14
Pretty Womaned
“Don’t think of it as a makeover,” Nora insisted. “Think of it as a polishing.”
I eyed Logan, who sat in the hairdresser’s chair next to mine, covered by a black robe, face lathered with shaving cream. One stylist trimmed his dark curls while a second shaved him. His eyes slid in my direction, though he was careful to keep still. “It’s nice once you get used to it,” he murmured. “World of difference from my old BargainCuts.”
Nora hadn’t dragged me to just any salon—we were at Acid Betty, where even Lee struggled to get an appointment. It was one of those new places Austin was famous for, both painfully hip and wildly expensive. The salon was so grunge it looked like the kind of place that would eschew money as a form of capitalist propaganda, but, as it turned out, was quite the opposite. A huge chandelier made of metal spikes hung from the vaulted ceiling, and stylists dressed in black buzzed everywhere with their hair half shaved or dyed slime green. The hypercool stylists both intrigued and intimidated me, but none more than the woman standing behind my chair, running her fingers through my hair with a scowl.
It had been four long days since my dinner with Logan, and while the photos of us leaving the restaurant had popped up on both The Watcher on the Hill and the Austin American-Statesman’s Out on the Town blog—which had then circulated on Twitter, accompanied by a fifty-fifty mix of single-tear and heart-eye emojis—I hadn’t heard a peep from the campaign. No texts or calls from Nora or Logan. Not even a Parks and Rec gif from Cary, who’d been DMing them to me nonstop ever since the Antique Car Society meeting. Apparently, he thought my impassioned speech about education had “Leslie Knope overtones,” which I’d decided to take as a compliment.
At first, I’d passed the time by returning to the photos, admiring what an effective sleight-of-hand Logan and I had achieved. The pictures captured him stroking my hair and leaning in to whisper, and we’d genuinely pulled off the look of two people with natural chemistry. But as the days passed without hearing anything, I’d taken to checking Logan’s event calendar and reminding myself that he was a busy person. And then, of course, I had to chastise myself for even noticing how long we’d gone without talking, because we were not actually dating. It was sad enough to obsessively check your phone waiting for a real boyfriend to call; doing it for a fake one made me question my grip on reality.
So it was no surprise that in my emotionally fragile state Nora had been able to catfish me into meeting her on the Drag, a shopping-heavy portion of Guadalupe Street next to UT, claiming Logan had important campaign business he needed my help with. I’d driven straight over after school only to be unceremoniously yanked into Acid Betty, where Logan was in the middle of getting a haircut. Nora had announced, rather triumphantly, that it was time to “spruce me up.” No amount of insistence that I didn’t need a makeover had swayed her. Somehow, I’d blinked and found myself sitting in this hairdresser’s chair.
“Logan, your old BargainCuts charged you seven dollars for a haircut and got shut down for health violations,” Nora said.
“I didn’t even know hairdressers could receive health violations,” I said.
“Oh, trust me, they can.” Nora rolled her eyes. “And he still grumbled when I told him we were going to a different place.”
“I won’t apologize for appreciating a good deal,” Logan muttered. “I’m a simple man.” With an air of indignation, he leaned back and settled into his stylist’s head massage.
Nora cocked an eyebrow and turned to me, tugging a strand of my hair. “Is it physically possible,” she asked my stylist, “to turn this into a Jackie O sort of situation?”
I yanked my hair back. “We’re not cutting it.” I was attached to my hair. Lee had once told me it made me look like Belle from Beauty and the Beast.
“Vat about a leetle trim?” It was the first my stylist had spoken since I’d arrived. I was astonished to discover that on top of her goth clothing, facial piercings, and matte black lipstick, she had an accent that could only be described as Transylvanian. “At least let me do za gloss. Your hair needs voom.”
“Voom?”
She waved her hand. “Interest. Life.”
Okay, ouch. Nora, whose picture was probably in the dictionary next to the word voom, gave me a pointed look in the mirror. “You’re about to be in a lot of photographs, Alexis. Do you really want the internet saying you have dead hair? Because you know they will.”
