The Sasquatch Hunter's Almanac by Sharma Shields

it—and her head—a squeeze. She would kiss her cap if she could, but then she would have had to remove it. No, she thought, I won’t ever remove you! She found it odd that earlier in the day she had balked at the very notion.
    And so her new life began. She came to breakfast in the cap and arrived to dinner in the cap. She wore the cap in her car, in the shower, and in the garden. She appeared in it at social gatherings and at the hairdresser’s. When the hairdresser began to remove it, Gladys gnashed her teeth and told her to leave it be.
    â€œJust style the hair around it, please,” she demanded, and the poor hairdresser complied, styling Gladys’s sleek black tresses around the cap’s faded fabric. In the end, the effect was a lovely one, like a plain of shining onyx beneath a pretty rainbow.
    After this excursion, Gladys, feeling every bit as lovely as a goddess, walked down Main Street. The patchwork cap made her head itch, and she scratched at it absently as she walked. Odds and Ends stood with its French doors thrown open to the avenue, and yet, once again, it was empty except for the preening birdlike shopkeeper, who was mopping the floors with a lavender-perfumed liquid.
    â€œHello there,” Gladys sang out, not wanting to catch the shopkeeper off guard.
    The woman glanced up, her head bobbing slowly up and down, not at all surprised. “Mrs. Roebuck. You’re looking well.”
    â€œThank you. I’ve just been to the hairdresser.”
    The shopkeeper scowled. “I hope she didn’t—”
    â€œOh, no!” Gladys said, touching the cap. “I’ve followed your directions perfectly. The cap hasn’t left my head for even a moment. You know, it’s funny, I can’t imagine taking her off now. She’s glued on to my head, as far as I’m concerned. Although I do sometimes worry about the smell.”
    The shopkeeper smiled. “There’s always a drawback to the good things in life, wouldn’t you say, Mrs. Roebuck?”
    This struck Gladys as infinitely wise. “Oh, yes,” she said.
    â€œAnd how is your husband?” the woman asked. Her nostrils expanded as she spoke, a greedy hunger smoking her eyes. Gladys nearly recoiled, frightened by the shopkeeper’s countenance, but the very next moment there was only kindness in the woman’s face, a benign interest.
    â€œHe’s better,” Gladys said. “Thank you. I was a skeptic, I admit, but he seems vastly improved.”
    And he was vastly improved. Over the last few weeks, he had fallen in love with her again. He even stayed home from two cryptozoological conferences in the hopes of regaining her affections. He had stopped spending the night elsewhere. He even told her he was considering a full recommitment to podiatry, if it would please her. It pleased her, almost, but Gladys could not bring herself to respond to his entreaties. It was far too much fun to have him chasing after her. Bouquets of roses arrived daily, gem-studded gifts. He was wooing her again. And the more indifference she showed him, the more ardency he poured forth.
    It was unintentional on her part, as Gladys felt little to nothing for him, not even when she tried. He was an odd, bespectacled little man. Fastidious and ambitious in his work, but so very tedious and silly! She was tired of him. If she never laid eyes on him again, then all the merrier.
    She was relieved to no longer feel afraid of his lack of love, of his imminent failure. She no longer felt that if he flushed his career down the toilet, so she, too, would go. She and Amelia would be just fine.
    Or at least she, Gladys, would be.
    She lacked emotion for Amelia, too. All of her affection was given, instead, to her image in the mirror, to the image of the patchwork cap. How amazing it looked! As though it had sprouted from her skull, a thing born of her. It was a better, more loving daughter than Amelia; it was more