The Love Album Series: Ride -BWWM- (SLOW UPDATES)

21

-Perfect by Topic & Ally Brooke-

Putting the Big Apple in their rearview mirror, Denise and Mark were on their way to Ocean City, New Jersey. There they would hopefully be staying at Denise's family's beach house. Her father had many vacation houses across the country, unnecessarily.

Their beach house in Ocean City went unused like most of them did. So, Denise thought it would be fun to go down memory lane. If her family hadn't changed, she guessed that they were out of the country for their summer family trip, anyway.

In reality, growing up, it wasn't much family time. Is was her parents leaving her with the nanny to explore and have fun on her own.

It hurt to know that her parents weren't even willing to give her attention on a family vacation.

Denise tossed her finished cigarette out the window and sat back in her seat with a content sigh.

"Are you sure you want to go to the beach house?" Mark asked her behind the wheel. "It could stir up some memories, don't you think?"

"Not when all the memories are already up here," she pointed to her head. "Besides, this beach house actually has pleasant memories, if that helps."

"It does," Mark nodded.

"Speaking of the beach house, since we're technically not supposed to be there, we probably shouldn't film our Q&A video there."

"You're right," Mark agreed. "We can do it here. Use one of our phones for the video and the other for the questions."

"On it," Denise grabs their phones and begins setting up.

Mark thought that his first video went well, but when he uploaded his video with Denise, it reached one million views in one day. It was a very emotional video.

Denise cried a lot, but she also laughed in the end. If Mark hadn't been there, she truly believed that she couldn't have gone through with it.

She didn't expose her parent's names, but she didn't lie about who she was either.

Her story had reached millions of people. Some were there for tea; others really cared and could relate to her in different ways. In the end, it felt good to speak her truth. Mark changed the channel name to "Denise & Mark," to make their new norm official.

People enjoyed the friendship that they so evidently had.

As crazy it was, they went from being nobodies to somebody's, and it was happening all so quickly. It was scary and nerve-racking, but it was fun. For the first time, they didn't feel stuck in their lives. They felt like they were going somewhere.

Like they had a purpose.

"Okay, first question," Denise read off of Mark's phone, after having done their intro. "Denise, what made you cut your hair?"

"Why did you cut your hair?" Mark realized that he had never thought to ask himself.

Denise lets out an awkward laugh, scratching her head, "well, I had a breakdown not too long after I lost my son. I hated everyone, especially my dad. As I've said before, he was a stickler for perfection, especially in looks. So my hair always had to be done. As he put it, that's where a woman's beauty comes from. So, I said, fuck him and shaved off my hair."

"Sounds about right," Mark wasn't surprised.

"Yeah," Denise couldn't help but laugh at herself. "Then I realized that life is actually easier without hair and decided that I'm never going back. I just throw on clothes and leave every day. There is no such thing as bad hair days for me. Even though I do need to cut my hair right now," she looked at herself in the camera.