#AND her locs look like a skeleton hand........perfection.....

[kumkaniudaku]

Chop, Chop!

A/N: This is for @alltheestars. Thank you for the request. I did a little CoCo and Chad throwback. I hope you like it!

Warnings: None. Just fluff.

Chadwick Boseman x Black! Female Reader (Chad & CoCo AU)

If there was one thing you took pride in, it was your hair.

In primary school, your mother would decorate your luscious pigtails with ribbons of every hue, being sure to match them to your school uniforms per your request. When other little girls would come home with unruly manes after a long day of playing, you returned with every strand neatly in place, almost identical to the way you had left the house.

By middle school, you had transitioned from the elementary hairstyles orchestrated by your mother to the beautiful press and curls from Ms. Gina, the family beautician. Your father would happily spend the $80 a week to make sure that you and your mother were well taken care of on Saturday mornings. Ms. Gina would take your virgin hair and wash it, grease it and press it to your specific instructions. Even when she’d bump the ends a little too much and leave you as a shoe in for a role asJames Brown, you marveled at how grown up you looked.

In high school, you took over the reigns and began crafting your own hairstyles. The ability to quickly transition from a flat press to a ponytail and back to a french roll gave you a liberating sense of freedom. When you were awarded ‘Best Hair’ as your senior superlative, you carried the title with pride.

College held more of the same. It was at Howard University that you were introduced to Aaliyah and her iconic swoop bang. There wasn’t a day that went by that your hair was not carefully parted on the left side with a thick bang covering your left eye. You figured that, if you couldn’t mimic her singing ability, you’d at least take her personal style for a spin.

Chadwick would often tease you by blasting her music whenever you’d visit his off campus house and beg you to do the dance moves in his living room. As much as you’d deny it, you loved being the center of his attention, even if he was picking on you.

With all of your previous hair triumphs, when your roommate Lynn needed a practice dummy to test her beauty skills, you were all for it. A simple color job inspired by Janet Jackson’s Velvet Rope era was the deal but, soon you found yourself with a snug processing cap over your head and the stinging of a box perm burning tears into your eyes.

“Lynn, this shit burns! Are you sure you know what you’re doing?”

“Yeah! My cousin Monica perms and colors her hair all the time! What’s the matter? You never had a perm before?”

You hadn’t. You’d always beg for one but your mother made sure you knew that everything a perm could do, a hot comb or flat iron could do just as well.

Your lack of knowledge and eagerness to change up your look seemed to be harmless at first. The subtle scarlet color was the perfect complement to your brown skin and came with the just the right amount of sheen. The perm left your hair so silky and smooth that you didn’t even mind the slight loss of volume.

“Lynn, I could kiss you in the mouth!” You exclaimed while executing a small spin to see your hair move behind you.

“I’ll pass. Save that for your revolutionary little boyfriend. Now come here, your roots are still puffy at your crown.”

What you didn’t expect from your little experiment was the handful of hair that left your scalp and clung to the flat iron. One handful turned into three and those three turned into breakage all around your head.

“What did you do to my hair!”

“All I did was a little bleach and color with the perm.”

“BLEACH!”

It was too late. No matter how much you tried to fix it, the damage was done. In a matter of hours you’d managed to trade in your healthy hair for a broken, brittle mess. Distraught and hopeless, you knew what needed to be done.

The next morning, with tears in your eyes, you watched a local hairdresser trim your hair to the root, only leaving a curly skeleton of what you use to hold so dear. When she was done, she handed you a tiny list of product suggestions and a little advice before pushing you out of the doors into the DC streets.

Maneuvering around campus proved to be the most daunting task. You’d grown to be a bit of a socialite, forcing you to avoid the three c’s: conversations, club meetings and Chadwick.

Through careful planning, the first two were easy but, Chad was hard to shake. After three days of no communication, he left a note in your work study office practically threatening you to stop by his house at the end of the day.

“CoCo, don’t make me come find you. I’ll be home at 6. Come by.”

