FACE TO FACE → OCTOBER 31ST

Maybe she was reading too much into what he was doing, or reading too much into what she was feeling, but when Ryder broke her eye contact and looked up, away, or beside her just to have something to turn his gaze too besides her made her feel a slight sting. She didn’t need to turn it into a big deal, though, he was probably just thinking how weird it was to look at someone when they were standing so close with their hands in your hair. That’s definitely what it had to be, right?

When he looked away, she quickly did the same and tried to focus on putting the finishing touches on his hairdo before taking her sticky hands out of his hair and taking a small step back, examining all of her work. “I have a lot more hair to play with, and years of being a teenager has made me pretty good with mimicking hairstyles from magazines and movies.” She admitted, shrugging her shoulders slightly as she tried to de-stickify her hands. “Perfect. Just as good as the real Danny Zuko. You could actually give John Travolta a run for his money.” Her little laugh was an effort to shake out the nerves and hopefully get those thoughts about his eyes out of her head, but it quickly failed.

"Oh yeah, you can use the shower at my place. It’s really no problem, and you’re probably going to have to shower as soon as we get home if you want to stand any chance of getting all of that gunk out of your hair." The last time Marley had a guy in her apartment was when her super came over to help with some plumbing issues, and even that was more than a few weeks ago. Marley’s life of living in her lonely little fishbowl of a home was more than satisfying for her, but now that she had a friend that she wanted to come over, that she was okay with using her shower and staying on her couch, and that she was even okay with staying over, Marley was beginning to realize just how much she was missing out on. "I’m pretty sure I have everything, though. So I’m ready to get this party started whenever you are."

For whatever reason Marley’s small laugh made Ryder smile like an idiot. He absolutely loved it whenever she laughed, or smiled, or sang along to whatever musicals they were watching, or just existed. Marley’s presence was always a welcome one and Ryder found it absolutely impossible to ever be down with her around. Any problems he faced on a daily basis just wiped clean the moment he laid eyes on her. “I dunno about that, I mean back in the day John Travolta was a pretty handsome guy. But you on the other hand-” Ryder gestured to Marley from head to toe, smiling as he did so and trying to give off the whole ‘you leave me speechless’ vibe as best he can for effect. “I mean just; wow. Olivia Newton-John basically looks like a troll compared to you.” He laid the compliments on thick, that’s for sure. He also hoped Marley wouldn’t be offended he called the actress a troll. He was over exaggerating of course.

For a moment Ryder just stood there looking at Marley. While he wanted to get to the party as soon as they could, it was impossible for him to tear his gaze away from his gorgeous friend. He noticed there was still some of his hair goop on Marley’s hands and he finally managed to look away from her in order to go collect a small hand towel from his bathroom, getting it damp with warm water, and returning to where she stood. “Here, it’s my fault you’re all gunked up so lemme give you a hand-“ Ryder paused and looked Marley right in the eye, giving her a big ol’ open mouthed smile. “Get it? Give you a hand?” He clearly felt proud of his terrible pun, but when he realized it wasn’t nearly as funny as he thought his face fell and quickly went back to what he was doing, taking her hands one by one and gently making sure to get every inch of her stupidly soft skin clean. When he was done he ran his hands over her palms to make sure they weren’t still sticky, because that totally isn’t creepy to do. Content with his cleanup job he returned the towel to the bathroom and finally deemed himself ready to leave. “Okay okay, we better go before Sam starts texting me a million times.”

_________

As anticipated some of the party participants assumed Ryder and Marley were dating, and when questioned about their ‘relationship’ Ryder found the best way to answer any questions by flat out lying and using basically the plot of Grease to describe how they met and how their ‘relationship’ was going. He saw no harm tricking the unknowing people for a night, right? And surprisingly a lot of them fell for it; apparently not as movie-educated as he expected. Despite knowing a fair amount of people currently occupying Sam’s apartment, Ryder kept to his place beside Marley. Their costumes only made sense when they went together after all obviously, and since Marley knew far less people at the party Ryder wasn’t about to leave her alone. He did catch a few guys eyeballing her though which may have fueled even more reason to stick close. Of course they weren’t actually dating or anything, and he wasn’t going to play the whole super jealous weirdly clingy friend card or anything. But as a friend he intended to keep any creeps at bay. Looking to his side he smiled brightly at Marley as he lifted up his empty red solo cup for her to see. “I’m dry. Ready for another drink?” He asked; feeling a bit buzzed already from the first couple drinks he had. He didn’t even wait for a response before he swiped her cup. “Like a ninja! Be back in a sec.” Well aware of the single guys prowling the party, Ryder went to the kitchen- poured two more drinks- and returned to Marley in record time, handing back her newly refilled cup with a smile on his face. “So, you having fun? I'm having fun. Thanks for coming with me, and- best part- the hair still looks awesome. I definitely can't thank you enough for saving me from my hair, and  basically everything else too." Buzzed Ryder is clearly more susceptible to rambling about utter nonsense. 

