“No, it’s actually for a Brazilian,” I said in a hushed voice as she reached me and started flicking through an A4 notepad.
“Oh, a Brazilian! Why didn’t you just say so?” she asked, her voice still as loud as before. “Oh wait, is that going to be just a normal Brazilian you want, or a Playboy Brazilian?”
“A Playboy Brazilian?” I answered, confused and wondering if she wanted me to have a Playboy Bunny etched onto my vagina.
“Yeah, you know, a Playboy wax. It’s a type of Brazilian wax but instead of leaving a thick runway strip, we just leave a smaller area of hair. Honestly, babe, I totally recommend a Playboy—they’re all the rage these days and I’m sure your boyfriend would love it.” She winked at me and threw her head back to screech in laughter. “Don’t you agree, Stan?” she called out to the man in the chair. He looked me up and down and smiled, showing his crooked yellow teeth, before nodding slowly.
I flushed under his lewd gaze and quickly said, “Fine, that’s fine. So, where do I go?”
“Oh, just down those stairs. Yasmin will take care of you when you get down there. Second door on the right,” she said, flicking her hot pink nails in the direction of a wooden staircase.
I ran down the stairs without thanking her and prayed that a Playboy was what Emma would have recommended. The name sounded like something she might go for, and a smaller area of hair sounded good. Besides, I had been so uncomfortable up there that I would have agreed to anything—even having a hair bunny marked out onto my lady bits.
“Hello?” I asked, creaking open the second door on the right.
“Oh, hiya,” said a young girl with curly black hair. “I’m Yasmin. Come in.”
I breathed a sigh of relief as I saw that she was dark-skinned and probably had thick pubes as well. That meant she wouldn’t judge me. She smiled supportively. “Okay, so do you just want to undress and lie down on the bed for me? I’ll be back in a couple of minutes,” she said.
I nodded mutely but as the door closed behind her, I began thinking about what she had said. I had to undress and lie on the bed, which sounded pretty simple, but just what did “undress” mean? Obviously I had to take my shoes and socks off, which I did, and then my jeans. But then, standing there in my black knickers and polka dot jumper, I wondered how much more to take off. I should probably leave my top half on, because it wasn’t like she would need to access those parts, but what about my knickers? Would she want to navigate around them and just sort of pull them to the side, or should I just take them off and lie half-naked on the bed?
I heard a knock on the door, and she called out, “Can I come in?”
Fuck fuck fuck. “One sec,” I replied as I made a split-second decision and pulled my knickers off. I jumped onto the bed and lay down. “Ready!” I called out, trying to hide the shrill panic in my voice.
She pushed opened the door and walked into the room, smiling at me. “Okay, great. So Roxy tells me you want a Playboy?”
“Um, I think so,” I said. “It’s a type of Brazilian, right? Would you recommend it?”
“Oh, I don’t know,” she said, with a slight laugh. “I reckon a Playboy should be just fine. Okay, so just spread your legs out as wide as you can and I’ll start.”
Feeling very awkward, I pulled my legs apart as much as I could and displayed the inner workings of my vagina. She brought a pot of wax towards me and slathered a hot blue strip onto my skin with a wooden spatula. She leaned between my legs as she did so and I prayed to God it didn’t smell. I had washed it as much as I could, but as my mum had told me I shouldn’t use soap down there, I was stressed that a pure water wash hadn’t left it clean enough. I mean, if I didn’t use shower gel all over my body, that would just be uncomfortable for everyone, so surely not using it down there would be the same?
Suddenly a bolt of white-hot pain soared up my body, pulling me straight out of my thoughts, and I screamed.
“Sorry, did that hurt?” she asked. “It should get less painful. Just hold your skin taut and do it as tight as you can. That should help.”
I looked down and saw a patch of hairless skin in between my legs. It was pale and already covered in tiny red dots. Whimpering slightly, I pulled the skin tight around the next waxed area and breathed in and out deeply, preparing myself for the next bolt of pain. Sure enough, a second jolt of agony spread through my body as she whipped the strip off my sore skin. The nerve endings down there felt frayed and I couldn’t help yelping out in pain again. I closed my eyes and tried to think calming thoughts, while my hands mechanically moved around my vagina, pulling the skin taut for the next minutes of agony.