Cracks

023 | apple green chip bags

Thank you so much for reading and apologies for the slow update!

A P P L E  G R E E N

—

        Avery stared at the empty box, a welcomed change of scenery from the plastic cap on his head. After watching approximately nine how-to videos online, he'd finally gotten the courage, knocking on the door to Sabrina's dorm and asking for her to cover for him, doling out a whimsically-vague response to her questioning. It had taken him a half-mile walk, one bus stop, and three reluctant seconds of a maps app to find the closest drug store. Once inside, finding what he needed'd taken maybe twenty seconds, though picking one out had taken ten minutes. Avery didn't understand why one company would sell ten shades of what looked to be about the same color. He thought it was excessive. As he compared boxes of chestnut brown, chocolate brown and dark mahogany brown, it'd made him very confused. He'd assumed brown was just...brown. He didn't even know what he wanted anymore. It hadn't helped when a worker had asked him if he needed any help, practically genuflecting over his 'dye job' and passionately persuading him to chose something less boring, more blue, or red. At that point he'd politely excluded himself, blindly grabbing the mahogany and inwardly slowing when he saw he had to pay nine bucks for it. Leaving the store he'd cursed himself, knowing that cheaper options had to exist. It was hair dye, not artisanal shampoo. Avery'd then questioned if that even existed, before deciding against it.

His phone beeped from the tray above the sink, signaling that his thirty minutes were up, that now, he had to see just how much he'd gone six-year-old-at-a-painting-party on his own head. Without any real guidance.

And with permanent dye. Vivre la vie, he supposed. Taking the plastic off he sighed, hoping that a rinse in the shower would take away I-just-fell-headfirst-in-dark-mudd. He quickly turned the nozzle, keeping his head under the water until the stream was clear at every angle, giving it a precautionary rub-down before stepping out, finding the darkest towel he could find—Devon's navy one. What he didn't know couldn't kill him. Only once he'd rubbed his head dry and replaced the towel did Avery allow himself a glance in the mirror. It made him jump, a long second before he recognized his own face. Avery didn't know what surprised him more, the fact that he looked like an entirely different person, or the fact that he'd actually done it. He'd actually dyed his hair and it didn't even look that bad. It actually—

He leant in closer, catching the little bit of the dye he'd rubbed into his eyebrows.

Looked pretty good. He shrugged, a mental pat on the back. If someone didn't know it, maybe it could even pass for natural.

"Dude, have you seen my—WHAT THE FUCK." Avery whipped around, just in time to see Devon drop a wireless charging disk. He arched an eyebrow in response, something Devon noticed when he stopped staring at Avery's head.

"Your hair."

"It's not that bad." Avery scoffed, actually offended now that he'd seen his handiwork.

"Yeah, actually," Devon snarked, moving around to get a better look at him as Avery walked out of the bathroom. Avery rolled his eyes, looking around the room for his pack of potato chips and hoping on his bed, happy once they were opened and ready to be crunched.

"Wait, wait, wait." Devon laughed, walking towards him, snatching the bag and making Avery scowl, as he lunged forward, grabbing it back but not before Devon took one.

"Are you having an early quarter-life crisis? Is this what this is?"

"Fuck you." Avery spittled slightly, shaking a finger at Devon in good-natured annoyance. "I've been wanting to do this for a while now."

"Yeah?" Devon's eyebrow quirked, something that irked Avery to know end. Enough to put down the bag of chips and glare condescendingly.

"What."

"I'm sorry, this is just so weird." Then his eyes squinted and he looked at Avery as if really seeing him for the first time. "Hey, hope I don't sound like a dick but....you're part-asian, right?" Unfazed, Avery resumed his chip-eating, grumbling in thought.

"Yeah? Probably, I don't know." He was definitely quarter-something, at the very least. If that type of distinction even worked in witch genetics. Yet Yu Na said half, and she'd seen a lot more people than he had. Then again though, as a hiding witch, there wasn't an easy way to know.

"What do you mean, you don't know? Don't you just look at your parents?" Fuck.

"I'm adopted." That'd have to do.

"Wait, really?" Avery nodded, looking at his chips to hide his lie-breaking expression. Out of all things he could've picked, he went for the most unrealistic one. Nobody got adopted these days. Thankfully, Devon was too disconnected to know.

"That's—woah. That's cool. I didn't know that." Devon sat on his bed, his mouth twitching with more questions Avery'd have to be creative with.

"So...you don't have any idea who your birth parents are?" Finally, something he could answer with the truth.

"Not in the slightest, no."

"Have you ever, like sorta, won—"

"dered who they were?" The short silence was cut by the sound of chips breaking in his mouth. Or maybe it was just loud to him.

"Yeah, I guess. But it doesn't really matter," He reached over and grabbed his phone, laying back on the bed and typing in his passcode.

"At the end of the day, they aren't really my parents." Devon threw a ball up in the air, watching it brush the ceiling and come back, the repetitions growing faster.

"You really think so?" He questioned, eyes still focused on the ball. Avery arched an eyebrow, and replied to a text.

"Yeah, why?" He knew his looks gathered curious glances, most wondering why Yu Na would dye a child's hair. White, of all colors. Especially when his skin wasn't pale enough to let him pass for albino and his eyes were brown. Besides his eye color, his hair was the only other noticeable indiction of his inhumanity. Well, unless someone wanted to break him open and knew how to identify the two different systems of veins in his body. Though no one thought his hair color was real enough to raise any suspicion, it still made Avery uncomfortable. Coming to Tulsa had made the trivial luxury almost seem necessary. So he finally caved and did it.

"I don't know," Devon caught the ball and tossed it to Avery, who caught it, throwing it up once before chucking it back.

"Even if they're lowlifes or assholes or mob kings, it still took them to make you." He tossed it across again and Avery expertly shot it back. "And you're not that bad." Avery caught it, propping himself up on his elbows. "You hitting on me, babe?" Devon chucked the ball at his chest, smiling.

"Feisty." Avery winked back, aiming the ball at Devon's head.

"Just for you, honey."  It spiraled to it and bounced off into the wall.