8TV FICTION CLASSICS

Finally, Ann was finished. She put a plastic cap over Karen's curlers and had her sit in one of the other chairs.

"Your turn Alan," Ann stated as she motioned for him to come over to the shampoo station. The boy hesitated only briefly as he took one last look at his mother. Karen Taylor just had an amused smile on her face.

Alan sat back on the shampoo chair as Ann tied a pink, plastic, salon cape around his neck and shoulders. She lifted his hair up as she guided his neck into the opening in the sink. Alan felt the warm water rush over his scalp from the hose Ann was using to wet his locks. It felt very nice to lay back and have someone massage his scalp and neck. After a thorough shampoo followed by a conditioning rinse Ann pronounced that she was done and helped Alan sit up while she wrapped a towel around his dripping hair."

"Well, that wasn't so bad," Alan commented as he plopped himself down in front of the mirror.

"Hey, I'm the best!" Ann joked. "Now, let's see what we have here," Ann spoke as she began to comb out Alan's wet hair. "I'm going to just clean up the ends and even it out all over. Maybe, shorten these bangs a little. They're too long to do anything with as is...unless you want to grow them way out? Hmmm...no I don't think that would be best," she continued on her analysis, thinking out loud, posing rhetorical questions which she answered herself.

Finally, she appeared to be finished her thought process and combed all his hair back. As Alan watched in the mirror, she combed out a two-by-two inch section of hair and deftly twisted it into a large pincurl. Fastening it with a couple of shiny metal clips. Noticing the surprised look on Alan's face, she explained,

"I'm just sectioning your hair and pinning it to get it out of my way while I cut it."

In a few minutes his scalp was covered with pincurls like he'd seen other women with in the past. First she took an electric hair clipper and carefully cleaned off the light fuzz on his neck forming a subtle V-shape hairline in back. Then she released a pin curl at the nape of his neck and cut about a half-inch off with her scissors. She continued from section to section releasing each pin curl trimming a little from the ends, steadily working up the back and sides of his scalp. Soon she was putting the finishing touches on his bangs.

"There, that will be much better!" Ann exclaimed, "No more split ends."

"Is that it?" Alan asked expectantly.

"Well, not if you want to have a hairstyle like my Mark's," Ann replied.

"Oh...so you're not done," The young boy replied sensing that he was in for more attention.

"Not at all. Pretty hair takes time! First we need to decide if you want to only have this hairstyle until your next shampoo, or if you'd

HAIR TODAY, GOWN TOMORROW -9 like it to be good for a couple of months," The hairdresser explained, now also speaking to Alan's mother as well as Alan.

"Alan? Would you like to have hair like Mark's for a while? It will require a lot more care than you're providing to it now," Mrs. Taylor explained to her son.

"Gee...I guess I like the way Mark's hair looks. He seems to be doing okay for the last two years. Right?" Alan said somewhat defiantly.

"He sure is with his mother's and my help," Ann answered, then quickly added, "So it's to be a permanent change, then is it?" Before Alan could even answer his mother spoke on his behalf, "That's what he says, so go ahead."

"Okay, I have less than fifteen minutes before I have to neutralize your hair so I'd better hurry," Ann replied as she briskly started her next task. Alan watched with trepidation as Ann pulled over the small cart and pulled open the drawer with the same rods that covered his mother's head. Her hands worked with precise expertise as she quickly began sectioning and winding his hair onto the perm rods. She was three quarters of the way done when the small kitchen timer sounded.

"I'll have to stop for a few minutes and neutralize your mom's hair," she said as she put down her comb. Mrs. Taylor was asked to sit at the shampoo chair once again so that Ann could use a different squeeze bottle to apply another chemical to each perm rod. In a few minutes she was done and returned to winding Alan's hair.

"There...done," she announced as the last strands of the boy's hair were tightly captured by a perm rod. "Now, I'll just put this cotton around here so that the solution doesn't drip down your neck.'

In minutes, Alan found himself holding a small plastic drip tray around his neck as the painfully, pungent smell of that chemical wafted down over his face. It felt very cold against his scalp.

"Gee, that stinks!" Complained Alan. "Mark went through all this too?"

"Many times," Ann chuckled, "you'll get used to it."

Alan sat trying to breathe through his mouth as he watched Ann rinse his mother's hair thoroughly in the sink. She then removed the perm rods and shampooed her hair before asking her to return to the styling chair. Now she combed it out and to Alan's surprise began to set it again, but this time on larger plastic rollers, the kind he saw his mother wear around the house quite frequently.

"Why are you putting those in?" Alan questioned. "Because after a perm, you have to set the hair on larger rollers to shape the style," The hairdresser explained.

"Gee we'll be here 'till morning before her hair dries," grumbled Alan.

"Well, actually it won't be that long. But your mother will be waiting for me to finish your hair rather than the other way around.