Читать книгу More Than Just Mum - Rebecca Smith - Страница 9

There’s no questioning the facts. It is one hundred per cent there and I have one hundred per cent got to deal with this situation immediately. Part of me was hoping that it was a joke, but the more that I stare into the magnifying side of my mirror the more the evidence stares back at me.

Brandon Hopkins was correct, which must surely be the first time since I started teaching him that such an event has actually occurred. I would find this cause for celebration if it weren’t for the fact that on this particular occasion, I would be happy to prove him wrong.

But as he so accurately and loudly pointed out during period six on Wednesday afternoon, I have a lady-moustache.

And I am about to do something about it.

The instructions on the packet are pretty basic but the page of safety precautions goes on forever. I start to read, squinting to see the tiny words.

This product is suitable for upper lip, cheeks and chin.

Chin? Brandon Hopkins didn’t mention anything about me having a lady-beard, but I’d rather be safe than humiliated in front of Year Nine, Class C next week. Grabbing the mirror, I scrutinise the skin below my mouth, searching for errant hairs. Fortunately for me, the majority of my facial growth appears to be confined to the area between lips and nose; I breathe a sigh of relief. I’m pretty sure I didn’t buy enough product to deforest my entire face.

I keep reading.

This item is NOT SUITABLE for the rest of the face, the head, the ears, or around the anus, genitals or nipples.

What now? Why would anyone in his or her right mind want to put wax there? What would be the purpose? Are there really people in the world who care about whether they have a hairless arse? And who would even know if they did have the odd hair or two in the vicinity of their rectal opening? I mean, I’ve never thought to check but now I’m wondering if I need to have a quick look.

Shuddering, I shove the instruction leaflet in the bin. It lost me at anus and I don’t care to read one more word. Not that I need instructions, anyway. The wax strips are laid out in front of me and it’s obvious what I need to do. I have two X chromosomes after all. The skills that I need to complete this task are inherent in my DNA. It’s genetic memory – I have inherited the knowledge that I need to remove my excessive and unwanted moustache from my mother, and her mother before her, and her mother before her, and – well, I’m not sure how long waxing your upper lip has been a thing, but it’s not as if candles are a new invention, so the craft probably goes back for many generations.

I pick up a strip and warm it between my hands before peeling off one side. Then I apply it to my skin, pressing it into place to make sure that it’s stuck down really firmly. And now it is the moment of reckoning. I’m quite looking forward to this bit. I’m not stupid – I’m aware that there may be a small degree of pain involved – but surely it won’t be worse than pulling off a plaster? And these things can often be quite satisfying, in their own way.

I take a deep breath and yank the wax away from my upper lip in one smooth movement.

‘Fuck it, that hurts!’

On the floor, Dogger gives me a baleful look. I ignore her and peer eagerly at the wax strip, keen to see how much hair I have managed to remove.

There is bugger all there. Not one single strand.

I am not feeling satisfied in the slightest.

I lean towards the mirror again, trying to ascertain the current status of my moustache, but the skin is tingling and slightly pink and I can’t tell if the hairs are still there. But it’s okay because this is my first go and sometimes it takes a while to get the knack of doing something technical like this. Otherwise, beauty technicians wouldn’t need to exist, would they? And I have loads more wax strips left. I’ll just keep going until I’ve got rid of them all.

The next fifteen minutes are not the best fifteen minutes of my life. On a scale from stubbing a toe to giving birth, I would say that the pain threshold hovers somewhere around the time I accidentally shaved off an entire strip of skin from my ankle to my knee. Both the bath and I looked like we’d been involved in a particularly gruesome episode of CSI: The Shires. At least this time there isn’t any blood.

Finally, when I have waxed over the same piece of upper lip with every wax strip that was in the box, I admit defeat. I haven’t seen a single hair come out and my lip is sore and suspiciously red.

