Morning all and happy New Year’s eve day. Today is going to be a crazy one I can tell. But before it kicks off, lets jump into the morning prompts shall we?
I kind of like where this is going. Not entirely certain where it is going, but I like the start.
Tuesday, December 24th: He looked at the row of wigs.
He looked down the row of wigs. There were blonde ones as well as brunette. There were redheads and white haired wigs. In addition there were pink, green and blue ones. Some were cut into a conservative bob others were piled into mile high towers that reminded him of the 1960s.
It was a dazzling array and he walked slowly down the aisle. Bernice had asked him to pick out a wig for her. Just one. She had accepted that she was losing her hair during chemo and had mourned when large clumps of it started coming out. She made a party out of shaving her head clean so that she would not have to see those distressing clumps upon the pillow or in the sink. She made her peace with the fact that her hair was gone, but was unwilling to leave the house bald.
At the moment she claimed it was due to the cold. She reminded him that a lot of body heat was lost through the head and with her compromised immune system she wasn’t willing to risk the dangers of being cold. Yet hats, scarves and hoods were all out. She needed a wig in order to go wig shopping.
And his job was to secure something.
He somehow hadn’t expected this. In truth he hadn’t thought it through at all. There were three wigs in the small display window. He somehow thought that there would simply be a shelf with a few more. He would point to one, purchase it and be done. He had a minor curiosity about how they would wrap it. Would he be carrying what looked like a head in a bag home with him or would it be compressed flat in one of those vacuum sealers?
He didn’t know. He had, if truth be told, thought more about that then he had about the actual wig itself. The shop was a long and skinny one. The shelves running floor to ceiling on both sides and along the back. Each shelf was filled with wigs. There was a central aisle leading up to the cash register. It was mercifully wig free and at the end of it he could see the sales clerk.
The clerk looked as though she was from a nineteen fifties sitcom. June Cleaver perhaps or maybe Mrs. Nelson. As he made his way forward, head swiveling from side to side as he took in the array of wigs, he wondered what Mrs. Nelson’s first name was. He was certain he had heard it, but he couldn’t remember. He reached the counter before her first name could surface from the pool of television trivia in his mind.
The clerk was tall, much taller than him and had a prominent Adam’s apple. His mind supplied the term Drag Queen. He glanced down and saw the chunky four inch heels. “You work all day in those?” He asked before he could stop himself.
“Sure do,” she said.
He shook his head. “My dogs would be barking in less than twenty minutes.”
“And you think mine don’t, sugar?” She replied with a smile. “So what can I help you with today?”
“I need a wig,” he said.
“You have certainly come to the right place.”
“Well yes, it’s a starter wig you see. My wife needs a wig so she can wear something to go out and look at wigs.” He frowned uncertain if he was stating his case correctly.
The clerk favored him with a sympathetic smile, “Chemo?” she asked.
“I bet you see this all the time,” he replied, relieved to be understood.
“More often than we really should,” came the reply.
Ten til Midnight 