The Hot Flash Club by Nancy Thayer Page A

four problems. Faye, you want to know whether your son-in-law’s having an affair with a secretary at his law firm.”
    “Right. Jennifer D’Annucio.”
    “Fine. Shirley, you need help with legal and financial matters.”
    “Right.”
    “Third, I want to find out whether the little brat in my office is after my job. And fourth, you, Marilyn, want to know whether or not your son’s fiancée—”
    “Lila Eastbrook.”
    “Lila Eastbrook?” Faye interrupted. “She can’t be after your son for his money. I mean, the Eastbrook Clinic and Spa are famous!”
    “Yeah, and the U.S. government once had a surplus.” Alice kept scribbling. “Look, we can each solve someone else’s problem. Let’s consider the possibilities.”
    “Oh, this is fun!” Faye cried, fishing an ice cube out of her water glass and rubbing it along her neck, which had suddenly turned red. Seeing the others look at her, she explained, “Hot flash.”
    “That’s it,” Alice said. “That’s what we are, the Hot Flash Club.” She speared a piece of chocolate cake on the end of her fork and lifted it into the air. “A toast, to the Hot Flash Club.”
    The other three stabbed up a piece of chocolate cake. Tapping them together, they echoed, “To the Hot Flash Club!”
    “Ladies”—Alice grinned roguishly—“let’s plot.”

10
    Saturday night, Alice, Shirley, and Faye had ordained that before Marilyn could execute her assignment for the Hot Flash Club, she had to change her image.
Completely.
    Faye had agreed to shepherd Marilyn through Parts One and Two of her transformation. Shirley and Alice both had to work and weren’t able to come along, which was fine with Marilyn, who found Faye, of the three other women, most like herself. Shirley, with her violet eye shadow and spangles, was rather startling, while Alice, beautiful, arrogant, and outspoken, terrified Marilyn a bit.
    But she trusted their judgment, and so here Marilyn was on Monday morning, sitting in the ophthalmologist’s chair, holding her ancient tortoiseshell glasses in her hands while she gazed at her reflection through her new contact lenses.
    She was excited and terrified. She felt like a tiny gastropod being swept away from the sheltered cove of her tidy life in a flash flood of enthusiasm toward—what, exactly? She had no idea. But she’d always enjoyed the challenge of research and discovery, so she tried to think of her own life as a research project, and this gave her courage.
    Blinking, she tucked the glasses in her purse and went out to the parking lot where Faye waited, as she’d promised she would be, in her dark green BMW.
    “You look great! Your beautiful green eyes look huge now!” Faye told her, as Marilyn slid into the car. “How do the lenses feel?”
    “Fine, I guess,” Marilyn said. “It’s amazing, how little I notice them, and I can see perfectly well.”
    “Good. On to the hairdresser’s.” Faye steered the car out of the lot and out into the flow of traffic. Her silver-white hair was caught up in a simple chignon.
    “I’m a little anxious about changing my hair,” Marilyn confessed meekly.
    Faye glanced over with a smile. “Only natural. How long has it been since you’ve had your hair styled?”
    Marilyn cringed as she admitted, “Um, I don’t think I’ve ever had it
styled
. I used to try to curl it, decades ago—”
    “Well, who cuts it?” Faye asked.
    “I do.”
    “
You
do!”
    “I just pull it over my shoulder and snip off a few inches with my desk scissors whenever it seems to be getting too long.”
    “Oh, my. Ricky’s going to love getting his hands on you.”
    But the first thing the hairdresser did when Faye and Marilyn walked into the salon was to clap his hands against his face in a gesture of horror.
    “¡Madre de Dio!”
he cried, circling Marilyn. “Where have you been hiding, under a rock?”
    All the other people in the shop turned to gawk at her, but Marilyn liked that he said
rock
, as if he’d