CHAPTER TWELVE #3
Maybe I was being too reckless. Maybe I should have thought this through more.
But that was the point, right?
To do something fun.
To be reckless.
To live.
I flipped the switch in the bathroom, and I stood in front of the mirror, studying my reflection. Dark hair. Dark eyes. The face I’d seen in mirrors my entire life, carefully composed. I didn’t look away.
Elyssa appeared behind me, her arms full of old towels. She draped one over my shoulders and secured it with a clip.
“Okay,” she said, tearing open the box. She pulled out a pair of plastic gloves and snapped them on, then held up the small bottle and the tube of colorant. “Sit on the edge of the tub. It’s easier.”
I obeyed, lowering myself onto the edge.
Elyssa mixed something in the provided plastic bottle, shaking it with a vigor that made the liquid slosh audibly.
“We’ll have to bleach your hair first to lift the dark pigment out of your brown hair.
Regular blonde hair dye alone can’t lighten dark hair.
And we might have to do more than one bleaching session to reach a light blonde without severe breakage. ”
I stared at her blankly.
Elyssa let out a short laugh. “I’m guessing my words don’t make any sense to you?”
I shook my head, a little embarrassed.
“Don’t worry. I won’t bore you with the details. Just trust me.”
My heart thudded once in my chest. I agreed to this because I did trust her. Fully. Completely. “Okay.”
“But this will take a few hours,” she said slowly, wincing at the words. “I’m sorry, maybe I should have said that before.”
“I don’t mind. Let’s do it.”
She got in the bed and stood behind me. Her fingers gently started parting my hair into sections. “This is going to be cold. And it’s going to smell terrible. Just a heads up,” Elyssa warned. “Are you okay?”
I nodded, though I wasn’t entirely sure.
“Alright, I’ll start then.”
I eventually lost track of time. She was right; it did take hours. But Elyssa completed each step meticulously.
“I’m going to change,” Elyssa said, gesturing toward her towel. “I’ll be back in two minutes. Don’t touch anything.”
After she was gone, I stared at my reflection and tried to imagine what I would look like as a blonde, but the image wouldn’t form.
Elyssa returned in a pair of cotton shorts and an oversized UCLA t-shirt. “Okay, it’s the final rinse now.”
I lowered my head into the tub, and she supported my neck with one hand as warm water rushed over my scalp. I closed my eyes as Elyssa worked the remaining product from my hair, her fingers gently massaging me.
When she was done, she wrapped my hair in a towel.
“Don’t face the mirror,” she ordered, grinning. “I want it to be a surprise. You can only look after I’m done styling it.”
I simply nodded, both nervousness and excitement bubbling through me now that it was almost done.
Elyssa began drying my hair, working through each section carefully, only stepping back every few moments to study her work. Her brows were furrowed as she focused deeply on her task.
“Almost done,” she murmured.
A few minutes later, she switched off the blow dryer. The smile on her lips was so wide, it was all I could see. She turned me around, and we faced the mirror together.
Silence settled over the bathroom.
Thud.
I stared.
For a moment, I couldn’t speak.
The brown was gone.
In its place was a golden blonde that framed my face in soft waves. It made my eyes look brighter, softer… I looked younger somehow.
Different.
Beautiful.
“Oh my God,” I whispered.
“You like it?” Elyssa asked a little nervously.
I touched a blonde strand and then ran my fingers through it. “I do like it. It’s… different.”
I smiled at my reflection, almost giddy at the sight of someone I barely recognized staring back at me.
And then Elyssa stepped beside me.
Thud.
Something inside me went still.
I stared at us in the mirror.
Thud. Thud.
My gaze rove over her face, her full frame in the reflection, and then I looked back at myself. Blood roared between my ears, the pulse at the base of my throat thundering.
There was something familiar about the way we looked standing side by side.
I studied her face closer through the mirror. The shape of her eyes, the curve of her cheekbones, the slope of her nose and even the shape of her lips.
My heart gave a hard, sudden thud against my rib cage.
My hand came up, and I touched my face and then my hair.
Elyssa’s smile faded. “Serafina…”
I could barely hear her words over the thundering noise in my ears.
The resemblance wasn’t obvious at first. It was subtle, almost imperceptible. But now that I had seen it, I couldn’t unsee it.
It was like staring at two versions of the same face. We weren’t the exact replicas of each other… no, but the familiarity was unmistakable.
My throat tightened. “I look like you…”
The words came out barely a whisper.
She swallowed and then I saw it—the most devastating guilt on her face.
“Or…” I turned toward her, my heart pounding even harder. My gaze drifted back to our reflections before I looked into her eyes again.
Thud. Thud. Thud.
“...you look like me.