//------------------------------//
// Hair Style 
// Story: Beyond Me 
// by Boopy Doopy 
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It turned out Rarity could do more than sew clothes. She wasn’t in the hair business, but when we got back to the four fillies, Sweetie Belle suggested we stop by the Carousel Boutique to get my hair done with her sister. 
“Hello, Sweetie Belle,” Rarity greeted as we entered. “And hello Sweetie Belle’s friends. Are you all enjoying the day? I have to say, last night was positively dreadful. I just woke back up after that horrid trip out into the Everfree. I hope you all are alright after last night’s events.”
I closed my eyes and shuddered at the memory of Nightmare Moon before I shook my head clear. “We’re fine,” I spoke for us, “but we were here to see if-”
“To see if you can cut Asher’s mane!” Sweetie Belle interrupted excitedly, smiling as she clearly enjoyed the idea. I couldn’t tell why she did, but she continued, “He said he wants it all cut off!”
“Well, that would certainly be an interesting mane cut, but I must ask, what’s with all of this ‘he’ business I’ve been hearing about, hmm?”
“That’s a story I’m not in the mood to get into right now, but if you could call me a boy, it would make me feel immensely happy. Also a haircut. I want my hair cut, please.”
“Uh, well, uh…” she looked at me a bit confused before saying, “I can certainly do that for you, uh, young… colt?” I smiled at her words, and she smiled back and continued, “But uh, I’m not sure cutting off all of your mane is the best way to go about these things, dear. I’m not sure you have quite the face to make it work very well.”
“If it looks weird, it’ll grow back eventually,” I responded. “It would just be a few months of awkwardness to deal with. I can live with that if I don’t like it.”
“Well, let’s see what we can do for you before we go the extreme route, dear. I’m sure we can find a hairstyle you’ll like with some work. I’m sure Sweetie Belle will tell you, I have quite the eye for fashion.”
“Well, the more masculine I can make it, the better it would be,” I explained. “I want ponies to look at me and see that I’m a man,” I said, mostly referring to Twilight Sparkle.
“Well, I’m sure they’ll see nothing but a ravishing young colt when I’m through with you. I remember those days, when I asked my own parents if I could dress up that way. It was quite fun to pretend for a little while. But anyway! Come along, and I shall get you taken care of.”
I ignored the fact that she said I was pretending, grateful just that she was doing something for me. The four fillies followed along with me, too, apparently excited to see what I would look like in a little while. We went upstairs to a back room where Rarity sat me in a chair in front of a mirror, putting a hairdressing gown around my neck. I thought it was interesting that she had this sitting in what appeared to be her bedroom, but ignored it as she talked to me.
“What sort of mane style are you interested in, Asher?” Rarity asked. “There are quite a few long mane styles that can be done that will make you appear more coltish, if that’s what you’re looking for.”
“Well, in my opinion,” I answered, “the shorter the better. I wouldn’t be opposed to you taking a razor and just cutting it all the way off, as long as there was still some left, like a few millimeters.”
She grimaced at that idea as we both looked at me in the mirror. “I’m not sure about a few millimeters. I’m not sure anything less than two and a half inches would be very good on you, but how about this?” As she spoke, she grabbed a brush and brushed my hair back, pushing it all in one direction. “A little grease, and you’d have a nice, slicked back look. Lots of stallions go for a look like this. You can even add in a few spikes to the cut if you want, or just the more gentlemanly slicked back look if you preferred.”
“Eh, it sounds nice, but I don’t want something that I’m going to have to maintain every single morning. The less I have to do to take care of it, the better.”
“It’s not any work at all, dear,” she said. “Just a brush and that’s it. It wouldn’t take longer than three minutes to get this style in the works when you wake up. We’d cut off the back up to just below your head, and then all you’d have to maintain is the front.”
“Can we see if there’s anything else?” I asked. “It sounds good, but I wanna know what other options there are.”
We went through a few more, all of them variations of the same general style. It seemed like she really wanted to go the ‘cut off the back and brush your hair’ route, but eventually I did ask about what we could do if we cut the front.
“I know you said you don’t like the idea of a few millimeters, but what about cutting it down to an inch?” I asked. “I really think the shorter you can get it down, the better it would be.”
“I need you to trust me when I say it won’t look good at less than two inches. I know you want to look like a colt, but your face isn’t built for a manestyle under two inches.”
“Can we try it anyway?” I asked. “It’s just gonna grow back if I don’t like it.”
“I… no,” she decided. “You’re going to have to trust me on this, Asher. I won’t do less than two inches. I really do think for you, though, the best look would be something slicked back for you. If you don’t like it, we can cut it down to two from there. Deal?”
“Fine, deal,” I sighed, let down that I wouldn’t be getting what I wanted. “I’ll trust you. I’d really rather have it super short though.”
“Trust me when I say I think you’ll love this cut,” she smiled, already getting to work.
She turned me away from the mirror so I wouldn’t see what was happening. The four fillies watched me as the mare worked, their eyes going wide and a couple of them smiling as I felt my hair changing. I could see parts of the golden mane I had falling to the floor and could feel grease being placed into my hair, being brushed back as she did. It took a long time it seemed, and after what felt like about half an hour, she was finally turning me back around to the mirror.
“Well, Asher,” she said, “I know it’s not as short as you wanted it, but I must say, you’d be easily mistaken for a ravishing young colt if you went out like this.”

