Chapter Text
When Dream entered his daughter's room that night, he didn’t expect to find her burrowed under her bedsheets, attempting to muffle her crying. Panic immediately washed over him like a tidal wave, and within seconds he was perched on the edge of her bed, gently prying her hands away from her face.
“What’s wrong, Paisley?”. She let him pull her hands away, uncovering the blotchy tears staining her cheeks. Dream’s heart ached for his daughter, and he desperately wanted to comfort her.
“Nothin”, she whispered back. Dreams brows creased, his daughter never withheld information from him. Replaying the day in his head, he went through all interactions she had.
Sure he had noticed Paisley would often come home with her hair looking messier than when she had first started the day, but she was a kid. Wasn’t that expected? His heart broke for his daughter who was being singled out for something so insignificant.
It was a standard day, and Sapnap was up early, so he offered to drive with Dream and Paisley to school. By the time George had woken up, she was already back home from school; albeit quieter than usual. Usually, she utilised the time spent driving home to cycle through Disney tracks, however today she hadn’t even entertained the idea.
“What’s wrong sweetheart? Did something happen at school? Was someone mean to you?”. Dream seemed to have hit the nail on the head, as his daughter burst out wailing about some girl- Katy?- laughing at her for having messy hair, claiming her parents were too busy to pay attention to her. Dream’s heart ached at his daughter’s hysterical confession. He had to find a solution.
“Then how about… tomorrow morning we wake up extra early, and we can try doing your hair a different way?”. Her head perked up in interest.
“Really?”
“Really really”, he parroted back.”But we’ll need to be up extra early, so you have enough time to get ready.
In an instant, his daughter shot up tangling her arms over his torso. “Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!”.
He chuckled into her hair, pressing a kiss against her forehead before tucking her back into bed. Turning from the door, Dream sighed into his hands. He made his way back to his bedroom, knowing there was no way he would be going to sleep now. Instead, he powered on his pc and went back to his most trusted resources website: Reddit. Unsurprisingly, he was able to find a link to a YouTube channel which specialised in young black girls’ hair almost instantly. He clicked on the first video he saw, skipping through the ‘resources you may need’ section.
Only four minutes into the video, and he was already stressed out. It turns out the resources section was very much a necessity, as he didn’t understand the use of the majority of the items in the video. The girl’s hair was just as thick as his daughters, and yet her parent had managed to braid her hair into intricate twists, which branched off into two small buns. Knowing he was nowhere near that level of skill, he went back to the channel, opting to look through the ‘Simple styles playlists, consisting of mostly different tied-up hairstyles. Finally, he had settled on a style that seemed too easy for even him to fuck up. By the time he had finished his research, he had less than 6 hours to complete his work and try to get some sleep.
-
Morning came as a surprise when he was woken by a knee jabbing into his stomach.
“Wake up daddy!”. Paisley made a vain attempt to climb onto his stomach, seeing as he was laying on his side.
“Morning baby, what time is it? ”, he asked groggily, still not fully conscious.
“Time to get ready for school” she replied, trying to forcibly pull her father out of bed. In the end, he let her pull him out.
Their morning routine went without a single hitch, Paisley completely pliant. By the time they headed into the kitchen, they had a full 20 minutes to eat and get her hair done.
“Morning Patchy”, George said from the kitchen barstool as Paisley practically skipped into the kitchen. It was a play on the patches of pale skin that was littered against her brown skin.
“That’s not my name”, Paisley grumbled back with childlike incredulous.
Dream hid a smile behind his palm as his daughter proceeded to lecture George on the proper pronunciation of her name. George watched as she waved a chubby finger in his face, seriousness written all over her face. George tried his best to mirror her serious face and offer an apology, but even he could barely stifle a laugh.
Dream placed her bowl of cereal in front of her, and rummaged through their drawers looking for some hair ties. In the end, rubber bands were all he could find. He looked at her thick head of hair helplessly, before deciding ‘fuck it’, and just going straight in. His comb didn’t even make it a quarter way through her hair before getting tangled in her tight curled.
“Ow daddy!” She cried out, and Dream let go of the comb as if it had burnt him. He quickly apologised and did his best to untangle the comb from her hair.
“I’m sorry baby, it might not look the best but it’ll get better the more we practise, yeah?”. The girl nodded solemnly and let him continue. After the comb accident, he decided to use his fingers to part her hair into two semi-even portions. In the end, the two buns on her head were loose and slightly lopsided, but she still seemed to love them as she threw her arms as tightly as she could around her father.
“Thank you, daddy!”. He kissed her on her forehead before grabbing her school bag and driving her to school. On his way home he searched for the nearest ‘black hair-friendly place in the area and began the long drive. He must have looked as helpless as he felt scanning the shelves because within five minutes one of the sales assistants had taken pity on him and helped him find some ‘starter-friendly’ items for his daughter's hair.
In the end, he went home with a different assortment of hair products, combs, and accessories. As soon as he saw the dream team's coloured hair bobble he instantly knew he had to buy a pack. Which resulted in him buying matching hair clips, and then matching hair beads. The sales assistant had even given him a small post-it note with essentials to know about caring for black hair- apparently, he wasn’t supposed to be washing her hair daily. He was extremely thankful and immediately stuck the post-it note on his monitor screen once he got home.
Buying the hair ties had been a good depiction, considering the rubber bands practically refused to leave her hair. She was a balling mess of tears by the time he had given up on manually taking them out and bringing out the scissors. Luckily he managed to get them out without cutting any more than a few strands of her hair off, but it was still a horrible experience for her. As an apology, he offered to take her out for ice cream the next day after school.
Eventually, two simple buns became basic twists, which became the same intricate hairstyles he had once looked at hopelessly. Styling her hair in the mornings had easily become Paisley's new favourite part of their morning routine. She would practically vibrate with joy as she was handed the box of assorted clips and bobbles and ribbons. On special occasions, they would spend extra time incorporating bead-covered twists into her hairstyles, which she always made sure to show off at school. Dream decided it was worth the extra 10 minutes of missed sleep every morning.