Skye
by Victoria Button


Julia did not want to see herself when she looked in the mirror, but her face was still there, beneath the make-up. She’d started to cake it on since it happened. Darius clipped a plastic cape around her neck, printed with 1950s rainbows, chubby pots of gold at the end of each one. The corner of her mouth twisted. Pots of gold, hah, she thought. The sort of picture you might see in a book for babies. For babies.

Dust scattered gold in the afternoon light, and floorboards of the hair salon glowed. Red flashes scarred the ceiling as she twisted the ring tight on her finger. Her hair burned magnificent copper.

Darius looked at her in the mirror, assessing. She avoided his gaze. Usually, they joked. He camped it up, and she loved it. They talked about art, movies, books, work politics, the ridiculous editorials in ridiculous newspapers, music, bands, her men, his men and, more recently, her baby, the baby she was going to have.

Darius was one of the first people to find out when she fell pregnant. He had noticed a difference in her hair, when she was barely eight weeks in, and commented. ‘Ta Daaa,’ she had said, triumphant.

Standing behind her, he stroked her hair. For all the trauma, it was in fine form, magic hair you could recognise from a block away. It stroked her shoulder blades, wavy and full, a song of sex flecked with copper and brass, and an undertone of soil after rain.

He had always resisted the temptation to experiment with her hair, the mark of the very best hairdressers. A few long layers was enough to set its body free.

‘How are you,’ Darius said. ‘I mean, how are you?’

‘Oh, you know.’

‘I’m sorry. Really.’

Her face twisted. ‘I’m fine. I’m going to be fine. You know, life goes on. All that crap. I don’t want_’ Julia bared her teeth, a smile. ‘To talk about it.’

He stroked her hair, lifting it in sections, examining the roots, the ends. God it was magnificent, he thought. He looked at her in the mirror. The sunlight highlighted the powder clogging the fine hairs of her face, the clumps of mascara on her eyelashes. There was a smudge of lipstick on her teeth, as if she had tasted blood. Too much make-up, Darius thought, but said nothing.

‘I’ll give you a wash,’ he said, and took her by the hand. The basins were stainless steel, retro-fashionable, and the leather chairs looked as if they had come from some long-closed dental surgery.

Julia closed her eyes. The shampoo smelled of jasmine. Darius massaged her head, pulling at the long strands of her hair, pushing at her temples, the point of the widow’s peak on her forhead, the pressure points behind her ears.

‘Mmmm,’ she said. Then, dreamily, ‘I want it all off.’

He massaged the crown of her head, keeping the water away from her ears. He didn’t reply, just kept rubbing. She had so much hair. There was a weight to it.

‘I’m going to put in some extra-special conditioner, today. Let’s see your hair drink that up,’ he said, reaching for a dispenser.

‘There’s not much point,’ she said. ‘It’s all going to go. I want it off, short as you can.’

He said nothing, as he rubbed the conditioner through the mass of her hair with his strong hands, his strong, distracting hands. He could feel the tension behind her ears, in her neck. He lifted her head to get at her nape, and rubbed at the knots he found there. He stroked her forhead, then reached for the water, to rinse it all away.

She wished the wash would never end, that time would freeze and she could sit forever in this chair, safe, with warm water and strong hands on her head.

Darius squeezed away the excess water with his hands, then wrapped a towel turban around her head. ‘Come, darling, let’s do your hair.’ He led her, her heels click, click, clicking, towards the mirrors. He squeezed her hand, but she shook it free, and stomped ahead of him.

‘I want it off,’ she said, sitting herself in the chair, kicking her handbag to one side. ‘All of it. Do what you like, but make it short.’

‘Darling, I don’t think _’

‘Off.’

‘It’s too beautiful, long. Are you sure?’

‘I don’t want all this hair anymore, okay? I want _ to be free of it.’

‘Hey. I haven’t got you a drink yet. A vodka and tonic?’

‘No, a Beam and Coke, double.’

‘Darling! No! A Beam? If you want a Beam and Coke, you’ll need to go to some nasty pub where there’s a cover-band playing and a barman called Ray serving shandies to old biddies. I’ll get you a vodka and tonic.’

‘O-kay.’

Julia played with her hair, twisting strands around her finger, pulling at it, using it to cover her face, then throwing it back. She used to be secretly proud of her hair, but now she wanted it gone. She desperately wanted it gone, all gone, all away. She wanted to be clean, and sharp, her head light and free from all this hair, all these thoughts. She wanted to be able to get out of bed, get in the shower and go. When John saw her, she wanted him to see someone different, not this failure. What was the point in nice hair, if you couldn’t have a baby?

‘Darling, trust me. Just leave it for a bit, then see what you think.’

‘Darius, will you please cut my hair off?’

