Any Way the Wind Blows (Simon Snow, #3)

by Rainbow Rowell

I lean over to find them in the grass. “Don’t put your hair in that awful bun. It makes you look a thousand years old.” “But I can’t work with my hair in my face.” I hold the hairpins out to her. “You’re not working now.” She takes the pins from me. She looks like she doesn’t know what to do with them. Or herself. “You have perfectly good hair,” I say, reaching up to smooth it down. (Penelope says I have too many opinions about other people’s hair.) “There’s no reason to hide it.” “I don’t like myself with long hair.” “Then get it cut. It looked good at school.” “I didn’t think you remembered it,” she says. “Or me.” “I remember you now.” Niamh is frowning very deeply at me. If I didn’t know her face always looked like that, I’d back off. Instead I smooth out the other side of her head. It is nice hair. Thick and glossy, with just enough wave to take a style. My hair is too straight to wear any way other than how I wear it. “I don’t want to colour it again,” she says. The way someone else might say, “I don’t want to go to prison.” “Then don’t,” I reply, arranging her hair around her face. “It’s a good colour. Chestnut. With some auburn highlights in the sun. Lots of people dye their hair this colour. You could wear it short and dark . . .” I pull her hair back into a ponytail and hold it so the front poofs out. “You’d look good with a quiff.” Niamh doesn’t say anything. Her eyes are hard, and her eyebrows are tense. She’d look very, very good like this. Her face looks sever...