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Nathan stared at the nerd sitting next to him on his bed. If someone had told him at the start of the school year that not only would he become friends with Warren Graham, the biggest dork at Blackwell, he’d also start dating the weirdo, Nathan would have laughed in their face. Or punched them. Probably both. But in all honestly, Nathan had secretly harbored a little crush for the nerd long before they got stuck together on a class project. Sure, Warren had absolutely no idea how to style himself, but he was kind and weirdly funny and his face was actually pretty cute. When it wasn't hidden behind his hair, of course. Over the past few months, Warren had neglected to cut his hair (or care for it at all, really), and now his shaggy brown hair had gotten out of hand. His bangs dangled in front of his eyes, the ends curled around his ears, and, quite frankly, it had begun to look like a weird mullet. And he wouldn't stop. Flicking. His. Damn. Head.
Nathan had to say something. “You need a haircut.”
The sudden declaration caught Warren off guard. He paused his game and put down the controller. He turned toward Nathan, cheeky grin plastered across his face. “What was that?”
Nathan huffed. “I said, you need a haircut. It's getting too long and you keep like, flicking your head to the side to get your bangs out of your eyes. It's annoying.”
“You mean to tell me you've been sitting here, watching me play instead of the game itself?” Warren questioned. He gestured at Breath of the Wild's pause screen, projected across the screen on the opposite side of Nathan's dorm. “You know you could just look at that instead of watching me flip my hair or whatever?”
Nathan's eyes widened and his face reddened, only just visible under the bright light streaming from the projector. He just admitted he had been staring at his boyfriend this whole time instead of watching the game. Warren laughed. Nathan's face soured as he brought his gaze down to his feet.
“W-What I meant was, I was trying to watch the game but I kept getting distracted by your dumb ass over there constantly messing with your hair, is all.”
“Aw, do you think I'm cute?” Warren teased. He inched his body closer to Nathan's, leaning in close. “Are my charming good looks distracting to you?” Warren brought his lips to Nathan's cheek and planted a gentle kiss upon his boyfriend's face.
“Shut up.” Nathan's softened expression belied his annoyed tone. He looked back up at Warren. “And stop it! I know you're trying to avoid this, but it's not going to work. Look at this shit,” Nathan said as he grabbed Warren's bangs and dragged them straight down, completely covering his eyes. “If your hair wasn't so wavy, you couldn't see shit. You need a trim.”
Warren gave an exaggerated frown as he shook his hair free from Nathan's grasp. “But my hair IS wavy, so there's not really a problem. You say I flick my head a lot but I don't really notice it.” As if on cue, he flicked his head.
“You just did it again!”
“Oh.”
“See, if you get it cut, that won't be a problem.”
“But don't you think my long hair makes me sexy?” In an attempt to prove his point, Warren dramatically whipped his head from side to side in fake slow motion, as if he were a lifeguard on Baywatch. Nathan sighed. Of all the people in Arcadia Bay, he just had to catch feelings for this loser.
Nathan never thought he could fall for someone like Warren Graham. There was nothing especially attractive about him; he only ever wore cheesy graphic shirts and the same pair of jeans, he didn't have an impressive physique, nor the features of a model. Yet despite that, and against his better judgment, he developed a crush on him. Nathan didn't quite understand it himself, but something about Warren charmed him. But then he actually started spending time with him and found out how annoying he could be, with his constant texting and inability to shut the fuck up every now and then. Yet, as time passed, that changed as well. Warren's long-winded tangents about science or television or video games or this totally weird bug he saw today, Nathan, you should have been there, you could have taken some gnarly photos of this thing had actually become... endearing. Nathan loved that someone could be so passionate about any little thing when he could barely muster up more than a few sentences about what he liked.
Nathan brought himself back out of his thoughts. His boyfriend was still pretending he to be a hair model in a bad shampoo commercial. “You look like a shaggy dog.” Nathan deadpanned.
Warren stopped flipping his hair and looked at Nathan. “But a cute shaggy dog, right?” He batted his eyelashes playfully.
Nathan's eyes darted to the floor once again. “...Yes,” he replied, his voice quiet and small.
Warren's face lit up. Nathan rolled his eyes but a small smile appeared across his lips. “Look, I'm not saying you have to cut it all off or even that you have to cut it as short as my hair, just that a trim would help, you know?”
Warren pondered it for a minute. He thought back to last Monday: he was studying with Max in the library and had gotten distracted because his bangs kept falling into his eyes. Warren had used his arm to hold them out of the way, but it wasn't too long before his arm became tired. Max ended up giving him one of her hair clips so he could make it through the study session, but when he got back to his dorm, Warren set the clip down somewhere and lost it in the great mess that is his room. He thought back to last night, how his bangs hung flat in front of his eyes like curtains after his shower, making it a real pain to stay focused when he played Overwatch that night. Perhaps Nathan had a point after all.
