“YOU’VE TURNED MY EIGHT-HUNDRED-DOLLAR HAIR INTO SOMETHING FROM A PRESCHOOL ART CLASS!”

At thirty-five thousand feet, a young woman stood in the airplane aisle, one hand glued to her hair and fury written all over her face.

With her free hand, she pointed straight at me.

Everyone in the cabin turned to look.

Yet just two hours before, I never could have imagined any of this happening.

---

Two hours before that, I was waiting in the duty-free checkout line, carrying a small gift for my granddaughter.

The queue barely moved, and the explanation was standing directly ahead of me.

She looked about twenty-eight, with blonde hair reaching the backs of her knees and a phone extended in front of her.

Her phone case was decorated with rhinestones spelling BRITTANY, presumably to remind her.

“All right, everyone, which should I get? This one or that one?”

She displayed two perfume bottles to her camera.

“Miss, are you ready for me to check those out?” the cashier asked.

“Hang on, my viewers are voting.”

At my age, a request to wait a second ought to include somewhere to sit.

“Oh, I know! They’re both amazing. I might just buy the two of them.”

The cashier announced the price. For a brief moment, the girl looked startled.

Then she beamed at her screen.

“Looking beautiful is an investment, isn’t it?”

After paying, she picked up a sample bottle and sprayed her throat, both wrists, and even her hair for good measure.

Seconds later, the perfume cloud reached me, and I started coughing.

“Excuse me, dear, but that fragrance is awfully powerful.”

“It’s from France.”

“I’m fairly certain the French didn’t mean for us to swallow it.”

The cashier let out a sound like a whistling teakettle.

“You guys, apparently people are offended by my perfume,” she announced to her phone.

She tossed her hair across her shoulder, striking me right in the face.

“Watch out, dear. You just hit me with your hair.”

“Well, stop standing right behind me.”

“This is a checkout line.”

“People still deserve personal space.”

I moved backward, but she swung her head around once more.

Now her hair brushed against my hand.

“Does that always require so much space?”

“Does what?”

“That hair of yours.”

“It’s called having volume.”

“Ah, understood. I assumed Cousin Itt had discovered hair conditioner.”

The cashier burst into uncontrollable laughter.

“Whatever. Clearly, some people don’t understand beautiful hair.” She paused at the exit. “You’re probably jealous.”

“Of that perfume? Hardly.”

She walked away, although her fragrance lingered like a party guest refusing to leave.

The cashier rang up my gift. “Your granddaughter is fortunate.”

“She certainly ought to be. Apparently, it’s the one thing she’s been asking me for.”

I secured the present inside my purse and headed toward my departure gate.

I felt sure of two things: I wouldn’t encounter that young woman again, and Emily’s gift would arrive undamaged.

Neither prediction turned out to be right.

---

My assigned row was toward the rear. As I approached, that familiar perfume greeted me.

Thick. Sugary. French.

“Guys, I’m finally getting on the plane! Come see where I’m sitting!”

An elderly gentleman in my row was struggling to lift his suitcase into the overhead compartment.

The blonde paused one row in front of us and whirled around to show her audience the interior.

Her hair followed her movement a moment afterward.

It smacked the gentleman’s face, sending his glasses one direction and his suitcase another.

I managed to grab the suitcase.

“Much obliged.” He picked up his spectacles. “I think I’ve been attacked by an advertisement for shampoo.”

“That certainly seems accurate.”

“Do you suppose I should report it?”

“You’d need quite a lengthy report. There’s an awful lot of hair involved.”

He grinned. “I’m Harold.”

“Martha.”

“Well, Martha, let’s hope she isn’t seated anywhere close to us.”

She settled into the seat immediately ahead of mine.

Naturally.

“You’ve got to be kidding. You again?”

“The world really is tiny.”

“Have you been following me?”

“Certainly not, dear. Your perfume beat you here.”

Once the seat-belt light switched off, she rose into the aisle, holding her phone behind her body.

