Blue Hair Dye

I.

I tug at the sleeves of my sweater as I rock back and forth on the hospital floor. A girl around my age tucks a strand of her turquoise hair behind her ear and sits in the chair beside me, her knees up under her chin.

“I’m Hannah,” she says softly. She gestures towards the black composition journal in my lap. “I saw you write something a few minutes ago. What was it?”

I look up at her. “Days clean,” I murmur. “Doesn’t matter anymore. I broke it. That’s why I’m in here.”

The look in her eyes tells me that she understands. “How many days?”

“53,” I reply. “But, like I said, it doesn’t matter anymore. It’s one, now.”

“Don’t look at what you’ve done wrong,” she shakes her head. “Look at what you’ve done right. 53 days! You did that! Progress isn’t linear. This is a step back in your recovery, yeah, but for a while there, you were moving forward. You’re doing amazing.”

For the remainder of my time in the hospital, I wear short sleeves. I’m not ashamed anymore.

II.

My ex-girlfriend takes a sip of her vanilla milkshake as we sit on a hill downtown, listening to slam poetry on my phone. This is the first date we’ve been on since I broke up with her in a text message right before I went to the hospital, back in March. Her hair fell in long brown ringlets around her face the last time I saw her, whereas now it’s cut short and dyed a soft blue.

“This poem always reminded me of you,” I say, swallowing down the lump in my throat. “I listened to it whenever I missed you.” There’s an unspoken apology that comes with the statement.

“I missed you too,” she replies, a smile playing on her face.

Forgiveness hangs in the air like it’s dancing with the atmosphere.

III.

A locker slams shut, revealing a pale girl with sapphire hair standing confidently, despite the fact that she is standing alone. I have friends, but I estranged myself from many of them when I disappeared for the last part of the second semester of eighth grade. She isn’t in my grade. She doesn’t know about any of that.

I walk over to her and extend my hand. “I’m Rachel.”

She takes my hand in hers and shakes it. “Quinn.”

“You have dyed hair. That typically symbolizes good music taste,” I laugh. “What do you listen to?”

“La Dispute, mainly,” she shrugs.

My eyes widen. “I love them! What’s your favorite song?”

She replies, and we engage in an avid conversation about the band.

“I think we’re going to be friends,” she says.

“I think so, too.”

To her, I am not the girl who tried to kill herself and went away for months at the end of middle school. With her, I can start again.

IV.

A boy with hair the color of the sky on an early autumn day lowers his head and snorts a line of Sour Patch Kids dust off of the cafeteria table. This is the first time I have ever met Will. I already love him.

He raises his head and wipes his nose. “Woo!” he yells. “The adrenaline!”

V.

Will shakes his cerulean hair out of his face as he holds me close to him. We are sitting in a hallway of our highschool.

“Whatever you do, don’t look into his eyes at the funeral,” he says, his voice void of emotion. “You don’t want to remember him like that. Trust me.”

“I miss him,” I say roughly.

“It should’ve been me.”

“It shouldn’t have been. We’d miss you just as much.”

He shakes his head.

VI.

Quinn is reading a speech at our friend’s funeral, wiping aggressively at her eyes with the back of her hand as her voice wavers. Her hair is faded, but the color is the same. She doesn’t believe in God, so she doesn’t say he’s in a better place or any of that typical stuff. I am thankful for that.

The beginning of her speech is in English for the sea of mourners in front of her, but the end is in French. That part is for her.

VII.

Will’s heart-shaped sunglasses and fancy suit don’t stand out too much to anyone; he was never one to conform. He texts me jokes while I lay in Shea’s lap. It’s just another morning in the art room.

This is the last time I’ll ever see that particular shade of blue hair.

VIII.

The best friend of my boyfriend’s sister-in-law has a stripe of neon blue in the back of her chocolate hair. We lay in hammocks beside each other, in our own world, as the rest of our group roasts marshmallows around the bonfire. She takes a drag off her cigarette and blows the smoke at me, and laughs as she passes it to me.

“I’d date you,” she says simply.

I inhale around the cigarette as I think of what to say, then giggle nervously as I blow out the smoke. “I have a boyfriend.”

She shrugs. “Yeah, whatever.”

In my head, the fight that my boyfriend and I had had earlier that day replays. As does the time last week when he made a joke about Will hanging himself. As does the time he said that thing that I am not vulnerable enough to write here. As does the time he punched his steering wheel when I pissed him off.

I hand the cigarette back to Courtney. I think to myself that maybe I’d be happier if I was with her.

IX.

One of my best friends has been in love with me since we were thirteen. He kisses me, hoping it’ll help me love him back. I feel nothing. He lowers his head, and the sun reflects off of his navy hair. I wish I had felt something. He deserves to be loved back.

X.

My best friend from senior year onwards comes to visit me in college. She picks me up and we drive to her dorm, where we listen to a playlist at an obnoxious volume as we get ready for a Halloween party. She straightens her hair that she’s temporarily dyed blue as a screw you to her father.

I am dressed as an angel and she is dressed as Charles Manson’s top girl, and we bask in the iridescence of our togetherness as we dance to Nicki Minaj. We steal drinks from the seniors, and laugh so hard our stomachs ache as we take selfies in the bathroom of whoever’s house we’re in.

This is the first time I have seen her since coming to college, and yet there is never a lull in our conversation. Screw what my mental illness says about me being unlovable—this is someone who isn’t leaving.

XI.

I am nineteen, almost twenty, sitting in my dorm room and typing this memoir. Blue hair dye has stained my wardrobe, the communal shower, my hands, my neck, my towels. 

I wonder what that girl from the hospital is doing with her life. I am choosing to have faith that she is still alive.

My ex-girlfriend and I share a mutual forgiveness.

I saw Quinn a few years back, and she told me she’s proud of me. I’m proud of her, too.

My relationship with Will is ever-changing, even though he is dead. When I write, he still flows out from my pen more often than I’d like, but I know that grief isn’t an assignment with a deadline. It’s more like an open letter that goes on for the rest of your life.

I haven’t talked to Courtney in half a decade, but I dumped that abusive boyfriend, so I’ll take that as a win.

I still call my old friend sometimes, and we talk about the old days with fondness. He values my friendship and what I was able to give to him. I am more than a romantic interest to him. I always was.

My best friend is still my best friend. I have in her what I have always looked for in a romantic partner. Platonic love can be just as fulfilling.

I just finished reading Song of Myself  by Walt Whitman. In it, he says “I contain multitudes.” I repeat the phrase out loud. I contain multitudes. I brush my indigo hair out from in front of my face and smile.

Rachel Richmond is a senior at Hollins University majoring in English. She is an editor for Gravel magazine, and spends her time writing and spending time with her dogs. Her work has been seen in American High School Poets: Just Poetry anthology, as well as a Hollins University anthology about mental health. She writes as a form of healing, as well as as a passion.