It was true. The internet was vicious.
“Besides, you have that library conference coming up.”
I did? I spun to face Logan. “You got me a booth?”
A champagne flute had mysteriously appeared in his hand, and he tipped it in my direction. “Even better. I called the council president and made a case for you to have top billing. You’re the new keynote speaker.”
Speaker? My stomach dropped, but I managed to smile—I think—and force out a thanks. Because obviously I was supposed to feel grateful.
Nora leaned over the back of my chair. “Do you really want all those librarians saying you have dead hair?”
“Ahhh, fine.” I had bigger things to worry about now, anyway. Like my first speech. You’re the new Alexis, I reminded myself. Old mouse Alexis is the one with the fear of public speaking. You’ll be brave, or at least you’ll die trying, thus saving you from future speeches. I eyed my stylist. “You have my permission to trim and do a gloss treatment. But nothing else.”
“And add za layers.”
“Okay, fine—and add the layers. But nothing else, I mean it. Please.” I tried to look resolute, but shied away when she made uncomfortably long eye contact.
“I’m eighty percent certain she’s a vampire,” Logan said when all the stylists had disappeared. With the shaving cream cleaned off, I’d expected to find him baby-faced, but the stylist had merely sculpted the edges of his facial hair into perfectly straight lines. And it was just the right length between a five-o’clock shadow and the beginnings of a beard—which, until now, I hadn’t realized was The Ideal Facial Hair.
“It’s his signature look,” Nora said, catching me staring. I jerked my eyes away and bit the inside of my mouth. “Polled the best out of all the options.” Oh, Logan had definitely had his appearance dissected a million ways.
“It’s my preferred look,” he corrected. “That’s why I wear it.”
“Sure.” Nora turned to me. “While I’ve got you captive, we’re going to run through some light media training.”
My stylist came back with a small cauldron of hair product and a paintbrush. “This is because of the press conference, isn’t it?”
Nora cocked a brow. “What do you think?”
I sighed. Well, I had wished for a training montage. And now with this Library Council speech, I needed all the help I could get.
“See,” Nora said, “what I just gave you is a perfect example of the kind of direct and pithy answer that works well with journalists.”
My stylist started painting white goo onto my hair. “Do you have to stick around for this?” I asked Logan. I was beginning to look like one of my mom’s long-haired cats after a bath. Meanwhile, Logan sat there freshly groomed, at what I had to admit was peak hotness.
“Oh, definitely.” He winked. “Nora says I need as many media refreshers as I can get.”
“Rule number one,” Nora said. “Always be respectful to reporters, but never feel indebted. Remember, they might intimidate you, but you’re doing them the favor. No need to suck up.”
“But don’t tell them when they’re being nitwits either,” Logan said. “Hurts their feelings, what few they have.”
“Come vith me to vash your hair,” said my stylist, and I stumbled behind her to the washroom, dropping my head back in a large black bowl with a hose attached.
“Never, ever repeat a question a reporter asks you.” Nora peered down at me from above the bowl. “Even if you’re trying to buy time. Especially if it’s a hostile question. Cause you know what they’ll do? Quote you, conveniently leaving out the question mark.”
Logan popped his head over the other side of the bowl. “That’s how Do you agree that you’re wildly unfit to be governor? gets turned into a viral news clip of you saying I’m wildly unfit to be governor.”
“Got it,” I said, then winced as my stylist blasted my scalp with icy water.
“Keep things short,” Nora instructed, as I walked back to the hairdresser’s chair, wet head wrapped in a towel. “For God’s sake, don’t ramble. The less talking you do, the lower the odds you’ll say something wrong.”
“And it turns out no one really cares if you studied Hume in grad school and developed your own theory of skeptical progressive economics,” Logan said. And he was right, because as soon as he’d started talking, my eyes glazed over.