There are worse things than a slight smattering of hair on my face, I tell myself. I am a grown-ass woman and I do not have to conform to the stereotypes imposed upon me by society. In fact, it is my duty as both a parent and a teacher to educate the next generation and show them, by my example, that it is possible to be successful and professional and intelligent and a worthwhile member of society while sporting a tiny lady-moustache. These things are not mutually exclusive.

Glancing at the time, I realise that unless I get moving then I’m going to be seriously late. I am experimenting with trying to keep as busy as humanly possible on Thursdays and Fridays, in a pathetic attempt to convince myself that not being at work is a treat and basically a good thing. My plan for today is to pamper myself. I have a lovely, relaxing appointment at the hair salon – which I probably can’t afford, hence the DIY hair removal, rather than paying an extortionate amount for someone else to get up close and personal with my lip-fringe.

Coaxing Dogger downstairs, I shoo her out into the back garden, so that she can take care of her own personal hygiene, before grabbing my coat. I call her back inside, give her a biscuit, dash out to the hall and pause briefly to appraise myself in the mirror. My face isn’t looking too exhausted, and while my hair is a bit of a state, that’s okay – it would be a complete waste of a salon trip if it weren’t.

The drive across town is slow due to it being market day. It’s freezing cold but the sun is shining; there is an optimistic sense of spring just around the corner. Despite this, as the minutes tick by, I become increasingly aware that something is wrong.

Hideously, badly, catastrophically wrong.

On my face.

The tingling sensation that I had from the moment I yanked off the first wax strip has increased. In fact, it would be highly inaccurate to even describe it as tingling anymore. It is more an agonising, burning, stinging, throbbing torment that is making it difficult to think about anything else. I brake for a red traffic light and risk a glance in the rear-view mirror.

Fuckety fuck. My lip looks like I’ve been stung by a thousand bees, and not in a good way.

Now I come to think of it, who ever thought that ‘bee-stung lips’ could be a positive thing? Nothing good can ever come from being stung by a bee on the mouth. It’s utterly ridiculous.

A honking noise from behind alerts me to the now-green traffic light. I drive carefully down the road, trying to focus on parking the car safely, all the while wondering if I require immediate medical attention. The sign for the car park is up ahead and I take the corner, gently easing into a space and then turning off the engine before pulling down the sun visor so that I can examine the damage more closely.

The skin above my mouth is swollen, stretched so taut that it is shiny. But worse than that are the weeping, oozing spots that seem to have appeared from nowhere.

And I was wrong earlier. There is a little bit of blood.

On a scale from terrible to fucked up, this is very, very bad.

And I’m late for my appointment.

Grabbing my bag, I leap out of the car and race across the car park, my hand held defensively in front of my face as a precautionary measure. I don’t want to upset any small children who may catch sight of me. Dodging between little old ladies with pull-along baskets and mums with prams, I speed down the street and then, with a huge sigh of relief, push open the door and fling myself into the sanctuary of the salon. I will be safe here. They are professionals and their business is to take the lame and make them beautiful again. I am among friends.

‘Morning!’ Caroline emerges from the staff area as I catch my breath by the front desk. ‘How’s it going, Hannah? How are your kids? I saw Scarlet in town yesterday afternoon – I can’t believe how tall she’s getting!’

‘It’s going really well,’ I mumble, from behind my hand. ‘And the kids are fine, thanks. How about you?’

What does she mean, she saw Scarlet in town? Scarlet was at school yesterday. Caroline must be confusing her with someone else – maybe she’s got a doppelganger, or a clone. God, what a thought – I love my daughter deeply but two of her is a bit of an overwhelming possibility.

‘I’m good, thanks. Shall I take your jacket?’ She reaches towards me for my coat and I realise that I’m going to have to move my hand.

‘Thanks, Caroline.’

I turn my back on her and hastily lower the zip before shrugging the jacket off and turning back to face her, my hand once again in place across my mouth.

