Betting Against Vanity

(Using a bit of randomness again, so no idea what the end result will be as I start out.)

Betting Against Vanity

Elena rolled her eyes as, from a safe distance, she watched her boyfriend say goodbye to his brother and sister-in-law. Keith’s brother was nice enough, but Elena wasn’t sure she’d ever met someone as vain as Madelyn.

The idea of someone ending a Saturday morning brunch early just because she was afraid the wind was messing up her hair? There was barely any wind to even speak of… it was a breeze, at best. As if to confirm that fact, a few of the shorter tresses from among Elena’s long, layered, chocolate brown hair danced against the frame of her sunglasses as she waved goodbye to the departing pair. 

It was probably juvenile, she felt like the fact that she had left Keith’s apartment with her hair gathered back into a casual twist provided a hefty bit of proof that she was more reasonable than Madelyn, who was basically running away because a few wisps of her blonde locks escaped the heavy braid she wore.

Elena realized she could have been the bigger person and offered to move to a table inside the cafe, but the reason she loved the idea of an early brunch was so they could sit outside, feeling the sun on their shoulders as they caught up with one another.

And maybe a small part of that was because she felt like she had really nice shoulders and looked great in a tank top, and didn’t feel like covering up with a pullover inside. Was that so wrong?

As Keith walked back to the table, Elena downed the last of her latest mimosa, grabbed her pullover from the back of her chair. She met him a few steps from where she’d waited, sliding easily under his arm as they started down the street to the lot where they’d parked.

“You were totally giving Madelyn the stink-eye when she said they had to leave,” Keith said.

“Was it noticeable?”

“Not to anyone but me. But it was still unfair.”

“Sorry.” She genuinely was. “But leaving because your hair is getting messy?”

He gave her a side-eye. “She left because she had to fix her hair before they went to her family reunion.”

“It’s still vain. I think she’s the most vain person I’ve ever met. It’s just hair.”

Keith laughed, and not in a way Elena appreciated.

“What?”

“I love you, hon, truly. But I don’t think you have a standing to call anyone else vain.”

“Shut up. I’m not the one who ran away over messy hair. My hair is totally crazy right now and I’m not complaining.”

He raised an eyebrow. “Your hair looks perfect. We were a half hour late because you needed to dry it before coming here, and then you spent twenty minutes making sure only the most perfect wisps fell free.”

“Lies,” she insisted, though she knew everything he said was true. “I just wanted to look nice since she’s so obsessed with how she looks.”

“She’s obsessed?”

Elena’s eyes narrowed, and she stopped walking. “You used a tone on me.”

He laughed again. “I most certainly did.”

“Well, I don’t appreciate that. I don’t think I’m vain at all. Or at least not as much as her.”

“Okay, then.” He crossed his arms. “Prove it.”

She crossed her own arms, raising an eyebrow as she sensed an oncoming challenge. It was silly and immature, yes, but challenges were somewhat common and often led to pretty fun romps in the bedroom — or whatever flat surface was convenient — once a winner was determined, so she was willing to hear him out.

Keith stepped close and reached behind her, pulling the clip from her hair and letting the soft, dark locks form a wind-whipped cloud around her. She forced herself to not react, pretending it didn’t bother her in the least to have lost control of how her bra-strap-length locks looked.

Keith nodded across the street, toward one of those chain hair stylist places that had just opened for the day. “Go in there and say you want a trim. A healthy trim.”

She scoffed. “That’s all?”

“Nope.” He grinned, letting all of the further possibilities linger in the air as she tried not to swoon over how utterly, charmingly endearing her boy was. “When they inevitably ask ‘is this short enough’ or ‘would you like it shorter’ you have to say ‘whatever you think looks best.’ And you have to do that three times.”

Elena’s eyes widened, and then narrowed. “I could wind up bald!”

He shook his head. “We both know that won’t happen. But you could always back out.”

“And then what would I owe you?”

He tilted her chin up, and pressed his lips to her. “Three nights of doing whatever I ask you to.”

She kept her chin up even after he let go. She knew Keith. ‘Whatever he asked her to’ could include anything from an enthusiastic blowjob while dressed as Tifa Lockhart to being his sidekick in Call of Duty.

“And if they don’t ask anything like that?”

“You still win. You’ll prove you’re not vain by taking this chance.”

“And what do I win?”

He seemed to think about it for a moment, running a hand back through his reddish brown hair, but she didn’t give him a chance to answer.