‘Not today, darling. Let’s come back to that in a month or two.’

‘Darius.’

‘I can blowdry it straight, if you want a change.’

‘Cut. It. Off.’

‘Darling, no. It would take years to grow back.. Years and years. I know you’ll regret it. I know that. I know that. It’s just because of, now_’

‘Oh, just fucking cut it off.’

‘Julia!’

‘Sorry. I just want my haircut, okay?’ Who died and made you God? If I want my hair cut, it’s not your business.’

‘No, you’re my best advertisement. You’re my favourite customer. You have the very best hair in this fine establishment.’

‘Look how short your hair is. I want it like that.’

‘But darling, that’s me! I shave my head. I have terrible hair, truly. Not mag-ni-ficent hair, like you.’

‘Darius, cut my hair.’

Darius set his mouth, and started to pin her hair on the top of her head, combing out only the bottom layer. He started to snip, gently, at the ends. She watched him.

‘Darius, cut my hair off, all of it. You’re just trimming. I want to have it all off. Gone. No more. Jesus!’

‘Seen any good bands lately?’

‘Don’t change the subject.’

‘No.’

‘What do you mean, no?’

Darius kept trimming the ends, working, and shaking his head at Julia in the mirror. Her eyes flashed. He shook his head.

‘No. I won’t do it. I won’t cut your hair off. I know you’ll regret it. You’d be back here in a month, two months, crying. “Oh, Darius. Why did you let me cut my hair off?” Just trust me, okay?’

Darius kept working. ‘You sure you don’t want to talk about it?’

‘No, I’m over it. It’s okay, really. I mean, it’s a big thing, but you know, it’s okay. I’m okay. John’s okay. We’re okay.’

‘But what did you do with all the stuff? What did you do with the cot?’

Julia had talked about the baby gear she was buying, great mounds of it, at their last appointment, a month ago, from over the top of her pregnant belly. Darius, who would have liked to have a child, absorbed every detail. The cot Julia and John had bought could be converted, when the baby grew, into a bed. She and John had painted it yellow, to match the nursery walls, and dotted it with smiling cartoon suns.

They hadn’t wanted to know whether the baby was a girl or boy, at the scan sessions. As it turned out, it was a girl, perfect in every respect. Except the one that mattered.

‘The cot,’ Julia began, ‘has gone to the Salvation Army. We strapped it on the roof-rack.’

She fell silent, as Darius worked. ‘When John drove it to there, he drove so slowly, in case it fell off. I’ll never forget that, how slowly he drove.’

She began to cry, and she was angry, because she had decided not to cry any more.

‘Just cut my hair, just please, please cut it off.’

‘I’m not going to do it. Trust me, cutting your hair won’t help. No.’

‘What would you know about what would help, or what wouldn’t help?’

Julia ripped off the cape with its rainbows and pots of gold. She stalked out of the salon, her hair half up, half down, wet, her cheeks streaked with mascara, her hands folded across the place where her bump used to be.

Back in her car, she cried into the steering wheel. Then, for the first time, she took the hospital envelope from the glovebox. The nurses had said she didn’t have to look inside, if she didn’t want to. She had carried with her everywhere, this last fortnight, but never opened it.

In the envelope, there were the official documents, birth certificate, death certificate, the date the same on each. There was also a photograph, a lock of dark hair, handprints, footprints. Ten fingers. Ten toes.

After the labour, she had been so proud, and yet so ashamed, to have made a baby so perfect, but to have had her die for no reason, no reason anyone could tell. At first, when they had shown her the baby, she thought there must have been some mistake. The baby looked alive. It was impossible, but Julia had kept on expecting her baby, somehow, to cry.

Julia looked, for the first time since it was taken, at the photograph. Her baby had a perfect little mouth, chubby cheeks and fine eyebrows. Her eyes were closed. She had a shaggy head of thick, dark hair. Her flesh was still pink with her mother’s blood.

They had washed her, Julia and John, and wrapped her in a yellow blanket. Her name was Skye. That was the name on the birth certificate, the death certificate, the name they had picked out in case it was a girl.

Skye. She and John hadn’t told anyone outside the hospital the baby’s name, not even their parents. No-one asked. It was like Skye never existed. Everyone said they were sorry, and life goes on, and time heals, and that they could have another one, but they couldn’t. They could never have another Skye, and no-one seemed to understand that. Julia kissed the photograph.

Then she put Skye back in the envelope, with the birth certificate and the death certificate and the handprints and the footprints and the lock of hair. She held the envelope to her chest, and held her breath until the tears stopped, then got out of the car and locked it. She cuddled Skye, as she walked along the pavement, and back into the salon.

Sitting down, she said, ‘Her name was Skye.’

(C)2003 Victoria Button