The Breeze

            In the supermarket next to the checker’s cash register sat a miniature fan.

            It wasn’t the type of miniature you might place in a curio cabinet or set up on a shelf, just to look at.

            This was a working heavy duty machine, that provided a welcome breeze to a woman  plaqued  by the villains of the menopausal flash.

            I questioned her about it, because of its size, which looked to be about seven inches tall and about four inches wide and was incased in a slick plastic black tower, which made it look like an air purifier. Then  I wondered why she would need one in this perfectly clean market I had frequented for years.

            She told me that two years ago she had the same thought, and she was desperate for a solution, until the salesman in the electronic store turned it on and melted her perspiration away.

“Wow,” she said. “What a powerhouse this is in such a tiny body.”

He told her; by using the casement of one of their little air purifiers they could add enough power fore a strong flow of air and still keep a small foot print, which would allow it to fit almost anywhere.           

 She said she’d take it and never looked back.

            “When the flashes started they came every fifteen minutes and didn’t care if I was sleeping or at work. No matter what time of day, the sweat would pour off my face and drip onto my clothes. I must have registered eighty degrees. This fan was then and still is a lifesaver.”

            I smiled and was glad she found a solution.

           Just before I was about to pay for my groceries, she asked me if the breeze bothered me.

            With both thumbs pointed up, I answered in solidarity,  “No, I get it.”

The pressure dropped. The thunderheads rolled in and buckled against the city’s height, then cushioned there, they threatened. Nothing less than dangerous.

“I can’t wait to get outta the city,” you said.

It seemed everything was rusting.

“Give me a haircut,” you said.

The scissors were dull. Lightning flashed at the windows.

The ivy crept near. That red chair, scraping, scraping, until you could see just right in the china cabinet’s mirror (I didn’t want you to see what I was doing).  Thunder. The humidity and the roughly cut hairs made my nose itch. So much damn DAX in your hair, my fingers were shining. Smoothed the hair between my forefinger and middle finger, snip, snip. Here, there. No plan.

You complained: “Too long here.”

I always admitted I didn’t know what I was doing.

You liked it, after all. You preened. The storm had already ended.

After you had driven across the bridge toward the city, I realized you were gone. I dug a wad of your hair from the bathroom garbage. Rubbed it between my fingers. It produced no effect. I smelled it. Nothing. For a second I thought about stuffing it in my pocket. Instead, I stared at it until it was only hair, then I buried it in the trash can among the tissues and cardboard rolls, deep down, underneath everything.