First You Fall

Toni’s P.O.V

“I want bangs.”

Sitting there in front of the dresser mirror with all of Aly’s people bustled around the room doing God knows what, I had a revelation. I wanted bangs. But apparently no one heard me the first time I said it. So naturally, I repeated myself.

“I want bangs.” I said, slightly louder this time, and a lot more sure of my decision.

Everyone paused for a moment and looked around at each other.

“Uh huh.” Val said from her spot on the bed and continued to file her nails.

“I’m serious” I started again. “I want bangs. And not those boring emo fringy bangs either. I want full on, thick, all across my forehead, bangs!” I said, making hand gestures in an attempt to show everyone what I meant.

Val stood up and walked over to the dresser, standing behind me. She tilted her head from side to side as if to inspect the details of my face.

“It’d look pretty good.” She said, turning to face Aly.

“Uh well, I guess I could-” Aly started to speak but was cut off by my second revelation.

“I think I might want to go back to my natural hair color too.” I said.

“What? This lovely shade of dark red wasn’t real?” Val said, dramatically putting her hand to her chest. “How could you?”

“Whatever you bleach blonde.” I said, playfully.

“Ouch. So what was your natural hair color?” Val asked, grabbing my head and inspecting my roots.

“Black.” I replied, swatting her hands away from my head.

“Sorry hun, but you don’t have the lovely pale skin to pull of jet black hair.” Val laughed and crossed her arms.

“Oh haha. You just wish you had my amazing skin.” I said, flipping her off.

“You’re right I do. What tanning salon do you use?” Val asked.

“It’s all natural, thank you very much. My mom was Venezuelan.”

“Was?” Val asked cautiously.

“Yup. She popped me out, handed me over to my dad and bailed. So she’s referred to only in the past tense.” I explained.

“Wow. I didn’t know all of that about you.” Val said, sitting on the dresser in front of me.

“Yeah well, there’s a lot you guys don’t know about me.” I frowned lightly, thinking about my life pre-Zacky. “But nothing life changing.” I said, smiling again and looking over at Aly.

“So can you do it?” I asked her, running my hands through my hair.

“Well, yes but I’d have to take you to the salon and I’m not sure we have the time.” Aly replied, fidgeting and shuffling around.

“Well then we should probably start going.” I said, hopping out of the seat and grabbing my jacket. “Let’s go.” I stood in the doorway and waited for everyone to follow.

Aly’s workers paused and looked over at her. With a wave of her hand, they started packing their things back up.

“No leave it. Infact you guys might as well stay here. We’ll come back.” Val told them, grabbing Aly’s arm and pulling her towards the door.

I walked out, followed by everyone else, and paused outside of the house. I waited for Val to unlock her car before I hopped in. Using the rearview mirror, I could see Aly following behind us in her car.

“So what brought on the urge to do all of this?” Val asked as she drove down the street.

“Not sure.” I shrugged. “If Zacky’s going to put me through all this stylist bullshit for a party I don’t even want to go to, then I might as well get something good out of it. I’ve been wanting to go back to my natural hair color for a while and the bangs was more of a random ass idea.”

“I could tell.” Val smirked. “But you’d better be sure you want it. It’s one thing to get nice, long side bangs that can be easily hidden and another thing entirely to chop off a bunch of hair all across the front of your head. And then you have to go through that annoying bang growing back period. When they’re at that really awkward length and keep falling in your eyes.”

“I think I can take it.” I laughed, moving around in my seat.

“I can’t wait to see Zacky’s face when he sees it.” Val smiled.

Pretty soon we reached the salon and I jumped out of the car, walking up to the door. Val and I leaned against the shop while we waited for Aly.

“Okay, let’s head in.” Aly said when she reached us.

I haven’t had too many haircuts in my life but the few times I did, it was never in a place anything like this. Not even close. This looked like something straight out of television. Not your average, walk in and get your hair done place.

“This is a bit more intense than I expected or is even necessary for that matter. We could have stopped at the local Walmart and grabbed a pair of scissors, some dye and done this in the bathroom.” I said to no one in particular and Val laughed.

“As the person Zacky left in charge of your appearance for tonight, I think that would have been a terrible idea. You have no idea how many home disasters I’ve seen.” She said shuddering slightly and I held back a laugh.

“Come on.” Aly said, walking past the receptionist and straight to the back.

She stopped in front of a woman with the brightest blue streaks I’ve ever seen and a name tag that said Diana. Holding a brush and scissors, Diana quickly snipped at the hair of some brunette sitting in the chair.

“I’m not so sure I want her touching my head.” I whispered in Aly’s ear. “Val goes much slower with a pair of scissors.”

“Don’t worry, her precision is always dead on.” Aly whispered back before tapping Diana’s shoulder.

“Hey Di, I need a favor. She wants a haircut but I really don’t have the time to wait. I have to have her ready in a couple of hours.”

Diana looked at me and then back at Aly, whispering something in her ear. When she was done, Aly leaned forward and whispered something in return. I turned and shot a confused look at Val who just shrugged.

“I’ll be with you in about five minutes.” Diana said to me with a smile.

I nodded and walked over to a chair, giving Aly a questioning look.

“What was the whispering about?” I asked.

“Oh nothing. I just needed to fill her in on the uh, urgency of the situation.” Aly said, fidgeting again with her hands.

“What she means to say is that she’s in a rush so that we can get back on time and avoid upsetting Zacky.” Val said, turning to face me.

“Oh.” I said with a slight nod.

“Yeah the whole people trying to please him thing. You get used to it.” Val said indifferently, picking up a magazine.

“Well relax. He’ll get over it.” I said, looking up at Aly from my spot on the chair.

Aly just nodded and kept fidgeting.
------------------------------------

An hour or so later, Aly still looked stressed as I sat in the chair getting ready to have my hair blow dried.

