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“Come here, Luz. We gotta get that abomination goop outta your hair,” Eda instructed. Luz appeared sheepish for a moment.
After a whole day of being around the gigantic carcass of a trash slug, being thrown into the dirt by vines, covering herself in abomination goop, hiding in a giant, unventilated cauldron… running from an angry principal that wanted to dissect her… Yeah. She could definitely use a shower.
“What? Nooo… I got this! I’ll just-”
“What, use my shampoo? I doubt it’ll be good for tender human skin.”
Luz initially laughed at this statement, thinking it to be another one of Eda’s weird jokes. When Eda stayed silent, her laughter abruptly stopped.
“You’re serious?”
Eda scratched behind her ear, looking away.
“I mean, it’s specifically designed for my skin, which is a… little different from normal. But I’d rather not get into that right now. What matters is that your hair is filthy, and I don’t want you staining my pillows.”
Eda walked over to the couch before sitting down. She patted the spot next to her. Luz just stood there, thinking this through.
“How’re you gonna clean my hair anyways? The abomination stuff is really clumpy.”
Eda waved her off.
Wait, no, she was just forming a spell circle. A second later, her hand was encased in wavy blue magic.
“This here will melt away the abomination goop.”
Luz pondered this.
“And it won’t… melt away my hair?”
Eda snorted.
“Of course not!”
“…”
“Probably. Look, if you’d rather I teach you how the shower works now, then we can just do that. But this is a lot quicker, and it gives me a chance to ask you what… exactly went down in Hexside? I’m a little lost on that, to be honest.”
Luz considered her options…
“And I warn you, if you don’t treat the shower right, it’ll burn off your skin.”
“On second thought, sure, I guess we can hang out for a bit while you clean my hair.”
With that declaration, Luz made her way toward the couch. She stared at the empty spot for a bit before raising her gaze to Eda’s questioning eyes.
“Are you gonna sit down or what?”
Luz nodded her head, maneuvering herself to sit down on the available spot. She made sure to leave a few inches of space between them. She noticed that Eda hadn’t been too fond of her hugs from earlier, so she surely wouldn’t appreciate the contact.
“Relax your body, dude. You’re tense as a board. What, you think I’m gonna eat you?”
Luz forced herself to relax, pressing the back of her head into the couch.
“Don’t relax that much!”
At Eda’s sudden exclamation, Luz bolted upright, removing her head from the couch. She turned to look at the stains she surely just put into the cushion.
“…Sorry. Wasn’t thinking.”
Eda rubbed her brow, staving off the mounting headache.
“It’s whatever. I needed to clean this thing anyways.”
With that, Eda combed her magically encased hand through Luz’s hair, finding it to be a bit messier than she initially expected (with all the leaves and sticks in her hair, Eda could only snicker at the parallels she was drawing to her own hair). Eda encased her other hand in the same magic before combing it through Luz’s scalp to help scrub away at the excess dirt.
Luz sighed, relaxing her body once more before leaning her shoulder against Eda’s, closing her eyes in contentment.
Eda stiffened.
Shoot! What should she do now? She didn’t… she didn’t want to ruin whatever this was, but her dress was getting…
Well, she had a whole wardrobe full of the exact same dress, so it didn’t matter too much.
As Eda continued to comb through and clean Luz’s hair, gently pulling apart knots and removing a concerning amount of native Boiling Isles ticks (they were vicious around these parts, and apparently had a hunger for human blood), she cleared her throat, readying her first question.
“So, uh… what made you wanna go to school in the first place? Am I not… was I not doing a good enough job at teaching you?” She didn’t know why it was bugging her so much. She’d barely known the human for like 4 days! Surely she wasn’t this attached already, to be worried about the human’s validation…
Though when Luz produced a small, sleepy mumble of a reply, Eda couldn’t help but feel her heartstrings tug a little.
“Wuzzat? Sorry, Hun. You need to speak up a little.”
…
Oh Titan, did she just call her ‘Hun’?!
Thankfully, Luz didn’t pay her slip up any mind, snuggling closer to Eda as she continued to clean her hair. When she inadvertently scratched an itch behind her right ear, Luz sighed contently.
“I said ‘no’. Your lesson actually saved my life. That greasy slime ball you gave me earlier sprouted into the most beautiful fantasy trees, giving me n’ Willow time to escape. Well, just me. I don’t know how Willow got out of that sticky situation, but she managed to change her track.”
The way her voice brightened when speaking of her friend’s accomplishments absolutely did not make Eda proud. No sir. Totally not.
By now, Eda had finished cleaning most of the gunk from Luz’s hair, either discarding the stuff to the floor or disintegrating it with anti-magic. With a bit more time, she’d remove her hands from Luz’s hair and instruct her to go upstairs and brush her teeth.
Luz closed the gap between them, snuggling closer and draping her arm across her stomach, pressing her cheek into her shoulder.
Eda raised an eyebrow at this development. She knew Luz was rather… physically affectionate, but this was a little bit more… vulnerable (was that the word she was looking for?) than the hugs?
Whatever was happening, Eda could hardly ignore the calming sensation that was washing over her.
“Geez Eda, does your magic melt away stress too?” Luz slurred out, relaxing further. Eda choked down the abrupt laughter that threatened to escape, not wanting to startle Luz.
“No, you dork. Petting’s just a relaxing activity. Just ask King.”
At her words, Luz stiffened, opening her eyes wide.
“Hol’ up. You were petting me? Like a dog?”
Eda lifted her hands from Luz’s head.
“No, like someone I care about. TLC is a standard of living in the Eda household.”
…
“Did you just say you cared about me?”
Shoot. Backtrack. Backtrack.
“Uh, I… uhm…”
She didn’t get the chance to as Luz pressed herself higher up, closing the space between Eda’s hands and her cranium.
“I… think you’re pretty cool, too. You can… You’re not supposed to pet humans, but… I mean, if you want, you can…” Luz mumbled something after, too garbled for Eda to parse out.
“I can what?”
Luz’s cheeks grew red as she turned her face into Eda, as though trying to hide a soft feeling she knew she couldn’t hide otherwise.
“You can keep… playing with my hair. It feels nice,” she admitted, somewhat embarrassed. Eda lowered her hands back to her head.
“You sure? I didn’t know it was a weird thing in the human realm. Witches do it all the time for…”
“People they care about?”
Eda began coursing her lithe fingers through Luz’s hair, the last of the dirt being magicked away. Technically, there was no more mechanical reason to be doing this, though that didn’t mean there wasn’t any reason.
The serotonin traitorously coursing through her system was exactly the same chemical that got produced whenever she spent quality time petting King’s fur. She couldn’t fight the smile that made its way to her lips. She was glad Luz couldn’t see her expression, eyes closed in pleasure and all. Eda would have struggled to admit the following if Luz hadn't dozed off, drooling a bit on her shoulder as she used Eda like a pillow.
“Yeah. People we care about.”