…it’s a whole thing.
Seriously, she’s nuts about her hair. This is just a rough snippet – I kinda edited and proofread it, so it’s definitely not perfect. Also, there is language in this, as there is with all of my writing.
The Haircut — Sérisse POV
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Athénaïs worked quietly, and Sérisse wondered had she made a mistake in allowing her wife to turn her hair into…this…whatever it was becoming.
“Is not mistake,” Athénaïs said softly, “Relax shoulders. Too tight.”
Athénaïs hadn’t read her mind; didn’t have to. Five hundred years together had done the work for her. They knew everything about each other by this point, and yet there was nothing that was cold or stale about their relationship.
“I can’t keep a damn thing from you,” Sérisse sighed, “Can I?”
“Non, and you not gonna start, either.”
Sérisse grinned. “Why would I?”
“Maybe you want go back to being mysterious,” Athénaïs said.
Oh, that. Sérisse erupted into laughter. Her shoulder shook enough that Athénaïs stopped what she was doing and put her hands on her hips. Mysterious, indeed. If that woman only knew.
“I was never mysterious, Mon Cœur,” Sérisse said, “Only awkward, ridiculous, shy, unsure of myself. I was yours from the moment you walked into that courtyard, and you know it.”
“I know you disaster when we first meet,” Athénaïs laughed, “Listening to Jean-Luc awful advice…pretend being smooth speaking when never even been with anyone for two hundred year…and then, the push and the pull…you call me beautiful one day, then disappear for five. Then you come find me, talk hours and hours, disappear two weeks. I almost choke you, Sérisse. I mean it. I stood over your bedside, hands in claw shape…you know like angry kitty cat, but you too adorable to strangle, so…”
What the actual fuck?
“Jesus, you never told me that,” Sérisse said suddenly, “How in the fuck did you even get in my room?”
“Not hard. You always leave window open, anything with wings, can fly up, walk right inside.” Athénaïs said, “And I tell you about this many, many time.”
“You did not.”
“Yes.”
“Non.”
“Yes…I say…” Athénaïs said, her lip forming into a pout, “I say to you, I nearly squeeze life out of you from the neck while you sleep.”
Oh. Well, that was true. She had said that many times, but to be fair, her syntax indicated that Athénaïs was currently planning to strangle Sérisse.
“Your English, Mon Cœur…it is horrendous, even after centuries.” Sérisse sighed, “I thought you meant…well, it doesn’t matter what I thought, if you had strangled me, I would have deserved it.”
“I not herbicidal maniac.”
Sérisse lost herself to laughter again, this time so hard she cried. For fuck’s sake, this woman’s English was horrific, and the ironic part was, it was neither of their first language. They could have easily conversed in French, but Athénaïs was insistent that they speak in English. Their children had assimilated into the current culture and century and barely spoke the old language anymore. It made sense why Athénaïs would be adamant on this, but she refused to better her grammar. Besides, whenever Athénaïs slipped back into speaking French, it was usually because Sérisse was in trouble for something.
“Homicidal maniac,” Sérisse corrected.
“Yes, that too,” Athénaïs said. “That too. Could never hurt you; would never. I just annoy when you kept appearing and disappearing. Could never hurt anyone anyway, I cry when Frosty melt and when Bambi Mother taken to farm.”
Sérisse jerked her head around. Wait..the…what?
“Athénaïs, Bambi’s Mother…”
“Went to farm, yes, yes, I know,” Athénaïs said, “Charlestre she tell me this because I so afraid the mother get dead from the buckshot. But Charlestre tell me is okay, she go to special deer farm. So… she okay. She with Elderly Yellow.”
Sérisse considered correcting Athénaïs on the subject of Old Yeller’s name, but she simply nodded. Athénaïs wasn’t an idiot, she was quite intelligent, even more so than Sérisse. She knew what had really happened, this was her way of coping with something she didn’t want to accept. Even if it was a fucking animated deer’s alleged death.