“Okay, I see what you mean. I hadn't really thought about it, but yeah, it's been getting on my nerves for a while now,” Warren agreed, “I'll go down to one of the local barber shops this weekend and get a trim.”
“What? Fuck that,” Nathan chuckled. “Why wait? I can cut it right now.”
A feeling of uncertainty crept through Warren. “Are you sure, dude? What do you know about cutting hair?”
“You know how many times I got my hair cut over the years? Do you know how many times Victoria's dragged me to the salon to keep her company? I've seen it done millions of times, it should be no problem.”
“Yeah, you've seen it done. You've never actually cut hair yourself before. Seeing and doing are two very different things, Nathan!”
Nathan scoffed. “How hard could that shit be? You just take some fucking scissors and like,” he gestured with his fingers, using them to cut strands of invisible hair in front of him, “snip snip, bitch. And voila. You got yourself a fucking haircut.”
A nervous laugh escaped Warren's throat. “I don't know, man...”
“C'mon, you trust me, right?”
Warren looked up at the ceiling as he thought about it. Did he trust Nathan? At the start of the school year, he and Nathan were total strangers. He knew about Nathan's reputation, of course, but aside from some jeers and insults during class or when passing each other in the hallways, the two never interacted. It wasn't until Ms. Grant forced them together for a science project that they started hanging out. It was then Warren realized he had a lot in common with Nathan, like taste in movies and sense of humor, and that maybe the so-called evil Nathan Prescott wasn't so bad after all.
“Hello? Earth to nerd?” Nathan snapped his fingers and brought Warren out of his thoughts.
Warren did his best to swallow down all his feelings of doubt. In spite of everything he had heard from his fellow students, Nathan hadn't given him any reason to mistrust him since they started dating two months ago. He gave a curt nod and said, “What the hell? Let's do it.”
The grin that spread across Nathan's face after that could only be described as devilish. Warren immediately felt like backing out, but another part of him wanted to give this a shot and see this through. Nathan shot up and began tearing apart his room. He searched his backpack and book bags, he shot a glance under his bed, and checked the shelves on the wall. Nathan made his way to his writing desk and let out a small sigh of relief when he discovered what he had been searching for: a pair of scissors. He brought them over to Warren and brandished them in front of his face.
“You ready for this?”
“Can you cut hair with just regular scissors?” Warren questioned with a laugh in his voice. He hoped if it sounded like a joke, Nathan wouldn't be able to detect how nervous he was.
Nathan shrugged. “Scissors are scissors. They're probably not as fancy,” he twinkled his fingers for emphasis, “as whatever kind of scissors they use in salons, but I figure as long as they're not some kiddie safety scissors, they should be fine.” Warren wasn't so convinced, but Nathan was too busy pulling two towels out from his closet to notice.
“Get up,” Nathan directed. Warren got off of Nathan's bed as the other boy centered his computer chair in the middle of the dorm and dropped one of the towels at its feet. “Now sit.” Warren obliged. In his best impersonation of a hair stylist, Nathan tried to dramatically drape the other towel over Warren's chest, to keep the hair from covering his clothes. Unfortunately, Nathan lacked both the grace and the practice the professionals have and ended up whacking his boyfriend in the side of his head.
“Ow!” Warren cried, hand shooting up to rub where Nathan's arm had smacked his head. Nathan mumbled a faint apology, an expression of soft sincerity across his face. Warren grinned at the sight. “Kiss it and make it better?”
Nathan's expression immediately hardened into a scowl. “Don't push your luck.”
Warren chuckled. “I didn't expect you to take this so seriously, man.”
“I just don't want your hair to fall on the carpet. My little vacuum broke so I'm not calling Samuel up here just because my hairy boyfriend shed all over the damn place.”
“Hey! This whole thing was your idea,” Warren reminded. Nathan just grinned.
With Warren finally situated in his computer chair, both he and the floor protected by towels, it was time for Nathan to get to work. He brought his hand to Warren's head and began to run his fingers through it to prepare for the cut. Or at least, he tried to, but found his fingers getting caught in the tangles and knots residing in Warren's hair.
“What the fuck, Warren?” Nathan said with a laugh. “Have you ever heard of a fucking comb?”
“Well, I had one but I lost it at some point and never bothered to get a new one. Besides, the wind will just mess my hair up again anyway, so why bother?”
