working alongside each another, Carla and Estevan hum off-key at slightly varying paces
to Ricky Martin’s “Amor.”