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Peter Nureyev stared at himself in the mirror of the Carte Blanche bathroom, his breathing quick and shallow. It was late. Too late. The lights in the ship were all off, save for the dim green lights in the hallway, and the entire crew was no doubt asleep after the long day they all just had. He should be in bed with Juno right now, and should be fast asleep with the rest of them.
The thoughts sometimes were just too much. They chased each other around in his head in an endless dance that never seemed to cease. During the day, it wasn’t so bad. There were plenty of distractions, other things to worry about in the moment, and more often than not, he had an alias he could fall into that had other thoughts.
But late at night, when he had nothing to distract himself but the ever creeping darkness around him? They were brutal . He would lay there in the pitch black and think of his debts, about how badly he wanted to leave everything he had here behind and start over. He would feel Juno shift in his sleep next him as he stared into nothing, and think about how badly he wanted to throw away everything he had with his lady because if he didn’t do it now, he’d just hurt him more later.
However, the most persistent thought he had on these nights where he couldn’t stop thinking was that he was trapped . Nureyev had spent the last, well, entirety of his life, moving. Running. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d stayed in one place for as long as this, or the last time he kept a name for longer than a week. So much of his time was spent alone, untethered, so when he was handed a place to land, to relax, he found that he didn’t know how to. His secrets were kept guarded as close to himself as he could, family meals spent being tense and formal, only truly letting his guard down around Juno. The urge to shed the name they knew him by, Ransom, grew stronger with each day that passed, and there were some times where he was tempted to flush himself out of the Carte Blanche through an airlock in an attempt to escape the suffocation of being known. The thought of seeing the same people, of having them call him the same name, and of looking the same for another day? It made Nureyev’s heart beat so fast that he felt like he was about to die, and he felt frozen and dizzy in fear, his entire body yelling at him to run.
He’d suffered through these nights alone; through the spiralling thoughts, the feeling like his chest was going to collapse, the surety that he would die if he didn’t escape. He was always quiet about it, and if he wasn’t, he’d go into the hall and wait it out there. Until one night a few days prior when he had accidentally woken Juno up.
Oh, and he’d been so nice about it. He had asked before touching Nureyev, rubbed his back while he cried, held his trembling hands and got him water after he was finished hyperventilating.
“You just had a panic attack,” Juno had said afterwards, and the realization that there was a name for the sensation he was feeling had hit Nureyev like a sack of bricks. “Hey, listen, if you ever feel like that, and I’m not with you, you come get me, okay? You don’t have to go through any of that alone.” Nureyev had kissed him, and promised that he would find Juno if it happened again.
Once a liar, always a liar, he supposed.
Nureyev wasn’t having a panic attack at the moment, but he was very, very close to it. His hands trembled and he felt like the bathroom ceiling was about to collapse on top of him. He’d thought that by getting up and taking a walk around the ship would ease his nerves enough that he could return to bed and catch some sleep before morning. But the hallways that all led to the same rooms just made him more dizzy with panic, and he was quickly spiralling out of control. The thoughts were getting worse, yelling at him that he needed to leave, that he was a bad person, that he was losing his touch, that he was in a prison.
He knew what Juno told him. He knew that Juno said to find him if he got like this again. But the thought of getting Juno right now, of going back to their room and shaking him awake, admitting that he was weak and that he needed help? It somehow made the panic worse.
So Nureyev just stared at himself in the shared bathroom mirror, and looked at his hair. It was his pride and joy; he spent most of his morning routine styling it, making sure it looked perfect, making sure it didn’t budge throughout the day. He had a distinct style for each alias; Rex Glass had it all plastered to his skull, Duke Rose had a deep side part and a few distinct waves gelled into it, Perseus Shah had a middle part and curled bangs that fell onto his forehead, Monsieur Dauphin kept loose and bouncy, but had added a few hairpins to match his wife’s dress. He’d decided early on that Ransom’s hair was slicked back, but otherwise kept casual and coiffed. That was fine for the first few days. But doing it every day felt like turning the lock further on the cage.
He twirled a strand of hair between his fingers. His hair was clean and dry now, and it hung in his face. He needed a change, he needed to style it differently, be a different person . If he was Peter Ransom for one more minute, he might actually tear all of his skin off.
It was a miracle that he was able to wrench open one of the drawers in the bathroom below the sink with how violently his hands shook. He was looking for his gel, for his comb. But what his eyes landed on instead were a pair of clippers. Vespa used them mostly, to keep her undercut clean and freshly shaven. No one else really touched them, so they lay unused in the bathroom. Nureyev’s fingers grazed across the smooth, cold metal of it.
He needed a change.
Nureyev didn’t think. He just did it. He grabbed the clippers and switched them on, and ran them straight down the middle of his head.
