The Good Hair Family Sitcom

S4 E7.3: Valentine's Day

Jayda's POV

I knock on Hazel's front door but get no answer. I try again a second time, louder.

"Why isn't she answering?" I huff. "Where else would she be?"

I lift my arm to knock again, but before I can, Andreas grabs my hand.

"I got this," he states.

He smiles and steers me down off the porch and around the side of the house up to Hazel's bedroom window. Andreas reaches up and slams his hand on the glass, and Hazel whips open the window instantaneously.

"What are you—? How—? What?"

Rather than answer Hazel's questions, Andreas hoists himself up through the window frame. Once inside, he leans out to latch onto my hands and help me up too. When I get my head through the hole and my hands firmly on the sill, Andreas takes me by the waist, lifting me in the rest of the way.

"Thanks for tracking snow on my bed," Hazel says sarcastically.

Andreas and I both kick off our shoes onto the floor and sit down at the head end of her bed while she rests, annoyed, at the other.

"Hazel, what happened with your date with Sarah?" I ask.

"Oh, yeah, um, she had to cancel," Hazel replies dimly. "Her—uh—she had too much homework."

I shift a little closer to her, dreading what I have to tell her. This is Hazel's first real girlfriend, at least that I know of. That thing she had with that redhead when she was 13 hardly counts. That was a middle school crush. But this was real for her.

"Hazel, that's not why she cancelled," I say gently.

She looks scared by that, asking, "How do you know?"

Andreas and I share a sad glance, and I take in a breath to release the bad news.

"Hazel, we saw Sarah with another girl...not like friends."

Hazel is silent. But not silent like sad silent. She's silent like thinking silent. She pushes herself onto her feet and takes a few steps away before facing us again, her eyes on the floor, her face lacking the tragic shock that should be there.

"You good?" Andreas wonders.

"I—" Hazel shuts her mouth suddenly, trying to redirect what she was saying, but I figure it out.

"Did you know?" I ask her.

Hazel lets out a heavy breath and nods.

Andreas is puzzled by that. "Wait, was it an open relationship?"

Hazel shakes her head and falls back against her closet doors. As her back hits the wood, her blank page expression begins to wrinkle.

"I'm not an idiot," she mumbles. "I noticed Sarah was acting weird, and that she would go places and be super vague about it, and I kinda pieced it together."

"Hazel," I say, "if you knew, why didn't you break up with her?"

"Because I—" She pauses, tears now poking her eyes. "What if I don't find anyone else?"

I react immediately, saying, "Hazel—"

But she cuts me off to continue while sobbing. "Like, she was everything I wanted, and I couldn't have that. What if I just...can't ever have it? What if I don't deserve fidelity?"

"Hazel, that's stupid," I respond.

"No, see, you guys are, like, actual soulmates." She gestures at me and Andreas while her voice wavers under the pressure of the tears she's failing at holding in. "Like, I sometimes watch you two together and question how you can be so perfect for each other, but I... I've never met anyone like me. I've never met anyone who gets me like you guys get each other, or who would stay up all night to help me plagiarize a poorly-written English paper, or who is enchanted by the simple sound of my voice. Maybe that person just doesn't exist."