The Hair Pin
A betrayal of the mind
Alice hesitates as she shakes the cotton under-sheet. A bent brown bobby pin — the type she wore years ago to secure her hair — lay on her husband’s side of the bed.
It can’t belong to her. She hasn’t worn an updo since her cousin’s wedding five springs back.
A chill scurries down her spine, and time stands still. Has her husband taken another woman to their bed? No. He can’t have. He wouldn’t. He isn’t that kind of man. Besides, when does he have time?
She holds the offending article in the palm of her hand and stares. Is this really happening? Not to her. This doesn’t happen to women like her.
Alice places the pin on the dresser, dithering for a few seconds, and puts a fresh case on her husband’s pillow. His favorite, from the blue bedding set his aunt Margret gave them as a housewarming present.
She looks at the hairpin when the bed is made, sinks onto the mattress, and then rises quickly in disgust. Someone she hasn’t invited touched the same place she touches. Rested her head on that pillow. Kissed. Yes. Kissed her husband and more besides.
Her hand covers her lips as if stifling a cry, and yet, she doesn’t make a sound as she takes three paces to the full-length mirror.
There is her reflection. A boring, middle-aged woman with blue-green eyes. She is average, she thinks. Maybe that’s why he took someone to their bed.
She shuts her eyes and strains to squeeze the image of him with the woman out of her head.
The stranger in her imagination has no face. Just a mass of silky, smooth bare skin and tumbling tresses. Her nails are painted blood red. No. Pink. Her husband isn’t bold. He likes pastels.
Alice knows she must choose. Should she confront him? Or pretend nothing happened? She can carry on and let it slide. He might not do it again.
If she doesn’t mention the hairpin, he won’t know she knows. He might regret what he’s done and be more like the man she believed he was when she got up this morning; from the bed where the unknown woman rolled and laughed, flicked her locks, and ran her hands over his body.
Anger flares unexpectedly in her belly. Who does he think he is? What right does he have? How could he do that to her? She will confront him. Make him explain. Make him crawl. Make him pay.
First, though, she will move the pin. Where to put it? As evidence, it mustn’t go in the trash. On auto-pilot, Alice walks to her old jewelry box, the one she rarely uses. It is full of bits and bobs.
Broaches she doesn’t wear. Tangled necklaces she means to sort out but never does, and… And the ancient bobby pins she keeps, just in case. The ones she emptied on the bed earlier that week when rummaging through the box looking for her pendant.
That’s it. The pin must have slipped between the sheets unnoticed until today. She plunges onto the bed and sighs. Nervous laughter bolts from her mouth as self-talk soothes and scolds. “Everything’s fine, you fool.”
