“I’m not the one who gets to decide! Don’t you get it?” Sophie felt her voice begin to crack, and she stuffed her anger in deep.

The word “pretty” was starting to swirl around in her head until it didn’t mean anything anymore.

Eve’s curls steamed.

“That’s confusing.” Eve wouldn’t let up.

Little Eve Hoffman wasn’t so quiet all of a sudden. Maybe this was what happened when you had the bad luck of having to get to know her in her big, fancy house. It’s also what happened whenever you did anyone’s hair. Sophie had heard lots of secrets from people in her building when she cut their hair for them.

“Ya know what?” Sophie felt a wisp of the anger slip out. “You’re judging me for the way I look, okay? You’re judging me for liking to look a certain way. So maybe you’re not the saint you think you are.”

“Oh my gosh!” Eve turned around all the way to face her, nearly burning a cheek in the process. “No, I wouldn’t judge you! I’m not!”

But Sophie put an end to it. “Let’s turn on some music.” She picked up her phone and put it on shuffle. Some country music came on.

They didn’t speak again for the amount of time it took a country singer to tell the story of how he got his favorite truck.

“Do you know who Emily Dickinson is?” Eve finally asked her, breaking through the sound of the twangs.

“Um, no.” Sophie watched the ends of Eve’s oak brown curls turn into streams of flattened strands.

“She’s who I’m doing the biography assignment on. What about you?”

Eve was trying to be nice now. Fine. “Audrey Hepburn,” Sophie told her.

“Oh, cool! Well, Emily Dickinson was a famous American poet. Like, the most famous.”

“Gotcha.”

Eve probably assumed Sophie didn’t read. Not true. Sophie read every school assignment. She got As on every paper. Eve probably thought Sophie was stupid just because she wore makeup. She probably didn’t even know that in addition to being a famous actress, Audrey Hepburn also spent most of her life helping people all around the world. Both things were awesome.

“She inspired me to write poems, actually, even though mine are pretty bad,” Eve went on. Maybe getting your hair done was like the confessionals at the church where her dad used to take her sometimes. When you couldn’t see someone’s face, it made it easier to tell the truth. “Anyway, I learned that Emily Dickinson never went outside! Like … ever. She just read and wrote poetry and letters in her room, all the time. Does part of that sound great to you? I think it sounds amazing.”

Sophie could see from Eve’s neck that she was blushing. Eve really was a Disney princess, Sophie thought. She probably sang to birds.

“She didn’t want to have to go outside and deal with the world, I guess,” Eve went on. “And I just don’t quite fit in in the hallways with a hundred people, you know?”