Nathan sighed as he turned back towards his closet. He rummaged through it for a second and emerged with a small black comb. “As a token of my appreciation,” he said as he pulled the comb through Warren's hair, “I'll let you keep this comb when we're done here.”
“Oh, thank you so much for this generous act of charity, kind sir,” Warren replied, voice dripping with sarcasm.
After successfully de-tangling Warren's hair, Nathan set the comb on his desk and picked the scissors back up. He turned Warren around in the chair so he faced the wall. Hair stylists usually start cutting in the back, right? Whatever. Nathan grabbed the ends of Warren's hair and held the pieces between his fingers, like he's seen his own hairdresser do countless times, brought the scissors up, and...
“Oh, hey! Can you pass me the controller so I can keep playing while you do this?” The sudden interjection surprised Nathan and he was grateful he actually hadn't made any cuts yet, because it would not have been pretty had it happened a second or two later.
“Hell no,” came Nathan's blunt reply. “I'm not going to risk fucking up because you jerked your head to the side during a battle or something. You can sit still for a few minutes, can't you?”
“Uh...”
Nathan knew his boyfriend and he knew that wasn't possible. Nathan reached over and picked up Warren's phone that he had left on the bed and passed it to him. “Here, this should keep you busy without causing too much movement.” Warren quietly thanked his boyfriend and perused through his apps.
Nathan sighed and collected himself. He brought the scissors back up to the edges of Warren's hair and paused, the realization of what he's about to do finally hitting him. He didn't know shit about cutting hair! He didn't expect Warren would actually take up him up on the offer! Yet he should have known sweet, stupid Warren would be way too trusting with him.
Come on, Nathan, he thought to himself, you've seen this done a billion times. It's just hair. This is a piece of cake. You just take the scissors and... Fuck. Nathan was no hair stylist, obviously, but anyone with eyes could see that he had made a mistake. For starters, the cut was too big. He only had gripped a small part of Warren's hair between his fingers, yet the chunk that was now missing from the back of Warren's hair was huge. Not only that, but it was at a weird angle and Nathan had no idea how that happened. He swore he had grabbed it in the right way. How could he have fucked it up? It was as if a triangle-shaped chunk of hair had fallen off of Warren's head.
It's cool, it's cool, Nathan tried to reassure himself. You can fix this. Just take the scissors and cut the other side like so and... Nope. That's okay, just go to the other side and... Fuck! With only three simple snips, Nathan had made a mess of Warren's hair. Anxiety started building in his gut and he had no idea what to do next. Should he keep cutting and hope he'll correct things eventually, or would that just make everything worse? Nathan looked down at his hands and saw how badly they were shaking; he knew he couldn't continue with this.
Nathan reached into his pocket as quietly as possible, pulled out his phone, and sent a quick text to Victoria, asking her to come to his dorm. It's an emergency, he added before pressing send. A simple omw popped up in reply not a second later. Nathan gave an uneasy smile and slid his phone back into his pocket. He knew she'd be pissed at him for calling this an emergency, but he'd deal with that later. Right now, Nathan needed his best friend and he needed her now.
As he waited for Victoria to come and save him from this awful mess he had created, Nathan continued to use the scissors, cutting the air behind Warren's head. He didn't want to resume cutting his hair and dig himself into a deeper hole, but Nathan wasn't ready to admit his mistake yet. Not without Victoria there for backup. He had to maintain the illusion he was still cutting Warren's hair.
“Shit, you've got a lot of fucking hair, Graham.” Nathan hoped Warren wasn't paying attention and couldn't hear the nerves in his voice.
“Thanks, I grew it myself.” Nathan rolled his eyes, but felt some relief that his boyfriend wasn't aware anything had gone wrong yet.
The next five minutes felt like an eternity to Nathan as he snipped at the air. He even ran his fingers through Warren's hair and ruffled it a bit. That's something hairdressers do, right? Regardless, Nathan's plan seemed to be working. Warren sat in the chair, distracted by some match three game on his phone. Good thing I gave him his phone, Nathan thought, otherwise he might suspect something by now. Another minute passed before a series of sudden knocks on the door interrupted the quiet, anxious silence that had clouded the two boys.
“Nathan, I'm here! Can I come in?” Nathan had never been happier to hear Victoria's voice coming through his door. He set the scissors down and made his way towards the door.
The confusion on Warren's was obvious. “What's Victoria doing here? Is everything okay?”
“Uh, sure, yeah, everything's fine.” Smooth, Nathan. “Just- just let me go out there and talk to her and see what's going on. You stay there and don't move, I still don't want any of your hair on my floor.” Nathan shut the door behind him and was relieved to see that no one else was roaming the halls at the moment.
