“You know, Kenz,” Jaden murmurs, “when you started taking my shirt off, this wasn’t exactly where I imagined the night going.” He slides out of the passenger seat of Mom’s Prius and shuts the door behind him, looking over the roof of the car at me. He purses his lips innocently, but I only roll my eyes and turn away from him before he can see me blush.
It’s dark out and we’re standing in the parking lot of Walgreens. Admittedly, it’s not where I expected the night to go either, but when an idea like this hits, I don’t have a choice other than to follow through with it. It could backfire entirely and may not be appreciated the way I’m hoping for, but I feel as though it’s at least worth a shot. I could do with something to focus on right now.
I lock up and walk around the front of the car to meet Jaden, and in his hand he’s holding the photograph from his room, the one of him and his family. I’m grateful that he was willing to not only take it out of its frame, but to also take it out of the house and all the way to Walgreens, of all places.
“It’s not what I had in mind either,” I admit, glancing sideways at him. I slide my hand down his arm and interlock my fingers around his as we head across the small lot toward the entrance. “But I think Dani will thank us for this.”
It’s quiet at this time of night and it should be closing up in an hour or so, so the store is relatively empty when we get inside. There aren’t many people shopping at a drugstore at this time on a Thursday night. Windsor may be small, but there are better things to do than this.
“She sure as hell better thank us,” Jaden grumbles. I can tell he’s irritated, but he’s being playful about it, which I appreciate. He traces small circles on the back of my hand with his thumb as I pull him along by my side, and he nudges his shoulder into mine to get my attention. When I glance over at him, he teasingly narrows his eyes and adds, “Especially since I’m giving up kissing you for this.”
“We have all night,” I remind him. It’s just before 9PM, so we do have a couple hours before I head home. There’s still plenty of time to kiss him tonight, and tomorrow, and the day after that. “Up here,” I say, and speed up my pace toward the beauty aisles. Jaden reluctantly follows me, mostly because he doesn’t have a choice. With our hands interlocked, I’m pretty much dragging him with me all the way down one of the aisles until I come to an abrupt halt in front of the shelves full of hair dye. “Can I see that?” I nod to the photo in Jaden’s hand.
“I really don’t think you’re gonna find the right shade,” he says as he passes it to me. He seems doubtful as I step forward to examine the large selection of hair dyes, releasing my hold on his hand. He remains behind me, heaving a sigh. “If the right one existed, Dani would have found it by now.”
I glance over my shoulder at him. “But has she tried mixing shades?”
“I don’t know. You can do that?”
Laughing, I turn back to the shelves. Under the store’s fluorescent lighting, I hold the photograph up slightly and squint at Kate’s hair. She was a natural dark, warm brunette. Exactly like chocolate. At the moment, Dani is too dark, more of a soft black than a dark, rich brunette. I kneel down on the floor in front of the shelves and hold the photograph up against all of the different shades in front of me. There’s not a shade here that’s identical to Kate’s shade. After five minutes of searching and comparing, I finally settle on a natural, soft black shade and a warm, dark brown shade. Mixed together, I’m pretty sure they’d create a shade that comes as close to Kate’s as possible. I can only hope that Dani will be willing to give it a shot.
“These ones,” I announce, straightening up and holding out the two boxes of different hair dyes to show Jaden. He looks extremely bored by this point, and with his arms folded across his chest as he leans back against the shelves of shampoo, he quickly glances at the boxes and nods.
“Can we please go now?” he says, slipping his arm around my shoulders. He pulls me in close and nuzzles his face into my hair, pressing his lips to my temple. “Buying hair dye for my sister isn’t exactly my favorite thing to do, you know.”
“We’re going,” I reassure him, shrugging his arm off me. I carefully pass him back the photograph, relieved that I haven’t creased it.
With the boxes of hair dye in my hands, we make our way back down the aisle toward the cash registers, but when we reach the end of the aisle we abruptly come to a stop. So does the person in front of us, and when I glance up, my shoulders sink.
“Darren?” I blink at him in surprise. I do bump into him occasionally, but never as frequently as I have these past few weeks. It’s easy to assume that he’s stalking me somehow, but I need to remind myself that he’s not. It’s Windsor, after all. Every third person I pass is someone I know. “What are you doing here?”
“Grabbing some eye drops.” Darren holds up the small box as proof. He seems surprised to see me too and, true to his word, his eyes do seem a little red and irritated. “My eyes are dry as hell.”