“I was wrong. The black kinda suits you.” Val said as she walked over to stand by me.

“Now for the bangs you wanted.” Diana said, picking up a pair of scissors and walking in front of me.

Lifting up a large portion of my head, Diana eyed the chunk of hair before lining her scissors up. After a couple of long snips Diana backed away and Val peeked in.

“That doesn’t look too good.” Val said, eying the wet chunk of short hair lying on my face.

“Val!” I screeched, hitting her across the stomach.

“I was just making a point.”

“It’ll look much better when it’s all dry.” Diana said, picking up the dryer.

“I hope so.” Val murmured to Aly.

“I hate you.” I shouted.

“Love ya too.” She said patting me on the shoulder before walking away.

Please don’t let this be bad. Please don’t let this be bad.

I repeated the line over and over in my head as I sat, eyes closed, in the chair while Diana dried my hair.

“Done.” I heard her say.

“I’d rather not look. Spin me around.” I requested.

I opened my eyes after I felt Diana turn my chair away from the mirror.

“Val” I shouted over to the chairs “come look.”

Val ran over and stood stock still once she got a good look at me.

“Shit.” I murmured, turning my chair back around to take a look for myself.

I couldn’t hold back a slight gasp when I looked in the mirror. It looked damn good. Definitely one of my better life choices.

“It’s incredible.” Val said, walking up behind me and touching my hair.

“It looks great, but we really need to go now.” Aly said.

I hopped out of the chair and thanked Diana before rushing out of the door with Aly. Val and I climbed into the car and followed behind Aly’s speeding car. We reached Zacky’s place far faster than when we had left in the other direction. Moments later Aly was ushering me up the stairs and back into Zacky’s room where about 6 dresses laid waiting on the bed. One was black, two were grey and three were various shades of blue. The styles of the dresses were all different but they were all on the short side. I decided that it’d be best for me to choose a dress quickly to calm Aly’s nerves. My eyes were automatically drawn to the lighter of the two grey ones. It was strapless and had a tight bodice but the bottom shot out in loose ruffles. The design across the dress was fairly simple and not as flashy as the one on the black dress. I picked the dress up and turned it around. The back had a long but thin oval hole that would show my back all the way from the small button holding the dress closed down to right above my ass.

“I’ll wear this one.” I said, holding the dress up in front of Aly.

“Great choice.” She smiled, clearly relieved that the process was moving along. “Now can you hop in the shower please.”

I put the dress down and walked over to the bathroom. Half an hour later I climbed out of the tub and wrapped a towel around myself. I ran out and took a seat at the dresser. Before I had a chance to react Aly, and some chick whose name I hadn’t learned yet, were swooping down on me. I could feel all sorts of make-up being applied to my face. Seconds later Val walked in wearing a gorgeous dark blue dress and a chic pair of heels.

“How’d you get ready so fast?” I asked.

“I’ve been doing this for a long time. You learn to do it really fast, and without the extra people.” She smirked and motioned around the room.

“Oh but I like having Aly around.” I said, squeezing Aly’s forearm in an attempt to calm her down as she continued her rush to get me ready.

“Thanks.” She said with a small smile.

“By the way, I think the guys are here and ready to go. They changed at Brian’s place.” Val said, causing Aly to stop what she was doing and stand up straight again.

“Shit!” Aly said, heading towards the door.

“She stresses too much.” I said to Val as Aly left.

“Yeah but you’ve never seen the impatient side of Zacky before. I’ll go get her." Val said turning on her heel.

Zacky’s P.O.V.

“Where’s Toni?” I asked as Aly came running down the stairs.

“Uh, she’s not exactly ready yet.” She said, pausing at the bottom of the stairs.

“She was supposed to be ready twenty minutes ago. What the fuck do I pay you to do? Waste my time?” I glared at Aly. It’s safe to say I was not in the mood to wait around much longer.

Before Aly had the chance to spit out some bullshit answer, Val came strolling down the stairs.

“Toni needs you.” Val said to Aly who took the opportunity to run back up the stairs.

“Hey guys.” Val said, sliding over to Matt.

“You look amazing.” I heard Matt say.

“Where’s Toni?” I asked again though this time in a much lighter tone since it was Val.

“We had to take an extra step. She’ll be ready in a couple of minutes and don’t worry you’ll like it.” Val said with a cheeky smile.

“I’d like it even more if we weren’t already so goddamn late.” I replied.

“What’s the rush anyway? The party’s not going anywhere.” A voice said from the top of the stairs.

I turned around and looked up to see Toni standing there. It took all my will power to keep my jaw from dropping and full out drooling. Instead of the usual dark red hair, a mane of black hair flowed down her back. The newly acquired bangs gave her already softly rounded face, even more of an angelic look. And she could have passed for an angel if it weren’t for the dress she was wearing. The dress was tantalizing and left just enough to the imagination to make a man want to tear it off and see what was underneath. Toni glided down the stairs and stopped barely an inch away from me.

“Have you changed your mind about going? We could just stay here.” She leaned up and whispered into my ear.

I was so tempted to take her up on that offer. Fuck it, there’d be other parties anyway. I wrapped my arm around her waist and was getting ready to drag her back up the stairs when Johnny interrupted.

“Save it for later.” He said, pulling Toni out of my arms. “We have to go.”

“No we don’t.” Toni said with a cheeky smile.

“Stop trying to get out of it.” I said, putting my arm back around Toni’s waist and moving her reluctant body towards the door. “Besides, I want to show you off.”

“I like the hair cut by the way. It suits you.” I said as we climbed into the back of a Benz.

“And here I thought you didn’t notice.” Toni said playfully.

“When you’re around, you’ll be the only thing I notice.” I said, wrapping her in my arms again.