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It takes every bit of strength Joshua has. He musters all of his willpower, his courage, his emotional growth and strength of character; with this titanic force assembled, he can just about manage it:
“Neku,” he says, “I don’t know how to do this.”
It’s a herculean effort. Somewhere, distantly, a crowd bursts into rapturous applause.
“Yeah, obviously,” Neku says, which completely ruins the moment of triumph. He’s dragging a chair into the depressing little closet of his bathroom; he has put a shower curtain on the floor already, which neither improves nor detracts from the terrible aesthetics. “But…” he says. “I don’t know. I wanted a change. So. Are you gonna help me, or not?”
“She really has better—”
“Wow, now the world’s really ending,” Neku says. “You’re saying Shiki’s better than you at something?”
At Joshua’s resulting face, Neku laughs. (He laughs.) (It changes the angles of his face, like sunlight smashing in through stained glass.) “Don’t hurt yourself.”
“It’s me you’re concerned about?” Joshua says, and he twirls the scissors around his index finger. Stops the motion. Levels the scissors at Neku, jerks them upwards: bang. “You handed me a sharp object, dear. Oh, put it up to my throat, Joshua. I really want to get a jump start scaling the Reaper ladder—”
“That doesn’t sound like me.”
“—so just cut my head off—”
“You wouldn’t do that, you don’t have the upper body stren—oof.”
This last part is because Joshua has gotten tired of the mockery, and has telekinetically shoved Neku down into the chair. It’s a satisfying little trick and he really does try not to overuse it. “Well,” he sighs, “I just can’t say no to you, Neku. If you want to be bald so desperately, who am I to stand in your way?”
“You aren’t going to shave me,” Neku says, with bravery and confidence.
Neku’s hair isn’t styled, so it’s adorably poofy; Joshua positions the scissors over the longest, orangiest puff. With one twitch of the fingers, he slices it off completely. Neku makes a noise that is something like agh!
“What were you saying?” Joshua says.
“Oh mighty Composer,” Neku says, “please don’t…uh…you know, your infinite mercy or whatever. I don’t actually want to be bald.”
“I know,” Joshua says, and he steps back; he finds the dinky little plastic apron Neku had pulled out from Angels-know-where, drapes it lovingly over Neku’s chest. Ties it in the back. “You should wear this more,” he says. “You look cute in an apron. Hee hee.”
“This was a mistake,” Neku says. “I’ve made a mistake.”
“Mmmhm.” Joshua cards his fingers through the hair at the back of Neku’s neck; in complete disregard to the sentence that just came out of his mouth, Neku sighs and relaxes into the touch. It’s strange, the little things that make Joshua really feel like a god – the teleportation is nifty, sure, and the mind-reading and the telekinesis and the (admittedly limited) control over life and death, et cetera, but really this outpaces all of that by a country mile. That Neku – bullet-scarred Neku – would go soft at the touch of Joshua’s fingers. That he would let Joshua touch him, and understand that it’s meant to be tender. That he would accept it as what it is, what Joshua wants so desperately for it to be: tender.
“What are we thinking,” Joshua says, still petting at the downy little poof of hair. “Pixie? Crew cut? Mohawk? One of those flirty little Karen cuts? Ooh, Neku, demand to speak to my manager.”
“I don’t know what that means,” Neku mutters, “and sure. I don’t know. Anything. I just…”
“Blank check, huh?” Joshua says. “Sure, I can work with that.”
“Maybe not a mohawk.”
“Mm, next time.” He really, truly doesn’t know what he’s doing; he picks a part of Neku’s head at random and begins to cut. Chunks of lurid orange hair go raining down to the floor like Cheetos descending from heaven.
Neku doesn’t say anything; from behind him, Joshua has a primo view of Neku’s shoulders tensing and tensing and tensing. Winding all the way up to his hairline. Neku really thinks Joshua’s going to ask one of those stupid questions. Why do you want to cut all your hair off? Why the change? Why me? But of course Joshua isn’t going to ask. He likes to think he knows pretty well already. And whatever he doesn’t know is Neku’s business.
“I forgot how terrible haircuts are,” Joshua muses. “You should really just become a Composer, Neku. You can change your form whenever you’d like. No need to commit.”
“Don’t tell me you’re doing the Composer pitch again.”
“Who am I to waste a captive audience?”
