I suddenly picture walking in a tight circle with Hilbert and Ruth and Pete, the four of us huddled together, back-to-back-to-back-to-back, for our own protection.

As she’s talking, she picks up a blow-dryer, turns it on, and starts drying my hair, brushing it out.

Why didn’t Jack finish doing my hair? Why did he leave me? Why did they switch? She never even said where he went. I feel a pit open in my stomach.

“How did you end up here? Doing this work?” I ask.

“My grandparents owned this house. My parents inherited it from them, and they used it as a summer house. I loved coming here as a child. It felt like a mansion out of a movie. I had so much fun here during those long summers, but I was always alone, and I would imagine what it would be like to have friends here with me….”

She trails off, and I feel myself shiver.

“The days and years go by so fast,” she says. “I wish there was a way to slow everything down, don’t you? To have more time. Time is the most important thing.”

She sets the blow-dryer down and picks up a comb and a pair of scissors.

My eyes wander to the mirror. Beside it are two plastic bins. One appears empty, the other has hair clippings in it.

“I guess everyone would like more time,” I say. “I might have given a different answer before I got here. But more time would be good now.”

I think about what more time would actually mean. For me, Pete, Ruth, Hilbert. More sitting around. More eating. More sleeping. I would get to paint more. But what would the work mean if it was endless? What would a relationship mean if it kept going forever? What would a day be if it didn’t end?

More and more and more and more and more and more and more and more and more and more and more and more and more and more and more and more.

It’s what everyone wants, so she says.

“What if time was all you had?” I say. “Maybe if we had all the time in the world, life would start to feel meaningless. Or worse.”

The scissors she’s using to cut my hair aren’t new. They make a hard swish sound each time they snip.

“No, Penny,” she says. “You’re wrong about that. Don’t say that again, please.”

I look down at my lap.

“More time can only be good,” she goes on. “It’s our duty to form connections and make strong links while we can. There is nothing wrong with dependence and asking for help. There is strength in fitting in, in sacrificing your identity as an individual, in becoming part of something bigger than just yourself.”

My hair falls off and down to the floor at her feet. She’s trimming it, cutting it in a simple, plain bob style.

She never asked me how I wanted it cut. She never asked.