Caroline gives me a slightly weird look but says nothing as she takes a gown from the row of hooks by the door and hangs my coat in its place.

‘Just pop this on,’ she tells me. ‘And then come on through.’

I repeat the performance with the gown and then follow her into the main part of the salon, sitting down at the seat that she is pulling out for me.

‘So, what are we doing today?’ she asks my reflection in the large mirror. ‘Same as normal?’

I smile in agreement and then realise that she can’t see my mouth behind my hand. ‘Yes, please. I need my grey roots sorting out and a quick trim on the ends.’

‘No problem! I’ll just mix the colour and then we’ll get started. Can I get you a cup of tea while you’re waiting?’

A cup of tea would be lovely. It’s exactly what I need to calm myself down after all the stress of the morning. I would kill for a cup of tea right now. But they bring the milk in a little jug here; I will either have to drink black tea or move my hand from my face. Neither of those is an acceptable option right now.

‘No thanks,’ I mumble. ‘I’m fine.’

Caroline shoots me another look before retreating to the staff area and I stare bleakly at my reflection, my hand pressed tightly across my mouth. It seems very unfair that I am sitting in front of the world’s largest mirror, today of all days.

‘Here we are then.’ Caroline is back with the tiny amount of dye needed to eliminate my barely-existent grey hair. ‘Shall we make a start?’

‘Let’s do it,’ I mutter. ‘Work your magic.’

She places the bowl on top of her hairdresser trolley and swivels my chair round so that she can begin with the front of my head. I give her an encouraging smile with my eyes and hope that she’s not in a chatty mood.

‘Erm, Hannah?’ Caroline looks awkward. ‘I’m going to need you to move your hand. I can’t reach your hair with your arm blocking the way.’

Bugger.

I spend three seconds debating the pros and cons of asking her to just dye one side of my head before coming to the harsh realisation that there is nothing for it. I am just going to have to lower my hand and hope for the best.

And I’m probably being totally melodramatic, anyway. I haven’t actually looked at the stricken area since I left the car. The biting winter wind will no doubt have done a lot to bring the swelling down. Caroline probably won’t even notice anything wrong.

I lower my hand.

‘Bloody hell!’ Caroline’s shriek gets the attention of the rest of the salon; I feel five pairs of eyes turn to gaze upon my terrible form. ‘What have you done?’

‘I was trying to wax my upper lip,’ I whisper. ‘It’s not that bad, is it?’

‘Not that bad?’ howls Caroline. ‘I’ve never seen anything like it, Hannah! And we’ve seen most things in here,’ she turns to the gawping audience, ‘haven’t we?’

‘We’ve seen some shocking things,’ agrees her colleague from across the room. ‘But none as awful as that.’ He’s new since the last time I came here and I don’t know his name but, from the sneering look on his face, I suspect it’s something mean.

Caroline pats my hand in what I think is an attempt to be reassuring.

‘Maybe you’re allergic to the hair wax?’ she suggests. ‘I can’t think of any other reason you’d get a reaction like that. You did do an allergy test first, didn’t you?’

I shrug. ‘I didn’t know that I was supposed to.’

Caroline looks shocked. ‘Hannah! You must always test out any new product. You can’t just go playing life and death with your skin.’

I allow myself a small laugh. ‘I hardly think this is a life and death situation, Caroline. Let’s get it into perspective, shall we?’

Her response is to spin my chair so that I’m facing the mirror.

Oh, for fuck’s sake. This is so not okay.

I look like I’ve dipped my top lip into a raging inferno. I wonder if I will forever bear the scars of vainly trying to remove the tiny bit of hair that nobody except that little maggot, Brandon Hopkins, ever noticed in the first place.

The new hairdresser wanders over, his scissors in one hand, an industrial amount of mockery and contempt in the other.

‘You know, it looks to me like you’ve removed several layers of skin,’ he tells me helpfully, peering closer. ‘Did you wax the area more than once?’

