I took a breath in through my nose. I took another one in through my mouth.
And I stared at me.
Alyssa had cut in delicate layers, these making my now shining, gray-less, subtly highlighted hair less heavy. These layers were more distinct around my face where she’d feathered them down the sides and cut in a long bang that hung to my eyelashes and dipped lower at my temples. That and the increased blonde around my face giving my skin a healthy glow. And Josie’s expert makeup tactics that were all about proper use of color, perfect shading, all of this packing a punch, made my eyes pop even more than they used to do.
I looked younger, not decades, but definitely younger.
Mostly, I looked like I gave a shit. I looked like I cared. I looked like I was worth something…to me.
Worth taking care of.
Worth spoiling.
Worth everything.
“My husband who I loved more than anything on this earth, save my children, had an affair with a nurse at his hospital, put an engagement ring on her finger before he asked me for a divorce, and married her only days after we signed the papers,” I said to the mirror, my eyes on my eyes, something I’d thought when I was younger was my best feature.
Something that was my best feature again.
Finally.
“Oh shit,” Alyssa muttered.
I felt Josie lean into me.
I didn’t take my eyes from me.
“I lost it. Completely,” I stated. “I went absolutely insane and made them both pay for this betrayal at every opportunity. My kids saw it. It was unhealthy. They didn’t like it. It went on for years and got so bad my ex had to move across the country to escape me. He got a judge to award him my kids. They’re all here and I followed them to heal my family. My husband welcomed me to Magdalene by showing at my new house, shouting it down and threatening me. And last weekend, my children made it clear they hated me.”
“Amelia,” Josie whispered.
Alyssa sat down in the salon chair on my other side and grabbed my hand.
I looked between them and then back at the mirror.
“I messed up,” I whispered my admission.
Neither of them said anything.
“I kept doing it,” I went on.
They stayed silent.
“And now I’m trying with everything I have to fix what I broke but I’m afraid I’m going to fail because they’ve completely lost faith in me.”
My new friends remained quiet.
“I miss my family.” It came out almost like a whimper.
“Of course you do,” Alyssa said on a hand squeeze.
I kept going, “And I messed things up.”
“Of course you did not,” Alyssa declared, startling me, and I looked her way.
“I’m sorry?”
“So I take it you went batshit crazy when your husband left you,” she noted.
“Yes,” I confirmed humiliatingly.
“And those two, him and his new woman, don’t deserve that…how?” she asked.
I stared.
“Shit happens, babe,” she continued. “Marriages disintegrate for a lot of reasons. And you’re sittin’ in a chair that’s seen a lot of ugly tales told and those include women losin’ their men because those men fell outta love and into love with someone else. I don’t live those feelings so I can’t say if it’s okay or not for that shit to happen. What I can say is that it’s not okay for it to happen while anyone is still wearin’ a wedding band.”
“She’s right,” Josie added and I looked her way.
But I looked back to Alyssa when she again started speaking.
“I don’t know what your kids saw. I can guess if it got so bad that shit is as ugly as it is for you. What I do know is that, you’re right, they shouldn’t see that stuff. You’re also wrong. Kids gotta learn they gotta stick up for themselves. That there are consequences to actions. That you don’t play with emotions. And you never piss on them. So it got outta hand. You’re pullin’ yourself together. If they’re good kids,” another hands squeeze, “and I know you got good kids, Amelia. You’re a good woman, you can’t have anything but. So I also know they’ll come around.”
“I hope you’re right,” I whispered.
“This is gonna sound harsh,” she replied. “But they got a good mom and if they go the way of their dad and piss all over her, then it’ll suck, it’ll kill, but that’s the way it is and you just keep on lookin’ after you. They don’t come around, it’s the wrong decision, Amelia. You pulled up stakes and tucked your tail between your legs and gave it your all and if they don’t have it in them to let go and let you back in, then they’ll have consequences. And those consequences will be losing you.”
“You can’t say I’m much to lose because you barely know me,” I reminded her.
“I know you’re hangin’ on by a thread,” she returned instantly. “That thread is the last you got after unravelling and you got the courage and strength to hang the fuck on and not let go, and you’re doin’ all that for your kids. Your ex fucked up your life. He did that. You didn’t. He broke your trust. He kicked your heart around. And you might have faltered along the way, but you haven’t fallen yet. So you got that in you and you’re still fightin’ to keep your family alive, they don’t wake up and see, their loss.”
“Alyssa,” Josie said warningly.
Alyssa sliced her gaze to Josie and sat back, letting my hand go and repeating, “Their loss.”
“If the impossible happened and this happened to you, would you feel the same way about your children?” Josie asked.
“My Junior screwed me over and I spent their whole lives showin’ my kids how much I loved their father, through the good times and the bad, standin’ at his side, and they knew he did that to me?” She shook her head and kept going. “And after I pushed them out and wiped their asses and blew their snotty noses and cleaned up their puke and loved on them at every opportunity and dropped everything the minute they needed me, and I had a time in my life where I needed a little understanding and they bailed on me?” she asked then answered her own question. “Yes. Absolutely.”
Josie touched my knee and I looked her way. “She’s right, of a sort. But I believe you should give them some time.”
“I am,” I told her.
“That’s good,” she said softly.
I couldn’t keep looking at her because I had fingers wrapped around my chin, forcing me to look back at Alyssa.