Hair Dye Party


ingredients:


directions:

your brother’s friend asks you to dye his hair
why you?
you’re a girl, duh
of course all girls know how to dye hair
*laugh*

at 2 a.m. you go to walgreens
it’s weird on the way
because you don’t know this friend
what if he’s just like your brother?
shudder in annoyance at that thought
well, the car stereo isn’t up too loud
that’s good
your head hurts

in the store, joke about buying the unlikable person some cosmetics
“is peach his complexion color? or pink?”
look in the hair dye section
“where the %$@!#? is the peroxide??”
find something that looks powerful
hmm
“Will change any hair color from this (black smear)
to this (blonde smear)!”
how much?
just enough
$ales tax leaves you twenty-eight ¢ents

back in the bathroom,
mix up the dye, make bad jokes with your brother’s friend
(he’s not so awful after all),
and use the comb to work the dye in
“how long are you supposed to leave it in?”
the duration of half a star wars movie, perhaps?

familiar music: “duh, da, duh dun dun daah, daah...”
the smell of the dye is sweet and chemical
it was purple going on, how on earth
will it turn anything yellow?
start quoting the movie exactly
the friend has a towel wrapped around him
that serves, oddly enough, as a darth cape
“use the force to make the dye work faster”
hehe

brother is watching the movie and eating his ramen noodles
the hour is getting later, you’ve been up since 8am
you fall asleep on the couch for a few minutes
then
“can you help me get this? i think we need to reapply, the directions say so.”
okay

lather, rinse, repeat

the second application goes well
the gloves are now purple, like the goop
there’s over half left in the jar
“hey, let’s dye your hair too!” they joke
grr. um, er, i mean, haha.
you use it on your brother instead
“but i’m already blonde”
shut up

still later
the boys wash their hair
brother opts out of reapplying
“i’m not a freakin albino”
his friend falls asleep on the chair
it is a little late
you wake him up at the rolling of the credits
surprised he didn’t get up with the
kaboom
of the death star

he takes a shower
comes back a pumpkin
*laugh*
“that’s a good look for you”
“i’ll just use some of what’s-his-name’s blue hair dye now”
brother is blonder
you didn’t notice before how dark his hair was getting
maybe if he washed it more often

impressed with the friend
“he’s okay”
falling asleep on the couch
again
”g’night, don’t use any of that crap on me
in the middle of the night.”

hide the bottle in the closet,
behind the toilet paper,
when everyone else heads to bed
can’t take any chances
*wink*

--fin--


Issue 4:
intro
brief and bittersweet
hair dye party
quotes
Back to Negative SixX
©1998 Eve Strain. All rights reserved.

Email: strge@rhodes.edu