FACE TO FACE → OCTOBER 31ST

Of all the reactions she thought she might get from Ryder when he answered his door, she did not expect the one she got. She could feel his eyes on her, and while it was flattering in a way, it still made her wish the suit wasn’t as tight as it was. He looked pretty dang handsome himself. Maybe his hair was a little bit of a trainwreck at the moment, but that didn’t take away from how good he looked in all 50s style black clothes. He could definitely pass as a great Danny Zuko, and the time he was spending gawking at her also gave her a moment to look him over for just half a second. “Hello yourself.” She smiled at him, hoping her face wasn’t turning as red as it felt.

As he let her in, she tried her best to brush off the staring as just a normal reaction. Seeing a girl that usually wore dresses or jeans in a completely skintight catsuit would make people stare for a bit, especially if it was someone like her. “It’s fine, don’t worry about it.” She mumbled as she returned her gaze up to his hair. Whatever he was doing to it, the amount of goop and hair product that was in it would definitely make it helmet hard for a few hours. Just looking at it made her laugh and chuckle, knowing what he was going to ask her before he even opened his mouth to do it.

"Have no fear, Marley Rose is here." She said as she set down her bag on a table, turning back to look at his hair to see what she should do first to try and fix it. During their last hang out session, she was able to get his hair almost perfect with enough hair gel, hair spray, and luck. "Here," She said as she reached towards his hand, trying to get some of the product onto her hands before her fingers were raking his fauxhawk back up again. "I’m sorry if this takes you a million years to wash out, by the way. Trust me, though. It’s going to look awesome, I just have to add some finishing touches and it’ll be perfect." For just a moment she looked into his eyes, trying to get that one little hair to hang down like they practiced. She never really imagined herself to be standing there, her hands in a guy’s hair like they were and their eyes meeting, all while wearing a catsuit. But there they were.

When Marley offered her help Ryder felt pretty damn relieved. He was never one to put product in his hair, or at least not enough to ever have to style it like a greaser. Even with Marley’s help last time he still couldn’t pick up her expert hair handling ways. He didn’t realize that asking for help was just going to make the situation worse by having Marley stand in front of him in such a close proximity. He swallowed hard as he remained still, watching his friend’s face as she fixed up his hair.

Marley Rose was hands down the most absolutely intimidatingly gorgeous girl that Ryder had ever seen, let alone has the luxury to be friends with. She was way more than just a pretty face too; her personality was unique, quirky, fun, and lovely, they had loads in common; she was basically the utmost perfect person in the entire universe and Ryder had no idea how he got so lucky to even have the change to meet her. When her gaze met his he instinctively glanced down, his social anxiety always making it a bit hard to keep eye contact. He realized quickly though that looking down and getting an eyeful of cleavage from Marley’s attire was definitely not the best way he could have gone about breaking eye contact. He quickly looked back up, hoping and praying she wouldn’t think he did that on purpose. He wasn’t that kind of guy, surely she should know that by now, right?

