Page 80 of Like Fathers, Like Son
“I’m not letting you give the baby a weird fire name or something, Blaze.”
I nearly choked on my food, taking a moment to cough before I laughed again.
“Nothing weird about fire names, babe. It’s no weirder than names of seasons, or months, or days, or flowers, or gemstones… shall I go on?”
She shook her head, her red hair rippling with the movement. I wanted her hair longer, and back to that glossy red it had been before. Had she coloured it recently, or was it just a natural progression of hair colour over time?
“Is it dyed?”
She froze with her mug in front of her lips, and a frown on her face.
“What?”
“Your hair. It’s darker than it was back then.” Suddenly I felt ashamed of even mentioning it, and reminding her of my obsession.
Anneka rolled her eyes, reaching up idly to smooth her hair.
“Yeah, I darkened it when I had it cut. Why?”
How could she do that? It was irrational of me to be pissed, and I knew that, but I couldn’t help it.
“That stops now. We’re getting it changed back to what it was before.”
She made a huffy sound as she poked me in the chest with her finger.
“That’s not up to you, Blaze. It never was and it never will be. My hair ismyfucking hair, got it?”
I reached over to stroke my fingers through her too-dark hair, and fisted the silky strands close to her scalp. She hissed with pain and reached up to try and pull my hand free.
“I want it the way it fucking was, Anneka. That’s not negotiable, unless you want to wake up with it all shaved off.”
She looked horrified as she finally pried my fingers from her hair, and pressed a hand against her scalp.
Anneka
EVERY TIME I FORGOT what a psycho he was, he found a way to remind me, didn’t he?
“You’re such a fucking caveman, Blaze! This isn’t something you get to control, okay? We’re having a baby together, and that’s what’s important. I’m willing to stay with you, to try and make this work, but demands like that, threats like that… they can’t happen. You can’t be dictating to me how I can look, and FYI, pulling my hair to try and make me comply is a real dickhead thing to do!”
Blaze glared at me for a long, awkward moment, then his face suddenly relaxed. He even rolled his eyes like he understood, and that just made me even more suspicious when he smiled and nodded.
“You’re right, babe. I’m being a dick, aren’t I? You should have your hair the way you want it.”
I narrowed my eyes, wondering what the hell he was even up to right now.
“If I wake up tomorrow with no hair, I’m never speaking to you again, Blaze. You get that, right?”
He snorted, getting up and gathering up our empty plates and mugs.
“Yeah, babe. That’d be crazy of me to do something like that, wouldn’t it? I’m just gonna bring us some water, so we don’t stay awake all night with all the caffeine.”
After he left the room, I sat and stewed over his sudden change in behaviour, because something wasn’t right there. Blaze didn’t just give in, so either he had some twisted plan, or he thought he could bully me into it over time.
The trouble was that it could be either, or some messed up shit I couldn’t even come up with. Did it really matter if I went back to the colour I’d had before? It wasn’t like I’d changed it because I didn’t like it. It was just an effort to look more grown up and mature for my new job. A job I probably no longer had after all the disappearing on them.
I liked the shorter haircut, but was I really married to this colour, or could I do something for Blaze just this once? Was I being stubborn for the sake of being stubborn? He’d saved my life today. He’d rescued me from a monster, and made sure that monster couldn’t hurt me again.
Of course, then he’d fucked me right next to the guy as he died, which was seriously creepy, and I didn’t know why I hadn’t refused, except that I hadn’t really been in my right mind at the time.
