Hair Care
Masterpost | Read on Ao3
Thank you to @whump-kin for letting me borrow Calamine! This is for @augusnippets Day 2.
A moment between two mirror images.
Contains: Platonic hair brushing/braiding, fluff
~~~
Elze’ith couldn’t remember the last time he brushed someone else’s hair like this.
Well— no. Perhaps he could. He just didn’t want to look at the memories. Didn’t want to face the fact that he and Altair were so far apart, that he might never see his partner again.
But it was easy to keep those thoughts bottled away right now. There was a new face, a new voice, a new kindness. Calamine was soft-spoken, and curious, and young and old all at once. And he was a vampire, and that made Elze’ith uneasy, even as he felt bad for the response. But above all, Calamine showed Elze’ith kindness. Elze’ith would have wanted to do the same regardless, but there was new meaning to it now, a desire to strengthen that connection, a desire to repay what had been offered.
He was as gentle as he could be as he ran the brush through Calamine’s hair, and he didn’t think about anyone else he had done this for. When all of the tangles were gone, he set the brush aside, and began to braid a small section on the side. It wasn’t much; Calamine’s hair was too short to do anything elaborate. But it was a token of appreciation, a signal that Calamine was cared for in the same way he had cared for Elze’ith.
When he was done, Calamine smiled at him. Elze’ith smiled back, knowing he would do a lot more to see that simple joy again.
