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There are only two hours left to prepare for a meet and greet down at the convention hall.
Everyone seems to be incredibly nonchalant about this- something Chet simply cannot wrap his head around for the life of him. His voice echoes out into the hallway as he barks at Skidmark to stop messing around and actually start getting ready. How could he not have fixed his clothes yet when they’re right about to leave?!
“Geeze bro, lighten up. We’ve got plenty of time.” Turbo’s voice makes itself clear and Chet quickly turns to the source. He’d forgotten Turbo was even there, sitting down with his arms leisurely crossed in a small brown chair in front of the bathroom vanity— and that Chet himself is supposed to be doing his hair.
“Seriously though, why are we doing this so early? It’s only a 15 minute drive over to the convention hall.”
Turbo raises his hand up to his head and Chet smacks it away. No chance that anything but a brush is getting through… that.
“You say that,” Chet rummages through the cupboard adjacent to the sink and blindly sweeps his hand through its contents as he brings his head up to give Turbo’s reflection the stink eye, “but if even one thing goes wrong, which it always does, suddenly we’re 15 minutes late and a mob of angry fans is chasing right after you.”
Turbo just hums in return, which Chet knows means You’re right, but I don’t want to admit it.
Chet gets up, only after he grabs the handle of what he correctly assumed to be a hairbrush and begins to work through Turbo’s hair.
Turbo has a horribly tender head. He rarely brushes because of this, and like other things in life Chet’s always had to come and pick up the slack for him. Annoying as it can be, helping Turbo is the same as breathing— an automatic necessity. Chet tries to make it easier for him by grabbing a section of that big blond mess as close to Turbo’s head as possible, that way it only pulls on the hair and not his scalp. It seems to be working for a while, until Turbo flinches with a hiss, and making this painless seems to be an impossible task.
Chet sighs, “It wouldn’t hurt so much if you actually detangled it yourself, you know.” Turbo’s reflection frowns at him, “Don’t give me that look when I’m right. Hand me the spray bottle, will you?” Despite the attitude, Turbo does. Chet sprays a generous amount of water (which is actually a concoction of water and conditioner, makes his hair nice and soft,) onto Turbo’s hair, but not enough to drip down on his clothes.
“It hurts no matter what I do. ‘Guess these luscious locks aren’t for the weak...”
Chet thinks he’s saying it sarcastically, but he’s got a big smile on his face, so Turbo must be proud of the rats nest he parades around like a haircut on the worst of days.
“If I didn’t know you better I’d tell you to cut it already-”
“Not happening.” Turbo gravely interjects.
It’s poignant, the way Chet immediately gets stuck on a harsh knot after that.
“I know, I know. I’m Sorry.” Chet realizes he’s not really talking about the knot, but it fits well enough. “I‘m surprised how after all these years you still can’t handle a brush. You didn’t even like getting trims.” Turbo hunches over and groans, until Chet tells him to sit back up or he’ll be dealing with this himself.
“Please, don't remind me. I never wanna go back to that again.”
Chet hums in return.
He remembers it quite clearly. Back before they ever worked at the plant, when Chet still measured Turbo’s height on the wall rather than production quotas on a clipboard, and Turbo was… still himself, just different.
“You weren’t as sweet about it, I’ll tell you that much.” Turbo adds.
Chet grimaces. He really wasn’t.
It’s not as if he was happy to be doing it, but there was a lot on his plate at the time. Dad was busy running the business and Chet had an eye for detail, so the arrangement was set in stone before he had any say. He’d have to drag Turbo to the bathroom as he practically screamed that he didn’t want to. At the time it irritated Chet to no end, with no idea in his mind as to why Turbo wouldn’t listen to him.
“Oh, like you were so patient?”
Chet would always make him sit down in front of the mirror. It’s not unlike the way they are now. Turbo still flinches the same way he did when he was 10, but his hair isn’t black like Chet’s anymore. Chet would comb through his hair with his then much smaller hands, with a much rougher brush puncturing the even longer, even more sensitive hair. Turbo always yelled, grabbed his own head to squash his hair closer to his scalp which only ever made the mess worse. Chet despised the sound, it crashed through his brain and reminded him he didn’t really know what he was doing, and that he wished Dad would’ve shown him what to do the first time, and that he wished he wasn’t the one who had to set him straight.
“I had a choice?” Turbo laughs.
“No, I suppose not.”
Chet had told him all those years ago, Theo, if you love your hair so much, you shouldn’t be getting it so dirty in the first place. The only thing Turbo hated more than hairbrushes were the scissors that inevitably followed suit. Even then, Chet knew, and it didn't matter because it would grow back anyway. Turbo would cry seeing Chet sweep away the sea of black that crowded over the colorful linoleum floor, as if parts of himself were swept off along with it. Chet maintained the idea that it was for his own good, that it’d be so much more of a hassle to go through the pain. He’s never stopped wondering if the ache in his heart while he shooed Turbo out of the bathroom after countless repeats of the same tragedy was worth it.
Tired of his thoughts, Chet remembers himself. The brush glides softly through Turbo’s shiny, long blond hair and he deems it done for the time being. Not finished, not up to Chet’s code whatsoever— but he supposes it’s not his hair to be messing with. It’s good enough for now.
“Looking good, brother. The messy look suits you— just, please finish it yourself when we get back.”