“Taylor Swift tickets.”

He looked like he was about to argue, but then he closed his mouth and nodded. “Fine.”

She held out her hand, and he took it in his.

As she crossed the street toward the salon, she repeatedly reminded herself that anything done today could be fixed with a quick visit to her regular stylist. Anything. 

Well, almost anything.

As she reached for the door, she was startled by the fact that Keith opened it for her first.

“You’re coming?” She asked as she stepped inside.

“Yeah. What else am I going to do? Besides, it’ll be fun to see you lose by running away.”

Her eyes narrowed, and she walked to the front desk in a huff.

After providing her name, she sat down next to Keith in the waiting area. The chairs weren’t the most comfortable and they were rather close together, letting him put his arm around her and pretend to whisper sweet nothings in her ear while actually taunting her with ideas of what he’d be asking her to do when she lost.

Despite just having opened less than an hour before, there was a bit of a wait as the stylists tended to other customers, the general make-up of which ranged from barely-teen boys to older women.

Flicking Keith’s hand away as he tried to twirl one of her face-framing locks around his finger, Elena concentrated on looking annoyed despite the fact that he was actually being quite funny with his taunts. She hadn’t considered the possibility of organizing his Legos by color while dressed as Mario, but… there apparently was a chance.

No, there wasn’t a chance. She wasn’t vain, and she wasn’t going to chicken out. Hair was just hair — it would always grow back.

But still, every time someone was called into the back by a stylist, Keith would lean in and whisper, “There’s still time to back out….”

Eventually, she engaged in the simple distraction of brushing the strap of her shirt off of her shoulder closest to her boy, drawing his attention away from her hair for the moment.

The wait, fortunately, wasn’t terribly long. When everyone who had arrived before Elena had been seen to, a middle-aged woman approached the waiting area. She was attractive and looked to know how to make herself presentable, though the long hair she styled back in a fashionable twist clearly wasn’t blonde when it first came out of her head. “Elena? Hi, I’m Lydia. Come on back.”

Within a few moments, Elena found herself sitting in one of the several stylist’s chairs as Lydia ran a comb through her long, wind-rumpled hair. There were a couple of sharp tugs when tangles were hit, but fortunately they were quickly and carefully dealt with. As the combing continued, Elena felt her nerves ease. She actually found herself smiling at her reflection as her hair spilled around her shoulders neatly, framing her cute features and warm, brown eyes. 

“So what are you looking to have done today?” Lydia asked. “Just a trim to freshen up your layers?

Elena thought of the exact wording she had agreed to, even though she was fairly certain Keith was too far away to hear. “A healthy trim,” she said with a nod.

Lydia looked a little more surprised than Elena would have wanted her to. The stylist ran her fingers down through the brunette mane, stretching it to its full length before letting it fall against Elena’s breasts. “Well, it’s already in gorgeous condition, but we can certainly do that. I know how annoying it can be when there’s just too much of it.”

Elena wasn’t sure it was possible for her to have too much hair… It already was pretty short for her, and she’d only cut it to her bra-strap and had it layered to cut down on the headaches it used to give her when she had it to her waist. She was grateful that Lydia kept to herself as she soaked the abundant tresses with a. Spray bottle and then pinned them up and out of the way, carefully sectioning each bit before clipping it out of the way. The stylist hummed to the music playing over the speaker system, letting Elena focus on keeping her nerves under control and her breakfast in her stomach. But most importantly, she focused on looking like she was completely at ease and not worried at all because anything less might let Keith think he was about to win this little challenge.

That would simply be unacceptable.

Elena’s usual salon made use of pretty gowns, so the cape the was whipped out and allowed to float down across her lap only served to remind Elena that she was in uncharted territory. She swallowed a lump in her throat as the light blue cape tightened around her throat.

She held her breath as the first section of her hair was let loose, realizing Lydia had never asked for more specifics after being told a healthy trim was in order. Elena was hoping that the stylist would at least suggest an amount to be cut, to which Elena could reply, “Whatever you think is best!” And burn one of the three times she had to reply in that manner.

But it appeared there would be no such luck with that today.

Instead, Lydia combed through the thick, loosened lock a few times and then picked up her shears from the counter in front of Elena. The stylist ran her fingers down the section of har she’d freed once more, and then lifted the scissors and began to cut. 