“All right, guys, you wanted to see it from behind.”

“Eight hundred bucks, everyone! Just check out the length. Totally worth it.”

She revolved slowly, like a chicken turning on a roasting spit.

Then she dropped into her seat and swept all that hair backward over the seat top, as though hanging clothes to dry.

It spread over my tray, along the armrest, and eventually across my forehead in individual strands.

“Pardon me. Could you please pull your hair back?”

“I’m broadcasting live. Not now.”

“Your audience must be delighted. I’d be delighted if your hair remained on your side of the seat.”

“Seriously? It’s just hair.”

Harold leaned closer. “Eight hundred dollars? My first automobile cost less.”

“Did yours include a steering wheel?”

“Not right away.”

I chuckled, and for a little while that made things easier.

An hour afterward, though, I was so irritated I could have blasted into space.

“Why are you, like, completely fixated on my hair?”

“I’m not fixated on anything. I’m simply the person seated behind it.”

“You’re obviously jealous. What was the last time you had hair like mine, fifty years back?”

These days, my hair is silver and cropped short, and I have no desire to return to the way it used to be.

I’ve brought up three children and lost my husband, and I refuse to regret any of the years I’ve lived.

“As it happens, I had rather beautiful hair back when Reagan was president.”

She giggled. “Exactly. That’s practically prehistoric.”

Then the attendants arrived with lunch.

The name printed on our flight attendant’s badge was Kelly.

Brittany swept her hair backward while photographing her meal, and its tips dropped directly into my rice.

“Excuse me! Your hair has landed in my food!”

Without looking around, she replied, “So don’t eat it.”

“I had no intention of doing that.”

“There you go. Problem fixed.”

“Except I’d still appreciate being able to finish my lunch.”

“Lady, you’re acting like this is some huge disaster.”

“By any chance, is my fork up there too? It appears to have gone missing.”

A teenage boy on the opposite side of the aisle snickered. His mother nudged him, although she was fighting a smile herself.

I pushed the attendant-call button. Kelly removed my meal and instructed Brittany to keep her hair in her own space.

“Okay! Fine! Whatever!”

Once Kelly had walked away, Brittany faced her phone again.

“Everyone, apparently having hair is against the rules on this airplane.”

She promptly tossed it over the seat again.

“Whoops.”

Eventually, another lunch was brought to me.

For precisely two minutes, I enjoyed eating without interruption.

Flying makes me nervous, so I’d requested a little glass of white wine to settle myself. When we hit turbulence, I gripped the glass with both hands as though it were a sacred cup.

That was when her hair dipped into it.

Not beside the glass. Right inside it. The tips moved through my wine like a brush swirling in a paint pot.

“Oh, good heavens.”

“Now what is it?!”

“Your hair is soaking in my wine.”

“Maybe someone your age shouldn’t be drinking anyway.”

“Excuse me?”

She raised her phone above the seat back.

“Guys, look! She’s doing that furious grandmother stare!”

“Would you kindly remove that device from my face?”

“Calm down. Eleven hundred people are tuned in. You’re basically just something in the background.”

“Want me to summon Kelly again?” Harold whispered.

I stared at the glass I couldn’t bear to drink from anymore.

“No, Harold. I’ve reached my limit.”

I bent down and retrieved my handbag from beneath the seat.

Brittany continued her livestream.

I pulled a hundred-dollar note from my purse and dropped it gently near Brittany’s shoes.

“Dear? I believe something fell out of your bag.”

“Huh?”

She glanced down, bent at the waist, grabbed the money, and shoved it into her handbag.

“Well, I guess your eyesight isn’t totally gone. Thanks.”

Naturally, she kept it. As far as she was concerned, anything landing within reach automatically belonged to her.

But her hair was so extraordinarily long that it could occupy two places simultaneously. Her body bent down.

Her hair remained hanging over the seat, with its tips piled across my tray table.