The longer their eyes remained locked the more nervous Ryder was becoming. It didn’t help that Marley had ridiculously pretty blue eyes, and her shampoo- or body wash- or perfume- whatever it was, it smelled really nice. Which totally didn’t seem really creepy of him to think, right? The longer they stood there the more Ryder’s mind had time to think of stupid scenarios; like how if this were a movie wouldn’t now be the utmost perfect time to kiss the girl? But this wasn’t a movie, and that would probably be really weird. It’s not like Marley ever showed any interest in him, so he had no reason to think otherwise, right? His eyes shot down to Marley’s lips before quickly looking away to the side. He was getting fidgety and decided to reach into his pocket and pull out his cellphone, using it as a mirror so he could take a look at the work Marley was doing with his hair. “Wow, magic hair guru over here. It’s shaping up to look so much better than whatever that mess was that I had it looking like.” So smooth, much romantic, many swoon. Taking a step back Ryder examined his hair some more, needing to move away from Marley before he ended up passing out. He cleared his throat as he put his phone back into his pocket, trying his hardest to not be completely obvious he was desperately missing her hands in his hair and her scent enveloping him. “Okay, so- should we get going or is there anything we need to take care of before we head out? We are going to your place after, right? Hope you don’t mind, you mentioned I could shower so I kinda packed a bag with extra clothes. Don’t need to look like Danny for tacos, right?”  

FACE TO FACE → OCTOBER 31ST

It may have embarrassingly taken him way longer than he’d like to admit but Ryder finally managed to perfect his Danny hairdo. It wasn’t as good of a job as what Marley had done during their night of costume planning and hair-playing but it was at least a semi-decent job. He’d be sure to ask for some assistance when she showed up if she thought he needed some. Looking over himself in the mirror he was pretty pleased with how his costume as a whole came together. Sure it wasn’t much other than just black clothes but he made sure to add a few small details to make it as authentic as possible, like a comb in his back pocket and a zippo lighter rolled up in his sleeve. He was just a regular good ol’ handsome Danny Zuko waiting on his Sandy to arrive.

He was a little anxious about tonight sure; knowing fully well that Sam might make things a little awkward for him and Marley. But maybe, just maybe Sam would see them and just get the hint to leave them alone, not bring up Natalie, and hopefully not hit on Marley. It’s not like Sam wasn’t a totally good looking guy and yeah he was a little afraid Marley would think so too. The last couple months he’d been spending with her were too good for him to want to let go of. If Sam managed to successfully woo Marley and the two ended up dating or something then Ryder didn’t know what he’d do with himself. Okay yes maybe he might have a little crush but he wasn’t anticipating on pursuing it. If things were gonna happen they would have happened by now, right? Though Marley did say she didn’t mind people assuming they were a couple.

The knock at the door tore Ryder from his thoughts and he quickly trudged through his apartment in his Danny boots to answer. Pulling the door open he smiled wide upon seeing Marley, very relieved it wasn’t just another trick or treater. “Well hello there.” He greeted as his eyes took in the sight of her in her skin tight outfit. Ryder leaned against the doorframe as he gawked at Marley a bit more bluntly than he’d have liked. She definitely looked ridiculously amazing, and the fact she’d be his pretend Sandy arm candy for the night made him feel pretty darn lucky.

When his gaze met Marley’s again he swallowed hard and quickly stepped back to let her in, not realizing he had been ogling her for so long. “Sorry…” Ryder awkwardly scratched at his head out of habit before he realized his hair wasn’t supposed to be messed with, and the gob of stuff he was using for styling was still wet anyways. “Shit- I mean, shoot.” He shut the door with his foot when Marley was inside and he turned to face her, holding his goopy hands up in front of him and looking at her with utter despair. “The hair. I can’t get it to work right. Can you…?” His voice was sad and desperate, and he hoped she would catch on to what he was asking. At least the hair catastrophe would hopefully make Marley forget he had obviously been checking her out. 

I am kidding, don’t worry. You’re the perfect balance of serious and joking, so there’s no need for me to do any smacking or yelling. You’ll actually never see me smacking or yelling, so don’t think that doing something will make me do that, okay? I’m harmless. That can be artistic though, like we can do those cheesy taking a picture of someone taking a picture and see if it turns out good? No modeling required for that. Don’t worry, I’ll still be your Sandy for the night and hang around you, especially since the last thing I want is some random stranger hitting on me. There’s nothing cool like a pinball machine or anything, we can just de-Grease-ify ourselves, hang out, maybe have some tacos. If you want to, though.

Oh, well that's good. I didn't take you as the angry or violent type anyways. I'll try my best to help shield you from random drunk guys hitting on you. Maybe if you're lucky, they'll just assume we're together since we are dressing alike and we might both end up safe from Sam. Uh, I know that's a little awkward to say and stuff but it's like the perfect crime! No one has to know the truth for one night. I'm just gonna stop talking about it.. You don't need to have a pinball machine to keep me entertained, trust me. Tacos almost sound better than the party! Post-party-taco-party. 

