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Chapter V - Bingle Bingle

Summer quickly rolled by, and school was just around the bend. We all had our school supplies ready, and we were all pretty much set with wardrobe for the next few years. Aunt Mari was a bit of a shopaholic, and it didn't just have to be on herself.

We were at the hair salon because everybody wanted haircut before school officially started. As for me, I didn't want a haircut. I wanted to grow my hair out more. However, I don't know what had come over me, but I suddenly wanted to have blonde hair.

Jian wasn't getting a haircut either, and he was just there to be there. I didn't tell him about my plans to become blonde. I thought that maybe it'd be better to keep it a secret, especially from him.

Hiru wasn't even there. He was at home finishing up some AP summer vacation homework. I still couldn't believe myself. My brother, taking AP classes. He was a senior now, after all. That meant that even though I've just started living with him again, it'd only last a year. I knew that very well, but sometimes it felt like he didn't.

"Come on, hun, you're next!" the hairdresser said in an unbelievably way too perky voice. Jian looked at me with a confused look on his face. "Wait, I thought you weren't going to cut your hair." I placed the outdated magazine on a little table beside us. "I can change my mind." I blankly said.

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For a perky hairdresser, she was surprisingly very quiet. Either that, or she was way too engrossed on a soap opera that was in the television.

I quietly leaned back into the chair and waited for her to finish covering my hair with bleach. However, I could feel Jian's eyes staring at me with curiosity. Sometimes I wish I could read Jian's mind. I also wish I could read Hiru's mind. I could not figure out what kind of person he was now. He was a mystery.

After an hour, the bleach had set in. I had been sitting in the hair heater thing for quite some time. By this point, my mom said she'd come back for me later since Lani was starting to get restless.

I stared at my new self in the mirror. Wow, I am blonde. I didn't know any blonde Asians, so this was quite a change.

I walked out of the salon in search for my mom's car. No where in sight, so I decided to go for some ice cream. It was fairly busy, and there was a killer line. "Hello, what would you like today?" an employee in his teen years asked. "Strawberry in a cone, please." he smiled a little. "That's my favorite flavor. Not a lot of people like strawberry around here." he scooped up ice cream. "Well I'm not from around here, so I guess that explains why." I laughed a little while scratching the back of my head.

"Oh really? That's just like my co-worker's sister. He says she loves strawberry, but she lives in San Diego." he began to walk to the cash register.

"Wow, that's weird. I'm from San Diego, but San Diego is a really big city anyw--" I stopped mid-sentence when someone walked through the back door. No, not just someone. Someone I knew.

"Jian? What the heck." Jian froze in his tracks.

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It was 9:23 PM. I quietly put all of my things together. I was tired, so I lied down on my bed while the situation at the ice cream shop reoccurred in my head.

-flashback-

"Hiru? What are you doing here?" 

"Well a better question would be, why are you blonde?" 

"Hiru, don't change the subject. Do you work here? Is this where you always are? Why didn't you tell us?" 

"Ail, yes. I work here, and you better not mention a thing to mom or anyone."