Page 3 of Love at Teamsgiving
“That might lead people to think it’s an express salon.”
“You could go with something trendy like ‘Cut and Color Bar?’”
I tip my head from side to side because I like it, and then I check the salon database. “Taken and trademarked by a franchise in California. My father suggested the ‘Hair Saloon,’” I say, as if he’s just at home watching hockey highlights in his easy chair.
Kian goes quiet.
My eyes prickle.
It’s been almost a year, and it’s still about as hard to talk about him as it was on day one. However, I want to talk about him and my mother refuses. I don’t like to think about losing my father so suddenly from a heart attack, but I can’t pretend he didn’t exist. Knowing Kian as well as I do, he’ll remain quiet until I’m ready to speak again.
Clearing my throat, I say, “Mom has always thought ‘Bella Capella’ would be perfect.”
“Translation?”
“Beautiful hair.”
He takes a bite of pie. “No. Won’t work. Sounds like an a cappella group. How about ‘Not Your Mother’s Salon?’”
We both laugh because everything in my life is my mother’s, which partly explains why I am the way I am. She’s a meddler—a busybody Italian mama who loves me more than life itself—but that also means she thinks she knows what’s best for me: my wedding, my career, everything.
Well, until Papa passed away. Since then, it’s like she’s willing herself to become nothing more than a shadow.
I help myself to a second slice of pie.
“That good?” Kian asks.
Or the state of affairs is that bad, and I’m stress-eating.
Kian, ever perceptive about me needing a laugh, says, “How about ‘Dye Hard’ or ‘Snippy Business?’”
“Have you been watching eighties movies?”
“Kimberly insists Kit and I have father-son nights, so I’ve been showing him the ropes.” As if realizing this isn’t a great segue from thinking about how I can no longer have daddy-daughter dates—always hockey games—even though I’m in my twenties and Kit is twelve, he adds, “Have you thought about ‘Styles by Juniper?’”
This is almost, but not quite, worse. “Miguel always thought ‘Junie Did It’ would be a good one.”
Kian’s eyebrows furrow. “Who is Miguel?”
I am so glad he brought pie. Nothing like a little dessert therapy to help me not think about the two men in my life. One, I tragically lost. The other went his own way.
Kian stares at me as if I’ve been holding out on him—not telling him about a gentleman. Gentlejerk is more like it.
“Mikey,” I mumble.
“Mikey’s real name is Miguel?” Kian nods as if filing away this information in case I change my mind and decide to take a hit out on the hockey player.
Kidding.
Jokes.
I’m not that vengeful. However, when I saw him at the last Kings v Liberators game, mixing it up with Eckles on the ice, I cheered when the gloves came off.
Moving on …
“I could name the salon, ‘Cobbiton’s Cut, Color, and Curls or ‘Corn Clips ...’”
Kian’s expression sharpens and I anticipate what’s coming.
