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As far as Kate was concerned, there were two options for her hair: she always either wore it down, brushed out and occasionally straightened or curled but not otherwise styled, or up in a simple ponytail. Technically, she also knew how to do a basic three-strand braid, but the few times she had actually tried that, it had come out crooked and looking silly. So now she just stuck to the basics.
It didn’t usually bother her, she liked how her hair looked when she wore it down, and tying it back mostly kept it out of the way without causing any issues. Sure, sometimes a strand would get caught on one of her arrows, but she could look past that because she didn’t really have any better options anyway.
For most of her life, Kate had thought all of this was completely normal. Sure, her mother made comments about her hair a few times, and even twisted it into fancy updos when she was a child and had to go to some gala or another, but Eleanor had always had weird opinions about her daughter’s appearance anyway so Kate didn’t pay much attention to it. Mostly, she was just glad when she stopped actually doing her hair for her because she always pulled too hard and ended up hurting her. Ever since she was old enough to decide that kind of thing herself, Kate had outright refused to let anyone touch her hair, except occasionally to cut it.
Of course, she could still admire when someone else had a particularly beautiful or complicated hairstyle, but it was always from a distance, and never with even the slightest intention of recreating it on her own head. She never even considered that wearing her hair in a braid rather than a ponytail could be more convenient for her crime-fighting until Yelena pointed it out to her.
They had been sparring – Kate was sure that Yelena was going incredibly easy on her, and she still lost most of the time – and a single strand of Kate’s hair got caught on one of the buckles of Yelena’s costume. Kate would have just shrugged it off and then immediately forgotten about it, but Yelena decided to bring it up a few hours later.
Some movie Kate wasn’t really paying attention to was playing on the TV and both women were splayed out across her couch, freshly showered and sharing a pizza as they wound down from another long and stressful day. All Kate really cared about was the way Yelena was holding her, one arm around her shoulder while the other was occupied with holding a half-eaten slice of pizza. Kate just leaned further into her and sighed happily, so content with her position that she almost missed it when Yelena started talking.
“You know, if you braided your hair for fights, it wouldn’t get caught on things nearly as much.”
She said it causally, clearly just thinking out loud rather than actually planning a full conversation, but Kate thought that she should probably respond regardless. Besides, if she didn’t say anything then this would just come up again at some other time, most likely in front of other people when Kate wouldn’t want to get into all of her very personal issues. So she just said whatever her brain brought up.
“I guess, but I’m really bad at braiding. Plus, I already get compared to Katniss Everdeen way too much, a braid would just make that even worse…”
The second thing was probably a bit silly, but it still kind of mattered to Kate and she didn’t like hiding things from her girlfriend, so she just said it anyway, trying not to feel embarrassed as she did so. Then again, this definitely wasn’t anywhere near the most embarrassing thing she had revealed during one of her rambling rants, and since Yelena clearly didn’t mind, Kate tried not to, either.
She even managed to stop her rambling at some point, though that part was always a bit hard for her. She was pretty sure that Yelena wouldn’t have minded if Kate kept talking for however long she wanted to, but Kate didn’t want to monopolize the conversation, so she made herself trail off and gave her girlfriend the chance to say something herself again.
“I could do something else, if you want me to. I have a few ideas that I think would look really nice on you, and if you like it too I could teach you.”
Kate was still kind of tempted to reject the offer, but for some reason, the image of Yelena carefully braiding her hair refused to leave her mind. The thought made her blush a little, which was a pretty good sign that Kate didn’t actually want to turn the offer down altogether. The only reason she didn’t just give in completely was that she still remembered the pain of having her hair pulled. She wasn’t usually overly careful – some might even call her reckless – but right now, she decided to at least try.
“I guess we could do that. Just please don’t pull on my hair too hard because I hate when that happens…”
That most likely didn’t actually need to be said – despite everything, Yelena was always incredible gentle with Kate, except for when they were training together – but Kate was never one to keep her thoughts to herself anyway. Besides, their relationship worked as well as it did at least in part because they didn’t really keep things from each other, even small quirks like this.
Yelena was probably nodding already, but Kate couldn’t be sure because turning around to look would have meant moving her head, and that would have meant making Yelena take her hands out of Kate’s hair, where they had somehow ended up without either of them noticing. Since that was pretty much the last thing she wanted, Kate just stayed still and waited for Yelena to respond out loud, using actual words.
“Of course, I am always careful with you, am I not? Now go and get your hairbrush, because I cannot work with this.”
Kate didn’t really want to get up from her incredibly comfortable spot in Yelena’s arms, but she eventually managed to gather up enough mental strength to pull herself away. She missed the comfort of her girlfriend’s presence instantly so she basically ran to the bathroom, turning it upside down until she finally found her hairbrush. Then she ran back to the couch, trying not to trip over anything, and presented it to Yelena like Lucky always did with his favourite toys.
The smile she got in response made her head spin all over again and she suddenly had no idea what to say, so she just let herself sink to the floor in front of the couch, leaning back against Yelena’s legs and tilting her head back to return her smile. Yelena rolled her eyes but bent down to kiss her regardless, just like Kate had known she would.
Unfortunately, the kiss didn’t last nearly as long as Kate would have liked, but Yelena promised that there would be more once they were done, so Kate only complained a little bit. It was mostly a joke anyway.
Then Yelena actually started brushing her hair and Kate’s brain shut down all higher functions. The rhythmic touch was almost hypnotizingly gentle and she couldn’t get enough, which would have surprised her if she had still been mentally present at all. As it stood, she just relaxed and let herself enjoy this situation fully, finally not overthinking anything for once.
After a while, Yelena put down the brush and started running her fingers through Kate’s hair instead. She twisted the strands around each other and moved them into whatever position she wanted them to have but Kate barely even noticed. By the time Yelena was done with her work, Kate had nearly fallen asleep against her, which was something that usually took her hours of total quiet in a darkened room. For once, her mind actually let her rest.
Because of this, it actually took a moment for her to notice that Yelena was done, and then a few more until she actually managed to get off the floor and back to the bathroom so she could look at herself in the mirror. Yelena followed her across their apartment, sticking close to Kate but refusing to look directly at her, almost as if she were nervous.
There was a moment of strange hesitation before Kate actually looked up, but as soon as she did, her breath caught in her throat. She didn’t even have the words to properly describe what was going on on top of her head, but she knew that it looked absolutely stunning. She was always pretty confident in her looks, but this just put her on a completely new level.
Kate was caught up just staring at the twisted collection of shiny braids on top of her head for a moment, but then her mind finally snapped back into her body and she spun around to pull Yelena into a searing kiss. That kiss was quickly returned and deepened, and kept going even as they stumbled their way back to the couch.