A/N: I did a little thread about a headcanon I had about Elizabeth dyeing her hair dark (like Téa did in the 90s) after her parents' death, and a handful of people asked for a full fic so! Here it is. Let me know what you think! I really enjoyed writing it and getting into Elizabeth's head a little bit more, especially pre-series/pre-Henry.
Disclaimer: I own nothing!
The first time she dyes her hair, she's sixteen.
It's because of an innocent, offhanded comment by her grandmother. A simple "you look just like your mother with your hair like that"- noting the half up-half down look she'd chosen for the day. It leaves her feeling raw; like her insides are ripped open and bleeding.
She grabs the first box of hair dye she sees at the drug store- some shade of dark brown, the farthest thing from the soft blonde she's had her entire life. The same shade as her mother- as her younger brother.
She just wants the ache in her chest to stop- wants the constant fractures to stop deepening, stop widening, stop sharpening inside her. For the last six months every single day had been like waking in a fog, struggling to come up for air from a deep sea dive. Waking up every day to remember she didn't have parents- waking up every day to remember her family was two members smaller, two people less.
The smell of chemicals burns her nose, and the darkness of the dye she smears into her hair sends shivers down her spine. She adjusts the shower cap over the wet strands, carefully peeling the plastic gloves off and cleaning up the mess she'd created in the bathroom of her grandparent's house. Elizabeth continually looks at the egg timer she'd placed on the lip of the tub, foot taping on the ground impatiently as the minutes tick by.
Half an hour elapses, and she rinses the dye off in the shower- the chocolate brown water sluices down her body, and she swallows hard as she shuts her eyes, pushing her head back into the stream of water. It takes nearly twenty five minutes for the water to run clear, and when Elizabeth finally turns the shower off, she feels…different.
She uses an old towel to dry her hair, unused to the dark strands that stick to her face and neck. When she looks in the mirror, a stranger looks back- familiar eyes set in a tired face, rimmed in dark circles, framed with long, dark hair.
Elizabeth Adams looks nothing like her mother- gone is the resemblance so many had seen to Suzanne Adams over the years. Gone are the soft blonde locks tumbling to her shoulders, framing her face- instead there are harsh brunette waves in their place.
She looks a little like a ghost, and it's finally a reflection of how she's felt inside every day since her parents had died.
Her grandparents hate it.
"What have you done, Elizabeth?" her grandmother looks downright horrified at her hair, but Elizabeth merely shrugs. She's leaving for boarding school in a week, she has four boxes of hair dye in her suitcase for the school year, and she feels…reborn. Like a brand new mask is in place. A coating of strength she hasn't felt in too many months.
"It's a change," is all she says, and her grandparents both purse their lips, but leave her alone- only Will tells her he likes it, a careless little shrug before he goes back to his Gameboy.
A week later, she's moving into her dorm room at boarding school, and her roommate is giving her a once over.
"I like your hair," she finally says, and Elizabeth gives her a small smile.
"Thanks. Call me Lizzie," she answers, extending a hand.
Elizabeth's hair stays dark from then on out.
It's easier- she doesn't offer much information on her parents, and no one really asks. School is easy- she's smart, and makes friends easily once people realize the subject of family is off-limits.
Slowly, it becomes easier to breathe- easier to be. By the time Elizabeth starts as a freshman at UVA, the weight on her shoulders isn't so heavy. It's easier to carry.
She's nearly completed her fall semester when she meets Henry McCord.
He's a grad student, registered with the Marine Corp, and the most beautiful man she's ever seen in her entire life. She's running late for one of her math classes when she literally walks right into him- both of their stacks of books go flying, and she's fumbling for words when she looks up, and the warmest set of hazel eyes look back at her.
"Elizabeth Adams," she introduces herself, sticking a hand out over scattered Calculus notes, and his lips curve into a smile as he takes her hand.
"Henry McCord," he answers, and his grasp is warm and firm and Elizabeth feels her mouth go dry. Henry helps her collect the rest of her notes, and part of her is ready to entirely skip her lecture just to get to know him. "I have a tutoring session to get to, but are you free to get coffee later?"
"I'd love that," she answers, and part of her is shocked to find that- yes, she would love that.
"There's a coffee shop just off campus- The Bean?" Henry suggests, and Elizabeth nods, familiar with the coffee place she'd pulled a few all-nighters at. "How does six sound?"
"I'll see you then," is her reply, and Henry smiles, his entire face lit up, and Elizabeth's stomach is warm as she hurries off to her lecture.
Henry is a dream.
She'd dated, off and on, since boarding school. But nothing serious- nothing ever more than a handful of dates and kisses goodnight. But Henry- with Henry things are different; deeper.
He listens to her- and she can tell he truly, genuinely enjoys listening to her ramble on about math and politics and all the things she's learning in her classes. He has this way of focusing entirely on her when she speaks- a singular focus that brings heat to her cheeks and a warm flush throughout her body.
They've been dating for nearly six months when her family comes up for the first time. Henry has told her about his family dozens of times- his parents and siblings, aunts and uncles and cousins. He has a blossoming Irish family, and they already know all about her. But even though she knows she cares for him deeply, even though she knows this thing between them is serious, she can't bring herself to tell him about her family.
"You're blonde?" Henry asks one day as they sit curled up on the couch of his apartment- she frowns, looking up at him, and Henry drags a hand down the part of her hair. Her eyes widen, and she counts back, realizing how many weeks it's been since she's dyed her hair. She'd been too happy- too content with Henry, and her classes, and the handful of friends from her classes.
It leaves an odd little feeling in her chest.