The scissors were held much higher than Elena had hoped, but she couldn’t see where they were specifically. All she could do was watch Lydia’s bent arm slowly move from right to left, while her thumb and fingers flexed together and apart in time with the rhythmic crunching of the blades slicing through Elena’s hair. Again and again Lydia cut, inspiring Elena to nervously lick her lips as she realized the only consolation she currently had was the fact that the scissors remained below her shoulders. 

Once the blades had traveled across Elena’s back, Lydia started freeing the next section of hair and began combing it out just as attentively as she had the first.  “A nice, healthy trim is always a nice change. No worries about a new style, you know, but they can get rid of so much otherwise overwhelming length. Don’t you think?”

Elena forced herself to smile and nod. 

“Especially with hair as thick as yours. If you don’t mind, I think I’m going to layer it a bit more than whoever did it last time. It looks like they were pretty conservative.”

That was by design, of course, and at Elena’s request. But, with a small glance toward the seating area up front, she replied, “Whatever you think would look best.”

One blind agreement down, two to go.

Again and again, pinned up sections were released and given healthy trims. The floor became blankets with Elena’s soft brown locks, creating a carpet she could only catch fleeting glimpses  of from the corner of her eyes as Lydia worked. Layers that once fell well past her shoulders were slowly being shortened above her shoulders, creating a landslide of treasured tresses that  gathered in her lap with every crunching reunion of Lydia’s sharpened blades. Crisp, shorn ends of face-framing layers tickled Elena’s cheeks as Lydia’s combed them forward, and with what she hoped was hidden terror, Elena watched as the stylist stood in front of her, focusing on her eyes and forehead.

“You have really gorgeous eyebrows,” the stylist said.

Oh god, was she going to do something to he eyebrows? That’d have to be a dealbreaker…

Whatever the stylist was considering, she eventually stopped doing so and stepped behind Elena again. Slipping her fingers through Elena’s dark mane, the stylist brushed soft hair in front of her shoulders, eliciting a small gasp as Elena took in the sight of her heavily layered hair just ending right at her collarbones. 

From mid-back to her collarbones… she felt that exceeded any reasonable concept of a trim, healthy or otherwise. Reaching up, she gingerly tugged some of the locks hiding her ears away from her head and let them fall free again; her eyes widened when she saw some barely reached past her chin before rejoining the flow of the rest of the style. Her ponytails — long and thick and beautiful — used to be a thing of legend, but now… would she be able to wear them at all? Or was she doomed to wear pigtails until her hair grew back to its former state? 

She was going to have to buy bobby pins in bulk, it seemed.

Lydia placed her hands on Elena’s shoulders. “With the basic cut done, I was thinking we could add some highlights to being out those gorgeous eyes of yours and break up the layers a bit. What do you think?”

Elena tried to stifle a sigh. Of course a fake-blonde stylist would want to do highlights. She cleared her throat and nodded again. “I’d like that,” she lied.

Two down. One to go.

If nothing else, at least the highlighting process forced Keith to wait much, much longer than he expected. The number of foils used felt immense, though the amount placed around Elena’s face were so thickly placed that she wasn’t really able to see how many were placed overall. 

Up until this moment, Elena had always hoped that her hair color would be considered unique, with its dark brown shades complemented by warm red tones that were more often hidden than not. But as she sat waiting for the highlights to take hold, she found herself hoping her usual stylist wouldn’t have any problem at all matching her old hair color, because it certainly wouldn’t be long until she tried to get it back.

When Lydia led Elena to have her hair washed, it seemed the time of quietly humming to herself had passed. “Wow, your hair must be really healthy. The highlights really took to it.”

Elena tried to smile, but couldn’t. Instead, she just tried to focus on the somewhat pleasant experience of Lydia’s hands running through her hair — or at least what was left of it.

“Your boyfriend is so cute, waiting here for you. Or was he just trying to talk you out of getting your hair cut shorter?”

Without opening her eyes, Elena replied, “A little of both, maybe?”

“I’ll never understand the fascination with long hair. Especially when a girl like you has such adorable features. Hopefully he wasn’t being annoying about it?”

Elena shrugged. “Maybe a little. It’s kind of why I’m going through with it at all, if you want to get technical about it.”

Lydia made a thoughtful sound. “Well, I think he’ll love what we’ve done. It’s really going to bring out your eyes.”