‘That is a potential possibility,’ I murmur, closing my eyes for a second so that I can avoid seeing the horror on Caroline’s face and the amusement on his. ‘I thought it wasn’t working so I used each strip several times.’

‘And how many strips did you use?’ he enquires.

‘All of them.’ I swallow loudly. ‘Was that wrong?’

There is a brief moment of silence while everyone takes in my words.

‘You waxed your upper lip using all the strips?’ breathes Caroline. ‘How many strips were in the box?’

I think back. ‘Maybe six?’

‘Didn’t you read the instructions at all?’ She is literally incredulous that anyone could be so stupid.

I think we can all agree, Caroline, that it is quite clear that I did not, in fact, read the instructions. Not after the word ‘anus’, anyway.

I nod my head vigorously. ‘Of course I read them. I’m not a complete idiot, you know.’

‘Hmmm.’ The new hairdresser looks at me appraisingly. ‘Then you’ll know that absolutely, under no circumstances, are you supposed to wax the same bit of skin more than once. You’ve given yourself a first degree burn.’

‘Will it take long to heal?’ I think about the fact that I am due in the classroom on Monday morning. I will never live it down if I walk in looking like this.

Caroline tilts her head to one side. ‘It’ll probably take a few days if you treat the burn and stop it from getting infected.’

‘How do I do that?’

The new hairdresser grins at me wickedly. ‘You need to get some of those burn pads from the supermarket and cut one down to size,’ he tells me. I sense that he’s enjoying himself. ‘And then stick it to the affected area.’

I look at him in disbelief. ‘You want me to walk around with a massive pad stuck to my top lip? Are you serious?’

‘I don’t care what you do, lady.’ He puts his hands on his hips and raises his eyebrows at me. ‘It’s your call. Do you want a permanently scarred lip or are you prepared to suffer in the short term?’

He struts back to his client who has been watching the whole thing as if she’s never seen a woman with a mutilated lip before. The rest of the salon resumes their business and Caroline gently spins my chair so that I am once again facing her and not my evil nemesis, the mirror.

‘Let’s get rid of these grey hairs, shall we?’ Her voice is shaking as if she’s trying not to laugh, but I don’t care. I’ve got bigger things to worry about than whether I’ve just made myself a complete laughing stock.

I care. I really, really care.

I sit in silence while Caroline starts slopping hair dye onto my head. I have three choices that I can see.

One: ignore the entire situation. Act normally and pretend that it never happened. If I don’t mention it then maybe nobody else will and my lip will heal before I have to walk into school on Monday.

Two: take the new hairdresser’s advice. Buy a burn pad and walk around looking like Groucho Marx all weekend. Hope that anyone I encounter, including my loving family, doesn’t mock me too enthusiastically.

Three: Wear a balaclava. It is still February, after all. People wear all manner of headgear during the arctic winter months here in southern England.

Okay, so option two is out straight away. Wearing a burn pad is going to look almost as ridiculous as my current appearance. And I don’t think much of option three. I can’t go into the supermarket wearing a balaclava – they have a very enthusiastic security guard who spends his days ensuring that nobody tries to steal the trollies. I’ll be rugby-tackled to the floor and put in a deadlock before I can say ‘lip trauma’.

Not that I can see the first option working too well for me either. I might be able to pretend that this hasn’t happened but there’s no way that my darling children will ignore it.

Which means that I’m going to have to choose door number four.

‘Is Laura in today?’ I ask Caroline. ‘And can you ask her if she has any spare appointment slots.’

And so it is that two hours later, I am sidling down the frozen food aisle with my beautifully manicured hands held out in front of my face. I have chosen a particularly zesty shade of azure blue and my nails are sparkling like the Mediterranean Sea. They will surely distract even the most observant of viewers from the car crash that is going on in the vicinity of my mouth.

And if that fails, then the very teensy bottle of Prosecco that I am currently purchasing will mean that I really don’t care.