"Yeah. Naturally blonde. My mom was," she says- moments before freezing, realizing what she's said. Elizabeth tenses, waiting for Henry to ask, but he just rubs his hand down her arm and links their fingers together, squeezing gently.
He doesn't push, and confusion swirls through Elizabeth even as she settles back into his embrace gratefully.
"My parents are dead," she finally tells him- there's no special occasion, no real reason to tell him. He's never pushed, never asked her to explain why she keeps her past so guarded. And maybe that's why she feels so safe- why she feels ready to tell him.
Henry looks up from his thesis, closing the book he's reading and placing his pen down. He doesn't say anything, simply turning to face her- his arms are open, but she has to be standing to say this; has to have the space to pace.
"They were killed in a car crash when I was sixteen. My- my brother was in the car with them. I stayed home," her voice breaks a little around the words, and Henry sits forward, but she shakes her head, swallowing before she continues. "I don't like to talk about it. It's- it's hard, for me to remember them. To remember that I wasn't with them."
Henry makes a small noise at that, but Elizabeth simply shakes her head furiously, swallowing hard as the backs of her eyes burn.
"My brother and I- don't really talk anymore," she murmurs around a thick throat, knotting her fingers together. "My grandparents both passed away before I started school here."
Elizabeth took a steadying breath, lifting her eyes to look at Henry- his eyes were damp, watching her carefully, and something in her chest eased.
"You commented about my hair, a few weeks ago. I dyed my hair when I was sixteen because I looked too much like my mother as a blonde," she tells him, shrugging one shoulder. "And at the time- it was easier, to erase whatever ties I had to her. It hurt too much to look like her- to look in the mirror and see her looking back at me."
Something in her crumpled as the words she's locked away for so many years- as the truth she's locked away for so many years- finally spills out, and when Henry opened his arms this time, Elizabeth slid into them immediately, burying her face in his neck as she curled into his lap, allowing his arms to wrap around her tightly. His embrace was warm and solid and comforting and home home home reverberates through her brain at the feel of them, and it doesn't scare her like it used to.
For once, the idea that another person felt like home isn't terrifying- it's warm and soothing and wraps around her back like a second spine, giving her strength.
She stops dyeing her hair after that. It's not exactly a conscious choice, but she's happy, and when she realizes she has no more boxes of dye, she doesn't buy any more.
When her roots are glaringly apparent, she goes to the salon, and spends too much money going back to full-on blonde. She looks in the mirror, and a trace of Suzanne Adams smiles back at her- but it doesn't hurt like it used to. Instead, it leaves a soft kind of ache in its wake, and when Henry looks at her in stunned awe afterwards, she knows it's the right choice.
It's slow going, but over the years, Elizabeth finds it easier to tell Henry things about her family- small things at first, like holiday traditions and the family cat they'd had when she was a child. The longer they're together, the more she opens up- the way her mother used to sing when she cooked, and how her father liked to sneak cigars in his study on Christmas Eve.
"You look like her," Henry tells her when she finally pulls out on old photo album, and the words don't sting when she hears them in his soft, love-laced voice. His finger traces the old photograph, at her gap-toothed grin as she beams at the camera, his own lips curling into a smile of his own.
"She was the most beautiful woman in the entire world to me as a kid," Elizabeth tells him, and Henry looks up at her, thumb brushing her lower lip as he looks at her.
"You're beautiful," he tells her, and her cheeks flush pink. "I love you, Elizabeth."
She can't help the gasp that leaves her mouth at that- they've been together over a year, but this was the first time he'd said the words aloud- and her heart is beating loudly against her ribcage, but all she can think is I love him, I love him, I love him as tears prick the corners of her eyes.
"I love you too, Henry. So much," she replies, hand cupping his cheek before she brings his mouth to hers, kissing him deeply.
Home, home, home pulses with each beat of her heart.
Elizabeth Adams has been Elizabeth McCord for four years when her entire world shifts, and Stevie McCord enters the world, red-faced and screaming.
She's the singular most perfect thing Elizabeth has ever seen or held or made, and as her daughter settles down in her arms for the first time, perfect pink lips smacking together and eyes squeezed tightly shut, she's never felt love like this before. She barely looks up at Henry's hand at her back, too enraptured by the perfect bundle in her arms, and she feels him press a kiss to her sweaty- but still beautifully blonde- hair.
"Look at all that hair," Henry murmurs softly, and Elizabeth can't help but smile, fingers brushing over the soft blonde locks covering their daughter's head. "Just like her perfect mother's."
"She's got a little bit of Adams in her," Elizabeth whispers, fingers stroking Stevie's cheek, watching the way she snuggled into her mother's chest. "She's perfect, Henry."
"Of course she is. You made her," Henry whispers back, and Elizabeth laughs softly, finally lifting her face so she can kiss her husband, eyes slipping shut as happiness fills her from head to toe.
"Your grandma would have loved you so much baby girl," Elizabeth tells her daughter later that night, after Henry has passed out in the armchair, exhausted from the day. Stevie is awake, blinking up large blue eyes at her, and Elizabeth brushes a finger over her cheek. "And I can't wait to tell you all about her."
Stevie's eyes blinked closed, and Elizabeth smiled, watching her fall asleep in her arms. Home is in her arms, and in the armchair five feet away, and she's not scared that home is no longer sheltered inside her chest- that it is housed in two separate people. After spending so long locking herself away, hiding behind hair dye and layers of secrets, she was finally happy.
Because her home was safe in Henry's hands, and Henry's heart, and in Stevie's tiny beating chest.