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Steph slept surprisingly well, despite an unpleasant end to a pleasant day, and by the time Mel wakes her for her shift on watch she's feeling absolutely rested and bright, even though it isn't quite dawn.

The others are sleeping now, Hana and Loo and Sokka and Mel all squished together for warmth. Steph's own family would never have slept like that.

It's kind of nice.

The rest of the house is secure still, and once Steph has satisfied herself that nothing is lurking in the gardens to eat them and double-checked the car's still there, helped herself (with only a tiny spark of guilt) to a new pair of jeans that almost fit and an oversized coat for the cold from the upstairs bedrooms, and made use of the bathroom, the sun's well over the horizon.

Outside, it's eerily quiet; Steph circles the house again, eyes sharp, and once she's satisfied with that she goes back to the kitchen.

Eggs keep surprisingly well, unopened and at room temperature, she discovers by dint of careful cracking and sniffing. Cheese, not so much, but there's a sealed can of powdered Parmesan and that's still okay too. And it's hard to go wrong with pepper and salt and rosemary.

Shortly, eggs are sizzling on the stove, and the smell of hot food spreads quickly through the house.

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Steph frowns, biting her lip thoughtfully.

"...you're really determined to do it?"

A brow lifts again and he shrugs. "Don't see why not. It'd be nice to have it out of my face."

Not that it's ever really been out of his face.

Not that Steph knows that.

Steph frowns. "It's not in your face when it's tied back."

She looks at his knife, and wrinkles her nose, going to the drawers behind them at the basin; in a moment she holds up a small pair of hairdressing scissors triumphantly, and holds out her free hand imperiously for the knife.

"For the record? I like your hair long."

Watching her - complain as well as boss him around - Sokka hands over the knife with a bemused smirk. "Yeah, well, once we find civilization, maybe there'll be a long-haired guy you can boss around. Until then, you're stuck with me."

He's shrugging, though, tossing the hair tie aside. "But if you're that worried I'm going to butcher it, you can do it. Just-- short, okay? Nothing I can pull back."

She wrinkles her nose. "Mel's gonna kill me," she mutters. "Sit down so I can reach your head, O Freakishly Tall Man. Are you absolutely sure you want to do this?"

It's just that she can't shake the feeling that it's more important than he's letting on.

Sokka snorts and moves past her to sit on the toilet, facing the wall. "Mel's not going to care what my hair looks like," he argues. "And she's seen it look goofier than this, too. Like when it was growing out and I looked like a hedgehog, that was fun."

"You still look like a hedgehog," Steph informs him, digging through the drawers again in a short and successful search for a comb. "It's something about your nose."

Combing hair time, pls to sit still.

"My nose isn't nearly as big as a hedgehog's!" Sokka protests, attempting to turn for this complaint-- and complaining more when she pushes him back to face the wall. "You better not make it look bad on purpose or I'll never grow it long again."

This threat is obviously meant to inspire SRS F3AR.

Steph's Horrified Gasp suggests that it does. Almost seriously, even! She eyes him suspiciously, running her fingers through his hair to straighten it out.

"I wouldn't worry," she reassures him comfortably. "It'd be hard to make it look any worse than it does already."

"That doesn't really speak well of your taste, y'know, since you already said you really liked it."

Steph grins, combing his hair upwards and holding it there to start snipping. Little bits of dark hair fall into his lap and around where they're standing.

"I'm pretty sure my taste's already in question," she points out, with a smirk in her voice even if he can't see her face. "You didn't figure that out the first time Creep Wonder jumped in a window while we were talking?"

Sokka blinks, and though his hand twists palm up to catch the hair, that's certainly not what has him silent for a moment. "Uh," he says, quite intelligently he feels, considering, "when did it go from Boy to Creep?"

"Probably around that time," Steph points out, muffled because she's holding the comb in her mouth while she snips.

So far it's just like trimming someone's hair. She's kind of nervous about making any serious changes.

"Or maybe it was the creepy staring-at-me-while-I-sleep thing. You sure you want me to cut this all off? There's so much." She lifts a lock and lets it fall.

With his head bowed, he can't see his twisted expression. Tim had always been a creepy jerk, but he'd been a creepy jerk to Sokka. Steph was his girlfriend, he was in love with her.

"I didn't even know what his real name was until after we'd been dating, like, a year, and he wasn't even the one that told me!"

Scowling a bit, he tilts his head when she drops his hair against the side of his head, trying to look at her in the mirror. "What? Oh-- yeah, short. Like, um... well, no one in Eden had what I'm thinking of. Just short all over."

Steph nods, frowning at his hair, thoughtful.

"...if it looks stupid, you can always put gel in it and spike it up." She jerks her chin at the bottles of product.

Then, with care, snip; a long curl of dark hair slides over his forehead and into his upturned palms.

He scrunches his nose against the tickle of that, smiling a little as he tries to look over where she'd gestured without moving his head. "Spike it up?" he repeats. Harper and Wash had always looked electrocuted naturally.

"Uh-huh." Steph grins, snipping again, concentrating hard. "I'll show you. Your own personal hairdresser, lucky you."

"...woooooooooo."

"Your enthusiasm overwhelms me." Steph tucks a lock of hair into the back of his shirt, with a smirk. It'll start itching soon.

Edited 2007-11-17 04:35 (UTC)

"Fine some hair dye and tell Mel about it, you'll be her new be-- ahh! Hey, what'd you do?!"

She better be holding him still or have put those scissors down, since he's liable to get himself stabbed flailing like that.

The scissors are up in the air, away from his head, and her hand curls in the remaining long hair to still him.

And she smirks.

"Sit still or you'll end up lopsided."

He's still squirming, scowling at her in the mirror with his hands digging up the back of his shirt as he tries to get the hair out. "I'll sit still when you stop dropping things down my shirt! It itches!"

Steph finds this hilarious.

Especially since the top of his head is short and spiky, but the sides are still long. He looks kind of utterly ridiculous.

"Well, if you're not gonna sit still, I guess I just can't cut any more."

Sokka is too busy grumbling to argue.

Until he catches sight of himself in the mirror.

"..."

He sits back down on the toilet but not without more grumbling.

You'll have to excuse Steph for a second. His expression is priceless. She has to just lean on his head and laugh for a few minutes, because otherwise she'd be cutting with shaky hands and that'd be bad.