“Lastly,” Nora said, as my stylist pressed me down into the chair and started snipping, “if you’re trying to avoid answering a question, never say No comment. It makes you look shady. Always say, Thanks for the question. The campaign will get back to you. We never will, but it deflects the heat. Let’s practice.”
“Now?” I asked, distracted as the stylist snipped a disturbingly long piece of my hair.
Nora lunged in my face. “Alexis Stone, if we searched your browser history right now, would we find your top-visited site is SoftRoundChonks.com, a blog devoted to pictures of chunky circular-shaped animals?”
“What?” I yelped. “How do you know that?”
“Wrong answer!” Nora cried, but luckily for me, the stylist turned the blow-dryer on full blast and Nora’s admonishment became literal hot air.
She must’ve cooled down during the ten minutes it took to dry my hair, because when my stylist floofed my crown and spun me around with a loud, “Much better, yes?” Nora clapped her hands. “You’re a sorceress.”
I studied myself in the mirror, turning my head from side to side. I never would’ve asked for a cut as asymmetrical and stylish as this, but I had to admit it made my cheekbones look sharper, which in turn made my eyes pop. I looked like a woman who barked orders into her cell phone as she power-walked to her corner office.
“What do you think?” Nora asked Logan, who was milling around sniffing bottles of shampoo.
He turned and studied my reflection in the mirror. His brown eyes locked with mine. “I liked the way Alexis looked before.” Before my heart could drop, he added, softly, “But this is good, too.”
“Excellent.” Nora was already walking out. “Now let’s do something about those clothes.”
“I don’t belong here,” I whispered as Nora loaded my arms with blazers. “Any second now, someone’s going to come tell me they don’t have anything for me and I’m obviously in the wrong place.”
Logan snapped his fingers. “Pretty Woman.”
“What?” Nora asked.
“I’m like Julia Roberts in Pretty Woman,” I said. “Trying to buy clothes somewhere out of my league.” Driftwood and Rose was only three doors down from Acid Betty, but the atelier was as refined and minimalist as Betty was grunge-chic. I’d flipped over a price tag on one of the skirts and almost gagged, dropping it before my fingerprints could do any damage.
“Isn’t that the movie where she’s a sex worker?” Nora rifled through the racks. “Never saw it.” She shot me an interested look. “Is it a political movie? The Arthur campaign supports sex work legalization.”
“It’s more a lighthearted rom-com about a quirky sex worker and a billionaire with a heart of gold.”
“And that’s not political? Sounds like billionaire propaganda to me.”
“Miraculously, they found a way to dodge politics in favor of romance.”
“That’s silly.” Nora’s eyes went back to roaming the neat rows of fabric. “Love is always political. Especially for women. Who you care for and believe in, what you do with your body, who you’re dependent on, the extent of your autonomy. Strange to me that people pretend you can separate the two.”
“And you don’t have to worry about paying,” Logan said, zeroing in on my secret fear. He flicked a price tag. “The Democratic Committee insisted on a line item in our budget for grooming, even though I told them it was a waste of money.”
“Oh, yes, the long lines at your speaking events have nothing to do with what you look like and everything to do with your recycling plan.” Nora gave him a look that fell somewhere between fond and exasperated. “The good news is, you use a quarter of what we budgeted. So we’ve got plenty to spare for Alexis.”
“Does that make the Democratic Committee my Richard Gere sugar daddy?” I mused, and Logan barked a laugh just as a gaunt, impeccably dressed woman flitted over. Oh, no—this was it. The moment I got asked to leave. My heart beat like I’d stolen something.
Strangely, the woman smiled at me, her expression full of warmth. “Hello, my dear. How may I help you?”
When I didn’t answer right away, taken aback, Nora rolled her eyes and said, “We’ll take another one of those Paul Smith suits in navy for this guy—you have his measurements on file—and a fitting room for her. Thanks.”
“My pleasure,” said the woman, and scurried away.
Logan and I glanced at each other. He shook his head. “She didn’t even tell you you’re obviously in the wrong place. Honestly, kind of a letdown.”
