Work Text:
A few days before their grade ten year was to begin, Liberty Van Zandt went over to her boyfriend’s apartment. It took a few hard knocks before Sean answered the door. He was only wearing one of his white shirts and blue and green striped pajama pants. His short, curly hair was sticking out in all directions.
“Babygirl, what are you doing here this early?” He asked her in surprise.
“Manny can’t come to the spa with me. She has a minor case of the summer flu,” she answered with a frown.
At her mom’s church raffle last Sunday, she had won two coupons for free treatments at the local spa in her neighborhood. She invited Manny to join her for a girl’s day out before school started back up. Unfortunately her best friend couldn’t come. But she still needed someone to come with her.
“That sucks, who are you gonna invite now?” Her boyfriend asked.
“Well, he’s standing right in front of me,” she declared boldly. The immediate confusion on his face was almost amusing.
“What?” He asked in disbelief.
Sean Cameron really regretted not being able to tell his girlfriend no sometimes.
When they walked into a place called Infinity Spa, he immediately felt like a fish out of water due to the fancy atmosphere. The walls and flooring were made up of marble and cherry wood. The decorations consisted of classical portraits, exotic plants, terracotta statues, and plush rugs. A big water fountain was flowing behind the main reception counter. Relaxing sounds of nature were playing from speakers.
As a guy who grew up in a trailer park, he was overwhelmed by what he was surrounded by. In his white tank top and black gym shorts, he didn’t even feel like he was in the proper dress code for this kind of environment….
While holding his hand, Liberty excitedly led them up to the counter. “We have two coupons for a mani pedi and eyebrow waxing package,” she announced to the receptionist, who was an older, middle aged woman.
“Excellent, which one would you two like to get done first?” The receptionist asked them.
“The mani pedis,” Liberty answered before looking at him, “What do you want first?"
He raised an eyebrow in disbelief at what she was insinuating. “You really think I’m doing that with you? Do you know how badly Jay would make fun of me?” He turned down. And it wouldn’t be just Jay either, the whole male population at Degrassi would clown on him. Nail polish and manliness did not belong in the same sentence.
“You don’t have to get the nail polish but your hands and feet have been looking like they’ve been needing to get groomed all summer. Let them trim your nails down at least,” she argued.
“Fine,” he replied, though he was wary about the whole thing.
The receptionist led them to the nail salon portion of the spa. The chairs for the pedicures had plush coverings, and they all had massaging functions. He begrudgingly sat in the chair next to his girlfriend. One of the workers came by with a small cart of complimentary snacks and drinks. “Would you like something to eat? For food, we have tea sandwiches, granola bars, low sugar chocolates, oatmeal cookies, fruit and veggie platters with hummus. For drinks, we have water, coffee, and herbal tea where you can pick between chamomile, ginger, and peppermint,” she offered them. He looked at all of the food. All of the offerings were light and super healthy. None of the sandwiches had any crusts on them, and they were all cut into small triangle pieces.
“No bacon cheeseburgers, eh?” He asked dejectedly. The worker shook her head.
“People go to spas for relaxation and wellness, it’s hard to do that with heavy and high calorie foods,” Liberty informed him, making him pout.
“Fine, I’ll take these,” he said as he picked up a small chicken salad sandwich stuffed with cranberries, a piece of dark chocolate bark, and a bottle of electrolyte water. Liberty also got a chicken salad sandwich for herself but unlike him, she got a granola bar that was mixed in with fruit and nuts, and requested chamomile tea for herself. The worker served her tea in a tiny porcelain cup.
Two nail techs came by to do their feet. While his girlfriend was quick to take off her sandals, revealing soft and slender feet, he was a bit more hesitant to remove his socks and air slides. “Come on my love, your feet can’t look that bad,” Liberty urged. He sighed before removing them.
Instantly, the foul stench from his feet penetrated the air. It was a putrid, cheesy scent. An older woman nearby immediately started coughing. But that wasn’t even the most horrifying part. A thick layer of dead skin and crust was on the soles of his feet, all of the skin on his toes were hairy, all of the nails were overgrown and gangly looking, and dirt was built up underneath his toenails. The nails on some of his toes were splitting in half.
“Sean…when was the last time you took care of your feet?” Liberty asked him, her eyes wide and frightened.
