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“Can you? Can you? Can you? Pleeaassee?” Omega asked for the millionth time.
Crosshair knew more than anyone that she was persistent, but this had lasted through breakfast. Crosshair wasn’t even done with his caf yet!
He’d already tried, no, why don’t you ask someone else?, stop, and I’m sick today (he wasn’t, and being sick wouldn’t even impede what she wanted, in most cases). Now he sighed, putting his caf down and going with the honest response, “I don’t know how.”
“Neither do I,” Omega admitted.
“So you’re a girl…” Crosshair began as Omega took a seat up beside him at the counter.
“Mm hmm.”
“…whose hair is long enough for this…”
“Mm hmm.”
“…and you don’t know how to do it either?”
Omega gave a bit of a laugh, trying to take Crosshair’s caf to have a sip.
She wilted when he grabbed it from her, glaring as he took a sip himself.
“Where would I have learned? Prison?”
“You’re dramatic.”
“Thanks.”
Omega crossed her arms and settled her head on them, looking at him, and looking at him.
“What, you think I learned it in prison? Some experiment where clones all learned to braid each other’s hair, and—” He wasn’t liking this little joke anymore. “Never mind.”
“I’ll do my chores without complaining.”
“You like chores.” Strange kid.
Omega tried grabbing his caf again.
“Pick your battles,” he grumbled.
“Fine.” She sat up, and started walking away.
“Wait, what?”
Omega didn’t say a word. Crosshair paused, eyeing his caf. Maybe he should pick his battles too.
Omega had gone down the hall to the bedrooms where everyone was presumably getting ready for their day.
Crosshair cursed and hurried after her when he realized Omega was knocking on Hunter’s door.
“In a minute,” Hunter called.
“Omega, just because he was your dad first—”
“Shush,” she told him, waving a hand at him.
“Young lady.”
“Shusshh.”
“I’ll do it.”
“No, you won’t.”
“I will.”
“I don’t trust you.”
Hunter opened the door, and Crosshair scowled (what was he supposed to do now that he was blushing and made to feel like a child?).
“What’s the problem?” Hunter asked.
“Crosshair won’t braid my hair.”
Hunter and Crosshair shared a look. Hunter’s expression seemed to say, This again? Crosshair gave a slight nod.
Hunter sighed, and Crosshair started feeling triumphant. Yes, he wouldn’t have to do this because—
“Crosshair, braid Omega’s hair.”
“What?”
“That’s an order.”
Omega thanked Hunter, hugging him, and then raced back to the kitchen, for…
…Crosshair sighed…
…his caf. She was finishing his caf.
“Hunter, I don’t know how to braid hair.”
“Figure it out.”
“Why can’t you do it? You actually have hair.”
Hunter ran a hand through said hair. “As if I’d ever braid this.”
Crosshair gave him a light shove. “You’re annoying.”
Somehow word got out in the small house that Crosshair would be braiding Omega’s hair to help her get ready for the day because now Tech, Wrecker, and Hunter were sitting on the patio with them. Only Tech was pretending he wasn’t watching.
“Is the audience necessary?” Crosshair asked, tone as sharp as if he was accusing them of war crimes.
“Technically speaking, no,” Tech answered, “but I happen to find your current predicament amusing.”
“What he said,” Wrecker agreed.
Crosshair sighed and set his attention to the kid in front of him who did not want to sit still.
He put a hand on her shoulder. “Stop moving.”
“It’s the caf.”
“Why do you think you’re not supposed to have it?”
Crosshair took Omega’s brush from the table as Batcher came over and looked at it like it was a toy.
He did his best to start brushing her hair, but he had only ever seen this done, not done it himself.
Omega stilled, and leaned back into it. Was that a good sign? Was he doing good?
“I do believe wincing is a bad thing,” Tech said.
“No one asked for the backseat flier,” Crosshair bit out.
But he did his best to gentle his touch.
He found a tough knot near her bangs. This he paid attention to, and slowed down.
After his job with that seemed done he ran his hands through her soft hair to check for knots.
Batcher was resting her head in Omega’s lap, and giving her that big-eyed look that said she wanted treats.
“I’ll give you treats in a bit,” Omega promised.
“She just had breakfast,” Hunter said.
“Sorry, Batcher. No treats.”
Crosshair had seen braids before. He was trying to hold the picture in his mind, and figure out the different components that came together to make the braid. Maybe it was made from two sections?
He tried that, but her hair just ended up in a twist a gust of wind could undo.
“I don’t think that’s how you do it,” Wrecker said, now petting Batcher who had given up on Omega giving her treats.
“You don’t even have hair,” Crosshair argued.
Wrecker laughed. “Neither do you.”
Omega laughed, and some of Crosshair’s self-consciousness washed away. Any day he could hear Omega laugh was a good day, even if he was the butt of the joke.
“Point taken.”
“I suggest separating her hair into three sections,” Tech said.
They all stopped and glanced at him. It took a few seconds for him to notice.
“What?” he eventually said, eyes holding a rare bit of confusion.
“Are you saying you know how to braid hair?” Wrecker asked.
“Theoretically.”
“Then why don’t you do it?” Hunter asked, leaning in towards him.
“Because Omega didn’t ask me to.”
“It’s okay,” she said. “Crosshair can do it.” She sounded so confident in her decision.
“At least let Tech offer some help,” he said.
“Fine.”
So they all sat on the porch on a sunny, quiet morning on Pabu, Crosshair following Tech’s instructions to braid Omega’s hair.
The braid itself was messy and loose, but when Omega was shown herself in the refresher mirrors she seemed pleased. She hugged Crosshair tight, almost squeezing too hard with those archer’s arms of hers.
“Thank you,” she whispered.
Somehow her words carried the weight of not just the braid, but what he meant to her, what this home they’d fought to have meant to her.
Crosshair gently ran a hand over her head and the messy braid that had been the cause of so much mischief.
“Always.”