Fixing A Broken Compass

Beanies and Normalcy: Part 1

"And so I process grief like I'm running from it. Until it finds me on a beautiful summers day."

Miles POV

The bathroom light was too harsh. Miles squinted as he clicked it on, the reflection in the mirror coming into focus like a stranger stepping into his skin.

His hair brown, uneven in places where Avery had gotten scissor-happy fell limply around his face. It was shorter than it had been in years. Or at least parts of it were. The white was gone. The sharp, unmistakable white he'd chosen for himself, that made him feel bold, distant, deliberate. Gone like it had never existed.

Why did that make him feel so...small?

He leaned forward, bracing his hands against the counter. The ceramic was cold under his fingers. He stared hard at his reflection, trying to recognize himself in the mirror. Trying to feel something other than this low-grade ache bubbling behind his ribs.

He touched his hair, slowly. The texture was the same, but it felt wrong. He swallowed thickly.

He should've said no.

He wanted to say no.

But Avery had been so close, her voice so soft, like she was letting him in on something special. And when she leaned in and whispered, "You've been stuck too long," part of him believed her. Or maybe part of him just didn't have the strength to fight.

His eyes burned.

Why was he like this? Did everyone feel as much as he did?

This was so silly.

It was just hair.

His hair.

He grabbed a towel and sat on the closed toilet lid, burying his face in the fabric. His chest rose and fell with short, uneven breaths. It wasn't just the hair. It wasn't even the color.

It was that he'd felt powerless. Again.

He thought he'd outgrown that.

He thought he was better.

But there he was, letting someone else decide what version of him was acceptable.

Again.

His voice cracked out loud, to no one, "I didn't want this." He was almost scared to say it outloud, his eyes flickering to the bathroom door, afraid someone would hear him.

The sound barely echoed in the small bathroom, swallowed by tile and silence. His throat tightened.

He took in a sharp breath squeezing the towel in his hands. He couldn't cry. Not over something as silly as hair.

Because that's what this was silly.

Stupid.

Why was he upset over something so small?

Maybe Avery was right.

Maybe he was over dramatic.

Maybe he was too much.

But his hair.

He tugged at a strand.

His hand brushed again the side and he winched in pain. Avery must have nicked him in the spots she brought the razor to close. Part of his head felt sensitive at her grip.

White felt like armor. Brown felt like memory. And this? This felt like he'd been peeled back to something raw, something unprepared.

He wasn't ready to be this version of himself. He wasn't sure who this version was.