“Um…last year?” He answered sheepishly. After a while when he broke up with Emma, he just stopped caring about his hygiene and appearance. He stopped using the one nail clipper in his apartment that he had, just preferring to rip at his toenails when they got too long. Then eventually he stopped doing that too….
“Excuse me, sir, I need to use the restroom. I’ll be right back,” his nail tech told him. Her face under the mask was unreadable so he couldn’t see her true facial expression. He had a good guess though. She then hurriedly ran off to the restroom.
A few seconds later, they could hear some vomiting noises from the restroom.
Once the nail techs started working on their feet, a pleasurable experience was beginning for them both. Especially with the massage chairs relieving tensions from their backs.
“This actually feels nice,” Sean mused to her, taking finishing bites from his chicken sandwich. After his nail tech had washed, scrubbed, and massaged his feet in the bath, they were already looking much more refreshed in Liberty’s eyes. He then let out a happy groan due to the massage chair seemingly getting a good spot in his lower back. “Whew,” he remarked next, “This is the best thing that ever happened to my back.”
Liberty giggled before sipping some of her chamomile tea. “I should have taken you to a salon a long time ago,” she replied. With his tough personality and harsh upbringing, Sean probably needed to be pampered and groomed more than anyone on the planet. In his massage chair, he never looked so soft and boyish to her before. He chuckled.
“These aren’t usually the type of spots I like to hang out at for dates,” he quipped dryly as their feet were dried with warm towels.
The nail techs clipped down each of their toenails and then shapened them up with a filer. By that point, her boyfriend’s feet were thankfully unrecognizable from how they looked before. Unlike her feet, his feet were thick and wide like his hands. Her nail tech placed foam separators between her toes before beginning to paint each of her nails with navy blue polish. She started munching on her granola bar. “Spa trips are supposed to be a really fun and relaxing couples’ activity,” she said in between bites.
“I’m certainly feeling relaxed,” he mused as he looked down at her toes, “What made you get that color?”
“This is your favorite shade of blue isn’t it?” She pointed out. She knew he loved blue in general. It was his favorite color.
He smiled softly at her. “Yeah, it is,” he reaffirmed, making her smile next.
She was always eager to make her boyfriend happy.
When it was time for their fingernails to get treated next, Sean had vehemently refused to get nail polish. He was content with just getting his fingernails trimmed down and cleaned up. Liberty next to him was getting the same navy blue polish painted on her fingers to match her toes.
“I like that color on you, and not just because it’s my favorite. It looks good against your skin,” he complimented her. Her light brown skin, due to her summer tan, looked extra golden right now and so the navy blue was a nice contrast.
“Really?” She asked him excitedly, he nodded. He usually didn’t care much what a girl’s nail polish looked like, but he liked the sight of his favorite color on her. “Yay!” She cheered, making him smile.
Liberty was so cute. It was why he adored her. She was his sweet little cutie pie. She was always coming up with unique ways to make him happy, and in a way, that made him both appreciative and often desperate to return the favor. If he had more disposable income than his student welfare checks, then he would be constantly buying her things to spoil her. With how great she was as a person, she deserved it.
“Are you sure you don’t want at least a top coat, sir?” His nail tech asked him. He swiftly shook his head.
“No I’m good,” he insisted as he looked down at his fingernails. He had never seen them look so neat and even before. They also felt way smoother. “They’re…nice enough already,” he reasoned.
He wasn’t going to admit it out loud but he liked it.
The final treatment of their spa package was eyebrow waxing. And Liberty was not expecting her boyfriend to be so scared.
“You go first, I don’t know if I can do this,” Sean said, staring nervously at the waxing chair. “Do I really need my eyebrows done?”
Liberty pursed her lips as she stared at his eyebrows. She honestly loved how naturally thick his eyebrows were for the most part; it added to his rugged, handsome appearance. But over the course of the month, it had grown so bushy that it looked like caterpillars were growing on his face….
“They need a little touch up,” she answered as politely as she could, making him groan, “Don’t be such a baby, Sean. Waxing doesn’t hurt that much.”
“That much?” He repeated apprehensively.
