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refused to tell her why it was necessary. She growled at him, only giving in after he agreed to go first. He handed her the surgical scissors and had her give him a trim beforehand. The end result was jagged and rough and only served to make his hair wild and unruly. Then she put the dye in, paying close attention to the mixing directions. Even though they left it in the maximum time suggested, and possibly even a few minutes over, it still didn’t look brown or even dirty blonde. It was a slightly unnatural color somewhere in-between, but Michael figured it would do.
     
    Then it was Nikki’s turn. She cried when he took the scissors to her hair and truthfully, he cried a little too. He managed to do a halfway decent job, taking off about six inches, but keeping it fairly even in the back and adding bangs in the front. The black dye worked well, giving her tresses a lustrous ebony shade, not at all Goth like he feared. It wasn’t her beautiful natural auburn color, but she still looked amazing in Michael’s eyes.
     
    He watched as she carefully dried and brushed out her hair until it was perfectly straight and knot-free. He couldn’t resist ruffling it and messing it up, laughing at her shocked gasp and her dropped jaw when he did. It earned him a splash of cold water from the sink, but the shivers were worth it just to hear her laugh. Still, he gently grasped her wrists to keep her from doing it again. Nikki looked up into his eyes and, for a moment, time stopped. But then the moment dissolved into awkwardness as Michael quickly released her and excused himself.
     
    It was peanut butter sandwiches and fruit cups for dinner. Then Michael checked Nikki’s wounds one last time before loading up the car. They both took a much needed nap, and headed out shortly after sunset. Michael thanked the man once more on their way out, again heading south.
     
    After their usual battle, Nikki offered to let him leave the rock station on if he was willing to answer some more questions for her. He agreed, expecting more mundane trivia like the day before.
     
    “Where are my parents?”
     
    So much for mundane trivia.
     
    “Your parents are dead, Nikki. Your mother’s name was Candice, but everybody called her Candy. You were 15 when she died and you moved in with your dad after that. Your father’s name was Joseph. He died the summer after high school graduation.”
     
    Silence. Nikki didn’t ask for further explanations, and Michael didn’t offer. He waited for her to digest the information he offered and ask something else.
     
    “Where are your parents?”
     
    Hopefully his dad was rotting in hell, he thought to himself.
     
    “My parents died when I was 15, too. Dr. Aaron Brennan and his wife Olivia adopted me. Aaron is the doctor who was taking care of you when you woke up.”
     
    “He… He said I was like family to him.”
     
    “You were. Are. They love you every bit as much as they love me, if not more. There’s nothing they wouldn’t do for you. After you moved in with your dad, you spent a lot of time at their house. When your dad was working, anyway.”
     
    He didn’t bother to tell her she had to sneak over there because her father wouldn’t let her associate with him, despite Aaron and Olivia’s many attempts to change his mind. Olivia didn’t feel the least bit guilty about helping Nikki lie to Joseph. She would even go so far as to cook extra food for Nikki to take home and pretend she’d made dinner for him. Michael always considered it rather gullible of Joseph to just accept Nikki was such a good cook. After all, Candy could barely manage to heat a can of soup without burning the kitchen down. Nikki was a fast learner, though. After a while, she became a first-rate cook in her own right, although she much preferred baking.
     
    Michael changed the radio to the oldies station. He only got off the highway when they needed to get gas, and even then was cautious when he went in to pay, scanning