Page 16 of The Breakup Bookshop

6

Perhaps surprisingly, Donna’s salon is the place to be on a Thursday evening.

As soon as I walk in, I’m hit with the scent of strongly scented shampoo, the wail of hairdryers and the most glorious sound of all: gossip.

Welcome home, Ava.

I’ve mostly been happy in my own company since arriving in Ullapool, but my limited interactions are starting to take their toll and I’ve started to yearn for some small talk. Most of my conversations are with Fiona from the coffee shop, but she’s always so busy balancing coffees and taking orders that it doesn’t go much further than a throwaway comment about the weather or a brief update on the bookshop. My exchanges with customers in Rory’s shop were transactional, despite my overly eager, people-pleasing tendencies.

When I received a spam call earlier asking whether I’d ever been in an accident at work, I contemplated playing along to see where the conversation might lead. I also had a full-blown discussion with myself this morning about whether to buy orange juice with or without pulp. Things got quite heated, let me tell you.

So, I’ve come to Donna’s salon.

Her face lights up as soon as she sees me and she pulls me into a tight hug.

The chat with Donna is top tier from the start. Ten out of ten. In the space of a five-minute hair wash, Donna reveals to me that she’s recently split from her boyfriend, Lewis from Glasgow, after trying to make a long-distance relationship work for a couple of years. I discover what he looks like, which football team he supports (apparently it’s a loaded question in Glasgow), and that sometimes he likes to eat cold baked beans from the tin. They split because he refused to move to Ullapool and she couldn’t possibly move to Glasgow to be with him because her pet poodle Bonnie suffers from terrible anxiety, which he’dalwaysknown.

‘Can you imagine wee Bonnie inGlasgow?’ she asks, incensed by the idea of it. ‘Bad enough when I take her to the vet here, never mind venturing to Glasgow. She’d have a complete meltdown. I think she might die of shock, to be honest. And what about Guy Fawkes Night? Had he ever thought ofthat?’

I stretch back in the faux-leather seat and shake my head.

‘I guess he hadn’t,’ I shrug, ignoring the fact that the water is getting hotter by the second as she rubs a coconut-scented conditioner into my scalp.

‘He did not. He always said he’d like to make the move somewhere quieter, but that’s what they all say, isn’t it? All I want is to settle down in Ullapool with the love of my life. Is that too much to ask? But every guy I meet around here is either a tourist or a pensioner.’

‘Erm, the water is getting pretty hot.’

It’s burning now. I have to flip my head to the left to escape the scalding flow.

‘Oh, shit, sorry,’ she says, switching the water off. ‘Don’t worry, you’re done now anyway. So, Lewis is in the bin. Next! I updated my Tinder profile, but around here you have to have your radius set to about a thousand miles to find someone you’re not related to. I just want to meet someone, you know?’

‘There must be some decent men around here. You like Rory?’ I say, ignoring the strange, unpleasant feeling in my stomach as I suggest it.

Donna scoffs. ‘Rory’s like a brother to me. Absolutely not.’

‘What about that other guy you mentioned the other day? The dog walker?’

‘Oh!’ she exclaims, rubbing my hair with a bright pink towel. ‘I didn’t even realize I mentioned Finlay to you. No, gosh no, notFinlay.’ It may be the hot water, but I swear I see Donna’s cheeks flush. She straightens and moves the conversation on. ‘Anyway, what was it that made you move from London, then? Was it man trouble too?’

‘Something like that,’ I mumble. ‘Everything trouble, really.’

Donna nods as though she understands, wraps my hair up in the towel and gestures for me to sit down in front of the mirror as she searches for her scissors.

‘You didn’t fancy a complete makeover then? New do, new you? That’s what we always say,’ Donna asks, throwing in some jazz hands for good measure.

‘Just a trim, please.’

‘Are you sure? Any time we have a breakup or tragic life event, or any minor inconvenience really, we whip out the dye, order extensions or jump on the latest hair trend. How bad was your breakup, on a scale of straighten-only to pink highlights?’

‘Oh, it was a complete and utter shitstorm. A spiky, purple mohawk of a breakup,’ I confirm. ‘But I’d still just like a little bit off the ends, maybe add in an extra layer or two for volume?’

Donna nods knowingly, glancing at me in the mirror with a sympathetic smile. ‘You’re not over it.’

‘I am!’ I protest. ‘I just don’t really dye my hair.’

‘It is a lovely colour,’ she says, twirling my wet auburn locks around a finger, before setting to work with her scissors. ‘It always was. Elle and I thought you were so cool when we were younger, you know.’

I burst out laughing. ‘Me? Cool! Donna, I stayed here with my granny and you had to drag me away from my books to get me outside. How could you think I was cool?’