For as long as I can remember, I have always worn my hair a little long, more than a little shaggy. Yet I recall that lonesome year in my life when I kept my hair neat and unusually short. I had gone through a phase, which at some point metastasized into dependency, when I would routinely walk to the Great Clips for my haircut. I’d make the trip to the barbers often. Each Saturday, in fact --not actually to cut my hair, which the weekly trim made completely unnecessary, but to feel five digits rake my scalp, a stranger’s fingers comb and part my follicles. In the worn, leather swivel chair, I’d close my eyes and enter Nirvana. I’d allow another human being to douse my head in warm water, to anoint me, to willingly touch me.

Sometimes it was the older man with the dapper hat and manicured moustache. He smelled like peppermint and told sweet stories about his yearly visits to Hawaii with his husband. I didn’t mind this, even if I did prefer silence, even if I did favor the woman my own age, her soft, plump hands with the ridiculous neon-hued nails that made her job so much more awkward, so much harder than it needed to be. She whistled with each breath, her nose ring --maybe?-- responsible for that consistent high note. It got on my nerves to begin with, but then I got used to it, and later, I became accustomed to it, addicted to it.

Someone would walk through the door from off the street and trigger the bell that would indicate their arrival. The older gentleman or the young, taloned woman would pat me on the head like a child, which put me in a happy-place trance that I cannot explain. They would dunk their fine-toothed comb in a glass of clear liquid and say they’d be right back. Their footsteps would trample the locks that had fallen like rain, that littered the linoleum like a blonde and black forest that had shed its strange, silken leaves.

When they returned, smiling at me in the mirror and brushing the rogue hairs off my shoulders, they’d say “Where were we?” I would fight back the inclination to respond “Paradise,” and simply smiled back. They would continue their art, manhandle my sticky-out ears to sever the bristles behind them. Occasionally, the comb would nick my Dumbo-esque appendages and I would savor the brief moment of pain.

When they held up the mirror for my inspection of their craft from the back, I’d nod and say, “Looks great,” and while I was not exactly lying, neither was I being entirely forthright. In truth, I had been looking at their hands. I was assessing the spider-like devices which had labored to serve me. The man's gaudy rings. The woman's technicolor claws. I was grateful for their intention. I was delighted by their touch. It was the journey that I savored. The destination was secondary; it was neither here nor there.

I’d go home, longing for next week. Longing for her, but fine with him. I’d rake my own scalp with my own fingers and feel nothing but the short hair that had been left to me. How I had wished it would grow. How I had wished I would grow, outgrow this quirk which may skirt the edge of personality disorder. Most of all, I wished I could come home and look in the mirror and see more than a harsh military cut, something substantial and large, disarrayed and wild, something worthy of booking an appointment to the barbers for a twelve-dollar feel up and some light conversation, a repetitive, muted whistle.

Every Saturday night I’d make angel hair pasta for dinner and wished I had someone to share it with. I could feel the ceiling fan above me cooling my head where there was so little hair to keep me warm. Even though money had been tight, I would’ve gladly forfeited my next paycheck to hear someone say “Pass the salt” from across the table. I would’ve forfeited each hair on my head, each strand on my plate, if only I could have parceled them out to someone who was present, anyone who would have received them. I would’ve shared my pasta, my angel hair. I would’ve offered over my heart, the juiciest of artichokes.

Lately, I have relapsed into old habits. Reclaimed by addiction, I am once again slave to my routine. My hair is uncommonly short, nothing shaggy about it. I reflect over dinner on familiar patterns that hold me, inescapable as gravity. Alone, I comb the noodles with my silver fork. With my teeth, I trim the angel hair into short, tiny bristles. I bring the artichokes to my mouth and open. Then I crush them all, those many juicy hearts.

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James Callan is the author of the novel A Transcendental Habit (Queer Space, 2023). His fiction has appeared in Carte Blanche, Bridge Eight, White Wall Review, Mystery Tribune, and elsewhere. He lives on the Kāpiti Coast, Aotearoa New Zealand. Find him at jamescallanauthor.com

ART:
Stephanie Phillips
WH (GA)
iPhone 7, 2019