“Hey…the running…that had everything to do with me and nothing to do with you,” Sérisse said, turning around in the chair. She took her wife’s hands in hers. “Stop for a moment…I never meant to leave you or hide from you. I was…frightened and I didn’t know how to handle that.”
“Sérisse, I know this, I-“
“I know that you know,” Sérisse continued, “But I never properly apologized to you or explained myself. I just…came back and eventually stopped trying to sabotage things and you accepted me…but I never apologized, and I’m sorry. If I learned anything from that damned therapist I was forced to go to, it was to learn how to use my words, as you would say.”
Athénaïs leaned down and kissed Serisse’s lips. “Was centuries ago, this business,” she said firmly, “Did not last long, has never happen again. Apology accepted, but lifetime of consistency blot that one moment out eons ago. No need think on this anymore, is gone. Is in past, done, finish. You want to change something? Get rid of cigar.”
“Now that’s a bit drastic,” Sérisse protested, “We both know those had nothing to do with my so called health issues when it was all said and done. I have no vices except for cigars and wine, surely you can allow me those? Especially since I’m no longer allowed to be at sea, and I can’t punch people in the fucking face whenever I feel like it anymore.”
“Hmmmph,” Athénaïs retorted, “Fine, but if there one inkling cigar cause health issue, is gone. No more. Understand? I never want to go through Versailles again, Sérisse.”
“Understood.”
“Bien. We finish hair, then we check on Melusine. Been sleeping all afternoon.”
“Yes, but we let her rest,” Sérisse said, “I know, I know…you haven’t seen her in eight years and all you want to do is hold our baby tight, but we have to let her rest. It’s…too early to expect anything beyond what she can do right now.”
“I know,” Athénaïs said softly, “I just need to see bebe. Need to see she is there, not fictional.”
“We will,” Sérisse said, “And then we are going to order dinner, and I am going to sit next to you while you embroider that…the fuck is that thing you’re making anyway?”
“Is paper bag with hat that is also paper bag.”
Of course it was.
“Okay, so I will order something for us, open a bottle of wine, sit by you while you make the paper bag with the paper bag hat, watch Buried in the Backyard…”
“Sérisse, you said Wonder Woman nineteen eighty four you promise…and get the scallops from the place I like. You know, the cute one, the one who not make scallop taste like jellyfish pee.”
“Right, right, so…scallops…Wonder Woman, and then…we check on Melusine…then…we go to bed…” As she said this, she pinched Athénaïs on the behind gently. Athénaïs giggled and kissed her back.
“Is okay you can watch dead in backyard,” Athénaïs said, “We wait for bebe to watch Wonder Woman, was one of her favorite when small.”
Athénaïs gently parted Serisse’s hair to the side, securing her long strands with an alligator clip. She was always careful not to pull or pinch. Sérisse thought back to the court dressers and their rough hands, not to mention her Maman’s tight methods. Jesus, it was as if they had been trying to pull her entire head of hair out, scalp included. Athénaïs was not like this at all; Sérisse could barely even feel her working.
Her wife had the patience of Job, especially when it came to detail. Athénaïs had been proficient with elaborate needlework since the sixteenth century. Well, more than just “proficient,” to be brutally honest; her hands were magical when it came to fine particularization. Hell, even if she weren’t a master artisan, Sérisse would have still allowed Athénaïs to do whatever the fuck she wanted to her hair. She always allowed Athénaïs to do whatever she wanted, it was one of the many charming aspects of their marriage and life together. Sérisse didn’t stifle or dampen Athénaïs, and Athénaïs in turn did not restrain or try to diminish Sérisse.
“You could tell me you wanted to shave my entire head and I would let you,” Sérisse absentmindedly murmured aloud.
Athénaïs laughed.
“Yes, this I know,” Athénaïs said, “But would not – I know what you prefer, Sérisse. I know you. I gonna use clippers now, stay still.”
The clippers buzzed and hummed and Sérisse closed her eyes as the hair began to fall onto her shoulders and lap. She trusted Athénaïs completely, but still didn’t want to see it. Her hair had been long since the thirteen hundreds, and even though this was not a full transformation, it was enough to make Sérisse slightly nervous. Non, not nervous…anxious.
