“I just figured you would…I don’t know. Have a wig made? All that beautiful, long hair!” she mourned.
“Please.” Her sister scoffed, ruffling her fingers through her new choppy fringe like she was addicted to it. “My real hair hasn’t grown beyond my shoulders in forever. It was mostly extensions.”
“But the honey color. It was signature! And what about your wedding photos?”
“I would’ve worn it up anyway. And honestly, I’ve been wanting to go lighter. More natural.” Up went her slim fingers again, running through from root to tip. Her engagement ring looked extra sparkly against the smoky matte tresses.
“You didn’t have to run it by anyone at the studio?” Tzipi pressed. Hard to believe they would take issue with her relationship status, but not over something this drastic. “No continuity clause, like we had as Rosie?”
“If they stay true to Vanta’s storyline, she’ll go short and silver by the next movie. She’s just giving them a head start.”
When Kara wanted to deflect, she used the third-person persona of the character she’d lived and breathed since nineteen. Tzipi didn’t push further. The stylist was beckoning her over to the salon chair, anyway. Beside it was a tray that looked prepped more for a surgery than a salon treatment – gloves, delicate tools, foils, and whatever woo-woo was needed to make the magic happen.
No turning back now.
She had been warned it was at least a four-hour process from start to finish, clamping bead extensions, custom color blending and styling. Kara, by contrast, had little more to do for her Cinderella-in-reverse transformation. She let the other stylists hanging around spike and gloss her new ‘do with Hawaiian white honey and pure argan oil. She fiddled with a selection of lip glosses on display, bringing colors over for Tzipi to choose. She took selfies in front of a big mirror, so she could capture the front and the back of her new look to text to Shel. Finally, she collapsed in the neighboring chair with a celebrity gossip magazine and read it aloud to Tzipi like a fairytale.
“…And then Lala and Sergio lived happily ever after. I give that three months.”
“Try one.” Tzipi raised a brow but didn’t elaborate. The real on-set drama and gossip often revolved around the catering and craft services tables, where she and her crew happened to spend most of their time, quietly boxing up excess food on behalf of That’s a Wrap, Folks! For all intents and purposes, they were trained to be invisible. Their movements made to blend into the background. She touted the importance of discretion within her organization, and she practiced what she preached whether she was on location or off. A closed set, she believed, should stay closed. And its stars insulated.
“Robby Levin, calling me again.” Kara glanced over her magazine at her phone, blowing up on the counter. “Wouldn’t be the first Bloom brother wanting me to hook him up on the Matzo Baller’s guest list. Everyone comes out of the woodwork this time of year.”
She waved away the buzz like it was an annoying mosquito. Meanwhile, Tzipi hadn’t thought of the possibility of running into their old Room to Bloom co-stars on the boat, or even in Manhattan. They existed on a long-ago set in L.A., crafted to look like their fictional family’s home base, the real town of Easton in Pennsylvania where the creator of the series was from. Famous for the Crayola factory. Some studio marketing genius of course capitalized on that, customizing crayons with their character’s names: Rosie Red, of course. Boxes by the truckload, used on the set and in the twin’s real house, and as gifts to every Jewish kid come Hanukkah that year.
“Hey, what do you think of this lip gloss?”
Kara swiped the product over Tzipi’s lips, since her own hands were held hostage under the salon cape. The color was pretty, but it smelled – and burned – like cinnamon schnapps.
“Depends,” she murmured through the tingle. Her lips were swelling before her eyes. “Do you want me to look kissable, or contagious?”
One look at her face and Kara laughed. “It’s supposed to feel like that, babe. That’s how you know it’s working. This formula lasts for thirty minutes. You’ll have to reapply, maybe time it right before the red carpet, then again after the menorah lighting, and depending on how much you eat or drink.”
“Is it really a good idea for me to board this boat all by myself? I’m not going to have a Shel with me to whisper this kind of intel in my ear.”
“You won’t be truly alone. You’ll have Armando. Or Max. Or Ham. Whoever the security detail sends.”
“Ham? On a Hanukkah boat?”
Kara laughed. “It’s usually Max on the Baller, come to think of it. He’s Jewish. People wouldn’t blink twice if he had to hora dance in the line of duty. No offense, Armando.”
“None taken.”
Tzipi couldn’t whip her head around to see who the deep voice belonged to. Not when Kara’s stylist was tracking the bead count and placement zones meticulously as she attached what looked like slim strands of a pony’s tail over and over again. But in the mirror, she caught the flash of a broad shoulder in a dark blazer shrugging by the washing station.
Talk about blending into the background.
“Has he been with us the whole time?” Tzipi hissed.
“Not in the treatment rooms, but yeah.” Kara flipped to the end of the magazine, then tossed it aside. “I’m never all by myself these days, Tizzy.”
Now that she thought of it, Tzipi recalled a similar bear in black, hunkered at a nearby table in Bergdorf’s café as the girls re-fueled after yesterday’s shopping marathon. And another, lurking in a doorway as the Town car pulled up to whisk them down to the spa today.
“And they know about…all this?”
“They’re briefed, briefly. Not the who and the why, but the what, when and where. They’re paid to not ask many questions. And it’s not exactly Pentagon-level cover-up, Tiz. Celebs have stand-ins more often than you think. Right, Bree?”
Without missing a beat, or a bead, the stylist working her magic on Tzipi’s hair nodded. “Beyoncé. Taylor. Harry.”