Reluctantly, you trudged down the hill carefully covering your head with the hood of your Howard basketball pullover and a hat for added protection. It was foolish to think that the ever inquisitive and observant Chadwick Boseman would not immediately notice your odd attire but, it was worth a try.

Stepping to the front door, you quietly prayed that Chad was caught up in class or too busy working on a script to answer so that you could say that you tried and scurry back home. Instead, the weathered door swung open to reveal your shirtless best friend with a guitar in his hand and a confused look on his face.

“It’s 75 degrees out. Why do you have on that sweatshirt?”

“Is that how you greet people now? No, ‘Hey, how are you?’, just questions? What if I did that to you?”

“Well...you kind of just did.”

Pushing him aside, you marched through the house and into his bedroom hoping that your petty argument would dead the inquiries. It wasn’t long before you were flopping across his bed and staring at the ceiling to fight back tears.

“So, you gon’ tell me what’s going on with the hood? You pledging Que and hiding a bald head under there?”

He was joking but your uneasy laugh and averted gaze alerted him to a larger problem. Hesitantly, you allowed him to lay in the space beside you to remove your hood and hat.

“This is...new.” Chadwick responded after carefully choosing his words. His fingers lightly caressed the top of your head, stopping briefly to fiddle with a ringlet at your crown. “Are you really pledging Que? Should I get balloons? I know you’re the tre because Tim and Eric are short as hell.”

“Ha ha, Chad. You’re so funny.” The tears you’d been trying to hold in slipped past your closed eyes and rolled down your cheeks.

“Woah woah, CoCo. Don’t cry. What’s wrong? How can I fix it?”

“You can’t fix it, Aaron!” You hadn’t intended to yell at him but the frustration of the last few days was starting to catch up to you. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have talked to you like that. This isn’t your fault.”

Enveloped in comfortable silence, Chadwick examined your face. Usually you’d tell him to take a picture so that it would last longer but now, with your eyes closed, he could take as much time as he wanted.

“If it helps, I think you look amazing.”

He watched you slowly open your eyes and scrunch your nose at his statement. “Yeah, right. I look like a dark-skinned DeBarge.”

“Yeah but, you can’t sing.” His boisterous laughter managed to pull a laugh from you until your stomach was hurting from the force. “But seriously, you look fine. It suits your face. I can finally see your eyes without that bang in the way.”

“You told me you thought it was fly!”

“It was! But, I like this one too. I like whatever to do with your hair and stuff. You make all of it look good.”

A familiar set of butterflies fluttered in your abdomen at his kind words and the feel of his hand returning to rub your head. How was he able to make you feel so beautiful with just a few words? He could’ve repeated that same line to every girl on campus but, in this moment, you felt like the luckiest woman in the world.

“So I don’t look like a low budget Missy Elliot?”

“Actually, that’s probably the best comparison.” He laughed. “Look at it this way though; we can go get haircuts together.”

“Haircuts? You been on this Basquiat journey for a while now. Would you really go get a haircut with me?”

Running his hands through his ‘fro, he gave the thought of a haircut serious consideration. He’d spent a lot of time growing his hair out to achieve the locs that were sprouting from his scalp. Not only did they fit his image but they’d received a lot of attention from the other women on campus. Was he really willing to get rid of them for you?

“Give me three weeks. If you still want to maintain the haircut by then, I’ll go with you.”

“Really!” You squealed, pressing your body into his bare chest. He never had the chance to keep you close before you hopped of the bed and danced around the small room.

Grabbing his guitar, he began strumming background music to your solo party.

“CoCo’s big ass head just got bigger…” He sang, a broad smile contrasting your straight-faced expression. “I’m messing with you!”

Rolling your eyes, you drug yourself back to the bed to sit beside him and lay your head against his shoulder. “Thanks, Chad. I needed this.”

“Anytime, CoCo. I got you no matter what.” His eyes found yours again in the tender moment, sharing a sweet smile with you.

“Your head is still big though. You look like Michael Jordan with hair. I mean gah damn!”

_____________________

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