Who: Kylie and Hayley What: A random meeting and hair care advice Where: A shopping center When: The day after Christmas, around noontime Warnings: Kylie is girly and Hayley is confused, not much warning there
Downtown Seattle was abuzz after Christmas, sales in stores reaching critical levels of "low low low." Though it was just the day after one of several American holidays in which it's considered normal to consume more food in one sitting than most families do in a week, it seemed that the people of Seattle were able to drag themselves out of their food-induced stupor long enough to spend more money. Without a family or any friends to speak of, Hayley wasn't one of the many incapacitated by massive food intake. She'd spent Christmas alone, like it was any other day, watching videos streamed off the internet and munching on snacks. But now that it was the day after Christmas, she could go out and get what she really needed: hair dye.
When she was sixteen, Hayley noticed her hair going gray. It started with her bangs, and then began to spread. At the moment, she would estimate her hair at 20% gray. Her bangs had gone silver/white now, not a thread of her natural brown color visible in them. While white bangs were surprisingly stylish, a salt-and-pepper head was not. For the last two years, she had been touching up her gray roots to maintain the illusion that the rest of her hair was a nice, even brown. And she was in need of a touch-up.
She left the in-mall pharmacy with her dye in a thin plastic bag, swinging it idly at her side. As she began to make her way towards the exit, she idly considered stopping at the food court for a pretzel - she was really hungry.