Once Lydia was finished, she wrapped a towel snugly around Elena’s head and guided her back to her chair. This time, however, she kept it angled toward the waiting area rather than the mirror. When she pulled the towel free, blotting Elena’s hair as she did, Keith’s eyes widened and his jaw dropped. Elena couldn’t quite read the reaction — it could have been shock, surprise, elation, or even pure terror at the heel he’d unexpectedly unleashed. 

Behind Elena, Lydia giggled as she combed the wet locks back. “That was fun.” She then turned Elena toward the mirror, and it was the brunette’s turn to gasp and look at herself with wide eyes.

Or more accurately, it was the former brunette’s turn because it looked like any trace of her natural, beautiful color was gone — just completely, totally gone. Elena’s breath almost stopped and her heart raced as she looked back at the stranger in the mirror, a shocked looking blonde with dark, furrowed eyebrows and adorable features that looked somewhat familiar but somehow completely different. 

“Since you seemed so excited by the idea, I decided to go big,” Lydia explained as she brushed Elena’s hair back into its intended style, with a parting that left a now-golden curtain hiding her right eye. “But I didn’t think your hair would lighten quite this much. But, you know, a lot of women would kill for blonde hair like this.”

A lot of women, yes… but not Elena.

From over Elena’s shoulder, Lydia leaned in and whispered conspiratorially, “So, since you said he was being annoying about not wanting you to cut your hair, what would you say to really driving him crazy and showing him how wrong he was?”

Elena wanted to cry, but also didn’t want to give Keith the satisfaction of watching that happen. In for a penny…

“Sure. Whatever you think would look best,” she whispered. Almost immediately, Lydia’s fingers slid up and over Elena’s left ear, capturing the thick locks that hid it. A razor that appeared out of nowhere made short work of them all, and with little to no ceremony the stylist simply dropped the shorn locks into Elena’s lap. A harsh rasping assaulted her ear, drowning out the music as Lydia worked, just grabbing lock after lock and slicing it away. Plop after plop sounded when heavy, wet tresses were dropped onto the cape, and Elena controlled her breathing as best she could to keep from bursting into tears.

Looking at her reflection, the beautiful brunette with long, flowing hair now transformed into a damp-headed blonde with one ear completely exposed, she couldn’t believe that she actually thought the collarbone length of her hair had been short. Compared to what it was now, with Lydia revisiting each shorn lock again and again until the entire left side was completely uniform in its lack of noticeable length, hair that reached her collarbones seemed positively Rapunzelesque.

With gentle coaxing, Elena focused down at her lap. The pile of golden hair taunted her, as did the incessant tugging at her nape that preceded every bit of harsh rasping and every eventual, distant plop as her once-beautiful hair hit the floor. The weight of her wet locks against her neck was gradually replaced by the feel of a constant air conditioned breeze, sending shivers down her spine.

Keith was going to pay dearly for this.

Dearly.

When her head was lifted and tilted to her left, Elena closed her eyes, fearing the worst. But that never quite came to be. Rather than shearing away any locks covering her right ear, the only remaining significant length on Elena’s head was sculpted to keep her ear, though not her jawline, hidden. She opened her eyes, taking in the graceful, gradual sweep that hid her right eye as well. As it dried, it gleamed under the salon lights, the shine shimmying this way and that as Lydia, played with her creation.

It was a beautiful haircut. Elena hated the style and hated the color; hated how naked her left ear and her nape felt and hated how it fell over her right eye, but she had to admit that Lydia’s work was well done.

But she still hated it.

When Lydia asked if she liked it, she lied and nodded with a smile, slipping out of the chair after the cape was pulled away. As she walked to the front, she avoided Keith’s eyes and rubbed her nape, astonished at how short Lydia had cropped her hair without using clippers.

Before she could pay, Keith appeared at her side and handed over his credit card, and then held the door open for her as they left.

Once outside, he gently held her arm and turned her to face him, meeting her gaze with his own. “It does look good, you know,” he told her, brushing the long bangs back from her eye and tracing the edge of her hidden ear with his fingertips.

She smiled, and he pressed his lips to hers. 

“I do kind of wish you let me win, though. Your hair was so gorgeous.”

She punched his shoulder before sliding under his arm and leaning against him as they walked. “You better get some fucking great seats to the concert.”

“Yes. Definitely. And probably some jewelry, too.”

End

 

Just a quick one to play out an idea I had. I used coin flips and a random number generator to decide what was done and how much was cut. I hope you liked it!