“So, you gonna tell me what this emergency is or what? I came as fast as I could but I didn't know if you might need anything. Was that Warren in there? What's going on?” Victoria's eyes were searching Nathan's body for any sort of anomaly or injury.
Suddenly, all the emotions Nathan had been holding back erupted. “Oh my god, Vic, thank god you're here. I fucked up. I fucked up and he's going to hate me and he's going to break up with me and he's never going to want to talk to me to me again and-”
“Whoa, Nathan, breathe.” Victoria's voice was soft and soothing. She placed her hands on Nathan's shoulders and brought him in for a hug, letting him sob on her shoulder. Nathan and Victoria had been friends since childhood. They were always there for each other when the other needed help, no matter what. Victoria was accustomed to helping Nathan during his breakdowns and panic attacks, but it had been a while since he had one. In fact, the last time she remembers Nathan crying like this was before he and Warren started going out. As she rubbed gentle circles into his back, Victoria whispered into his ear, “Whatever happened, I'm sure you two can work through it. He's not going to hate you. Warren's not that type of guy. Why don't you tell me what happened?”
And so Nathan did. He pulled away from the hug, and recounted the whole tale to Victoria, about how he thought Warren's hair was getting long so he should get a haircut, that he didn't need to go to a hair salon because Nathan thought he could do it himself, and how quickly he realized he was in way over his head and now Warren was missing three big chunks of hair and was sure to hate Nathan forever.
“Ohmigod, Nathan,” Victoria said, a hint of exasperation in her voice, “You had me worried sick. I rushed over here for that?”
“I know, I know. I- I just panicked, okay? I didn't know what to do so I texted you and I know it wasn't really an emergency but I was afraid you might take too long and Warren would find out something's wrong and I didn't know what to do so-”
“Nathan, listen, I'm not mad, okay? I was just scared you had gotten hurt or something. Look, Warren's a nerd and he's... weird, but he's a good kid. There's no way he'd break up with you over something like this. Let me go in there and see what I can do. I'm no expert, but I've trimmed my own bangs in the past so maybe I can fix his hair a bit. Let's go, I'm sure he's wondering why we're taking so long out here.”
Nathan wiped the last of his tears from his eyes and nodded. Together with Victoria holding his hand, they turned and opened the door to Nathan's dorm to find... Warren standing at Nathan's desk with the scissors in one hand and his phone in the other, awkwardly angled behind his head in an attempt to take a picture of it. Victoria quietly cleared her throat and caught Warren's attention.
“Oh, hey guys!” Warren turned to face them. He smiled and laughed as if they didn't just catch him taking photos of the back of his head. “Okay, Nathan, see, you were taking so long out there that I got bored and wanted to see how my hair was looking, so I, uh, took some photos and didn't see much progress, but then I got to the back and discovered that it was, well, it was fucked up.”
Nathan felt Victoria's hand tense around his, but still he pulled away from her to rush over and hug Warren. “God, Warren, I'm so fucking sorry. I swear I thought I could do it but when I tried, it came out all wrong and I understand if you hate me and want to break up with me and-”
“Whoa, whoa, Nathan, what?” Warren pulled away and looked down at Nathan, brows furrowed in confusion. “I'm not going to break up with you, man.” Warren's voice didn't carry the anger and disappointment Nathan had expected.
“You're not? But I completely fucked up your hair.”
Warren laughed again, this time soft and gentle. “Sure, but it's just hair. That's no reason to break up with an awesome boyfriend like you!” Nathan's heart nearly leaped out of his chest. “And besides, if you didn't notice, I kinda fucked it up even worse myself. See, I tried to take the scissors and correct things on my own, but, well, that just made it worse.”
Warren turned to let Nathan and Victoria get a better look at things. The three missing chunks from the ends of Warren's hair were now much larger than before, and now there were tiny pieces of missing hair all over the backside of Warren's head. Somehow, in his attempt to even out the ends, Warren managed to grab a section of hair from the middle of his head and cut almost a perfect circle into the back of it. Nathan and Victoria stared at it for a second, then at each other, and, with tears still in his eyes, Nathan began cackling, and it wasn't long before Victoria was laughing as well.
“I know, right?” Warren was laughing just as hard as Nathan. “I fucked it up big time!” He shrugged and faced Nathan and Victoria again, who had both managed to fall over onto the bed, doubled over in laughter.
Victoria wiped a tear from her eye and caught her breath. “Warren, I'm sorry. Nathan brought me over to help but I don't think I can do anything to fix.. that.”
