I spun around, and there was Autumn, followed closely by Summer.
Autumn stared. “Wow.”
“That’s crazy,” Summer said.
I walked toward my sisters. “I know it’s horrible.”
“No, what’s horrible is you left the house dressed like that,” Autumn said.
I glared at the baby of the family.
She grinned and shoved a bag and a cup of coffee toward me. “Black as your soul,” she said.
I nodded, took a sip of the drink, and felt the heat all the way to my toes.
“What’s in the bag?” Summer asked.
“The most ‘Winter-like’ outfit I owned,” Autumn said. “Otherwise known as my court and interview suit.”
I glanced in the bag. “You know, it’s going to wrinkle if you wad it up and put it in a bag like that.”
“It’s that new, non-wrinkling fabric.”
I sighed. Part of me wanted to be irritated because no fabric was truly wrinkle-free, but the other part of me knew that Autumn came from a good place, bringing me something to put on.
“Thank you,” I said.
* * *
An eternity later,after all the photos were taken and everyone was spoken to multiple times by different people, I was finally able to start cleaning up. Though I wasn’t going to do it in Autumn’s nice clothing.
They were fine for talking to the police and everything—I at least somewhat felt like myself when I gave a statement about any enemies I or the salon may have had.
Enemies…
Such a while concept.
I mean, I knew I had ex-employees over the years who weren’t my biggest fans, but that didn’t mean I had enemies.
And so far, we didn’t know if the message was directed at a particular person, or if it was in general to the salon. If it was personal or professional.
There was even the idea thrown around that it was kids, but that didn’t make sense, because if it had been kids, why just hit the salon? Why not all the stores in the strip mall?
An exhausting morning, and since the police were doing an investigation, they couldn’t really speculate on anything.
Even Louie wasn’t saying much yet.
All I could do was see what I could clean. So I ran home and changed into overalls and a sweatshirt before hitting up the store for cleaning supplies.
I wasn’t sure what to expect, because of the cold. Would the paint come off? How long had it been on the windows? If they did it Saturday night, it would have had plenty of time to soak in and solidify.
But would that be different in the cold?
I just didn’t know.
The police recommended a few things, but to start with soap and water first, so I got some of that power soap stuff and those special erasers, to see if I could get the windows clean.
All of us girls and Mom cleaned and scrubbed, doing what we could to get it all as close to back to normal as possible.