“What are you doing back in town, though?” I ask. Darren never used to come home this often, and I never could blame him. I wouldn’t either. “Shouldn’t you be back in your dorm chugging beer or something?”
Darren laughs as he rubs at his left eye. “I’m trying to come home more often,” he says. “Mom misses me, so I’m trying to keep her happy, and my classes tomorrow got canceled, so here I am. Home again.” Shrugging, he rolls his eyes and then seems to finally notice Jaden for the first time. His smile falters a little as his brown eyes study Jaden, looking him up and down slowly until he forces a tiny smile back onto his face. “Jaden Hunter, right?”
“Right,” Jaden says, shifting his footing. He looks uncomfortable and it is clear he is finding this awkward. He knows that Darren is my ex.
Darren gives him another quite obvious once-over. His eyes sharpen with something like confusion as he analyzes Jaden, and he glances between the two of us for a few seconds. I can almost see the gears in his mind turning as he pieces together the obvious. The muscle in his jaw twitches as he looks me in the eye. “Did you get the flowers that I left for you?”
“Yes,” I tell him, stiffly. I appreciate the fact that he is trying, and the flowers were a sweet gesture, but I just wish he would stop putting in the effort. He is wasting his time, and the harder he tries, the more I want to push him away. “They were nice. But you should really stop doing stuff like that.”
“I don’t mind. You’re welcome,” he says. His lips curve into a smile to reveal the dimple in his cheek. With great emphasis, he glances at the watch on his wrist. He doesn’t want to stick around to chat, and neither do I. “Well, I guess I’ll see you around, Kenz.”
I give him a small farewell smile back as he brushes past me. I hate that he just called me Kenz, and I already know for a fact that Jaden has noticed too, because as soon as Darren is out of earshot, he steps around in front of me looking distinctly perplexed. “He sent you flowers?” he demands.
“Last weekend before the dance,” I admit, shrugging. I don’t really think it’s that big a deal. Darren started asking me to take him back long before Jaden and I started talking again, so it’s not anything new. However, the flicker of anger that crosses Jaden’s face tells me that he disagrees, so I quickly add, “But it doesn’t matter, because I’m not really much of a flowers type of girl, anyway.” To lighten the mood, I force out, “He should have just sent me a box of Hershey’s.”
Jaden doesn’t even so much as crack a smile as we begin to walk, falling into place by my side. “Is he bothering you?”
I roll my eyes. “I can handle him, Jaden,” I tell him firmly. It’s actually pretty attractive that Jaden is trying to look out for me, but Darren really isn’t a problem.
Jaden remains silent all the way to the cash registers. He doesn’t say anything more on the matter, but he has a face like thunder. We pay for the boxes of hair dye, have them bagged up, then leave the store in silence. He kicks at the ground as we cross the parking lot to the car and I watch him, surprised by his reaction. I try to figure out why he’s suddenly gone so quiet. Jealousy, maybe? I don’t know why he’s so irritated, but I do know that he has nothing to be jealous about. He was the one I was kissing thirty minutes ago, not Darren.
“How long left?” Dani asks.
She’s sitting on the toilet seat, legs crossed, hands in her lap. There’s a towel draped around her shoulders and a shower cap on her head. Underneath it, her hair is gathered into a damp, sticky mound. Nancy and Terry’s bathroom reeks of chemicals, but it doesn’t smell as strong as it did when we first started.
I’m perched on the edge of the bathtub. I reach for my phone and check the timer that’s running. “Five minutes,” I tell her.
Dani was reluctant at first. After the surprise of having me thrust two boxes of hair dye in front of her wore off, she was skeptical that mixing the two shades I’d chosen wouldn’t get her any closer to the color that her mom was. It did take some convincing before she agreed to let me potentially ruin her hair, and even now she still has doubts. “You really think this will work?”
I set my phone back down on the sink’s counter and give her a shrug, though there’s a small smile on my face. “It’s worth a shot, isn’t it?”
I’m glad she agreed to let me do this. Sitting here together, chatting casually while the dye in her hair develops reminds me of how we used to be last summer. We would often hang out, and when we did we were always gossiping, always laughing. Being friends with Dani was something that filled the void that Grace left. Being friends with Dani allowed me to see what life with a sister would have been like, and I’ve missed these kind of nights with her.
