shook her head. “No, but I’ll be back tomorrow afternoon. I’ll drop off a few samples for you.”
“That would be sweet of you.”
Judy misted Mrs. Edwards’s hair, separated it into sections, and began to cut while she got filled in on the latest tabloid headlines and Mrs. Edwards’s plans to volunteer at the Book Fair.
“I learned my lesson and made sure I signed up early. Last year I waited until the last minute and wound up at a booth selling cotton candy. What a mess! I came home, looked in the mirror and cried until you got here, remember?”
Judy held back a giggle. “I remember. Before I washed your hair, I thought the pink-and-blue cotton candy added a bit of whimsy to your braid.”
“And my eyebrows and my ears? Oh, I was one sticky mess. I was so worried you’d laugh at me, like certain other unnamed people who live in my building.”
“I would never laugh at you,” Judy promised.
When the telephone rang, Mrs. Edwards lifted the cape and pointed to the wall phone. “Be a dear and answer for me, would you? Hannah Damm was supposed to call me this morning, but she never did. That woman is getting more forgetful by the day. Tell her I’ll call her back.”
Scissors in hand, Judy answered the telephone.
“Judy? Penny. Mrs. Worth called from the school, like you thought she would. I told her you’d call her back, but she was a little huffy. She wants you to call her back right away. ‘Immediately,’ as she put it.”
Judy sighed. “Well, isn’t that dandy? I call that woman for three days, patiently waiting for her to find the time to call me back, and now that she’s ready…Mrs. Worth will just have to wait for me for a change. If she calls back again, tell her I’m booked until five so I’ll stop in to see her in the morning when I take Brian to school. I may not be an important lady like she is, but my customers are.”
“Got it. I’ll take care of her for you.”
“Thanks.” Judy hung up and returned to her customer.
“Trouble at school?”
Judy shrugged and resumed cutting. “Nothing that can’t wait till tomorrow.”
“It’s hard being a grandmother and raising your grand-baby, isn’t it?”
“Not all the time.” She snipped at a few pieces she had missed. “I hadn’t seen Brian since he was a toddler, so we’re really just getting to know one another. Between school and work, we don’t have all that much time together. He spends more time with his teacher every day than with me.”
“I was a teacher, you know.”
“Really?”
“Fourth grade. I only taught for a year or two before I met James. As soon as we got engaged, that was it. I got called down to the principal’s office, and he fired me on the spot.”
Judy gasped. “Fired you? For getting engaged?”
Mrs. Edwards laughed. “We were getting married right away and back then, teachers weren’t allowed to be married. We couldn’t do a lot of things teachers do today, but I didn’t mind trading a classroom full of students for married life. Not one bit.”
Judy checked to see that the ends were even. “That’s it for today. Shall I braid your hair again for you? It’s still a little damp.”
“Don’t bother, dear. I’ll sit on my couch by the window and let the sun dry my hair first. Since you’re going to Hannah’s next, tell her to call me when you leave, will you?”
Judy agreed, packed up and cleaned up. “You’re good for another five or six weeks,” she suggested.
Mrs. Edwards smiled. “You’ll do fine with that boy. You might be his grandmother, but you’re a good woman. You’ll be a grand mother to him, too.”
Judy swallowed hard. “Thank you.” She left for Hannah Damm’s apartment with a five-dollar tip for herself, all in quarters inside a little plastic bag, and a box of animal crackers for Brian. But the notion she was a grand mother as well as a grandmother was a priceless memento she tucked into her heart.
She rang the bell at Miss Damm’s door on the fourth floor twice. No response. She tried twice again, but no one answered. It was not like Miss Damm to forget an appointment, but she was hard of hearing and wore two hearing aids. Judy sighed and decided to go back down to the office again and try calling before moving on to the next appointment with Mrs. Thompson. If Miss Damm was not wearing her hearing aids, she would not hear the doorbell, but she might hear the extraloud bell on her telephone.
If Judy had a cell phone, she would have been able to call from where she stood, but a cell phone was out of the question, along with any hopes for a new winter coat this year. Brian needed an entire winter wardrobe. She retraced her steps, with her quarters jingling in her pocket, and walked back to the elevator that arrived before she had a chance to push the call button. Oddly, the elevator was empty, and she rode back down to the first floor hoping and praying Miss Damm was home and would hear her telephone.
Penny tried calling Miss Damm’s apartment. No answer. She tried again. “Still no answer. I know she’s here. She stopped in this morning for a package the mailman left and said she was going back to her apartment to wait for you. No problem,” she said and jangled a set of keys she retrieved from a drawer. “I’ll go up and let you in. She probably fell asleep watching television.”
“I don’t think I heard the television,” Judy countered as she followed Penny to the elevator.
Penny pushed the call button. “She keeps the volume turned down. Don’t ask me why. I haven’t a clue.” When they got to the apartment, Penny rang the bell several times before opening the door with her master key.
Looking over Penny’s shoulder, Judy could see the television. The screen flickered with life, but there was no sound. Miss Damm was lying in her recliner, apparently sound asleep. Penny had been right, but how she knew all the little idiosyncrasies of the residents still mystified Judy.
“She’s asleep. Just like I thought,” Penny whispered and approached the brown vinyl recliner with gentle steps. “Miss Damm? It’s Penny. Judy’s here to do your hair. Miss Damm?”
While Penny tried to wake the elderly woman, Judy held back and stayed just inside the door. When Penny looked up at Judy, the ashen look on her face confirmed an odd premonition that Miss Damm had slept her way from this world to the next.
“Call 911. There’s a telephone in the kitchen. Hurry. She’s still breathing, but I think she’s suffered a stroke.”
The next half hour was a blur of sirens, paramedics, police and fire personnel, who routinely responded to all emergency calls, and hosts of residents who filled the corridor and filed down to the Gossip Garden to share whatever they had been able to see or hear. After Miss Damm had been placed into an ambulance and peace had been restored to the Towers, Judy was not surprised when Mrs. Thompson canceled her appointment. She was simply too upset about her neighbor and friend to have her hair cut.
A bit shaken, Judy stored her canvas bag back in the office while