Warren smiled. “It's cool, I can deal with this until the weekend and then just get it cut at a barber's.”
Nathan quickly composed himself and looked straight at Warren. “No, we're not waiting until the weekend.”
“Nathan, really, it's no big deal-”
“Yes, it is. I got you into this mess, and no boyfriend of mine is going to be walking around school with his hair looking like that. I'm going to go call my stylist, Bella, and see if I can't get you an appointment with her tonight, and I'm paying for it.”
“Babe, you don't have to do that.”
“Yes, I do. End of story.” Nathan rose from his bed and stepped out into the hall, door closed behind him.
Warren placed the scissors back down on the desk and undid the towel that was still draped around his neck. He carried the towel carefully over to the trash can in the corner of the room and shook the chunks of his hair into it, making sure not to get any on the carpet.
Victoria remained seated on Nathan's bed as she watched Warren pick up the other towel off the floor and dump the remains of hair on it into the trash as well. “So, Warren...”
“Just a sec.” Warren gave a last look at the towels in his hands. Unsure of what to do with them, he shrugged and simply dropped them on the floor next to the trash can. He walked over to the bed and flopped himself onto it. “What's up?”
“Did you really think you could fix your hair like that? No mirror, no training, no help... for someone so smart, that's pretty dumb.”
Warren sighed. “Honestly? No, I didn't. But before you came over, I had this feeling that something was wrong. I could feel that Nathan had stopped cutting my hair and was, like, I don't know, slicing the air instead? And I didn't know if I should bring it up or not. Then, when he went to go talk to you, I decided to investigate what went wrong and what I saw wasn't pretty.”
Victoria chuckled. “I'll bet.”
Warren gave a murmur of agreement. “Yeah, I was actually a little annoyed at first, but when Nathan took so long talking to you, I figured he must be pretty freaked out or something, and then I started feeling bad for him. So I was just like, I don't know, maybe if I make things worse, it'll take some of the pressure off him and he won't feel so guilty and upset.” Warren looked Victoria square in the eye. “Promise not to tell?”
She nodded. “I promise. And for the record, that's pretty sweet, what you did. He was really freaking out you'd hate him and break up with him and never talk to him again. So thanks. I guess you're not so bad after all, Graham.” Warren flashed her a big, cheesy grin. Victoria groaned. “You're still a fucking nerd, though.”
“I'll take it.”
The door opened and Nathan walked back into the room. “It took some... persuasion, but Bella finally agreed to cut your hair tonight.” He slipped his coat over his shoulders and picked up his wallet and keys. “She's waiting for us now, Warren, so let's go.” Victoria and Warren gathered up their own belongings and followed Nathan out the door, Breath of the Wild's pause screen still flickering across the wall.
----------
Later that evening, Warren and Nathan stepped out of Le Chic Boutique. Nathan held the door open for his boyfriend, Warren's hands full of miscellaneous hair products, a fancy new brush, and a hairdryer.
“I can't believe you get your hair cut at a place called Le Chic Boutique,” Warren said with a laugh. He made sure to emphasize the name with his worst French accent possible.
“Shut the fuck up,” Nathan smiled in reply. They stood in front of the store, and Nathan reached his hand up to gently stroke the back of Warren's head. “I can't believe you got an undercut.”
Warren raised his hand and rubbed the back of his neck. His fingers lightly grazed Nathan's as the other boy pulled his hand back. “Hah, yeah, but your stylist said it was the best way to fix, well, everything. I gotta say, it feels pretty weird.”
“No, it- you look... pretty good, actually.” The smuggest grin Nathan had ever seen appeared on Warren's face, and Nathan wished he could go back in time and take it back.
“Could you repeat that, babe? I don't think I heard you the first time,” Warren teased.
Nathan looked up at Warren, face red with embarrassment. “You heard what I said, you fucking nerd!” Nathan shouted, a bit louder than he had intended.
Warren just laughed. “I know. I just love hearing you compliment my rugged and handsome good looks.” Warren paused and attempted to flip his hair for dramatic effect. “Oh wait, I don't have hair anymore,” he said with another laugh.
Nathan rolled his eyes. “Come on, let's go home.” Nathan unlocked the doors of his truck and got in. Warren dumped all the hair products onto the floor in front of the passenger seat and climbed in as well. “Why did you get so much of that crap anyway?”
“Because you were paying for it, of course. I'm probably not even going to use any of this junk.”
Nathan groaned. “Seriously, Warren?”
“What? I'm lazy! But maybe, just maybe, since you're such a good boyfriend and all, maybe I'll let you come over and style my hair from time to time. Just as long as you don't bring any scissors.”
“What the fuck ever.”