The Truth About Haircuts
"So what was your answer about the hair?" Yuuta called out, pointing at the mop on top of his head.
"Do you need an answer?" Atobe barely looked past his newspaper as he responded. His voice carried easily to Yuuta, standing in the bathroom.
Yuuta stood in front of the mirror and examined his head of hair. "Well, it's not that long, is it?"
"A couple more inches and we'll have a new woolly mammoth, I think," Atobe called back. He flicked his newspaper and hummed to himself. Somewhat annoyingly, he was humming Bach again, and had Yuuta not heard the original piece of music, he'd have thought Atobe had turned into a broken pager.
"I like the woolly mammoth look," Yuuta announced, and plonked onto the sofa opposite Atobe.
At this declaration, Atobe neatly folded his paper and laid it aside. He eyed Yuuta carefully.
"What?" Yuuta shrugged, and picked up a magazine off the table. "You said I didn't need an answer so I decided that I don't need a haircut either."
"That was the wrong decision," Atobe responded flatly. "Your eyes have almost disappeared under your hair. You look like the shaggy version of my old cat and sometimes you smell like it too."
"Shaggy version?" Yuuta snorted. "What a joke. My hair's fine. Yesterday my sister said even said it makes me look younger."
"And then Syuusuke said that you looked cute," Atobe drawled, and fixed Yuuta with a firm stare.
"Cute?" Yuuta frowned. "He said that?"
"Of course," Atobe nodded. "You weren't there, of course. I think you were attacking the pie in the kitchen."
Yuuta cleared his throat awkwardly, remembering how he'd snuck into the kitchen before dinner and helped himself to an entrée of what was supposed to be dessert. "Leaving the pie aside…"
Atobe watched as Yuuta tugged lightly on the strands of brown hair that came down over his eyes. It was true; he did look rather cute, as Syuusuke had announced in a rather disturbing fashion by whispering into Atobe's ear. More specifically, Syuusuke had said: 'a sweet little cherub with rosy cheeks and a bow and arrow ready to strike at my heart'. But Atobe was not one to agree with Syuusuke even if what he said was correct, and besides…
"Well, I guess I could have it cut," Yuuta decided. "It is going to warm up soon and I hate getting hair on my face in summer."
Atobe nodded. "Wise choice."
As Yuuta headed out the door to a last-minute appointment at Atobe's hairdresser, Atobe thought about whether he should have swayed Yuuta that way or not. True, his longer hair was cute, and it was lovely to run his fingers through, but the cat smell part of his reasoning hadn't been totally false… Yuuta did have an ability to get rather sweaty and then not wash his hair for several days, forgetting that longer hair is less forgiving than short hair.
And besides, Atobe thought, most importantly… it was either his hair or Yuuta's. He wouldn't stand for having matching haircuts no matter how much he loved Yuuta.