ONC 2024 SHORTLISTER || After two opposites find comfort in each other and have an instant connection but can't be together, they collide again months later and get a second chance at love || August Walker and Jasmine Kelly are complete opposites...
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There's something about shampooing hair that always makes me feel calmer. That and putting colour on someone's hair will never fail to send me into a trance of peace and tranquillity, no matter what's happening in the outside world. The hairdresser's I'm working in is always like a little bubble of peace and quiet.
Josh, however, never liked me working here. My boss, Adrian, is a guy, and the one who trained me up when I started. Although Adrian was, when I started, engaged to a man – and now married to him and adopted a set of twin babies. The fact he's bisexual never got relayed to Josh, luckily, or it may have been worse.
It's been three days since I woke up in August's house, took off and the police started investigating. In that time, they tracked down some CCTV footage of him in the club with a knife, following me out and down the high street. They also found some footage of him having me against the wall with the knife, and a long track of historical evidence of his computer tracking me, buying a knife, and whatever. Half the things they found went over my head because I couldn't take it. I'm just waiting to hear if he's been charged or not.
For now, I'm safe. It gives me time to plan if I need to move away or something. The police said I could go under witness protection if he gets out on bail, which seems drastic to me. Though, I must say I'm considering changing my name, even though I shouldn't have to. I like my name.
I wash the shampoo out of the client's hair. She's a regular now, and she always comes in every third Thursday of the month at ten in the morning, with the request of a quiet appointment as she's autistic and doesn't like the noise. We make sure there's only her in the book if we can and turn her favourite radio station on.
We'll usually converse to get her the right cut, but other than that, we stay quiet for her. It's actually so peaceful for everyone involved, and she insists on paying us double the amount she owes – half of it as a tip to split between the six of us. I take some of the conditioner and start massaging her head. A small trill of happiness comes out of her mouth – something I've come to realise is a way of her saying she's enjoying it.
I've felt awful since I left August's house the other morning, but it's all over social media with the photo of the back of August and Josh's quest to find him for revenge or whatever. I'm on social media under a different name, got rid of all photos of me and don't connect to many people so I can still follow celebrity stuff and whatever. It means I can keep an eye on what Josh is saying about me, too.
I managed to track down August on it under my social media. I saw his NHS card, and I memorised his last name: August Walker. He's a trainee doctor, and he's twenty-five, so three years older than me, and he seems to follow a lot of pages on medical stuff, and a lot about books as well. His profile picture is him by a beach, the same glasses he has now, and his hand is adjusting them – something he kept doing the other night. His brown hair and stubble look a little longer in the photo, though.