You really do, I’m almost too scared to even smile around you, you are just that serious. It’s so intimidating, I just thought that you knew about it. No way, if I can somehow look good on film, then so can you. You just have to get the smizing with the eyes down, and you could definitely make it as a model too. That sounds a little weird, but still. I have my ways of distracting people, so maybe I can be of service that night. Usually I distract people with food and cupcakes or my horrible dancing, though, so it might not work. Trust me, my place is nothing worth getting excited over. Not even a little bit.

I'm gonna assume you're kidding, or at least hope you are. Actually no, I can definitely see me getting too serious sometimes. Just yell at me or smack me upside the head if I get like stupid serious like those professional model photographer people get. I don't think I can have a good smize going on, or any sort of serious model facial expression, just serious photographer expressions. Hey now, if you're going as my Sandy then you can't be off distracting other people. ...I mean, that sounded strange. You can do whatever you want to obviously, just be careful else Sam will start hitting on you or something. Aw, don't say that. It's exciting because its yours, and I haven't seen if yet! 

I don’t think that’s a bad thing, or at least I hope it’s not. As long as you don’t mind a few dorky faces every once in a while, we can make it work. If it’ll help, I can always get my phone out and take pictures of you all the time. You could be the first ever photodrummer, you’d be super famous. Oh wow, at least he has good intentions? I’m sorry he does that to you, though. I’ll completely understand if you say that we need to leave though, we can just go hang out at my place.

Dorky faces are definitely allowed. Do I really seem like the kind of super serious face professional kind of guy to you? I basically have a dorky looking face 24/7. Uh, maybe not. I'm pretty sure any pictures you snap of me are going to look super embarrassing. Not that you'd purposely take embarrassing pictures or anything but I'm usually always looking or doing something embarrassing. Eh I wouldn't call them good intentions. Like I said it's super annoying. I'm glad you understand the potential situation we could be dealing with. Hopefully he can keep himself under control though. Oooh, I'll get to see your place huh?

You’re doubting my abilities to smize with the eyes on cue. C’mon, I can totally handle it, I just have to figure out a way to make my hair not look like a lion mane all the time and we can start. Maybe you can take photos while you drum, like super multi-tasking. I’m really excited too, really really excited. It’ll be nice to meet some of your friends, even if one of them becomes a little bit of a problem when alcohol is involved. He doesn’t get really bad though, right? I usually can’t be around people that get too wild to the point of just…being crazy. It probably sounds stupid, but those kinds of drinkers just make me really uncomfortable.

Mkay well you've been warned. If we're going to be spending all this time together you might end up the subject of most of my projects. Photodrumming, I'm not sure that would turn out well. But hey if I'm getting paid then I guess I'll just have to figure out how to make it work! I mean don't get all nervous or anything about Sam. He's just an idiot and can be kinda bro-ish sometimes. He just likes to think he's a good wingman when he's been drinking which totally isn't the case. And since I'm a single friend of his I get to unluckily be a target. So, I wouldn't say he gets like uncomfortably drunk for anyone but me. It's more annoying though if anything. 

If you want to take pictures of me reading then, just know that I don’t mind. I can’t think of any instance where I wouldn’t be okay with you taking your camera out, actually, unless I have a mouth full of food. That sounds amazing, a vocal-drum band sounds like one of the most original ideas since sliced bread, or since apple cutters. I might just take you up on that offer of being my drummer, though, fair warning. That’s unacceptable, completely unacceptable. I think I have it on DVD somewhere around my room, no next time maybe I can bring it and we can have a totally Grease study party. Practicing hair, and laughing at the cheesy jokes they made, and hopefully getting the characters down pretty well. The whole nine yards.

Don't say that else I'll always make sure to have my camera at hand. You're getting yourself into situations you're probably not ready for. I mean like, you could be doing absolutely nothing and bam, photoshoot. Hey if you get all rich and famous I'll happily be your drummer, or personal photographer. Or both! Yes please bring the DVD. I definitely need to rewatch it and get all in character for this Halloween party. I'm so excited! Like super ridiculously excited. Warning though, Sam can get a little annoying if he drinks too much so if it gets to that point we might just leave, so heads up if I try to coax us out of there and you don't understand why. 

