When I woke up I felt a little groggy and disoriented. However that feeling went away within a few minutes. I knew how it felt to be hung over, and I didn’t feel that way right now. I realized that Rachel was already out of bed as I glanced over and found no one next to me. I brushed the hair out of my eyes nonchalantly and then suddenly stopped. I’d never had to do that before. I was anxious to see what it looked like. I got off the bed and looked down at my body. Nothing else appeared to be different. I pulled on the clothes I wore last night. I didn’t have the urge to keep them off yet. I left my room in a hurry and headed for the bathroom so I could look in the mirror. I was so anxious that I didn’t realize someone was in the shower. Because of the steam coming from the shower, the mirror was fogged up so I couldn’t see myself clearly.
“Someone’s a little anxious,” a voice called from the shower. I could tell it was Rachel. But then I heard a giggle coming from the shower that I knew was not Rachel’s. “Shh, you,” said Rachel.
I wasn’t pleased. “Just exactly who is in there?” I asked.
Rachel poked her head around the shower curtain. “Just me,” she said with a smile.
I narrowed my eyes at her. “I don’t believe you,” I said.
“Believe what you want,” called the other voice. My heart sank a little when I realized it was the voice of my sister.
“Pam! Just what are you two doing in there?” I demanded.
Rachel continued to smile at me. “Are you jealous?” she asked. “Getting possessive?”
I knew she was teasing me, but something in the way she asked the second question sent a chill down my spine. I wasn’t going to be Adam. “Yes,” I admitted. “And I’ll stop that right now.”
“Good,” she said. “If you want to see your hair, that little mirror is still in the living room somewhere.” She emphasized the words “little mirror” so I knew that it was the one the ring created previously. I turned to leave. Just as I was about to close the door behind me, I heard Rachel say, “He’s finally leaving.”
Then I heard Pam in a deliberately loud voice say, “Oh, good. Do that thing you did before he came in here.”
Over my shoulder I shouted to them, “I heard that!”
“We know!” they shouted back in unison. That produced a pretty good giggle from both of them. I shook my head as I shut the door behind me.
I re-entered the living room. I heard sounds coming from the kitchen and saw the couches were empty, so I guessed Joyce was making them. I found the mirror the ring had created and picked it up. I was definitely shocked by what I saw. My hair had completely grown over my ears and was beginning to dangle in front of my eyes. It was definitely fuller and thicker as I ran my other hand through it. I could also see that it had grown longer. It was almost touching the tops of my shoulders. The color didn’t appear much different. It was still a dirty blonde.
I walked into the kitchen and saw Joyce preparing something on the stove. She still had the same clothes on as when we went to sleep, which meant she was naked from the waist down. “I hope you don’t mind, but I just helped myself to your dishes and things,” she said.
“No, not at all,” I said. I tried to stay out of her way. I had to ask her something, though. “Joyce…what is Rachel really like?”
“You know what she’s like,” Joyce asserted.
“Well…yes and no,” I said. “I’ve really only known her as a neighbor up until now.”
Joyce turned around. “So what’s your concern?” she asked.
I sighed. “I don’t know,” I said. “I’m worried about myself, I guess. I don’t want to be like the last guy, but then she’s in the shower with my sister and it just makes me feel weird and possessive and…other things I don’t want to feel.”
“I think you’re letting your imagination get the best of you,” she said.
“Well why else would they be in the shower together?” I asked.
“To get clean?” she said somewhat mockingly. I gave her an exasperated look. “Seriously, Joe, if you want to know what she’s like away from home, I can tell you that she’s not much different. As long as I’ve known her, she’s always been a bit flirty. Hasn’t she always been that way with you?”
I wasn’t sure how to answer that. Rachel moved in across from me about two years ago. She was friendly from the start. I knew she was outgoing. I just always figured she was out of my league. She had also been attached to Adam for as long as she’d lived here. “I don’t know,” I said. “Maybe. Maybe I never noticed it because of her situation.”
“What situation?” asked Joyce.
“The one with that…guy,” I said, still not wanting to say Adam’s name out loud. “I’m not one to hit on someone who’s taken.”