“Thanks for this, Kenzie,” Dani says after a moment. She reaches up for the towel around her neck and pulls it closer around her. She looks ridiculous right now, but I’m just glad she feels comfortable enough to even do this with me. A smile full of gratitude lights up her face but her bright, blue eyes grow sad. “I’ve tried so many different shades, but they’re always too dark,” she admits. “I never thought about mixing colors, so hopefully this will work.”
“If it doesn’t,” I begin slowly, my voice cautious, “then you could always just go back to being you. I don’t think your mom would mind.”
Dani’s gaze meets mine as she thinks about my words. She seems to subconsciously chew on the inside of her cheek at the same time and I’m surprised by the fact that she appears to never have considered it before. She doesn’t get the chance to answer me either, because Jaden appears at the door.
“God, you look horrific,” he tells Dani. I roll my eyes at him. He was in the kitchen eating the cookies Nancy made and then he went upstairs to his room to watch TV, but it seems he’s growing impatient now. I’ve forgotten how it feels to have to balance out my time between the pair of them.
“Shut up,” Dani says. She stretches over to grab a towel from the rack so she can whip him with it, but he successfully dodges the attack.
“How much longer are you guys going to be?” he asks, carefully traversing the bathroom floor and all of the newspapers that cover it. He sits down on the edge of the bathtub next to me and, on purpose or by accident, places his hand on top of mine as we grip the edge.
“A couple minutes,” I tell him. The closer the time to rinse out Dani’s hair gets, the more nervous I begin to feel. This is my idea, so if it backfires then I’ll be the one to blame. I really hope the color turns out the way I’m praying it will.
Dani, however, has something on her mind other than her hair. She gently narrows her eyes and studies Jaden’s hand on top of mine on the edge of the tub. She arches a brow and then glances between the two of us. A smirk toys at the corners of her lips. “So, just in case the two of you making out earlier wasn’t already enough evidence, are you guys, like, a thing now?”
Is it obvious? Do we look like we’re a thing? I instantly pull my hand free from beneath Jaden’s and turn my face away, hiding my blushing cheeks. I really don’t know what to tell her, even though I’m pretty sure I do know what the answer is. I like to hope Jaden and I are something, and luckily, he’s the one to muster up a reply.
“I think so,” he says, but there’s a tinge of uncertainty in his words. He casts me a sideways glance, eyes glossy, waiting patiently for my agreement. My cheeks already feel hot again, and I’m unable to truly meet either of their gazes, so I just nod quickly at the floor. Yes, I think. We are a thing.
And then, because I’m so desperate to change the subject, I quickly blurt out, “Will’s throwing a party on the fifteenth. You’re both invited.”
“Me?” Dani says, blinking a few times. It’s sad, really. A lot of people would have invited Dani to a lot of places a year ago.
“Yeah. Will personally reminded me to ask you, so what do you say?”
“Count me in,” Jaden says from beside me. He leans forward and cocks his head to one side, exchanging a glance with Dani. “What about you, Dracula? You haven’t been to a party in forever. You should come.”
Dani frowns as though she’s fighting a mental battle with herself. She spends a few seconds pulling a face and then finally heaves a sigh. “Okay, I’ll come. Just as long as it’s not a pity invite.”
As soon as the words leave her mouth, the timer that’s been running on my phone rings out around the bathroom. I rise to my feet and grab it, switching it off and turning back around to look at Dani with nervous anticipation. She looks equally anxious, and she stands up, stretches her legs, and huddles over the sink. I get the water running and give it a second to heat up.
“Kenzie, I swear to God, I’m trusting you . . . ” she mumbles, hugging the towel tighter around her shoulders as she bends down and lowers her head to the edge of the sink. “If this turns out—I don’t know—blue or something, then I’m going back to ignoring you.”
“It’ll be fine!” I promise her with a laugh, but I’m not all that confident. The water is warm when I stick my hand under it, so I begin to slowly massage my hands through Dani’s hair, rinsing out all of the hair dye. The stream of water turns black as I do so, and I can only continue to pray that Dani’s hair will now be as close to her mom’s shade as possible.
“I still can’t believe my night has turned into this,” Jaden complains as he hovers behind me. He leans in closer and slips his hands around my waist from behind, his chin resting on my shoulder and his body hugged tight against mine as he watches me rinse Dani’s hair. I like that I’m spending time with both of them together, and I find myself laughing out loud when Jaden says, “I’m literally standing here watching the girl I like dunk my sister’s face into a sink.”