“Okay?”

“Okay. But I’m in the room.”

“You’re not allowed in the room.”

“Then I’m in the hall.”

The next morning I called in to the cancer center and told Sonya I needed a personal day, and I got in the car and drove three hours to Springfield without telling anybody. I hadn’t been back. Not once.

Marbury’s Salon Supply is on Commercial Street, and it is not really a salon supply anymore, it’s mostly a wholesale operation with a retail counter stuck on the front like an afterthought.