A Whole New Image by Faded Dusk

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The Omni Boys were in trouble. Their latest album, Syncopated Direction, had tanked hard, with none of the singles even reaching the top 100 and critics and fans alike panning the project. Their numbers were down in pretty much every area: social media engagement, ticket sales for their concerts, album sales, all of it. The quintet of pretty boys just wasn’t standing out from the crowd, neither musically, nor with their image, and something needed to change soon or they’d have to disband and go their separate ways, an especially scary prospect considering they were one of the few boy bands with no drama to speak of. Silas, Luca, Nate, Paxton, and Zach were just a collection of 20-24 year olds making music, becoming genuine friends, and following their dreams.

So when their manager called them into the office to tell them about a new plan to revitalize their brand and drive their career forward, they were prepared to do whatever it took to stay together. The idea to take a more rock-inspired approach to their next wave of music worked just fine for them, what with Paxton’s recent interest in electric guitar and Luca’s drumming skills which they hadn’t made use of yet in the age of synth-based pop and mopier tunes. The other half of the suggestion landed like a sledgehammer though: all five of the boys would be receiving radical makeovers to accompany and accentuate the shift in their music. The shortest hair among them at the moment was still down to the collar and over the eyes, and by the time these makeovers were done there wouldn’t be a hair on their heads longer than an inch.

It was a pretty sleepless night, but the next day, the five of them resolved to go through with it, and they drove down to a studio where a local barber was prepared to give them their transformations, before they’d change clothes and immediately do a photoshoot brandishing their new looks. Five long-haired boys, one, ominous red barber chair waiting to divest them of their precious locks.

Paxton volunteered to go first, pulling off his beanie and shaking free his carefully coiffed reddish-brown hair. Despite his hair’s often voluminous height when he styled it for the stage, it was far and away the shortest of the Boys’ manes, considering it was more or less a heavily grown out undercut with shaggy sides beginning to droop over his ears, and so much length on top that it was hard to tell where the top ended and the back began. That wasn’t much of a concern for the barber though, who mere seconds after throwing a simple black cape over Paxton already had the clippers vibrating in his hand with a #2 guard attached. And the barber made use of those clippers with terrifying, military-esque efficiency, plunging them into Paxton’s hairline immediately and stripping away a huge stripe of auburn hair like it meant nothing. Seeing the shimmering locks fall to the floor and be crushed under the barber’s heel, perhaps saying they meant nothing was accurate now. The buzzing sound filled the room as the clippers ran circuits all over Paxton’s head as the young man sat silently and accepted the shearing, Once he’d been clipped down all over, the barber switched guards and began the steady process of fading the sides into the top, creating a very stylish, though very short, faded high and tight. Though the finished product was a startling change from the proud pomp Paxton entered the chair with, it certainly seemed promising compared to the horror stories the Boys had imagined. Little did they know that Paxton was getting off relatively easy compared to the transformations to follow.

Silas and Luca were often thought of as borderline twins, considering they were the same age, had possibly the closest friendship even among a tight-knit group, and they shared similar shaggy brunette mops, with the only difference being Silas’ wavy texture contrasted with Luca’s straight floppy hair. For that reason, management had a special pair of cuts for them in mind. With Silas in the chair first, the barber wasted no time in lifting his wavy bangs high above his head with the comb and running the clippers over it, dropping a mass of waves straight to the cape and causing Silas’ eyes to widen in disbelief at the lifeless clump that had fallen so fast. With the same brutal efficiency that he had used to strip away Paxton’s locks, the barber continued lifting the foot long pieces of Silas’ hair with the comb and slicing them off at a uniform length. As his process continued, the other four boys sitting on the sidelines realized with shock what the plan was. The rapid shearing of the sides and back was followed with the emergence of a new tool, a huge, paddle looking comb that the barber pushed into the front of Silas’ hair and used as a guide to keep running his clippers over. Silas was getting a very short, very boxy flattop. None of his previous trademark waves were even visible anymore, as the barber worked a wax into the tiny strands that remained to keep them stick straight and stiff.

