Ed the Barber by The.Fellow.Traveler

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This is a choose your own adventure kind of story - you pick whether the protagonist gets a short crew cut or a headshave.
If you want the former, end the story before the all-caps announcing the second haircut; if you want the latter, skip the part between the mark that ends the intro and the beginning of the second haircut.
This was written in one sitting so, my apologies for any potential mistakes. All feedback is welcome. Happy reading!


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I sighed as I turned away from the barbershop.

It was early July, the concrete itself was near-melting and the diaspora was already well-settled in our small town for the summer; every barbershop in the small city was thus stacked with customers, which meant that you couldn’t get a haircut without two or three hours worth of waiting.

I’d just gotten off the bus from my latest project. The humanitarian aid organization I worked for was helping with the clean-up of a city struck by floods and landslides, so I was stationed in a makeshift camp for the better part of last month. There wasn’t much time for haircuts or really, anything that wasn’t quite necessary; we worked on cleaning up the city from dusk till dawn, then dropped to sleep in our tents at night. I barely caught the time to shower and make myself presentable before the bus.

I was hoping that I’d be lucky enough to get a haircut before I traveled home to the countryside; between the heatwave and the crowds of people I used to go to high school with, I wasn’t looking forward to having to drive back to town and spend hours waiting for a haircut. Well, as luck would have it, my barber’s place had people waiting in front as well: four men sat on the bench in front of the barbershop, and two more stood next to them; I was afraid to even imagine the number of people inside.

Darn it. To say that my hair was overgrown would be putting it lightly; the haircut that was once recognizable as an undercut had grown out into a thatch of black, straight hair with bangs that flopped past my eyebrows when they fell flat across my forehead, as well as into strands of hair that fell past the tips of my ears and neckline. To put it best, I was in dire need of a haircut. There was somewhat of a beard, too; not long enough to look unkempt, but also nowhere near a stubble, either.

During the drive back home, I spent the better part of half an hour annoyed at the mere thought of having to come back into the city again: I had to get a haircut before I returned to the camp in seven days time, there was no discussion about that.

Driving down the dirt road seemed to somewhat calm me down; there was some magic in the fresh morning air and the song of the birds. I even waved at my neighbor, Ed, who was unloading his groceries from his car when he nodded his greeting and then smiled broadly as he made way to his front door.

Ed lived down the street from me. Ever since I’d met him when I first moved into grandma’s house at sixteen, he’s had short hair, ranging from a smooth shave in the summer to a crew cut for the winter. As I was unloading my bags, I wondered if he knew how to cut hair: by all logic, he’s received enough short haircuts in his forty-something years to be able to give one, or at least have the ability to follow a YouTube video on how to do so.

No sooner than I’d dropped my bags into my hallway, I was texting him.

"Hey, Ed. Hope I’m not bothering you â€" I was wondering if you’ve got a minute or two for a question I’d like to ask."

His reply came instantly. "Ask ahead, kid. Today’s my day off and I'm in no particular rush to go anywhere in this heat. What’s up?"

"I was wondering if you’ve ever cut someone’s hair before." I sent the message out, then hurriedly, typed: "If not, would you be willing to have some fun and give it a shot?"

The three dots jumped up and down for a bit, and I was starting to regret the whole thing. Maybe I should just bite the bullet, pick up some clippers at the store and do it myself; it would look like a lawn mower attack in the most optimistic scenario, but at least it’d be shorter, especially these bangs.

My phone screen lit up with his message as I was considering the possibility of looking insane as a result of the self-cut. His message read:

"I’m not a professional, but I did my fair share of barbering here and there, mostly short cuts though. Who needs a haircut?"

"That’d be me, sir. With all this kerfuffle in the barbershops and the heatwave, I wanted to ask if you’d be willing to give me a haircut when you get the chance this week."

"Does today work for you?"

"Today would be perfect. I’m free anytime."

"See you at my place in an hour."

"Thanks! You’re a lifesaver, Ed. See you."

He sent a thumbs up in response; for some reason, this put a smile on my face. I ran my hand through my hair and sighed with relief as I headed to the bathroom to wash it before the haircut, wanting to look my best. All my annoyance and my sour mood disappeared by the time I pulled the tap open and put my head under a stream of cold water.

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It only occurred to me later that I asked the man next to no questions before agreeing to a haircut. I was five feet away from his front door and approaching when I realized that I didn’t even ask if he had any clippers at home, or if I should run to the store and buy some before we start.

I was standing on the porch with a pack of beer in one hand and my phone in the other, wondering if I should ask him whether he needs anything for the haircut aside from the nest on my head, when the wooden door swung open.

"Punctual as always," he said as a greeting, stepping out for a quick hug. When retreating, he ran his hand through the hair on my temple and into the top, where he picked up a handful of hair and let it drop back onto my head, chuckling. "And hairier than ever, it seems."

"Amen to that, sir," I replied with a small chuckle of my own. "A proper trim is well overdue."

Ed smiled, letting go of my hair and patting me on the shoulder before sliding his hand onto my back. "Then let’s get that dealt with, son."