“You really don’t have to stand there handing me things,” I said to Logan through the changing room curtain. It was oatmeal-colored, nearly sheer—I could make out the outline of his broad shoulders—and short enough that I could see his polished shoes on the other side. My heart wouldn’t stop hammering as I pulled clothes on and off. With only a thin barrier between us, I should have felt exposed, but instead I couldn’t help picturing what would happen if he brushed the curtain aside, drank in the sight of my bare skin... I shivered, goose bumps lifting on my arms.
“It’s not a problem.” His outline shrugged. “You know... I’m kind of happy you don’t feel comfortable here.”
I froze with a green sheath dress half on. “You are?”
There was a long pause. Through the curtain, I saw him lace his fingers together. “Yeah. Makes me feel less alone.” He cleared his throat. “Anyway, how’s it going?”
I tugged the dress down and looked at myself in the mirror. Then I took a deep breath and opened the curtain.
I’d caught him by surprise. His wide eyes drifted down, taking me in, the look on his face more serious than I’d expected. I turned my back to him. “Zip me?”
In the mirror, I watched him hesitate before his hand came to rest on my waist, the other finding the zipper. “Green’s a good color on you.” He tugged the zipper slowly.
“Thank you.” The world narrowed to two sensations: the warm pressure of his hand on my waist and the light skim of his fingertips up my spine as he pulled the zipper. I bit the inside of my lip, wondering if it was possible for his touch to sear my skin, leave a mark. Though he touched me lightly, it felt like it could. And I would welcome it. Then I could trace the trail of his fingertips, proof this beautiful, quiet moment between us had existed.
He brushed my hair from my neck. “All done,” he said quietly. But his hands didn’t move.
Slowly, I turned to face him, pulse skipping. “So. What do you think?”
His eyes rose to meet mine, full of a sentiment I couldn’t parse, except that it was heavier than I’d anticipated. The space between us became charged.
“You’re gorgeous,” Nora called, striding over with a pair of heels.
Logan stepped back. “What Nora said,” he answered gruffly.
“Try these.” Nora shoved the heels at me. “At first it’s going to feel like you’re walking on stilts, but just roll with it. Eventually your feet will numb, and then you’re in business. These suckers are so hot it’s worth it.”
I groaned but reached for the heels.
Thirty minutes and three shopping bags later, Logan, Nora, and I were strolling along the edge of the UT campus when she suddenly stopped to glare at her phone. “Y’all go on ahead. I need to yell at an event coordinator.”
Logan nudged his Wayfarers higher on his face. “If it’s that fucker from the Log Cabin Republicans who keeps insisting we buy piñatas with Grover Mane’s face on them, tell him to grow up. I’m a politician, not a troll.” He turned to me and crossed his arms. “Why are you laughing? Out with it.”
“You would be much more intimidating right now if you didn’t smell like lavender aftershave.”
He sniffed himself, then glared and gestured for me to keep walking. “After you.”
I fell into stride beside him. We’d reached the part of campus where you could see the UT Tower in full view, and it always gave me a jolt of nostalgia. “You’re actually quite soothing. The man equivalent of an English garden.”
He turned to me and laughed, face cracking into a dazzling smile, wider than I’d seen from him. He leaned over and caught my hand, lacing our fingers together. “I think that’s the first time I’ve been accused of being soothing.”
My heart took off. We’re in public, I reminded myself, nodding at the people we passed. This part of the Drag, close to the group of dorms known as the six-pack, the heart of campus, was always the most crowded. A prime spot to be seen, which was surely why Logan was holding my hand. Playing the part. But when he squeezed my hand and tugged me closer, all reason fled. I was simply a girl having a lovely afternoon with her boyfriend.
We were closing in on a crowd standing around a guy with a microphone. I couldn’t hear what he was saying or read their signs, but rallies were common here—students loved to hold them in front of the UT Tower for visual impact. Logan and I would have to skirt them.
Or not.
