“Are you sure?” Cyan ran shaking hands through the new hair-cut. It was short, shorter than Cy had ever dared before, but just long enough, or so Mary assured, that it could be made girly when the urge or the need arose.

“Cy, with your folks, nobody can ever be sure of anything. But, in a normal world, yes. If they’re being stupid, you can show them how it curls up so cutely when you want it to. And if they’re not, you can slick it back and do the manly thing when you want to. Days you’re feeling middle-of-the-road, the curls are easy to tame down once you get out of the house.”

“You make it sound so easy.”

“Look, everything will be easier when you can get out of the house – but this, this is hair. It doesn’t have to be hard or anything.” Mary fluffed the back of Cy’s hair. “This should be fine.”

“Psst.”

Cyan and Mary both ignored the voice coming from the alley. It didn’t do to talk to strangers, not in this neighborhood.

“And besides,” Mary continued, “your mom when through her pixie cut stage, didn’t she?”

“Yeah, but my dad-”

“You want easy?” The voice in the alley was not to be ignored. “I can make you look the way you want to, kid.”

“-my dad hated it. My dad hates everything.”

“Come on, someone transitional like you, wanna be red one day, green another.” Now the alley-way voice had resolved itself into a shadowy figure. “I got what you need.”

It wasn’t going to shut up and it wasn’t going to go away. Cyan looked directly at the shadow. “I know better than to make deals with fairies.” The haircut would have to be enough, for now.