FicWad

"Why blue?" Pierce asked.

"What do you mean?" Aziz blinked back, confused. The question was completely random. "What's blue? The sky? Your feathers?" He looked up, past the tree tops to where little puffy clouds were making shapes against the sun. "I dun' know why the sky's blue. Never figured it out. And aren't you part blue bird?"

"Blue jay." The hawk frowned. For once Pierce was still, leaning against the side of Aziz's house while the blue-maned lion did sit ups. "And I meant your hair. Why did you choose blue? Why not green or red or something like that? Hell, while we're on the subject, why dye it in the first place?"

"'Cause it's a good, manly colour, why else? Blue's for boys you know." Aziz snorted. He'd lost count of how many sit ups he'd done. He randomly decided he was on thirty. "And I dyed it because it was a sign of rebellion, man! Defiance of the system! Independence and liberty!" As he said this, he kept his eyes firmly shut. He'd discovered that, for what ever reason, people could always tell when he was lying if he had his eyes open.

*

"Come on!" His little sister, Abeni, glared at him, the tip of her tail twitching.

"No way!" He burrowed further under the blanket, pulling it firmly around his ears.

"We had a bet!" She stamped a foot, a sure sign she was running out of patience. "You said that if the girl's team won at basket ball, you'd let me do your hair!"

"It wasn't a fair bet! The girls are all taller than the boys!" He sniffed. Of course, this hadn't stopped him from making the bet in the first place. He and his friends had bought a bit too firmly into the idea of masculine superiority to admit they might lose. Stupid, really, when one had four sisters who could all kick your ass.

"So? You still made the bet!" Amber eyes rolled and she yanked hard enough on the blanket to drag him off of the bed. "And you lost!" Letting go of the blanket, she crossed her arms. "If you don't let me do your hair, I'm going to tell everyone at school that you play with dolls."

That just stung. He floundered into a sitting position, protesting, "I do not!"

"And who do you think they're going to believe?" She arched an eyebrow and smirked. "Mr. I can run the mile in under a minute. Mr. my uncle taught me how to hang glide with a glider made from a coat hanger. Mr..."

"All right! All right! I get the point!" Reluctantly, he let the blanket drop away. He really didn't see why she was so insistent. His mane was barely starting to grow in anyway. What could she do to it? "Just whatever you do, nothing permanent and nothing pink."

"Don't worry." She grinned, showing off all of her teeth, especially the canines. "I got the 24 washes stuff."

*
Fifty eight washes later, he'd resigned himself to blue hair. The colour had eventually grown on him enough that he decided to renew it rather than put up with his sisters teasing him when it grew out an inch leaving the original brown visible.

At the count of fifty eight sit ups, give or take what he missed when he lost count, he gave up. He pulled himself into a sitting position one last time and held out a paw. "Towel."

Pierce obligingly handed over a nice, big, fluffy towel and leaned back, watching as his friend finished his exercises. "I think you added. I only counted forty eight."

"Oh yeah, blue boy?" Baring his teeth in challenge, Aziz stood. "Well I still bet you can't do as many! I got your number!"

"You might have my number," Pierce retorted, flopping down on the slowly fading green of the lawn, "but at least I don't have your roots!" Laughing, he started his sit ups. "One, two, three..."

Scowling, Aziz started counting and made a mental note to go buy some dye as soon as they were done.