You can take pictures of me doing my homework, that way we can multi-task? Those photos might not be the most abstract or ground breaking, but you might get a few of me pulling my hair out. Being a weird loner duo sounds just like us, and if we ever become superheros, or in a band, or in some kind of group, I’m already declaring that it’s going to be our name. I feel like this is going to turn into me playing with your hair for a few hours, and, just so you know, I’m probably definitely going to take a bunch of pictures. There’s a lot of duets in Grease too, and even if you don’t get the need to sing with me, I’m determined to get at least one song stuck in your head for a few days.

Actually that might almost be super original. I don't think I've seen a single homework-related photo turned in or anything once during my time here. I totally wanna make a Weird Loner band! I could do drums and you could sing and- and- we could change everything in the music industry with a weird sounding vocal-drum only band kinda like the White Stripes but no guitar. I'm 10000% content with some hours of hairtime. I apologize though if I end up falling asleep. I think I really only know two, the Summer nights one and the ending one at the carnival or whatever. Not the weird one with the gibberish lyrics but the You're the one that I want one. Clearly it's been a while since I've seen the movie. I'll have to re-watch it to make sure I can get into character. 

Same here! I fee like this little arrangement is so much better than me laying in bed, either writing papers or watching old shows on Netflix. It’s way less boring and doesn’t make me worry about being such a weird loner. It might be good he doesn’t allow it, since I’d probably have forty cats by now. Maybe next time we hang out, we can plan our costumes and I can try and braid your hair? We might need a little bit of practice to get the Danny hair too. I won’t expect you to sing, I just hope you don’t mind if I do. I know all the words to Hopelessly Devoted To You, and it’s one of those songs I can’t help but belt when it’s in my head.

I try to do photography things on weekends, and I feel like even with you around I still probably will. We can both be weird loners, but together? A weird loner duo. A 20-something old crazy cat lady huh? Is that your ambition in life? Sounds good to me, we can try to whip up the costumes ahead of time, since knowing me I'd probably wait till the night before to actually look for my stuff or buy whatever I need. I love when people touch and play with my hair, so I'm down for braiding, or 'greasing' it up or whatever else. As a musical major I wouldn't dare doubt you would totally just burst into song at any given moment. I mean we did kinda watch some musicals together already. 

I promise, and a Rose never goes back on a promise. This weekend your tastebuds will be exploding from happiness with what I have planned, just you wait. I like looking at them. The super of my building doesn’t allow pets, or else I’d have a few of them running around. As much as I’d totally love to help you braid your hair and let you borrow my mockingjay pin, I have a few ideas for what I could do for Sandy? We could go as them and hope that nobody else steals our idea?

Well I'm officially super stoked! Our weekend movie-baking-hangouts are gonna quickly become the highlight of my week. Cuz y'know, movies, and sugary treats. Really? That sucks. I don't even know if we can have pets in my building, never really asked. I'd look so good in a Katniss braid! But a Grease theme works perfectly. Like I said,I can save money that way since I have black clothes and surprisingly at least one leather jacket somewhere. Even if someone else stole the idea we'd still totally pull it off better! But I can't think of anyone coordinating costumes last year, so we might be safe. I hope you don't expect me to bust out into song though.

I guess we know what we’re doing this weekend, then. I promise I won’t stuff you full of sugar, though. Just a little bit. Don’t every worry about me dragging you to a party, I’m way more likely to drag you to PetsMart so we can look at the hamsters and little ferrets. I know! If I wanted to be a female batman, I wouldn’t wear a black and sequinned corset with tights, that just makes me so uncomfortable I can’t even think about wearing it. So, we need a list of movie oriented coordinated costumes? There’s Katniss and Peeta, Batman and Robin, Danny and Sandy, Edward and Bella if you’re feeling sparkley, or we can always go for something Disney? We could really think of so many ideas if we go through our movies!

Is that a promise? You can't get me all worked up and excited for treats if you're not planning on going through with it. I'd offer to help but I'm sort of really bad at baking. Really, PetsMart? Are you planning to buy a little pet or do you just like looking at them? Hard pass on Edward. I might actually have stuff to pull off a Danny which would save me a couple bucks. Don't want to spend more than I have to, you know? Own too much black, and a leather jacket. Guess I could technically pull off Batman too. I'll totally be Katniss though.