Sérisse was a creature of habit, to put it mildly, and this hairstyle, especially using clippers, was a massive deviation for her. She felt a breeze against her scalp, and a single lock of hair blew into her lips. She winced and wrinkled her nose.
“There’s hair in my mouth.”
“Yes, yes, I see, hold still, I get.”
Athénaïs pulled the hair away, then reached down and kissed Sérisse on the lips again. Her feathers ruffled slightly. Christ almighty, this woman. Then, to make things either better or worse (Sérisse couldn’t decide which), Athénaïs straddled her in the chair as she worked on the left side, running her fingers through the length that remained. Sérisse put her arms around Athénaïs and kept her eyes closed, the familiarity of Athénaïs gathering and organizing the weight of her hair as she began to braid from the crown downward.
“You’re making it very hard for me to behave,” Sérisse said.
“Oh?”
Sly woman. Athénaïs knew exactly what the fuck she was doing, she always did.
“I don’t want to look like someone from that ridiculous dragon world puke city show the children watch,” Sérisse huffed, “I’ve already had to endure too many damned jokes and comparisons in regard to my hair color as it is.”
“Serisse-Sthenaïs, your hair not same color as those,” Athénaïs snapped back, “Is not white. Is gray and lavender. Not same. Anyone who says hair look like that is dipstick.”
“You mean dipshit,” Sérisse corrected, “But close enough.”
The steel-gray and lavender tinted hair had been hers since birth, had come in that color the first time her hair grew in. It was a precise shade of white steel shot through with platinum and laced with lavender, the color of faded silverware. Now her children carried it, every one of them, in some way or another, either entirely or in partials.
The braid reached far past her shoulder now. Athénaïs secured it, then laid the flyaways down with languilier seed before removing herself from Serisse’s lap. Well, before attempting to anyway. Sérisse grabbed her and pulled her back down.
“Non, non,” Sérisse said, “Stay.”
“But you cant see hair with me in way.”
“I’d rather see you, but, I can make a compromise.”
Sérisse picked Athénaïs up and turned her around so that she was sitting on her lap.
“Okay, yes. Good. I get the mirror…Now…ouvre les yeux,” Athénaïs said softly.
Open your eyes.
Sérisse opened them.
The right side was shaved where the scalp was clearly visible, but not completely gone. Athénaïs had detailed sigils in delicate patterns throughout. The left side was still long, braid sweeping down over Serisse’s shoulder as it normally would. It looked like something that had been forged, like cascading steel.
It was…her. Not the same as before, but not much different. Just a slight departure in architecture. She looked at herself for longer than she intended to, which was a statement in itself. Sérisse hated seeing herself in the mirror, hated pictures of herself, paintings, all of it. But this…she couldn’t help but stare.
“Huh,” she said.
Athénaïs laid the mirror down, then ran her hand slowly through the top of the braid, her palm holding the back of Serisse’s head, then her other hand caressed the shaved side. her fingers found Sérisse’s temple, and she said nothing at all as she brushed her fingers up and down from the temple to Serisse’s jawline.
“It’s…perfect,” Sérisse said, “Thank you, Mon Tresor.”
Athénaïs leaned back and admired her work and then bit her bottom lip.
“Mon Dieu, don’t look at me like that,” Sérisse said.
“I not look at you like what?” Athénaïs teased.
“You know damn well what you’re doing,” Sérisse said. “You have been giving me hundreds of looks since the fifteen hundreds, and that one? That one is a specific type of weapon.”
“Mm,” Athénaïs said as she turned around and straddled Sérisse again. She kissed her fully, then bit her bottom lip. Serisse’s wings popped straight out, her feathers going taut and then ruffling. She wasted no time in returning her wife’s affections, hands moving where they needed to be, kissing down her neck, reaching for the buttons on Athénaïs’ blouse…
“Memere. What exactwy you phink yow doing young wady.”
Sérisse stopped, closed her eyes, exhaled through her nose, then looked slowly to the left.
