My jaw clenched so tight I could hear my teeth grinding.
Ryan’s voice echoed in my head: “Just let it roll off, babe. She’s trying to get a reaction.”
“Oh, would you mind if I used your powder room?” Linda set down her barely touched tea.
I gestured toward the hallway. “Of course. You know where it is.”
She was in there longer than necessary. When she emerged, her lipstick was freshly applied, and she was wearing that cat-that-ate-the-canary smile I’d come to dread.
“Well, I should be going. So much to do before the big day!” She air-kissed my cheeks. “Do try to get some rest, dear. Those dark circles under your eyes…”
The next day at my usual salon, everything started normally. Megan, my regular stylist, chatted while mixing the dye I’d brought from home.
“So, final touch-up before the big day, huh?” She grinned at me in the mirror. “Nervous?”
“About marrying Ryan? No way. About surviving his mother for the next forty years? Absolutely terrified.”
“Still giving you grief about the wedding?” Megan started sectioning my hair.
“Let’s just say if passive-aggressive comments were an Olympic sport, she’d take gold.”
Megan laughed and then started applying the dye. But she slowly became distracted, frowning at the mixture.
“Um, Sarah?” Her voice wavered. “Are you sure you want to do this color?”
My stomach dropped. “What do you mean? It’s the same ash blonde I always use.”
“Well… no.” She grabbed a hand mirror and held it up behind my head.
The scream that came out of me probably scared half the clients right out of their chairs. Where my blonde hair should have been, electric green was bleeding into my strands.
I watched in horror as Megan frantically tried to rinse it, but the damage was done. My hair looked like freshly mowed AstroTurf.
The memory of Linda’s lengthy bathroom visit suddenly took on a sinister new meaning.
I drove home in a daze, praying it was just the salon lighting playing tricks. But my bathroom mirror confirmed my worst fears — I looked like the lovechild of the Joker and a highlighter pen.
Ryan found me curled up on the bathroom floor, mascara streaming down my face.
“Your mother,” I choked out. “She must have switched my dye when she was in the bathroom yesterday.”
Ryan’s face hardened. He kneeled beside me, pulling me into his arms. “Hey, look at me. Nothing is ruined. You could walk down the aisle with purple polka-dotted hair and it wouldn’t matter. You’re still going to be my wife.”
His voice then took on a hard edge. “Leave it to me. This is definitely Mom’s handiwork, and I’ll ensure she regrets this.”
The next morning, Ryan called Linda over. When she swept in, her eyes widened theatrically at my appearance.
“Oh, honey! What happened to your hair?” The corner of her mouth twitched.
“Cut the act, Mom.” Ryan’s voice was icy. “We know you switched Sarah’s hair dye.”
Linda’s face shifted before settling on wounded dignity.
“I would never! How dare you accuse me of such a thing?”
“Really?” Ryan crossed his arms. “Do you think I’ve forgotten that time you put orange dye in Aunt Fran’s shampoo?”
Her face crumpled. “It was just a little joke,” she muttered.
“Here’s what’s going to happen,” Ryan said. “You’re going to pay for every treatment it takes to fix this, or you’re uninvited from the wedding. If you ever pull something like this again, you won’t be welcome in our lives.”
Linda blanched. “But I’m your mother!”
“And Sarah’s going to be my wife. Time to decide what’s more important: being right, or being part of our lives.”
The day before the wedding, after three unsuccessful attempts to strip the green, I sat in our bathroom fighting back tears. Ryan walked in, holding a bowl filled with hair dye.
“If you can’t beat ’em…” He grinned.
“You wouldn’t.”
“I absolutely would.”
And that’s how we ended up walking down the aisle with matching green hair, grinning like idiots while our guests tried not to stare.
My dad nearly choked on his laughter, and even my mother had to admit we looked “uniquely us.” Linda sat in the back row, looking like she’d swallowed a lemon.
Sometimes the best revenge isn’t getting even — it’s showing the world that nothing, not even nuclear-waste-colored hair, can dim your happiness.