The clippers buzzed in his hand and he froze, eyes wide. He looked up at himself, and saw the consequences of his actions; a stripe of shaved hair starting at his hairline and stretching back to the nape of his neck. He reached up and touched the shorn hair, compared it to the silky, long strands next to it.
He laughed. He couldn’t help it. It bubbled out of him, and came out a strangled gasping thing, halfway between a sob and a cackle. The panic in his chest twisted and grew stronger, spreading up to his throat.
He needed Juno.
Nureyev’s footsteps were usually soft and muted, an essential for a thief. But now, they were loud, and they echoed throughout the halls. If he were on a heist, they would be the ringing of his death toll. He wrenched open the bedroom door, shutting it clumsily behind him, and stumbled to the bed. He fell on his weak knees before it, hands scrabbling desperately at the blankets.
“Juno,” he mumbled. “Juno.” Nureyev found his body and gripped him like a vice. There was a grumble from under the sheets as he shifted awake, trying to pull his arm sleepily away from Nureyev.
“Mm... whaddaya want...” Juno mumbled into his pillow.
Nureyev opened his mouth, closed it again, and found that he just didn’t have the words. So he just grabbed uselessly at the sheets. His hands didn’t feel like his own. Juno finally sat up, rubbing at his good eye, tired and annoyed, but then he saw Nureyev. Nureyev, with wide, haunted eyes, shaking hands, and a new haircut.
“Oh, shit,” he said, throwing the blankets off of him. “Hey, hey, what’s wrong?” Juno sat down in front of Nureyev where he was kneeling on the floor, taking his hands in his own. Nureyev drew in a rattling gasp.
“I was- go- I- needed to- uh- I’m- I- I’m” His brain felt like it was short-circuiting, the words glitching and cutting out. But Juno seemed to understand.
“Hey, it’s okay, you’re okay. I want you to breathe with me, can you do that?”
He nodded, and Juno took one of Nureyev’s hands and pressed it to his chest, holding it in place with his own. Juno took in a deep breath, and Nureyev could feel his lungs expanding underneath his hand. He tried to follow suit. It was a clumsy attempt, and he could only manage a few shallow intakes. But Juno, short-tempered and impatient Juno, just exhaled, slow and long, rubbing his thumb across his knuckles.
“Just concentrate on breathing. Be here, with me,” Juno said, his one eye focused on Nureyev’s. “You’re alright.”
It took a while. His mind was still convinced that there was an immediate danger, and sometimes, just when he would calm down, the panic would spike again, and he would start hyperventilating again. He felt like he was falling, drowning, but Juno was there to catch him with calloused hands and soft words.
It could have been fifteen minutes, it could have been hours. But eventually Nureyev got there. He had to claw and bite his way there, but he was there. Breathing normally, his heart beating at a pace that didn't make him feel like he was about to keel over.
"There you go," Juno said as Nureyev sighed, letting his head fall against Juno's shoulder. He was just tired now. Juno put one hand in his hair, the other on his back, and held him, and Nureyev held him back, hands clenched in Juno’s shirt and trying to sap the warmth from him. "Did something happen?"
Nureyev shook his head. "No. I simply... had let my thoughts run wild," he said into Juno's sleep shirt. They were fancy words for 'I was overthinking and had a panic attack for no reason', but Juno didn't need him to translate.
"Okay," he said. "Is that also why you have this fun new haircut?"
Oh, shit.
Nureyev had forgotten all about that. He sat up, and his hand drifted upwards to feel the stripe of shorn hair going straight down his head.
"Maybe I can comb my hair over, cover it up?" he said, but as the words left his mouth, he knew that it would be a futile effort. Juno humored him, humming gently and pushing the hair to the side, playing with it.
"Maybe," he echoed. "Let's get in front of a mirror and I'll see what I can do, okay?"
They made it back to the bathroom where Nureyev was now sitting on the toilet, and Juno was combing his hair this way and that, musing aloud about different ways he could cover up the shaved bit, about how long it might take to grow back fully. It was a performance, Nureyev knew that. The stripe was huge, and anything they tried would just point attention to it.
"We should just shave the rest of it off," Nureyev said finally. Juno paused.
"I-... are you sure?"
"You and I were both thinking about it. There’s no use trying to salvage what’s already been ruined. The clippers are still on the sink."
Juno was quiet for a few moments, still running his hands slowly across Nureyev’s scalp. "I know how much you like your hair, honey," he mumbled.
"It will grow back. Besides, I- I needed a change."
"Okay. If you're sure."
Juno grabbed the clippers off of the sink, switched them on, and took a breath before running them ever so gently up the side of Nureyev's head. He was tender with it, brushing stray hairs off of his shoulders and his face, going over the same parts several times to make sure he didn’t miss a spot. The process was almost nice, and Nureyev could almost pretend he wasn't going to be bald when it was done.