When she got in the chair, the wax specialist heated up the liquid in a silicone container. Then the woman dipped a thin stick into the liquid. After blowing on it to cool it off, she then slowly applied the wax to her right eyebrow. It was thick and hot on her skin, but she liked it. Getting waxed was a therapeutic experience for her. The specialist placed a thin strip of paper on the wax, tapping on it to set it in place. When she ripped the paper off next, Liberty didn’t flinch at all despite the minor sting. But her boyfriend did while watching the sight. The wax specialist smoothed out her now thinner eyebrow before repeating the same act with her other eyebrow. Once again, she didn’t flinch but Sean did. Then the specialist handed her a mirror. As Liberty looked at her face in the mirror, she was pleased with the look.
“Alright, your turn, my love,” she demanded from Sean, who blanched. As soon as he replaced her in the chair, he stiffened up. “It’ll hurt more if you’re tense,” the wax specialist warned him.
“How am I supposed to be relaxed for something like this?” He argued. Liberty reached over and grabbed his hand.
“It’ll be over before you know it,” she told him kindly, trying not to let her amusement show. His lip started trembling as soon as the specialist started heating up the wax for him next.
Like with her, the specialist applied the wax and thin strip of paper to his right eyebrow, though his strip of paper was slightly bigger. Then she swiftly yanked it off.
“Ye-OUCH!” Sean exclaimed as he jerked in the chair, gripping her hand roughly.
“Oh you big baby,” Liberty scolded. The wax specialist repeated the same with his other eyebrow. He let out a pained squeal when she yanked the strip off that one.
“I guess I finally know what can take down the mighty Sean Cameron,” Liberty quipped.
For a few minutes afterwards, she lost feeling in her right hand.
“I think they look lovely,” Liberty told him later as they had lunch at The Dot. They were both drinking strawberry smoothies while sharing a basket of poutine. She lightly ran her fingers over his eyebrows.
“I can barely tell the difference,” he replied defiantly while rolling his eyes, “That waxing shit is not for me.”
“Well the alternative at the salon is threading, would you like that?” She suggested. “The person uses these thin loops of cotton and twists them with their fingers. Then they roll them over the other person’s eyebrows to pluck out the hair.”
Sean shuddered at the mental image. “Hell no, I’ll get a cheap, Dollar Tree razor and do my own eyebrows. I can’t believe you girls do stuff like that on a regular basis,” he replied in disbelief.
“My mom doesn’t take me to the spa that often. I’m not the kind of girl who obsesses over maintaining her appearance like that,” she argued, before a bittersweet look fell over her face, “But I do enjoy going to the spa and getting pampered when I do. Because it makes me feel beautiful.”
“Liberty, you’re already beautiful,” he assured her, making her smile warmly at him in response. He looked over her appearance. In the pink, orange, and yellow sundress she was wearing and with her long curly hair falling down over her shoulders, she looked gorgeous in the summer sun. The thinned eyebrows and mani pedi she got today only added to how good she already looked.
Liberty was genuinely the prettiest girl in the world to him.
“Thanks,” she replied in gratitude, “I’m glad you went with me today. It was a nice experience; getting pampered at the spa with my man.”
“Just don’t expect this to be a regular occurrence. I have a manly reputation to maintain,” he warned her lightheartedly. But admittedly, with how much lighter his entire body felt from his hands, to his back, to his feet. His skin didn’t feel as hard as it usually did. He almost felt like an entirely new person.
“Even the manliest men need a spa day every now and then, you know,” she argued, “You don’t have to take yourself so seriously all of the time.”
“I know, but it’s hard when you grew up the way I did. I had to toughen myself up real quick when I was a little kid,” he reminded her, “I’m not used to doing soft stuff like going to the spa and having people take care of me. I don’t even think there was a spa near the trailer park I grew up at, and my mom definitely wouldn’t be able to afford taking herself to one if there was. I can’t even remember a time where she could afford to go to the nail salon. Today was pretty much like an out of body experience for me.”
It didn’t help that whatever money his mom could have spent on a service at the spa was typically spent on booze instead.
“Then that’s even more of a reason why you need to do more things like this and why I want to help you do them. Everyone deserves to be soft, Sean, even tough guys like you,” she declared.
That made him emotional. “Liberty, I’m glad you’re my girlfriend. You’re amazing,” he praised.
Sean leaned forward and tenderly kissed his girlfriend on the lips. Then when they broke apart he lovingly pressed his forehead against hers, sharing a smile with her.
Every day, Liberty Van Zandt did something to make him feel grateful for having her in his life.