“There, all done,” she breathes as she tosses the plastic tub into the sink.
I uncross my legs and pull myself up, letting the blood slowly flow back into my feet before I stumble. I look at myselfin the mirror, already seeing the dark roots turning that familiar yellow shade.
Good thing I bought toner.
Harper comes up behind me, taking a long look at her hair. “If this goes wrong, I’m blaming you.”
I scoff. “I didn’t force you to choose Barney the Dinosaur purple.”
“It was between that and Bear in the Big Blue House blue.”
“Honestly, both on brand.”
Harper laughs, the sound echoing off the tiled walls. She looks at herself in the mirror, her eyes turning a shade darker. Harper has always been one of the easiest people to read. She feels everything loudly, brightly. Her emotions are always so close to the surface.
Most people only see the performance version of her—she would never let them see anything else. The girl who laughs the loudest at parties. The one who convinces strangers to dance. The one who has never known an awkward silence. But I’ve known her long enough to recognize the quiet shifts. The way her shoulders drop when she’s tired, how her eyes darken when she’s upset. Tonight is one of those nights.
“You okay?” I ask gently.
“Yeah. I mean, I will be,” she says. “If he calls tomorrow, I’m definitely not answering.”
“I’d be disappointed if you did.”
I set a timer on my phone, and we collapse onto the bathroom floor, backs against the tub. The peroxide smell has dissipated, leaving only a subtle chemical lingering.
“You ever think about how weird this is?” Harper says quietly, and I quirk a brow. “That we change ourselves a little bit, hoping that it fixes the big shit going on in our lives?”
I consider her words, unusually deep for Harper.
“I think it helps,” I say slowly. “Not because it actually fixes anything, but it puts something in your control when the big shit is completely out of your control.”
Harper nods, looking down and checking her phone for the twentieth time this evening. I know when my best friend is hurting. She puts on a brave front all the time, always the frontwoman working the crowd, the light that illuminates a room. But tonight, she’s just Harper.
“If this goes bad, we could just disappear,” I say, breaking the tension.
“Disappear where?” she replies with a snort.
“I don’t know. The mountains. A new identity. We could make sourdough and adopt ten cats. Five for each of us.” A cold pang grips my chest at the thought of starting over. Again. Even though it’s only a hypothetical situation, I can’t imagine a life without Harper now.
“Do we get new names?” she asks.
“Obviously,” I reply, nudging her knee with mine.
“Mine will be Scarlett,” she says confidently.
“Scarlett?”
“Yes, Scarlett. Scarlett is mysterious. Scarlett has secrets.”
“Scarlett owns a tattoo studio, for sure,” I reply.
“I’m totally game,” she says, moving closer to my side, careful not to transfer her Barney dye onto my shoulder. She sitsup straight, head held high. “If he doesn’t call tomorrow, I think I’m done,” she says confidently.
“What does done look like?”
She shrugs. “Sad. Annoyed. Probably crying in your kitchen.”
We both burst out laughing, our bodies rattling together.