I was sitting in the chair with foil on half of my head and black dye on the other, scrolling through Instagram and eating my food when I got a message from Corpse on discord.
"Hey, what are you up to?"
I smiled lightly and sent him a selfie of me with the tinfoil in my hair, with my tongue sticking out; holding up a peace sign.
"Letting my best friend play with my hair and eating Chinese Food. What are you up to?" My reply was quick, but the picture was hard to get just right.
"Watching Nightmare before Christmas for the millionth time this year. Is Olivia a hairstylist?"
I chuckled lightly, "She prefers the term "Hair Perfectionist", but yes. She specializes in color treatment and does transform people's hair. I'm getting rid of the darkness in my hair on the left with bleach and on the other side, I have black dye in it. Still deciding if I want to keep the bleached part blonde or dye it some other color. What do you think?"
I decided to stuff my face with food.
Olivia came from the back and took a peek behind the foil, "Oh shiz that's blonde. Come on, we should rinse it out." She said taking the food from me and placing it on her counter since she closed for the day.
We traveled to the back room and she gestured for me to sit at the shampooing station, "Alexa, put on Paranoia by Rotten Royale." She called out to her Alexa which replied, "Okay, playing Paranoia on Spotify."
I rolled my eyes, "Really?"
"Yes! I still think this is your best song, next to Up All Night." She smirked as she removed the tinfoil and leaned me back.
"Should we add color to the blonde side? I feel like black and blue look good together." Olivia suggested, grabbing the hose and starting to spray my hair down.
I sighed, "I think I may just keep it blonde. I'm trying to not get disowned by my family."
"Your family is traditional, but you're also an adult to does everything they say. You should be able to live a little." She grumbled, grabbing a bottle of purple shampoo from her shelf.
"I don't blame them, we've been having some bad press recently thanks to my cousin Dimitri. He was arrested for getting into a fistfight with three police officers in Vegas, yet they call me the family disappointment?" I sighed, looking at my nails.
She snorted lightly, "You are not a disappointment."
"Come to Christmas at my grandmothers' house, then you'll see what I mean."
She finished washing out my hair and helped me up after ringing out my hair, trying to keep both halves separated before bringing me back to the chair.
"You still need to do the WAP dance for your TikTok." She reminded me as she searched around for her hairdryer.
I groaned, "Don't remind me. I'm not looking forward to that."
"What if you make it so if someone donates five hundred dollars or more, you do the WAP dance on stream?" She suggested, making me snort lightly.
"Maybe, no one else would donate that much at one time." I watched her plug in the dryer, "Maybe I can use that as leverage in my twelve-hour charity stream tomorrow."
"Who are you going to give the money to this time around?" She turned on the hairdryer, drying the black half first.
I pursed my lips, "Well, my normal donations go to make a wish or children's cancer centers, but this one I'm going to be hitting even closer to home. I'm donating the funds to the Texas Eating Disorders Association." I explained and she paused, turning off the hairdryer.
She looked at me in the mirror, "You're going to tell the world about your eating disorder tomorrow on a Livestream? Do you honestly think that's a good idea?"
I played with my fingers, "No, but I feel like if people were to know that I am recovering from an eating disorder myself, that they can recover too...I just think it's time people know. I won't go too deep into it during the stream, don't worry."
Olivia nodded, continuing to dry my hair in silence.
She straightened my hair with the blow-dryer and sat in the chair next to me, "You know, I'm proud of you. I'll support you through anything and if you want to talk about your struggles with Anorexia on the internet, I'll support you." She sat back in her chair.
"Besides, it's your life. No one can tell you what to do with it."
***
When I arrived back at the manor, I entered the kitchen and heard my mom gasp.
"Oh, darling it looks so good! Come here and let me see." She pats the stool next to her and I smile, walking over and sitting by her side as she looks at my hair.
"Olivia did such a good job!" She complimented as she ran her ringers through the blonde.
"Do you think it's too crazy?" I asked and she shook her head.
"Not at all, darling. Your aunt will be snippy no matter what, but I'm sure grandma will like it." She muttered, starting to French braid the strands.
My face flushed, "Shit, Thanksgiving is in a few days, isn't it?" I muttered and she nodded.
"Don't worry, we're a family, we'll deflect the conversation if she starts acting up."
I just stayed silent, standing up, "I'm going to order some food and work in my office. Can someone bring me the food when it gets here?" I asked, making her nod again.
"Of course."
With that, I went out the back door and crossed the backyard, checking my phone for the first time since I left the salon.
I saw a text from Sean that I received a few minutes ago, "Wanna play Among Us again? Same people."
I smiled, texting him that I'll be on the call soon and to let me set up.
I quickly changed into some comfortable clothing and put my hair into a messy bun as I walked into my studio and sat in my gaming chair, putting on my headphones and making sure the mic was on. I started recording the audio and my screen. I didn't put on a face cam since I wasn't wearing any makeup.
I opened Discord and saw that the call was already on with everyone there. I joined the call immediately.
I didn't make my presence noticed immediately, not for any reason. I just wanted to make sure everything was set up, but I immensely heard Kassie's voice in the call as they had been mid-conversation.
"Oh yeah, I first heard Rotten sing when she came up to Canada and stayed with me for a week. I swear to God it made me weak at the knees. I told Terry that night to not be mad at me if I cheated on him with her one of these days." I muted my mic before I could laugh, mostly because I knew I wasn't supposed to hear that.
Sean laughed, "I first heard her live after we first met. It was at Vidcon in Florida and she was performing a cover of one of Queen's songs. I can't remember which one it was, but I was blown away completely. So many people think she edits her voice or uses autotune but oh my god she does NOT. If she was older I would have said it was love at first listen."
They were simping over me. I was getting it on video too.
"I haven't met her in person yet, what is she like off-camera?" Rae asked and Kassie laughed.
"She's the same oh my god! She's funny and witty and always a good sport. You guys should watch our collab videos on my channel. I have an entire Playlist of us." She said and I was going to announce my presence until Corpse spoke up.
"She's from Texas, isn't she? How come she doesn't have an accent?"
That's when an idea popped into my head and I unmuted my mic. I was going to act like southern trash for most of the intro.
"Guess who's back, back again." I sang into the mic and everyone squealed in surprise making me laugh.
"Rotten! Heyyyy." Sean said awkwardly and I smiled.
"Well howdy." I brought out my inner Texan accent, not just the accent I fake on the internet. Though just to teach Corpse a lesson, I intensified it a lot.
"Oh god," Kassie said which made my smile turn into a smirk as I entered the game.
"Corpse wants a Texan, he's gonna get a Texan y'all," I said and he instantly realized what he had done wrong.
"Oh, no no nooo." He said, obviously trying to hold in his laughs.
"Awe yeah Corpse. I'd do in'thang for you." I teased, moving my cyan character to get a new hat.
Then I see a cowboy hat and gasp loudly.
"Rotten, if you put on the hat I will kill you the second I'm Imposter," Sean Warned me, but it was too late as I showed them the hat.
"Yeehaw! See paw, I'm a real Texan now!" I shouted out my open window even though they couldn't see.
I heard a thump come from Corpse's mic and I burst out laughing.
"I take it back! Please! Uncle!" He whined and I gave in, using my "internet accent".
"Okay, okay. I'm sorry, but that was my real accent. I intensified it, of course, but I don't use it on the internet because people suck." I explained.
"Well, I think your accent is beautiful." Felix complimented and I cooed as the game started.
"Oh and by the way, Sean. The song I sang when we met was Spread your Wings. One of my favorite Queen songs."