Avalon
A loud clatter followed by a string of PG-rated curse words jolted me out of my daze in the wicker chair on the Big House porch. Melody’s bathroom window was right behind me, so it took only seconds to get from the chair to the doorway.
I found her perched in an old chair, a pair of shears—as I was learning to call them—poised dangerously close to her eyebrows. She was seconds away from making the worst decision of her teenage life.
“Please don’t tell me you’re cutting bangs right now. You’re going to regret that in three days when the wind blows and they won’t stop flying up and exposing your massive forehead.”
Melody turned toward me, horror painted across her face, one hand slapping to her forehead. “You think my forehead is massive?”
Oh shit. Shit. Shit.
Stepping into the small room, I shook my head and gently took the shears from her other hand. “No, of course not. You have a perfectly normal-sized forehead. Me, on the other hand…”
She giggled as my voice trailed off. “I think I’ll just trim the ends instead. Bangs seem like a really long commitment.”
I snorted. She wasn’t the only one with commitment issues. “Well, if you’re going to do it, you might as well do it right.”
I set the shears on the counter and began sectioning her hair.
I wasn’t a cosmetologist, but I’d watched enough Brad Mondo videos to consider myself an at-home professional.
“I don’t want a lot cut off,” Melody said, adjusting her oxygen tank beside her. “Just enough to make Geneva Handersung shut up.”
In the short time I’d been here, I’d noticed how often her skin tone shifted—warm cream one moment, pale the next. No one had told me what illness she had, and it felt rude to pry.
I snipped the first section. Silky strands fell to the floor around my socked feet. “You shouldn’t let anyone named Handersung bully you about your hair. You have beautiful hair, Mels.”
“Geneva likes to say I won’t cut it because we never know when I might get sick again and have to cut it short.”
I whistled slowly. I wanted to tell Melody to tell Geneva to shove it, but I doubted Clarke would appreciate that kind of language around her sheltered little sister.
“If she makes comments like that about you, I can only imagine what she says about herself.”
Melody perked up at the nickname, sitting a little taller, eyes a little brighter.
“I like that nickname. My siblings just call me Melly.”
I moved to another section, watching the layers fall into place. “Melly is a great nickname. Have you ever seen Scandal?”
She shook her head, meeting my eyes in the mirror.
“Melly is one of the strongest characters in the whole show—she even becomes President of the United States.”
Her jaw dropped. She tucked one leg into the chair and hugged it. “She sounds amazing.” Then her brows furrowed. “You need a nickname too.”
I shrugged. No one had ever stuck around long enough to give me one. “My Aunt Brie calls me Lonnie or Ava.” I separated the final section. “You can call me that.”
“Ava?” Melody repeated softly, testing the name. “I’ve never heard it before.”
I finished trimming, fluffing her hair and shaping the front pieces. When I stepped back, her reflection brightened—visibly, beautifully. “Well, it’s spelled like Ava but pronounced like the first part of my name. Ava.”
She ran her fingers through her hair, chin lifting with new confidence. The door opened just as she began striking poses with her phone.
“Melly, have you seen—”
Clarke’s voice cut off. She froze in the doorway, eyes wide, mouth slack.
Her gaze darted from the hair on the floor, to the shears in my hand, to Melody’s new cut, then back to me. Her pupils darkened, narrowed—and I braced myself.
They were all about you. They were all about you.
“What. The. Hell. Are you doing? Oh my God?” Clarke shoved past me, dropping to the floor as she gathered the strands of hair with trembling hands.
“You—you cut her hair.” Her voice cracked. “Why would you do that?”
Tears streaked her cheeks as she looked up at me. “You had no right to do that!”
I stepped back, setting the shears on the counter. “Clarke, I’m sorry. I just wanted to do something nice for Melody—”
“You have no idea what you’ve done.” She sniffled, gingerly picking up each strand, sweeping her hand across the floor to make sure she didn’t miss a single one.
“Clarke, it’s just hair,” I said, confusion tightening my chest. “Melody wanted her hair cut and I thought—”
“Melody is sixteen,” she snapped. “She doesn’t know what she’s doing, and you don’t know what she wants. This was not your place.”
“Okay, you can’t be mad at her for this. I was doing way worse things at sixteen,” I joked weakly —and immediately regretted it when Clarke’s glare snapped to me like a whip.
“Oh, we know all about the things you did at sixteen, thanks to People Magazine page six.”
“C.K., this was my idea,” Melody said, stepping in. “Ava just wanted to help. I was going to do it anyway.”
Clarke’s face twisted at the sound of my nickname. Her glare sharpened. Her mouth opened—but instead of lashing out, she inhaled deeply. Then again. And again.
“Melody Claire,” she said, voice trembling with restraint, “I’m going to count to five, and I need you gone before I finish.”
She said “one” on the exhale.
Melody was out of the bathroom before Clarke reached three.
“You don’t have to be like that,” I said, crossing my arms and stepping between her and the door. “Don’t be mad at her. I cut her hair.”
Clarke rose to her feet, mirroring my stance, Melody’s hair still clutched in her hand. “You have no idea what you’ve done.” She held the hair up to my face, tears welling in her eyes like liquid glass.
“You have no idea what this is or what it means. You had no fucking right. How dare you come into my home—”
“It’s just hair, Clarke!” I snapped, unable to stop myself. “You can’t keep acting like I’m supposed to magically know everything when you won’t tell me anything.”
Clarke recoiled like I’d slapped her. Her eyes widened, shining with hurt and fury.
“Just hair?” she whispered. Then louder: “You think this is just hair?”
She shook the strands in her fist.
“This is the months we feared she wouldn’t wake up from her coma.”
A few strands fell.
“This is the months of chemotherapy.”
More hair slipped through her fingers.
My heart hammered against my ribs.
“This is the bullying she faced when her hair finally started growing back.”
Another handful dropped.
“This is the look on my mother’s face when she had her first bad day after weeks of good ones.”
Only a few strands remained in Clarke’s palm. She stared at them, a tear sliding down her cheek and falling onto her skin.
“It’s not about the hair, Avalon. It’s the resilience. The strength. We didn’t think she was going to make it.”
She looked up at me, eyes blazing.
“You had no right. Regardless of what my sister said—it shouldn’t have been you.”
I swallowed hard. “I—”
“You’re sorry,” she snapped. “Yes, I know, Avalon. You’re always fucking sorry.”
She pressed a hand to her forehead, gaze darting around the room like she was searching for an escape — anywhere but me.
“I’m sorry, Clarke. Tell me what to do to make this right.”
My voice trembled. I bit down on my lip to stop it.
“You can leave.”
Her tone was cold. Final.
“I don’t think…” She sniffled, wiping her nose with the back of her hand. “I don’t think this is going to work, Avalon.”