Kisses for Lula Read Online Free PDF

asked.
    ‘You’ve got a
great
nose. The glasses have got to go.’
    ‘No, no, Lula. Come on now.’
    ‘Have you never tried contacts?’
    ‘They make me feel vulnerable.’
    ‘You don’t want to show your face.’
    ‘It’s not that.’ Though Arnold seemed suddenly unsure. ‘I worry they’ll fall out, or I’ll get infected eyes and not be able to see or – or something,’ he ended lamely.
    ‘And you’re supposed to be some kind of genius.’ I shook my head sadly.
    ‘I wear them sometimes,’ was the pathetic defence. ‘When I go running.’
    ‘Running. Interesting.’
    ‘Whoa, Tallulah, I’m going to stop telling you stuff. I don’t like where things are going. Perhaps this is a bad idea.’
    ‘Three words.’
    ‘Hn?’
    ‘Mona de Souza.’
    ‘Oh. Yes.’ Arnold’s brow furrowed.
    ‘So, Arns. You got a full-length mirror anywhere?’
    His wary eyes never leaving my face, he took a step towards the built-in cupboards and pulled a door open. An enormous mirror glinted red with reflected light.
    ‘Great.’ I pulled the chair from the desk in front of it and gestured to the client to sit down. ‘Towels?’
    ‘Bathroom. End of the hall.’
    ‘Scissors?’
    He jumped straight up off the chair and whacked the bottom of my chin with the top of his head.
    ‘Fffffriiiik! Frik! Frik!’ I clutched my face, seeing stars. ‘I think there’s blood!’
    ‘Blood? Sorry sorry sorry! You okay? Scissors did you say? I’m not very good with scissors – I mean, blood.’
    ‘Did someone say blood?’
    ‘Elsa! I’ve hit her and she says she’s bleeding,’ rattled Arns.
    ‘I knew I couldn’t leave you alone with her,’ cried Elsa from the doorway.
    ‘Hey!’ said Arns and I simultaneously.
    Dropping a load of heavy stuff on the floor, Elsa came right over. ‘No offence, but you two are an accident waiting to happen.’ She prised my fingers from my face. ‘No blood.’ Arns stomped off to the bathroom. I could hear him running water and rummaging in cupboards. ‘Are you all right, Tatty?’
    I opened my eyes and swallowed carefully. Everything north of my neck hurt. ‘I think I bit my tongue in half,’ I whispered.
    ‘Open your mouth.’
    I obeyed. Elsa was about the same age as Pen, eighteen months younger than me, but two inches taller. She was lithe and strong-looking in a frightening Germanaerobics-instructor kind of way. I generally wanted to do what she said.
    ‘It’s still in one piece.’
    ‘Thank God,’ I slurred.
    ‘Could still be bleeding, but probably just the walls reflecting.’
    ‘Nff?’ I was alarmed, and swallowed carefully again before crawling to Arns’s mirror and dropping my jaw to investigate damages done. ‘Ungrhf.’
    ‘Ouch,’ agreed Elsa. ‘It
is
bleeding. Good thing you haven’t got a boyfriend. Kissing could be a problem. Have a paracetamol.’ She rummaged in her jeans pocket, came up with an ancient-looking pack of pills and went off for a glass of water.
    Arns returned.
    ‘You cretin!’ I slurred. ‘I come here to help and now look!’ I stuck my tongue out at him. ‘
Look!
’
    ‘Oh,’ said Arnold, slightly distressed. ‘I’m really sorry, Tallulah. At least it wasn’t your nose. The tongue is the fastest healing organ of the body. You know. Because of the saliva.’ He sat down in the chair with the towel draped demurely round his shoulders. ‘Sorry,’ he said for the umpteenth time. ‘I’ll be good now.’
    ‘You better be,’ I growled, and came up behind him again, staring at his reflection in front of me in the fulllength mirror.
    Elsa appeared with water and I popped two pills and swallowed with a grimace. It felt like half my tongue flapped open with that gulp of water. Eeenf.
    Arns handed me a pair of scissors, and Elsa started rolling out dustsheets and pushing furniture around.
    ‘Let’s discuss this before we get going,’ said Arns politely.
    ‘Okay,’ I agreed amiably. ‘Where is your comb, Arnold?’
    ‘You sound