Read My Way Home (St.Gabriel Series Book 1) (St. Gabriel Series) for Free Online Page A

“Off with her hair!”
    Then the woman sitting two chairs down with foil spikes protruding from her head echoed, “Off with her hair!”
    Then one of the shampoo girls repeated, “Off with her hair!”
    Then everyone in the joint, except for Tina, took up the cry, “Off with her hair!”
    Tina took in another deep breath, opened the scissors around the braid, and worked the blades until she stood there with my braid of hair in her hand. What hair was still attached to my head fell forward in front of my eyes. It felt seriously light. I looked over at Loretta and saw a tear roll down her cheek.
    It’s just hair , I told myself. But it wasn’t just hair and everyone knew it.
    Tina gently laid the braid to rest on the counter and I cried. Pretty soon everyone was crying and I thought of what Tennyson wrote about the woman whose soldier husband was killed, “She must weep or she will die.”
    Yes, she must, no matter who’s around to see her tears.
    Through a sob, I sniffled out the words, “Now, make me sassy.”
    Tina tried to convince me that she could create an adorable short bob with what was left, but I didn’t want adorable. “Little boy short,” I demanded.
    Tina sighed deeply and said, “Okay, it’s your hair.”
    “It was my hair,” I said and held in another sob. “Now it belongs to Marni Scott-Robles.”

CHAPTER FIVE
    The Call
    Nothing bunched up between my head and the pillow. Virtually hairless, I lay in bed the night after getting my hair cut, rocking my head from side to side and thinking about how I could make Race completely miserable. But just as I had done with all such thoughts, I pushed it away. I loved my children much more than I wanted to bring complete and total destruction to my unfaithful husband, their father.
    Since Race had left, I had called Paul and Janie once a week. I didn’t want them to call the house and wonder why I wasn’t answering the phone. I kept the conversation to what was going on in their lives and didn’t tell them their father had left me. Deep down, I was still hoping Race would come back, and they’d never have to know. It was crazy.
    Loretta stayed for a week and was screening my calls when one came in from Janie, crying, breathless. “Mom, why didn’t you tell me? Are you all right? I’m coming home. I can’t believe Daddy would do this.”
    She had already spoken to Race and he had told her everything. I wanted to agree with her. Her father was a rat, an idiot, a selfish, stupid man. I wanted her on my side. It would be easy. She was almost there, and he was wrong.
    But I listened to the hurting sobs and the warble of my little girl’s voice, and I couldn’t do it. She was a thousand miles away. I couldn’t hold her and make sure she would be okay. It was happening to her too. It was her family falling apart. The father she adored was breaking her heart.
    In that moment, I decided that what was happening to our family would not be about me, at least not when it came to Paul and Janie.
    I had wanted Janie to stay close to home for college. We only lived a few blocks from the school where Race taught, a good college. But Race insisted our children needed to go to a university where they would be exposed to other cultures, philosophies.
    I was mad at Race at the time. How many times had I been mad at Race over things that didn’t really matter? UCLA, her parents’ Alma Mater, was where Janie chose to go, the place where her father and I had fallen in love. That part I had liked.
    That night when Janie called, I was thankful she was away at school and not home where she could see my face and know what I was about to tell her was a lie, mixed with some truth but a big, fat lie.
    “Baby, I’m fine, really. You need to stay right where you are and finish the semester. You’re almost done. I’m okay. I promise. I wanted to tell you, but for now you need to be focused on your studies. People change, honey, that’s not necessarily something you have