"I look ridiculous."
"You look great."
"Says the girl who dyed her hair with Kool-aid..."
"Shut up, it worked out fine. And you don't look ridiculous." Vee spun the chair around to see my face clearly. I saw hers frown a bit. "Just...don't go out in direct sunlight too much."
I rolled my eyes at her and faced the mirror again. What was supposed to be a new hairstyle from a magazine Vee found, instructions included, turned out to be a failed science experiment. The grimace on my face, though going quite well with my new look, didn't reach the standards Vee held for my attitude. "It looks awful."
"Maybe because you're the one wearing it," she muttered, putting a hand to her chin and observing me like a vulture. I shrunk in the chair and looked at my watch, stressful, but a better view than the face in the mirror. It was gone in an instant and met with one not much nicer, as Vee spun my chair around to face her thinking frown. Hoping that whatever thoughts coursed her brain didn't involve a pair of scissors, I sighed in relief when she grabbed a comb and raked through it instead, but held my breath when it began to hurt.
"What on earth are you doing now?" I asked.
"Making it better. We have..." She checked her own watch. "Fifteen minutes before the guys are supposed to pick you up. Which means I've got to get to work." A few more violent tugs and she finally stopped, her actions growing slower. I looked up at her. "The guys are the ones picking you up...right?"
I shrugged. "That's what the man on the phone said. But who knows, there's always a catch with one of these contests." I sat back waiting for Vee to finish her maiming-uh, excuse me, taming of my hair, and when she didn't I looked back at her again. "What?"
Her comb was suspended over the vanity table. Her eyes were staring into the mirror, at the reflection of her bag of supplies she brought over. Tilting her head, she finally set the comb down. "Hannah...what if, this isn't actually-" I raised an eyebrow. "Ya' know, real?"
"How so?"
"You know how so, people are always pretending to run contests over the phone, it could be some crazy guy or this-John Johnson or whoever you talked to-could have been some punk pulling a prank."
"Try saying that five times fast," I mumbled with a grin. "I don't think it's a trend to be pretending to host contests over the phone...but I won't say you're wrong."
"I don't want you getting hurt."
I rubbed my leg. The brace from the doctor was lying across my bed on the other side of the room, waiting to be put on. Getting hurt already happened, and I did not need to endure any more pain. If this was a real deal contest that I had won, all the walking would do me in anyway. But Vee was right. I was suddenly glad she was there with me, in case there happened to be trouble when I got picked up. If I got picked up.
It was a quarter to five, when the band or whoever was coming was supposed to be there. In record time my hair was calmed down to look acceptable, and Vee grabbed my brace for me from the bed. "Do you need help?"
"It's alright, I got it." I stuck my leg through and brought the metal ends together but it wouldn't snap in place like it had for the doctor yesterday. My hands stung from prying it closed, and the metal burned through my fingertips. I looked up at Vee, who was cleaning up the mess of hair that had accumulated on the desktop, her lips in a thin line. I knew she had been watching me struggle. Releasing my grip I let the braces rest on my leg and stretched it out. "I suppose two more hands wouldn't hurt."
"I thought so." Throwing the hair in the garbage can, she knelt beside the chair and gripped the braces, pushing one side while I pushed the other. Her face was set in such concentration that I couldn't help but laugh, losing my grip. "Shut up," she mumbled, the brace snapping in place. Trouble is, it snapped rather hard, and one of my fingers happened to be in the way. "Oh, are you okay?" she asked when she saw my widening eyes.
