Page 151 of The Home Grown
“Oh?”
She waves me over to the counter, sitting back down before tapping the seat next to her.
“Look … I know you were thinking about a website and since you’re helping me out with my wedding hair, I thought I’d just have a play with a few things.” She twists her laptop towards me, and she scrolls through a website; lilac and a blush of pink with snippets of white fill the screen. “I can change anything you’re not keen on but?—”
The colours feel natural and so very un-Kathryn like. But it’s the logo at the top of the page that gets my attention the most when Jen scrolls back to the top:Styled by Ellie: Bridal & Beyond.
“I’ve just put that in as a placeholder,” she says, her eyes flicking towards mine as my jaw drops because it’s perfect. Perfect and it feels some.
I take a moment to scan over the screen, completely in awe that Jen went out of her way to make this.
“Oh, my God,” I say. “It’s beautiful.”
“Really? I mean, I thought you could keep it simple. I think you need a section for ‘Prices’, ‘Services’ and ‘Contact Information’. That’s it,” Jen says.
I stare at the screen, completely mesmerised—still in complete shock, if I’m honest.
Then a pair of arms wrap around me, the fresh smell of Mike as his head rests on my shoulder.
“Wow, Jen. This is great,” he says. “Isn’t it great, Kitch?”
“Well, yes. I absolutely love it.”
But then an anxious knot settles in my stomach. Because something like this looks expensive. And something this expensive is out of my price range considering I’m currently trailing behind when it comes to paid work.
“What’s wrong?” Mike says. “Is it the colours? Jen can change that sort of thing, right, Jen?”
Jen offers me an encouraging nod.
“No, I love the colours, but—how much will this cost?” I ask.
“Less than a bridal hair styling would. And it’ll be easy to maintain. I can set you up with a mechanism to upload new photos and reviews.”
“But—”
“Ellie, don’t worry. I enjoy doing this sort of thing. And I liked the challenge since I’ve never made a website for anything that isn’t sport or e-commerce before,” she says, reaching for her mug and taking a sip.
“But—”
“Please,” Jen says, setting her mug down.
I worry my lip, because this is probably the nicest thing anyone’s ever done for me.
I throw my arms around her before I can stop myself, tears already prickling behind my eyes.
“Thank you. But, please let me do your hair in return. No charge. It’s the least I can do,” I say.
Jen squeezes me back before pulling away. “Okay, deal. But you need to let me have some photos. We need to get real snaps and?—”
“Ah, that’s the thing,” I say. “I’m terrible at remembering to take photos. I mean, I definitely have some, but nothing remotely new.”
“Well, it’s good timing that you’ll be doing trials soon,” Jen says. “Do you have any I can use to get us going?”
I rummage for my phone and unlock the screen, pulling up my gallery and flicking through the photos I have saved. I only have a few decent ones I’d consider web-site worthy though, but Jen picks out several and taps in her email address for me to send them over.
“I need to figure out my social media, I guess. Get some decent photos and?—”
“I’ll ask Vicky,” Jen says. “She owes Mike a favour.”
