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FEBRUARY 1985
"I can feel the dye soaking into my gloves, Ronnie."
Veronica Moreda lifted a perfectly trimmed eyebrow in her boyfriend's direction. They stood in front of her large vanity mirror in the bathroom right next to her room, both giving each other dramatic looks in the reflection. A box of cheap L'Oréal hair dye laid on the sink counter, ripped open with contents spilling out of it. Veronica – quite stupidly, she must admit – enlisted her boyfriend's help to dye her hair back to its usual bright blue, seeing as her roots had grown out halfway down her hairline. It wasn't really her thing to care about the fading, or her natural dark brown color showing, but she figured it was time for a much-needed dye job.
Steve Harrington didn't know anything about hair dye. Give him a can of Farrah Fawcett hair spray and he was golden. But he began to realize, as his gloved hands followed Veronica's and massaged the thick, blue liquid into her scalp, that dying hair certainly wasn't his expertise. It was way too messy for him.
"As long as you have the gloves on, you'll be fine." She persuaded, flicking him off with a gloved hand. "I've been using this dye for over a year now. I think I know what I'm doing."
He squeezed a dollop of blue dye into his palm and pinched it into the ends of her hair. "Don't you ever want to grow out your natural color?" He asked, meeting her eyes in the mirror. "Show people the real Ronnie Moreda."
Veronica picked up the half-lit cigarette from the ashtray she brought from her bedroom. Placing the filter in between her chapped lips, she took a deep inhale and coughed out the rest into her arm. "I like remaining a mystery," she said, clearing her throat from the deadly nicotine that she grew fond of. "Showing the student body something like, let's say, my natural hair color is like getting to the end of a Sherlock Holmes novel. Then, I'll just be ... ordinary. I don't wanna be ordinary."
She passed him the cigarette, which he took willingly, but only released a small puff of smoke out of his thin lips. He wasn't much of a smoker anymore. Veronica noticed that he wasn't looking at her anymore, causing her to lift a brow and smooth out the dye into her roots. "Do you not like the blue?"
Steve's eyes almost bugged out of his skull. "No! No, that's not what I'm saying –"
"Because I don't really care if you don't," she continued. "I stopped caring what people think a long time ago. I just wish you would tell me."
He could tell her anger was flaring up. Many people couldn't handle Veronica Moreda's random outbursts, but Steve could. He understood her like no one else, and although she'd never admit it, she was grateful.
(And she might've just been in love with him for that.)
"No, Ronnie, it's just ..." He flicked a few ashes into the tray on the counter, setting the cigarette on the rim. Veronica spun on her heel to face him, arms crossed over her chest. He didn't realize until then that she was wearing one his shirts that he lent her on a night she stayed over his house – thankfully, when his parents hadn't been home. He smiled softly. "What are you gonna do when you have to apply to jobs?"