Joyce laughed. “So you think Rachel belonged to him?” she asked.
“No,” I said. “No, no, no, not at all. That’s not what I mean. Hey, you’re twisting my words around!”
“Of course I am,” said Joyce. “You’re too easy to twist around,” she said with a smile.
I sighed in disgust. I said, “I’d like to think that shows I have consideration for others.”
“Trust me, it does. Ever since Rachel moved here, I’d sometimes hear about the great guy that lived across the hall. She’d tell me she constantly flirted with you, but that you never overstepped any boundaries. I honestly think she’d made up her mind a while ago that she wanted to be with you,” Joyce explained.
“Really?” I asked. “I would have never guessed that.”
Joyce nodded. “That was the way she wanted it,” she continued her explanation. “One of Rachel’s issues with her modeling is that she doesn’t hide her emotions very well. It takes her a little while to put on that mask. That’s crucial to modeling. She doesn’t do that so well with her personal life. I watched that jerk scream at her before, during and after sessions, either because he didn’t like her performance or she mistakenly gave a sign that let him know she was upset with him. She was honestly afraid of him, but didn’t know how to get rid of him. She assumed he’d keep coming back. He finally gave her the way to do it.”
“Wait,” I interrupted. “You know what happened with them?”
“Of course,” she replied. “Rachel called me from the police station. I offered to come get her, but she said she was going to take a chance with you. Seems like that worked out…for both of you.”
What Joyce told me actually raised more questions. Why did Adam get contrite all of a sudden? Did he honestly regret his actions or did the ring somehow do that? And if the ring did it, why did Rachel’s wish to know tell her that the ring didn’t do it? I had to dismiss that thought, because so far the ring fulfilled every wish I had made. I did wonder why Joyce didn’t find Rachel’s lack of bruises odd.
“So how much did Rachel tell you about what he did to her?” I asked.
Joyce turned back to whatever she was fixing and talked over her shoulder. “She told me that he came after her, that he broke a lot of things and flipped out. She said that the cops showed up before he could actually do anything to her physically. But because she had a prior complaint, she was able to get a restraining order, even without any direct violence,” said Joyce.
Now I understood a little better. Rachel obviously lied to Joyce about the exact nature of the incident. My guess was that she really did just want to engage me at that time, so she told Joyce she was OK physically. If she hadn’t, I figured Joyce would have insisted on coming to get her from the police station.
“So he actually came over here and apologized?” asked Joyce.
“Yea, he did,” I said. “He seemed sincere. But I don’t know well enough to be certain.”
“Hmm,” said Joyce. “He’s a hustler. He could have been playing you. I suppose it doesn’t matter now, with all this peace. And the fact that he won’t be such a tough guy anymore. Or even just a guy.” We both laughed at that comment.
At that moment, Rachel and Pam walked into the kitchen. They too had put back on the same clothes they had on last night. Their hair appeared dry so I guessed Rachel had retrieved her hair dryer on her own. “So what were you two talking about?” asked Rachel.
“This and that,” said Joyce. “We got to know each other a little.”
“Good,” said Rachel. A silence fell over the room until Rachel asked, “So do you want the details?”
“Of?” I asked.
“What Pam and I did in the shower,” answered Rachel.
I looked away from her and toward Joyce. All I said was, “Nope.”
“No?” Rachel said in her teasing tone of voice.
“Not my business,” I answered.
Pam walked over to me and punched me in the arm. It actually hurt a little. I couldn’t ever remember a time where that was true. I instinctively rubbed it to alleviate the slight pain. “Do you honestly think I’d have sex with your girlfriend?” she asked. “Do you think she would have sex with her boyfriend’s sister?”
I nervously looked around the room. Somehow it finally occurred to me that this all might have been one big test concocted by the three of them. With resolution in my voice I answered, “No, of course not. To both questions.”
Rachel walked over and kissed me on the lips. “Good answer, you big pile of nerves,” she said. She then took notice of my hair and began feeling it with her fingers. “Oh, I like how this is turning out.”
“I can’t wait to see how the other two look now,” said Pam.