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All of the children at Greymoore were expected to have shaven heads to avoid lice. Ashton was pretty sure lice weren't a problem for him, what with their stone skin, but the administrators weren't about to let a little thing like 'logic' or 'reason' get in the way.
The issue was that shears and razors weren't about to cut crystals. So instead the administrators borrowed some masonry tools from a nearby quarry - a chisel, a hammer, and a wedge, and made do.
It's not like it hurt, not much. But it was jarring and long and tedious and they had to sit still for what felt like hours until it was complete. It was the sound he remembered the most; traveling through his skull, inescapable.
(they remembered, ever so faintly, back when they were soft - someone brushing their hair back, coming fingers through it lightly. At some point he had been in a body capable of being loved. That was a long time ago)
Anyway, they left, Ashton and the other Nobodies. None of them ever had to cut their hair ever again, and Ashton hadn't been planning on it. It got to be thick and large and if the crystals would sometimes grow into each other and crack off? So be it. Their hair could be jagged and sharp, and maybe it would catch and cut - but nobody should get that close, anyway.
Until one day, there was a girl (there often was, unless there was a boy or some other sort of person). She was a jeweler's apprentice turned fence - she was good at assessing value. She just sat behind them, asked permission and Ashton had been so smitten and curious that he'd said yes.
"Thanks. I hate to see potential wasted," she said, and got to work.
It was different than with the orphanage. Her tools were finer, made for more delicate work. She touched him lightly, as if they were soft. As if they were valuable. It wasn't so jarring against his head, and she'd hum in time with every removed piece.
When she was done, she made them go into the front room of the hideout - the only one that got any light - with a mirror. Ashton stared. They almost seemed to have a halo, the way their hair held then refracted the light.
She’d ran away with the take, which was fair enough - if she could steal from them, she deserved it. Wasn’t like she was one of the Nobodies, after all. But then the Nobodies left Ashton for dead, and…
That was the fucking end of that.
Jiana Hexum required a certain amount of respectability in her subordinates’ looks, even if they were just there to do the dirty work. Ashton couldn’t cut all of their hair, not by themselves, so they got Milo to take a stab at it. They did a fine enough job, and if it sometimes hurt, well, Ashton could barely tell with the other pain.
They did wonder, from time to time, how other earth genasi managed it. If there was a trick, if they took turns as families, or used some sort of softening solution. He thought about seeking them out - there had to be at least a few in Jrusar, but he never went through with it. Something stopped them - shame at missing some secret knowledge that they should have known, but had no one that could have shared it with them. Or perhaps it was fear of being judged and rejected for not being a real genasi, having been made - even made against his will, instead of being born. Even worse, if they accepted him and he’d have to live with the dissonance and unspoken anger - that the reason they were giving him community was what had destroyed his first home, all those years ago.
It was a fucking conundrum, and too complicated to be worth thinking about for long.
Too bad Fresh Cut Grass didn’t agree - at least not about the not talking about it. They seemed to believe in talking about everything, at poking at every possible wound to help clear it - not caring if anyone might bleed out. But they were kind, and meant well, and Ashton couldn’t very well leave them alone - he wasn’t like… he couldn’t.
Besides - Ashton might not be the most perceptive creature, as Anni will remind them, but even he can guess why FCG might be so invested in Ashton finding other Earth Genasi. And fuck, it might make sense for one of them not to be alone.
They drew the line at letting FCG’s buzzsaw anywhere near their hair, though. They valued their life.
He was successful in keeping FCG from trying to give him a haircut, but he couldn’t keep their mouth shut. Not around the other Hells. And then the Bells wanted to help. They were insufferable in that way, and without an ounce of understanding. Not that Ashton would ever explain it to them.
Orym’s gentle pressure wore him down, wind and water on stone. Laudna, of course, had a rock chisel, and Chetney deigned for once to carve something that was not wood. Imogen kept him calm, and Fearne picked up the fallen shards as keepsakes, stole a little bit of Ashton in a way that warmed their heart.
The end result wasn’t as pretty as the jeweler’s apprentice’s work, long ago. It was jagged in places, and the sun didn’t seem to catch the amethyst in the same way, and the transition to the opalescent would was still awkward. But it fit Ashton, and if it hadn’t been a little bit fucked up, it wouldn’t have been the Bells. Looking at their reflection in a little bit of silver, Ashton smiled.