"You said you needed a change," Juno said haltingly. "There's gotta be a deeper meaning to that than just your appearance." For a minute, they just sat there, listening to the buzzing of the clippers, watching more of Nureyev's hair fall onto the cold metal of the bathroom floor, a dark halo around his feet.
"It's difficult, being here," Nureyev admitted. "When you've spent your entire life running, always seeing new things and new people, this steady pace and routine makes me feel at times like a wild animal trapped in a cage."
Juno nodded. "I understand that, I think. It's a change in routine, and your mind is still adjusting to that. I'll let you in on a secret, Ransom, mine is, too. I've never been in space before, or to anywhere other than Mars. I'm not used to being around people who aren't trying to actively kill me."
"That makes two of us."
"Yeah. What a life we lead, huh?"
Nureyev smiled a little for the first time in what felt like years but was probably only a few hours. It fell away as quickly and suddenly as it came, though.
“Do you think I’ll always feel like this?” he asked. He wasn’t really asking Juno, but Juno answered nonetheless.
“No. No, you won’t. You’re gonna have a lot of bad nights like these ones, and things are gonna feel awful for a while before they start to feel better. That’s how life is. But I’ll be there for each bad night as long as you’ll let me. And you’ll get through this, and one day you’ll think about tonight and you’ll laugh, and you’ll think about how far you’ve come.”
Nureyev didn’t trust himself to respond to any of that without crying, so instead he took Juno’s free hand in his, and pressed a kiss to his palm, and hoped that even a little of his gratitude for him was communicated through it. Juno let out a breathless little laugh, and leaned down to kiss his temple before continuing to work.
They fell into a comfortable quiet after that. Nureyev's hair was thicker than he thought it was before, so it took quite a while for Juno to finish buzzing it all off. Once he was done, though, he stepped back, setting the clippers down on the sink once more.
"You're like a new man," Juno said, a smile teasing at the corners of his lips. Nureyev braced himself, stood, and looked in the mirror.
"Huh," was the first thing out of his mouth. Wow. He certainly was bald. He ran a hand over his scalp, and felt like he was petting a strange sort of cat. He certainly looked different, that was a goal achieved. His face seemed longer, his nose bigger, his hair gone . Juno wrapped his arms around him, hugging him from the side.
"What do you think?" he asked.
"I... quite honestly have no idea what to think," Nureyev answered. “I might be in shock.”
"Well, I think you look hot," Juno said bluntly.
Nureyev kept staring at his newly shaved head. "I look like an alien," he mumbled.
"Yeah, you’ll get used to it. I had a buzzcut when I was... oh, 16? They're fun, I promise. Your earrings will really stand out with no hair to distract from them." Nureyev turned away from the mirror to look fully at Juno. He was tired, he could see that in the deep bags under his eyes and the way his smile was a little lazier than usual. But there was still a smile , and he was still here with Nureyev, despite the fact that he should be in bed.
"Thank you," he said softly, reaching up to cradle Juno’s cheek. Juno leaned into his touch, and it made Nureyev’s heart melt a little. "For being here with me. You didn't have to comfort me, calm me down, or do anything, really, and you did it anyways."
Juno shrugged, putting his arms around Nureyev's neck. "Hey, it's not a big deal. You were struggling, and I helped you out because I know you'd do the same for me. And I'll do it again and again. And I know you will, too." He leaned up on his toes and kissed Nureyev, simply and sweetly. "You ready to go back to bed?"
In the morning, Nureyev would walk confidently into the kitchen for breakfast like nothing was off. Vespa's eyes would go very wide, and she would spit her coffee back into her mug before recovering asking what lawnmower he had gotten into a fight with. Buddy's eyebrow would raise silently, but she wouldn’t comment on it beyond , ‘Looks like you found a new barber, Pete.’ Rita, of course, would squeal immediately and babble on about how different he looked, and how he was just like the one guy in that stream she saw the other night who was working for a corrupt government and was secretly in love with this other guy but the government had forbidden love and killed the other guy and so the bald guy had decided to rebel, and Nureyev would lose the plot by that point. Jet would give him an indifferent once-over before returning to his meal, which somehow would hurt the most out of all the reactions. And Nureyev would want to feel embarrassed and ashamed, and would be tempted to just go back to bed and wallow in his self pity and bruised ego. But then, he would also see the way Juno looked at him from across the table, like he was the most handsome man this side of the galaxy. And Juno would ask cheekily who cut it for him, and if they were cute. He would sit next to Juno and grab his hand under the table, and Juno would squeeze it three times. And he would feel strong.