That was the Summer

1) Pink Hair

My name is Marcie O'day.  I'm a sixteen-year-old girl and today I'm dyeing a strand of my brown hair pink.  Why?  Well, you could say it's for a secret reenactment.  :)

You see, since the first time I saw him in second grade I've had a crush on a certain Shotaro Yasakawa.  He was new from Japan then, but he knew more English than he let on.  We became good friends.  He even taught me a few Japanese words like: Kon'nichiwa (hello) and Arigatougozaimasu (Thank you very much).  For a year, we were close, but afterwards he opened up and became friends with everyone.  We drifted away from each other and became friends with other people, but Shotaro would never forget about me.  Every once in a while he'd come around and pull me into a game of tag.

Though we still aren't the closest of friends at school, home life has always been a very different thing.  We both live in beach front houses; his house is a few streets down.  We became beach buddies and would swim, surf, or boogie board together while our moms chatted on the beach, becoming good friends just like us.  It always seemed like we were meant to be close.

Back to pink hair.  You're wondering what happened for me to need a reenactment?  Well, it was a hot summer day back in sixth grade.  Shotaro and I were headed to down to the shore with our surf boards under our arms and our wetsuits hugging our bodies.  The pitter-patter of our bare feet on the hot concrete cliff steps was not an unfamiliar sound.  Shotaro was laughing at some joke I was telling him, like usual, but suddenly he turned and stopped, making me knock my board into his.

"Shotaro!  You're going to ding my brother's..." I had started to reprimand him but suddenly my heart jumped in my chest that day as Shotaro picked up the end of one of my French braids.  The night before mom had weaved fake pink hair into my braids and it caught Shotaro's attention.

"I like your hair like this," he said, before taking another moment to fiddle with the pink and brown ending tuft.  Then he continued walking forward.  I stumbled after him in a daze.  I could feel my cheeks flush red at the sudden compliment and was weirdly too shy to look into his eyes until we hit the water.

That's why I'm dyeing my hair today.  I want to see if he might say the same thing and replay the moment that happened years ago that defined my crush on him so much more.  Mom helps me, since she is a cosmetologist, as I sit in a on a kitchen chair with a hair-dressing cape around me.

"Why is it you want pink again?"  Mom asks with a skeptical tone of voice like my next style change might be shaving part of my head, putting on think eyeliner, and become some type of crazed punk rock fan.

"I don't know," I lie through my teeth, "I just feel like adding a little more color to my life."

"I hope you know it won't stay for long," Mom begins her technical spiel like usual, "It'll be an orangey color in like three weeks."

"Whatever," I say as she washes the rest of the dye out of my hair and down the kitchen sink drain, "It makes me happy." 

When I'm finished, I brush my hair out while looking into the bathroom mirror.   The pink streak peaks out from beneath my brown hair.  I part my hair with my fingers and slowly I braid as perfectly as I can.  I can only stand here and stare just like I did after that one beach day in sixth grade.  It looks the same as it did then.

Before I knew it, there was a knock at the front door.  Mom lets Shotaro and his board inside as he waits for me to get ready.  I pull quickly pull on my one-piece bathing suit.  The magenta line work on it almost matched my streak perfectly.  Running though the living room I yell, "I'm ready."  Shotaro trots after me and waits as I pick my brother's board out of the clutter of them hidden behind the hedge in the side yard.  Scooping it up and tucking it under my arm, I turn preparing to run down to the beach with Shotaro, but instead our boards clatter against each other.  I try to smother a smile by biting my cheeks as I watch Shotaro look over the braid.  His free hand reaches for it and all time seems to generously stop for me.  The wind stops in his hair and in the palm trees, the birds stall above in the sky and all I can think about is my thin braid between his thumb and index finger.

"I like your hair like this," he whispers to me.

"'Hontou ni?  ...Arigatō, Shotaro-kun!" I beam widely at him saying the phrase I had rehearsed many times.  His hand falls and he tilts his head in interest with a grin.

"Douitashimashite." (Which means you're welcome)

That was the summer I dyed my hair.  That was the summer I knew I had to confess to Shotaro ...but I didn't know when.