Prompt 4: "A simple haircut."

Emma looked at herself in de mirror and she liked what she saw. A happy, handsome face with lovely freckles and long, blonde curls. Never in her life did she have a bad hair day.

 

'Are you sure?' Lisa asked, she had been Emma's hairdresser for the past ten years. 'Absolutely.'

      Lisa sighed, she didn't like it a bit. 'I remember the first time you came here,' she said remembering, 'I was immediately enthusiastic about your hair. So beautiful, long and soft and perfectly maintained off course.'

      Emma smiled and simply said: 'sometime you just have to.' Lisa started to work on Emma's hair and told about her weekend. 'Lawrence was extremely drunk again, off course, the jerk! I already said thousands of times that he should stop doing that. He won't listen to me anyway and I keep forgiving him. Which, I know, is very stupid of me, but I just love him so much!'

       Emma nodded and said: 'humans are weird creatures, especially when it comes to love we don't know how to stay rational.'

       Lisa laughed softly: 'well you didn't do it so bad yourself, Emma. With your sweet, gorgeous man who always takes care of you. I must admit that sometimes I am a little jealous of you.'

 

Emma smiled absently and looked around the saloon. It was a very small room, everything was messy and chaotic. If you'd walk by and look through the window you wouldn't consider walking in to get your hair done. You had to know Lisa before you did so! She wasn't just a good hair dresser, she was cheerful and witty as well. It didn't take long before Lisa and Emma became good friends, also outside the saloon they saw each other regularly. Lisa preferred visiting Emma’s house. She always said that that was the place she felt most at home. She liked the flowers, there were always plenty of them. And the smell! Emma was a great cook, and the house always smelled like freshly made bread or tomato soup. Besides she and Charles, Emma’s husband, were actually quite close, they were teasing each other and giggling all the time. Emma was perfectly fine with this, it gave her the opportunity to retire to the kitchen and prepare some snacks. Have a little time to herself.

 

Meanwhile in the saloon Lisa was telling some story again, but Emma missed all of it, she was too deep in thought. ‘What is wrong with you today?’ Lisa asked, ‘you’re so absent and silent.’ ‘I am sorry, sweetie,’

      Emma answered,’ I’ve just been so busy lately. All these things that I had to do and arrange. I am just tired.’

      Lisa padded Emma’s head and said: ‘don’t worry about it babe, sometimes I talk so much anyway. Just sit back and relax! Maybe you would like it to double date with Lawrence and Charles any day soon? It’s quite a while ago, I’m sure they will like it. Plus, I was thinking, maybe Charles can get through to Lawrence and tell him to stop drinking so much.’

      Emma laughed cynically: ‘right, I’m sure he will listen.’

 

‘All right then Emma, here goes, are you ready to look at yourself in the mirror?’ Emma nodded and closed her eyes, Lisa pulled the sheet of the mirror. Slowly Emma opened her eyes and looked at herself. She was shocked, her mouth was wide open. ‘Is this me?’ She thought, ‘is this really me?’ She looked so different, so tough, so…so…independent! Emma couldn’t say a word, the only thing that came out of her mouth was a soft and hoarse ‘thank you.’

      Lisa had a big grin on her face and said: ‘I must admit that it looks terribly good on you, that short, spiky, red hair.’ Emma stood up and gave Lisa a big hug, ‘thank you,’ she whispered once more. ‘No problem, babe, I’ll see you soon!’

 

Emma walked out the door, she felt great. The sun was shining, the flowers were blossoming and Emma was ready for the rest of her life. Finally she did something on her own, completely independent and free!

      She remembered Lisa saying: ‘with your sweet and gorgeous husband who always takes cares of you.’ If only she knew…after all those years of friendship, and she had no idea. Well, how could she even know? Charles always knew how to hit the places that Emma would cover up. She stroke here hip, there was once more a big black bruise. Yesterday she accidentally burned the potatoes, she still feels the pain from it.

 

Today, though, everything would be different, she wouldn’t accept it anymore. She felt in her purse, fortunately it was still in there. It was quite difficult to get it, you can’t just get it in the supermarket, obviously. But with meeting the right people, and with lots of determination she succeeded! It wasn’t even that expensive…

 

She walked into her street and smelled the comforting roses, slowly she felt her heart raid raising, she started to walk faster. When she was at her door she felt her legs shaking and heard herself breathing. She opened the door and walked into the living room. She saw that the stick was ready to be used, what did she do this time?

Charles turned around in his chair, Emma looked at his face full of repulsion. ‘What the hell did you do with your hair, ugly b***h?!’ He cried out, ‘did I f*****g give you permission for that, or what?!’

At this point Emma’s legs were shaking really bad, and her voice was trembling while she said: "A woman who cuts her hair is about to change her life." At that moment she became calm, took the gun out of her purse, pointed it at Charles’ bewildered face and pulled the trigger.  

 

Author's Note

This is my very first story, so don't be to hard on me. My language is not English, so if there are any weird things in it, that might be the cause. Thanks!