This all happened a couple of years ago while I was working for my mom’s landscaping business part time while I was putting myself through college. Most of the time I’d help out on jobs, just doing simple things like lawn mowing or a bit of pruning. Sometimes though, my mom would ask me to go around collecting payments from customers and that was when I first met Agnes.
Agnes ran a beauty salon come barbershop in town, it wasn’t a place I frequented as a child because I’d always kept my wavy red hair long, only getting it trimmed every other month or so and the salon my mom used was one that was closer to home. Agnes’s salon had a beautiful window garden and a couple of shrubs that she would pay my mom to upkeep and as such, was one of the customers that I would call in on to collect payment.
She seemed nice enough, an older lady who was always cheery and never had a problem handing over the cash unlike some of my mom’s other customers. It’s when she took an interest in my hair that our relationship took a turn.