I unwrapped the gift.

I scooped out a substantial amount and spread it through the ends of her hair, working roughly twenty inches upward as well.

I’d originally planned only a modest little reminder.

“Please remind me never to upset you,” Harold said under his breath.

“Then don’t let your hair invade my seat.”

“Fortunately, that’s an easy rule for me these days.”

Brittany straightened up.

The teenager across the aisle noticed before anybody else.

“Mom! Check that out!”

“It’s impolite to stare.”

“But she’s got something stuck in her hair!”

“What? Why’s everybody staring at me?”

No one responded. The boy was covering his mouth with both hands.

Brittany turned her phone around, using its screen to inspect herself.

Because the livestream was still running, all eleven hundred viewers witnessed the discovery too.

Bright pink. Sparkly. Resting on her shoulder.

“WHAT ON EARTH IS THAT?!”

She touched it, and a sticky filament stretched between the substance and her fingertip.

“IS THIS SLIME?!”

“That’s slime, dear. I bought it for my granddaughter. You’ve simply tried it before she has.”

“YOU STUCK SLIME IN MY HAIR?!”

“Your hair went into my lunch. I assumed we were trading possessions.”

“I PAID EIGHT HUNDRED DOLLARS FOR THESE EXTENSIONS!”

“Indeed, dear. You’ve told us several times. I’d advise you not to touch them.”

“STOP ORDERING ME AROUND!”

Instead of snapping, the slime elongated into a glittery strand connecting her hand to her head.

Her artificial nails became embedded in it, like forks plunged into pasta.

As she tugged her hand loose, pink goo stretched between her fingers like warm melted cheese.

She smeared it onto her denim trousers and then onto the armrest, leaving sticky marks behind.

When she shook her head, a tacky strand struck her cheek and clung there.

I thought I’d delivered my lesson, although I couldn’t guess what consequences might await me after landing.

She reached toward her hair with the hand holding her phone, and the device adhered to her palm.

“Mom, she’s turning into cotton candy!” the teenager yelled.

His mother attempted to silence him, but she was laughing far too much.

“YOU HORRIBLE OLD WOMAN! SEE WHAT YOU’VE DONE!”

Kelly rushed along the aisle toward us.

“Ma’am, you need to sit down, please!”

“I WANT TO GET OFF THIS AIRPLANE!”

“Ma’am, we’re flying thirty-five thousand feet above the ground.”

“I DON’T CARE! JUST LOOK AT MY HAIR!”

Which returns us to all that shouting: a furious woman, an entire plane of witnesses, and the evidence of my misbehavior tangled in her hair.

Kelly persuaded her to sit. Brittany’s phone was still attached to her palm, its screen facing outward toward her.

“Someone end the livestream! Turn it off! I can’t do it because my fingers are stuck!”

“Try not to move.”

Using a napkin, I gripped the phone around its sides, located the red control, and tapped it. It took me three attempts.

The display was coated in slime.

Before it switched off, I couldn’t avoid reading the final comments.

IM DYING LOL

someone please find some oil for her

why isn’t anyone doing anything

dude she kept dumping her hair in grandma’s food for AN HOUR

not gonna lie grandma’s a legend

“What are people writing?” Brittany wanted to know.

“They’re concerned about your hair.”

“They really are?”

“For the most part.”

Kelly knelt alongside my seat. “Ma’am, are you responsible for this?”

I’d enjoyed my foolish prank. Now I needed to behave like the adult I was.

“Yes, I am. And I’ll clean it up.”

“There’s a vacant seat beside her. Please take care of it without any more disturbance.”

I suspected serious consequences were coming.

Harold reached over the seat with my salad and offered me its small container of olive oil.

“Why should I trust you anywhere near my hair?” Brittany demanded.

“Because I can remove this, and I give you my word I won’t add anything else.”

I tried a single lock first. With one drop of oil and a little gentle rubbing, the slime came free.