But it’s working: Neku has relaxed slightly into the chair, is banging one heel thoughtfully against one of the legs. “Have to say, ‘you’ll never need a haircut again’ is maybe your worst attempt.”
“You say that now, but I can always sink lower. Hee hee.”
“Oh great, I’ve tempted you.”
“That’s all you do, Neku.” He indulges: he uses his hand to brush a chunk of hair off of Neku’s aproned shoulder. He doesn’t need to move it, and he doesn’t need to use his hand to move it, but that moment of touch – just a moment of touch—
…he really has to start talking again, or Neku will notice he’s gotten all soppy and sentimental.
He murmurs: “Do you want to cut my hair when we’re done, Neku? I’ll grow it out extra-long for you, so you can feel like you’re accomplishing something.”
“Rude. And – no, I definitely don’t.”
But he paused. Sure, Joshua can imagine it too: Neku standing behind him, carding his fingers through Joshua’s hair. Joshua’s bowed, vulnerable neck; the place in his throat where his heart would be pounding away, waiting for Neku to cut into him. Go ahead. Remake me.
“Do you remember,” Joshua says lightly as he snips away (he’s gotten invested, now, and he’s actually going to put in the work to make this look good) (Neku has tricked him) (and it’s unforgivable). “On Day…mm, I want to say 2, when you threatened to shave me bald?”
Neku huffs a laugh. “No. I don’t.”
“I remember. It made me swoon. Big bad Neku—”
“Little annoying Joshua—”
“And how the tables turn, as they say—”
“Shut up, I know you made yourself taller than me on purpose.”
“Who’s to say? Hee hee.”
So maybe he slipped it through, in the middle of all that – maybe Neku didn’t notice – do you remember how we were, and how we are now, and how large a space there is between those people? I wouldn’t do that anymore, would you do that, do you – and am I – and all of that endless nonsense, which he really does try to obfuscate as much as possible.
“Hey,” Neku says.
“Hay is for horses, Neku.”
Neku somehow finds the inner strength to ignore this. “Thanks. For doing this. And…I don’t know. I’m glad we’re…”
“Lovers?”
“Of course you found the most annoying possible word. No, jackass, I meant…I’m, just, I’m glad you’re here. In my shitty bathroom that you hate. Doing this for me. I would miss you a lot, if you weren’t here.”
“Well, of course,” Joshua says, because – thankfully – his quip-muscle works on autopilot. “You’re my lover, lover.”
Neku accepts this in brave silence, and then says: “It’s kind of cute, when you say it.”
“Hm.” There’s still that lump in his throat. Biologically and physiologically impossible. But here they are. “Do you want me to? Say it.”
Neku lifts a shoulder, lets it fall; chunks of hair shiver down to the floor. Leaves falling. Snow erasing the outlines of the city. Flower petals, summer rain. “Whatever I want you to do, you’ll do the opposite, right?”
“You know me so well, partner.”
“Yeah,” Neku says, “I guess I do.” Wryly: “For all the good it does me.”
“You’ll get to say you received my very first haircut! That’s an honor. When I’m an award-winning barber in another year or two, I’ll be sure to thank you in my acceptance speech. I never forget the little guy, Neku.”
“You constantly forget the little guy.” Neku’s voice is warm, affectionate. Impossible. It really does sound better than music, and the Angels can do whatever they want with that.
“You’re slandering my name,” Joshua says. “I love each of my Players and Reapers with the whole of my celestial heart. They are all my children—”
“That’s creepy, Josh—”
“—and I know all of their names, so don’t ask me—”
“—sometimes I think you don’t even know my name—”
“I know your name,” Joshua says, and clears his stupid uncloggable throat. “Anyways, I’m done. Cutting your hair. Do you want to see it?”
“Oh,” Neku says. Then: “Already?”
“Yes. You know what they say, Neku. Time flies when you’re having fun.”
Neku tilts his head all the way back, so he can peel Joshua open with his upside-down eyes. “I’m glad you had fun.”
“Mmm. You’re going to get hair up your nose.”
“Uh huh.” Neku sits up, shakes his head with the determination of a dog exiting a rainstorm; orange flies everywhere, blanketing Joshua’s clothes. (He could fix them.) (He won’t.)
“Disgusting, Neku.”
“You’re disgusting,” Neku says agreeably. “Here, gimme the mirror, I want to see.”
“Yes, sir,” Joshua says, and he grabs Neku’s tacky little hand mirror. He tries his best to show Neku everything.