“Afternoon, folks,” Logan boomed, and I jumped. Instead of maneuvering around the group, he was beelining toward it. A few people on the outskirts turned at the sound of his voice, and I read their burnt orange T-shirts: Longhorns for Grover Mane. This was a rally for Governor Mane. We were in enemy territory.
But Logan didn’t seem troubled. “Hi,” he said, extending his free hand to a tall man in a burnt orange Longhorn cap. “I’m Logan Arthur, running for governor against Grover Mane.” The man eyed Logan skeptically, but gave his hand a polite pump. Their interaction had more people turning, and I could see the guy with the microphone eye us. I wanted to melt into the street.
Logan cocked his head. “Mind if I ask what you like so much about Mane?”
The man in the cap made a scoffing sound. “He’s a Longhorn. You always support your fellow Horns.”
“That’s right,” someone else boomed. Around us, people were nodding and humming their agreement.
“Where’d you go to college?” asked the man. “Lemme guess: A&M.”
Logan waved a hand. “Never mind where I went.” He tugged me forward. “I want you to meet my girlfriend and campaign partner, Alexis Stone. She’s a librarian over at Barton Springs Elementary.”
“Hi,” I said, though what I wanted to say was: Where are you going with this?
The man tipped his cap to me.
“Hon, remind me.” Logan scratched his jaw. “Where’d you go to college?”
First of all: Hon? Second: So this was why Logan had grabbed my hand. He must’ve known about the UT alumni rally for Mane, and thought it would be a great time to show me off. I plastered on a smile. “Right here, hon. UT class of 2018. Hook ’em, Horns.”
It was definitely the most deflated I’d ever sounded uttering those words, but no matter—the man in the ball cap had enough enthusiasm for both of us. He whooped and made little horns with his fingers. “That’s right, bay-by. Hook ’em!” It caught on like wildfire, as it always did, and the crowd echoed it until the man with the microphone finally resigned himself to the fact that he’d lost his audience.
“Well, there you go,” said Logan, who had now successfully commandeered the attention of the crowd. “We’ve got a Longhorn at the highest level in our campaign, too. And you know what, I think we have some ideas for Texas that might interest you...”
I zoned out as Logan dove into his policy platform. He was good at this—far better than he gave himself credit for. And even though he’d clearly dragged me here to bait the crowd into listening to him, I wasn’t mad. The whole point of our arrangement was to help each other. And I knew how badly he wanted to win—I’d heard it in the tenor of his voice, the fire in his eyes. He was right that people told you who they were in a million different ways. And when I looked at him, I saw his longing.
I was the one who kept confusing fact and fiction. And of course I was, because that was my shtick: trying to will relationships into being more than they were capable of. I’d done it with Chris when I’d taken him back after he cheated, convinced I could will us back to normal. And though I didn’t really want to think about it, I’d done the same with my dad, thinking if I just tried hard enough, I could make our family whole again. Emotionally speaking, I was stuck in a Groundhog Day loop.
As if he knew I was thinking about him, Logan rubbed his thumb in a gentle circle over the back of my hand while he listened to the man in the hat talk about health care costs. A woman nearby looked down at our hands and smiled wistfully. I grimace-smiled back.
“Lex, did you want talk about our education plans?” There was a momentary pause in the man’s monologue, and Logan was leaping in.
“Oh,” I said, caught off guard. He’d never called me Lex before. It was surely only part of the act, but a traitorous bolt of pleasure shot through my heart. “No, you go ahead.”
Logan gave me a questioning look, but launched in dutifully.
It was time to break the loop. Logan had been clear our relationship was professional and he wouldn’t catch feelings. So starting now, I was going to stop putting stock in ridiculous daydreams and call a spade a spade. Manage my emotions. Stop giving away my heart.
Logan squeezed my hand and gave me a small, knowing smile as the man in the ball cap started talking about how he actually did agree with us that teachers needed more support—his wife was a kindergarten teacher, it turned out. I smiled back, encouraging but perfunctory, the perfect politician’s smile. Nothing more and nothing less.