I blinked at the sight of myself and smiled. I had to admit, it did look very good. I thought it would look better, but it was amazing how just changing my hairstyle made me look much more masculine. I felt extremely happy with the result and a lot more like myself again, even if there were still a whole host of problems.
“Thank you,” I smiled, checking the style out from side to side. “It looks great, so much better than it was before. I really appreciate the work you put in. Thank you very much.”
“No trouble at all darling,” she replied. “I should’ve known you’d like something like this much more after you told me you didn’t want that dress. You act much more like my friend Rainbow Dash in that way. You both act like tomboys… I wonder if I can convince her to try a manestyle like this.”
“Well, I’m not a tomboy,” I explained. “I’m just a boy, but thank you very much. It looks amazing. Thank you.”
It felt nice to smile and like how I looked for the first time in weeks, and I appreciated it. The four fillies giggle behind me as I stood back up, laughing at how I looked, but I didn’t care. I liked it, and even though it was something small, it made me feel a lot better. It wasn’t a hairstyle I’d give myself on Earth, but it was much better than the shy little girl look I had going on before. 
“You look just like a colt, Asher!” Sweetie Belle said. “It’s so crazy!”
“Wow, I didn’t think she could get cuter, but she totally did!” Silver Spoon got out, earning a glare from Diamond Tiara and a grimace from me. “I’d definitely ask you out with how cute you are.”
“Lets- let’s not… I’m gonna move on and pretend you didn’t say that,” I told her, thinking back to the alcohol and cringing that it wasn’t just the drinks that made her say that about me. I couldn’t stop my blush as I continued, “I need to get my stuff from Miss Holiday and Miss Lofty’s house so I can set them in that librarian’s house. I wanna be in and out as quickly as possible so I can enjoy the rest of my day.” I smiled again at what Twilight would think of what I looked like. She’d be surprised, that was for sure.
“So, uh, the sooner we can get going, the more time I’ll have to hang out with you guys.”
“Oh! My mom and dad are gonna be here, too!” Scootaloo proclaimed. “You guys should see them! They’re amazing!”
With that, we set off, getting to her house a few minutes later. It turned out her parents were already there greeting Holiday and Lofty, looking not quite like what I expected. Her father was a brown pony with purple hair and a body that was a bit stockier than most of the other ponies I saw, and her mother had a peach color coat and incredibly long legs. In a word, they were weird, probably the weirdest looking ponies I’d come across, but I kept that thought to myself.
I had the idea to ask them if I could stay with them, but I didn’t. I didn’t know what it was, but for some reason, it felt like they weren’t particularly happy to see me. They smiled politely at me when they saw me, but it seemed more like they only were because they were forced to, not because they actually liked me. I made a mental note to ask about that before the two mares left, wondering what was up with them.
We didn’t stay there long, only long enough to grab my few possessions before I quickly headed over to the library. Twilight was still snoring as I quickly went inside to set my possessions down, the purple dragon I saw hanging around her a couple of times coming up to me and looking at my books. I assumed he lived with her, and so explained that I was just dropping my stuff off here for now.
“Huh,” he commented as he looked at the book titles. “Calculus. I know that's some kind of math, but I don’t think many ponies know how to do that. Twilight does though.”
“Not many people on Earth know how to do it either, but that’s why I went to college. I kind of already know how to do everything in that book though, but it’s better than nothing I guess. I have to keep my mind sharp somehow.”
“Huh,” he said again, looking at the other two books I had. “My First Writing Book?” he asked. “What’s up with that?”
“I- I can’t read in… what was it? Ponish? I can only read English… or whatever you guys call English here. I don’t see how you can have two types of writing for the exact same language though. That doesn’t make much sense to me.”
He shrugged, seeming like what I said blew past him before telling me, “Twilight told me about you before she went to sleep. Complained actually. She said you were rude to her and Princess Celestia. Is that true?”
“Not in the slightest,” I answered. “Being rude isn’t something I would intentionally do… err, I try not to intentionally do. I slip up sometimes, but I’m fairly certain she’s upset that I called her and Celestia out on treating me like dirt. If that’s rude, then yes, I was rude.”
“Yeah, she sometimes blows things out of proportion… anyway, I’m Spike,” he told me, smiling and extending a claw for me to shake. “I’m Twilight Sparkle’s assistant.”
“Asher,” I said, grabbing his claw politely and shaking. “It’s nice to meet you.” As I said it, I felt bad that he said he was the librarian’s assistant. That sounded like a terrible job to have to me, considering what I knew of Twilight already.
“You know, you seem a lot like her,” he continued. “I don’t know what it is, but I think you two act the same. It’s weird.” That made me flinch. I in no way wanted to act like her at all, and decided that if I felt like I was, I would stop and change my behavior.
“Anyway, I’ll be back later,” I said. “I’m gonna go hang out for now and… I don’t know what, but do something. I guess I’ll come back later. I don’t know when though.”
“Okay, see ya, Asher. Also, I like your mane. It makes you look a lot like a colt though, I think.”
“Thank you, that’s what I’m going for,” I smiled as I left, giving him a wave. “I appreciate it.” It made me happy that my hair was having the effect I wanted it to, and I grinned widely because of it.
“Lord, thank you for this,” I prayed silently. “Thank you very much.”