Luca tried to sit down slowly, but the barber, not to be deterred, clamped a hand on his shoulder and pushed him down into the seat, tossing the cape and performing the same bangs demolition he had administered to Silas. The rest of Luca’s mop fell the same way Silas’ had; his silky strands were no match for the clippers’ power, and the sound of their blades running over the plastic of the comb was becoming mind-numbingly consistent. Strangely though, the barber didn’t seem to spend as much time perfectly flattening Luca’s hair as he did with Silas’...although the reason soon became clear when he placed the clippers at the crown and drove them forward, depositing even more of Luca’s remaining hair on the cape and making the young man’s shoulders tense in alarm. Paxton and Zach had to look away, Nate had kept his head in his hands since the start of the ordeal, and Silas alone was left staring in disbelief at the pale strip atop his best friend’s head. Luca was getting a landing strip. As the barber finished up Luca’s shearing, he spoke for the first time that morning with a slightly malevolent grin, "now your fans will be able to still tell you two pretty boys apart." Luca stumbled out of the chair in a daze, hands feeling the top of his head where the lack of hair still made so little sense, and since Nate was inert, Zach stepped up to the chair next.

Though no one would admit it, least of all the Boys themselves, Zach’s transformation was the one everyone was most excited to see. While by the standards many would follow, all five boys had long hair…at least before this fateful morning…Zach was the one with undeniably LONG hair. When fully let loose, Zach’s hair was a shimmering black curtain that fell all the way down to his waist, but he rarely unfurled it, preferring to keep it in a thick braid that the band’s fans would nevertheless swoon over. Today the curtain would not be making a full appearance though, as the barber brandished an even larger set of shears, and slowly, but surely sawed through the braid right next to Zach’s neck. The whole heavy rope fell away into the waiting arms of an assistant who scurried off with it. Apparently Zach’s braid was going to be an auction item for fans. The thought was little comfort to its former owner, whose head felt much, much lighter with its departure. Even with the braid gone, the barber had a lot of fun lifting the silky strands and severing them close to the root, over and over. Sheaves of shining black hair fell and fell and for a time it seemed like Zach had an infinite amount of gorgeous hair…but the cut soon began to take shape, especially when the barber brought out the clippers to mow away what shine remained. Zach got off the easiest of the five, with just a neat crew cut, but considering how much hair he had to lose to get to that point…

Nate practically had to be dragged to the chair, where his adorable mop of blonde curls lay on the chopping block. His hair combined with being the youngest member of the group had led to nicknames like "Cherub," but he tragically had the most dramatic shearing of all to endure. Wordlessly, the barber took the guard off the clippers and plunged them straight into the mop of curls. They whined and screeched as they worked against the tangled overgrowth, but the machine won in the end, and a clump of curls, large enough to fill one’s palm, slid into Nate’s lap. Nate couldn’t hold back the tears anymore. For better or worse, the shock of what was happening paralyzed him, forcing him to just sit there, tears streaming down his cheeks, watching cluster after cluster of his angelic hair slide past his eyes. Such a short cut on such a blonde haired boy made him look almost bald. The other boys had to physically help Nate out of the chair and half-carry him down the hall to the dressing rooms to get cleaned up and put on the new clothing. First though, it took them a solid fifteen minutes just to stare at their unrecognizable heads in the mirrors, taking in the pale skin seeing the sun for the first time in years, the sharp bristly feeling where once there had been silky softness…and all the while Nate just sat in the corner, not saying a word. The photographers were thankfully able to utilize his stony expression, and at the end of the day the five returned to the house they shared, taking as much comfort as they could in each other’s company and shared misery.

A few weeks later, the Omni Boys’ sales had shot back up. Every entertainment outlet was gushing about the new fashion, the snippets of their upcoming singles, and of course the dramatic disappearance of most of their iconic hair. There were inevitable fan cries about the loss of the boys’ lovely long hair, but management was finally looking at the numbers they wanted. The short cuts were here to stay for a while, and sure enough, when the boys arrived at the studio for the day, the red chair was waiting for them once more…

Author’s note: I was not subtle about what group originally inspired this story idea…though I did change their hair quite a bit for fun. I also tried to do slightly less plot and slightly more emphasis on haircuts themselves…though I do not know if I succeeded. If one method or the other (shameless plug, this one can be compared and contrasted with Wait No More) appeals more to you, I’d love to know.

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