He led me into the living room, which he’d turned into an impromptu barbershop: there was a haircut next to the wooden table, which currently hosted a large mirror and a folded piece of fabric. There was a lot of light pouring in from outside, illuminating the spacious room and making for great lightning in the area he’d prepped for the deed. On the table, next to the folded fabric, was the usual hair cutting equipment: clippers, attachments varying in size, a comb and a spray bottle.

"You could seriously set up shop here," I said after he returned from the kitchen; he went to put the beer into the fridge and cool it down for later.

Ed laughed and nodded, motioning for me to sit into the chair; I did just so while he picked up the fabric and shook it open; it was army green and slightly shiny, sure to not have any hairs stuck to it. He threw the cape into the air above me and closed the ends of it around my neck with a soft click.

Only now did he sit down on an ottoman next to the table and across from me. He picked up the comb and finally took off his cap to reveal a fully shaved head, which was a stark contrast against his thick eyebrows and lashes.

I was expecting him to be bald, but still it surprised me; it looked great on him, with the slight shadow of a beard tracing his jawline. I was still blinking as I teased, "Smooth for the summer, huh?"

Ed chuckled, nodding. "You know it. There’s no better way to fight the heat."
He pointed the comb at me and said:

"Now, let’s talk about the haircut."



**** PICK A HAIRCUT ****


HAIRCUT NUMBER ONE:

THE CREW CUT



"I want to cut off at least this much on top," he said, standing up from the ottoman and planting himself behind me. He picked my bangs up with the comb, pinning his forefinger and middle finger between them; the hair that fell past the fingers flopped over them immediately, giving me a comical faux micro-bang. Ed shook his fingers to and fro, saying, "All of this needs to go, son. This heat will drive you nuts if we leave it any longer; the bangs need to be the longest part, so count on me going shorter and shorter from here."

My bangs would be an inch long, then; I thought back to all the times I unwrapped my bandana and found them making me look like Frankenstein’s bride, and immediately liked the idea.
"Ed, I’m game. Do what you think is best."

"Even if I tell you that I want to clipper you up," he said, picking up a strand of hair at the crown and holding it at the ends, "around here? We’re talking half an inch of hair in length."

He nodded curtly, dropping the hair on top and going over to the sides. He combed my hair from my temples to the back as I watched in the mirror; I felt like Elvis with that famous pompadour of his.
"The sides need to go completely," he concluded. "I’m not sure if I want to take them down to a one or a zero, but we’ll settle on that as we go. How’s it sounding this far, kid? Any disagreements?"


"None whatsoever. So long as it isn’t an undercut, I’m down for anything."

Ed chuckled, patting me on the shoulder. "Toldja that undercut was not a good idea," he said as he picked up an attachment and pressed it onto the clippers. Before turning the clippers on, he concluded: "No good haircut has hair that long on top while the sides and back get buzzed."

Before I could agree with his sentiment, he dug his fingers into my hair in a spot near the crown and tugged on it slightly, his other hand sweeping in with the clippers. As the buzzing device pressed against my scalp, a sea of shivers slid down my back; the tingling sensations traveled quickly from my scalp to my stomach, then even more south. I curled my toes and shifted slightly in the chair as he pushed the clippers against my head from different angles, buzzing the crown and all around it; my hair was falling onto my shoulders more and more every minute.

He stepped to my side and in the same breath, dove the clippers into the hair at my temple, right up until the parting in my hair. His clippers followed the line of the parting flawlessly, leaving me with a patch of short bristles on the side and ridiculously long hair in comparison on top; the hair fell in clumps as it tumbled into my lap, between the knees I’ve spaced out to hide what rose between them. Ed did the same on my other temple, seemingly taking off even more hair as he cut his way from front to back of the side. The top was looking more and more ridiculous in the mirror as he cut the hair; my sides were rounding up, following the curve of my head, and the top looked elongated, alien amongst them.

He quickly took off the attachment and replaced it with another one before continuing. This time he began on the sideburns; he put his left hand vertically against the opposite side of my head, using his fingers to hook onto the top and use it to manage the angle at which he wanted my head without even saying anything as he dove the clippers into the hair of the sideburns. I was almost from the top of my ear up until my temple all around the head at the end; this was the shortest I have ever had my hair.

There were a few more rounds with the clippers to ease the transition between the temple and the sideburn before he finally got started on the scissors. He wet my hair with the spray bottle and combed it back, intentionally making a bump in the front; it now looked even more like a pompadour until he got to the cutting.

Hair flew in all directions. He was slowly making his way to the front, making sure to leave me with a length that I could barely comb on most of the top; it was all snip and crunch, snip and crunch until he arrived at the bangs and I could finally see the scissors in action.

