It was a warm morning with a strong scent of spring flowers in the air, some of which had fallen, but still lying beautifully on the long trodden road, not caring a damn whether they would be crushed by random people busy with their monotonous morning schedule or be left alone to be found by a love stricken stranger.

A young frightened girl in her early twenties came sprinting towards the road. She was beautiful yet timid. Her shabby white clothes were not long enough to cover her long and enticing legs which were bruised all over. She kept on adjusting her messy uneven yet long and shiny hair from falling over her tear filled green eyes. She ran bare footed constantly checking behind whether she was being followed by someone or something.

She reached the road panic stricken and looked in all directions thinking what to do next. She couldn't get her thoughts right. All she could see was judgmental faces of unknown people trying to figure out what a beautiful girl in a shabby attire was doing there in this fine morning.

She started to move forward amidst the unknown environment.But to her surprise caught eye of some hostile faces keenly looking around like mad dogs. One among them pointed and started pacing towards her making some weird, 'hard to decipher' hand gestures. He was strange looking, bald, and had tattoo resembling reptilian scales almost all over his head and forearms. She was dumbstruck for a moment, unable to do anything.

LIVE OR DYE

It was a ordinary day at the hair salon 'LIVE OR DYE'. A normal 'not so busy' morning. Ashton was struggling in his office to get the bits of potato chips stuck between the keyboard keys.

"No one will ever know the hard work" , he spoke as he wiped the sweat over his forehead.

He had big dreams for himself, of opening a company for manufacture and supply of hair wigs, which somehow got reduced to operating a hair salon.

"Whats with the 'DO NOT DISTURB' sign?". One of his subordinate 'Jerry' asked and giggled. "Mr.Grumpy might be in a bad mood. So, stay busy...people!!", told Jess.

True. Ashton felt miserable.

"Okay..lets see..Can a handsome guy have mood swings?" He googled and started going through the articles intently.

He tried to process the info provided by the internet while he stood up speaking

"Doesn't hurt anyone for being more knowledgeable!".

He tossed the beer cans and chips packets to a carton lying below the desk while he thought about the lonely night he had yesterday.He took a deep sigh and left the office with the box.

He opened the glass door of his salon and stepped forward. He took a quick look inside the carton and started to mentally segregate the items to be recycled. And that exact moment changed his life.

"Oh my God, I am so sorry", Ashton spoke as he crashed into a strange girl standing in front of the salon. She was thrown to the hard ground because of the hit. For a moment, he was terrified, not knowing what to do, but soon came to his senses and rushed towards the girl. He stretched his hand to help, but was lost in words, seeing the beguiling beauty lying in front of him.

He was wearing a neatly tucked loose white shirt, arms folded till the elbow, with a coffee colored pant and black shoes.The girl looked at him with wary in her eyes. She contemplated whether to take his hand or just run away. Seeing that the girl was reluctant to hold his hands, Ashton sat beside her to help her out.

The girl had never seen a man up close. She noticed that he had tempting hazel colored eyes which sparkled in the sunlight. His brown hair was parted to one side. His slightly crooked lower set of teeth looked perfect underneath his thin and pale lips.

Ashton concerned over her and spoke, "I am deeply sorry. Are you hurt? Should we go to the hospital?"

The girl was quite surprised. No one had ever told her sorry before. But she couldn't waste anymore time there. She had to flee. She got up suddenly and started running, leaving Ashton behind.

"I am sorry, Have to go" She shouted while running away.

Ashton was left confused. He thought, "Did I scare her away? Was it obvious that I was mesmerized by her beauty? And 'wow' she got damn good hair!!!"