“What’s wrong with hair product?” Aiden said, touching a strand of his own hair that’d fallen forward self-consciously.
“Probably nothing, I just have no idea how to use it.”
Aiden glanced at me, eyes wide. “Your hair justdoesthat?” he asked, clearly shocked.
“Does what?”
“The… thething,” he said, gesturing vaguely again. “With the soft loose curls and the perfect amount of bounce. Donottell me that every girlfriend you’ve ever had hasn’t played with your hair. Don’t start lying to me now.”
“Uh.”
Well. Looking back, I guess they had…
“It looks so soft,” Aiden said, with an air of awe that sounded like he was having some kind of religious experience.
“I think it’s just like that,” I said, scratching the back of my neck as heat crept up it on the way to my cheeks. “Y’know. Naturally.”
“I hate you.” Aiden shook his head, smiling broadly. He definitely didn’t mean that. “Noproduct?”
“I wash it,” I defended. “Does that count?”
Aiden laughed again. “Unless you’re using some kind of miracle shampoo, no. No, it doesn’t.” He sighed, adjusting his grip on the steering wheel. “Guess there’s no faking good genes.”
That was maybe the one thing my family had going for it. Good genes.
I would’ve taken less-than-perfect hair and a slightly quieter home life over perfect hair and what I’d had growing up any day. But Aiden didn’t mean it like that. He was just paying me a compliment.
“You don’tlooklike you use a ton of hair product,” I said. “For what it’s worth.”
“Thank you, that means a lot coming from someone who doesn’t know how to use it,” Aiden said, still grinning.
I liked that I could make him smile.
“This is your turn-off,” I waved at the sign ahead, squinting down at my phone one last time to make sure it matched.
The middle of nowhere was the obvious place to get married for my sister. Making anyone’s life easy wasn’t the kind of thing she did.
Much as I loved her and wanted her to be happy, I couldn’t see why we weren’t doing this in a city somewhere instead of in a place where there was snow banked up to shoulder height on the side of the freeway.
… that might’ve been an exaggeration, but I’d never been a big fan of snow, and my opinion wasn’t improving with more exposure to it.
Aiden drove like he did everything else, as if he’d been born for it.Confidence. Whether he believed me or not, he had enough of it for the both of us.
Kieran really had been right. I probably owed him a text to that effect.
Aiden’s actually pretty cool
Kieran:I know. Having fun?
To my incredible surprise, yeah. Thanks for lending him to me
Kieran:My brother is your brother. Tell him I love him.
Done. Thank you
“Kieran says he loves you,” I reported, tucking my phone back into my pocket.
“I owe him one for convincing you to take me to this. It’smagical,” he said.
