One and the Same (Loki Fanfic)

Chapter 3: First Impressions Suck

Taylor frowned at her hair in the mirror, wrinkling her nose when it refused to settle into proper curls. How was it that she had trained and disciplined herself to complete perfect, but her hair of all things absolutely refused to submit to her will? With a groan of frustration, she went in search of Natasha or Pepper, either one of which usually aided her when things like this happened and ignored Steve's snort of laughter when she passed him in the living room. Twenty-two years old and Taylor still couldn't tame her own hair, how embarrassing.

They'd finally decided to party at home, where she was more comfortable and where food of any kind could be ordered in an instant. Besides, Loki couldn't get too far if they stayed in Stark Tower. The only problem was that Tony had invited way more people last minute and had somehow convinced almost all of them to show up, which meant she had to actually be presentable. She could deal with the dress, and the shoes, and even the copious numbers of people, but her hair? That she could not deal with.

"Natasha?" she asked, tapping on the spy's door.

"Hey, what's-whoa, never mind. Okay, come in. I can fix this."

The spy sat the younger girl down in the chair by the desk in her room and immediately went to work. Natasha had just been finishing up her own outfit for the night when Taylor had sought her help, so she wasn't too concerned with her own appearance.

This was not the first time Natasha had had to fix one of Taylor's hair disasters...although this wasn't the worst it had ever been. Once it had been a fluffy, frizzy mess and it had taken nearly an hour to get it in order. This-the failed curls and the slight frizz-was almost nothing in comparison to that night. Even so, Natasha worked patiently and methodically at the younger woman's hair.

"I'm sorry to bother you with this again. I gave it a good effort, but I always manage to mess it up somehow," Taylor sighed.

"Don't worry about it," Natasha replied easily, "I'm not in any rush. I wish I had someone to help me with my hair when I was younger too."

Taylor, despite Natasha's best efforts, had become something like a younger sister. Natasha kept up the wall between them, but Taylor never pushed it. She knew when to reach out and when to stop.

"There," the redhead said at last, sounding satisfied, "I fixed it."

Where there had been kinky, messed up curls before, her nearly blue hair fell in thick, manageable curls around her face and shoulders now and it was pretty.

"Thank you so much," Taylor sighed with relief, "you're the best."

"I know," Natasha joked, squeezing Taylor's shoulder, "now let's get going. You wouldn't want to miss your own party."

Bucky was, thankfully, waiting for her with Steve when she arrived. He already had a drink in hand, even though he couldn't actually get drunk, and another for her. Taylor generally avoided more than an alcoholic beverage or two a night-her brother had kind of ruined it for her; she'd cried on 21st remembering his drunk stumbling, black outs, and, occasionally, his rages. All of the Avengers were sympathetic to this-bless them-and generally didn't get too inebriated around her.

"Hey, doll," Bucky murmured, nudging her with his elbow and pulling her from her dark thoughts, "relax. Celebrate! This party's about you, remember?"

She chuckled, glancing at him sideways.

"Yeah, yeah, I know," she grumbled, a reluctant smile pulling her lips up.

"Go talk to Thor," Steve suggested, "You love talking to him."