“Stay away from the extension clips,” Brittany warned.

“I wouldn’t consider touching them.”

After raising three children, including one with a particular talent for getting gum stuck everywhere, I found slime considerably simpler.

Kelly returned and leaned down beside us.

“Ma’am, do you want us to arrange for police officers to meet the plane on arrival?”

“Yes!” Brittany replied sharply. “Of course I do!”

Kelly glanced in my direction.

“I understand,” I answered.

What I didn’t anticipate was that this shameless blonde still had another surprise in store for me.

“I’ll have to make a record of the incident,” Kelly explained. “I’ll speak with you again before we land.”

Then she walked off.

“These extensions used up nearly all the money I had left for this month.”

“Why did you buy them, then?”

“I wanted to be attractive.”

“You were attractive already.”

“You wouldn’t understand.”

“Give me a chance.”

“Every person online seems flawless. Perfect hair, perfect complexion, absolutely everything.”

“And you believe purchasing those things is the secret to happiness?”

“I’m not sure. Perhaps.”

“That’s an awfully costly perhaps.”

“I didn’t have the money for that perfume, either. I’m only twenty-eight, but I already feel ancient.”

“Oh, dear. You’re saying that to a woman who’s seventy-three.”

“I realize that.”

“And I’m enjoying life quite nicely, thank you. Except for today’s journey.”

The corners of her mouth almost lifted.

I spared her a sermon. Sometimes what your hands do matters more than what you say.

“Your hands remind me of my grandmother’s.”

“Should I take that as praise?”

“Yes. When I was small, she always used to braid my hair.”

“Does she do that anymore?”

“No. She died several years back.”

I gathered three clean sections of hair.

“Fortunately, I still remember the technique.”

All the slime had been removed. Her extensions remained completely undamaged, though they were thoroughly coated with oil.

I fashioned the hair into a simple single braid, ensuring it couldn’t fall over the seat again.

“So my hair isn’t destroyed?”

“It’s more like a salad now. Shampoo it a couple of times and it’ll be all right.”

“It’s been years since I last wore a braid.”

“It looks lovely on you. You’re a pretty young woman, Brittany. You don’t have to spend eight hundred dollars improving yourself to establish that.”

“I’m sorry I kept tossing my hair onto you. And I’m sorry for insulting you about being older.”

“It certainly wasn’t polite.”

“I know it wasn’t.”

I secured the end of the braid.

“And I owe you an apology for putting slime into your hair.”

“Yeah. That was a pretty nasty thing to do.”

“You’re right.”

Brittany studied her new braid.

“Still, thank you for getting it out.”

“You’re very welcome, dear.”

Several minutes passed before Kelly came back.

“Ma’am, regarding the police: would you still like us to have officers waiting when we arrive?”

Brittany paused to think.

“No. I’ve decided against it.”

Kelly acknowledged her answer with a nod.

When the attendant was gone, I faced Brittany.

“What made you reconsider?”

“Because I know how that recording makes things appear,” she muttered.

“And how does it make things appear?”

“As though I deserved what happened.”

“I might choose gentler words, but I wouldn’t disagree with the meaning.”

She let out a quiet chuckle.

I wasn’t certain whether to bring up one final matter.

“And, dear, I think you may have collected something belonging to me.”

“What do you mean?”

“One hundred dollars.”

“Wait, that money belonged to YOU? I honestly thought it was mine!”

“Naturally you did, dear.”

I acted as though I believed her. It seemed the most gracious option for us both.

She searched her purse, found the bill, and returned it to me.

“Then I accept your apology.”

I returned to my original seat, which Harold had thoughtfully kept available, if not literally warm.

“How would you feel about having coffee after we land?” he asked.

“Do you regularly approach women so boldly on flights?”

“Just the ones who seem dangerous.”

The captain informed us that we were beginning our descent.

Emily would receive a check rather than her present. That weekend, she and I could go shopping for a replacement together.