Fabienne-Griselde. Their two year old great-grandaughter. Standing in the living room, a happy meal in one hand and a…the fuck was that? A broken cassette tape in her right hand? Jesus. The film was stretched all the way out and had been wrapped around Fabienne’s arm like a bracelet. The fuck did she even find one of those? Where the fuck did these toddlers find half of the shit they collected? Was it a toddler thing, a gorgon thing, both, or some kind of cosmic superpower created simply to perplex Sérisse?
Tomas came bounding into the apartment, Fabienne’s twin brother Charles-Benard hot on his heels. Good thing he was Charlestre’s pain in the ass son-in-law, not Serisse’s. Although, he was a good father and husband; once Charlestre stopped being such a drill-sergeant, she was finally able to see that. Not that her twin sister Charon was any better at accepting in-laws, either. Which they got straight from Sérisse.
“So sorry Mesdames,” Tomas sighed, “I….where the hell did you get that, Fabienne?”
Fabienne looked up at her Father and grinned.
“I find it in Oncle Terrydactyl special room,” she said.
Sérisse sighed and dropped her forehead to Athénaïs’ chest. “Jesus Christ, here we go…” She threw up a ward in front of the room where Melusine was sleeping so as not to wake or alarm her. The last thing she needed was her youngest child’s PTSD going feral on her other children over french fries and a fucking INXS cassette tape.
“MAMMA! MAMMA!”
Thierry-Chevalier. Right on cue. Her next to youngest child, the one who had all the collections, hundreds of years worth, and had all of them catalogued and organized.
The room suddenly flew into pandemonium as every fucking one of her adult children and THEIR grandchildren (at least a dozen toddlers) burst into the room. Good lord, why had her children waited for centuries to have kids of their own? Their children didn’t waste any time getting married and reproducing, and since Gorgon clutches often came in multiples, there were dozens of toddlers all at once. Everywhere.
“I was supposed to be retired at this point,” Sérisse grumbled, “Why couldn’t they have had all of these kids and grandkids and great-grandkids back in the seventeen or eighteen hundreds? At least then, we would be past diapers and boogar wiping.”
Athenais popped her on the head.
“Stop being bitch. You love the bebes, and you hear yourself? Retire. Retire, you say. Pfffft. Cannot retire from sacred duty assigned to our people by Most High at beginning of time,” Athenais said quickly, “You not retire even if you could. Work addict.”
Well, that was true. All of it. But did they have to come interrupt every damn time she was about to –
“MAMMA,” Thierry howled, “Charlie let the kids play in my cassette tapes. ON PURPOSE!”
“Who gives a damn?” Charlestre said, “Like you even use any of that shit, and like ANYONE listens to cassette tapes. Jesus.”
“They were SEALED,” Thierry shot back.
“Come on, Terrycloth,” Charon said as she tousled his hair, “The kids did you a fucking favor. They made them into something useful.”
Sérisse surveyed the scene. The children had used the cassettes to make jewelry, clothing, artwork…a….large rat? Was that what it was? Christ. At that exact moment, her offspring realized what they had walked in on.
“JESUS! MAMMA! WARN SOMEONE NEXT TIME!” Charlestre yelled, covering her eyes and running out of the room, the rest following suit making gagging noises and shrieks. Charon grabbed up a handful of toddlers, Thierry the rest. Tomas grabbed up the twins and bolted away, slamming the door behind them.
“Fucking little shits,” Sérisse growled, “Can’t they leave us be for one motherfucking-“
“Provocative,” Athénaïs interrupted, “I said this, did I not? Hair…very provocative…” then she kissed Sérisse full on, open mouthed. After a few seconds, she pulled back and grinned. “Now, what were saying?”
“I have no fucking idea,” Sérisse said, “Not one damned clue…”
She warded the door to keep them from being interrupted again and grabbed Athénaïs. Everything else could wait.
-Copyright Kat S., 2026
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FYI:
Also, a second FYI – I have no issues with HOTD, but Sérisse takes it personally, because she thinks the dragons were misrepresented. Terribly.