It lasted all of five seconds, but it felt like eternity. My bangs were wet and glossy from the water, making a loose, gracious curl as the water drops bended them over his fingers; he took pleasure in locking his fingers in place around them and closing the scissors around them. The crunch of wet hair under the blades was strongly audible; I swore that I could hear every individual hair snap at once. It took me a good amount of self-restraint to suppress the whole body shudder that caused within me. They dropped into my lap and once he removed his fingers, I saw that they left behind short, sharp spikes in their wake; Ed came to the rescue, however, because he combed them forward and snipped the very tips off, making them even shorter.
There were some more snips here and there; some at the left corner of my forehead, some at my right. At some point, he stood back and looked at me, using his blackened hand to turn my chin here and there to see if he missed anything. In the next second, he picked up the clippers again, this time without any attachments, and before I had time to register it, he placed them against my sideburn, where the beard began, and swooped the clippers down the line of my jaw.

Shorter, curlier hair was now falling on top of my shoulders, and I didn’t mind it; I was ecstatic to be able to feel this sensation for even longer. He kept going at it, clipper-cutting my beard altogether; in one moment, he was at my cheek, and in the other, already pushing the clippers up the lower side of my chin. My moustache was gone in a flash next, and so was the hair on top of my chin.

When he was done, he put the clippers down and uncapped me. He stood behind me, smiling proudly. "That’s more like it," he said. "Go to the bathroom to wash your hair and shave that stubble off while I clean up here. We’ll have a beer on the porch later."

I merely nodded, too stunned to speak. I barely recognized my reflection in the mirror, but God, it felt amazing. I wanted to feel this every day. Washing my hair was quick; towel-drying it even quicker. I shaved with the razor he’d laid out for me and put his lotion on afterwards; it stung, reminding me of a sensation I haven’t felt in a while on my bare skin.

I picked up a nearby comb and swept my short bangs sideways; they complied instantly, remaining there long after the hair had dried and we shared a beer and a proper catch-up on the porch. The sun was setting by the time I made my way home. I was waving him goodbye from the street as he closed the front door; immediately, my hand fell to my head, the calloused hand sweeping all over the soft bristles of my hair and nearly trembling at the sensation.




HAIRCUT NUMBER TWO:

THE HEADSHAVE





I was sitting there in front of him, starting to sweat under the cape.
Ed cocked his head to the side, his eyes narrowed as he asked, short and simple:

"How short can I take you?"

My lips trembled a little as I answered. "Barber’s choice. You hold the clippers, you call the shots."
It wasn’t a bad kind of anxiousness that I felt; it was as far away from fear as can be. I was sternly aware that shorter hair was more practical, and that I wanted it short, given the conditions at the camp; it was excitement that tightened my muscles until my hands shook a little.

He smirked, his lips curling into a crooked smirk. "That’s what I like to hear."
I always admired his shaved head, not just because he looked great with it, but because I thought of the clippers going flat against his hairline, no attachments, no fuss; just the bare metal and the bare skin it leaves in its wake. As he rose from his ottoman with only the clippers in his hand, I shifted in my chair. Sweat began running down my forehead as well, and my whole body felt as tight as a bowstring.

Ed ran his hand through my hair and chuckled. "I’ll give you just what you need. You just sit back and relax."

As he turned the clippers on, my knees buckled; they would’ve given out had I been standing. He began at my right sideburn, slightly turning my head the opposite way so that I could watch as he worked. The hair fell quickly, all but jumping from my head, as he made his way from sideburn to temple in one swoop. My breath grew more shallow as he made his way to the back of my head: he gently tilted my head forward, pinning my chin to my chest.

The clippers hummed as they made their way from the base of my neck all the way until the crown. For the first time in my life, I could feel the air against my skin: I felt his breath as the air bounced off of my skin, felt the air as he moved from one place to the other. I felt as though I was coming to life.

Ed made quick work of the other side of my head; as if for the sake of his own fun, he began at the very top of the parting in my hair. He put his hand against the back of my head, his thumb resting on the top of my hair and the other fingers cupping the bare skin around them. The undercut was being mowed away as he pushed his clippers from beginning to end, the hair cascading down the cape into my lap swiftly.

At last, it was time for the top to be cut. Ed wasted no time: he ran the clippers into the base of my hairline, right where the part was; right where the hair on top was the longest. The forelock was heavy as it dropped into my lap, damp with perspiration. Once he took the section off, he swept his fingers over it and looked me in the eyes in the mirror.

"How’s this feel?" he asked.

"Perfect."

With a satisfied chuckle, he continued. He repeated the same motion over and over again, until there was not a single hair left on my head. Eventually, he turned the clippers off, looking at his work in the mirror and smiling proudly.

"I barely recognize you, kid." He runs the back of his hand against my short beard, smoothing it out, then says, "You look like a man now, son."

I nod in appreciation, my lips nearly trembling as he runs his hand over the top of my head again. He unties the cape and collects it carefully after he instructs me to go wash my hair in the bathroom. An hour later, we’re sitting on his porch and he’s proposing an idea I am more than fond of.

"Hear me out," he says. "Whenever you’re in town, we’ll cut each other’s hair. We’ll do shaves in the summer, buzz cuts for spring and fall, and crewcuts for the winter. What do you say?"

I drank a dram of my beer first. The cool beverage gave me some of my sanity back, if only enough to say: "I’m down for it, but only if you agree to one condition."

Ed raises his brow. "And what would that be?"

I nod to the house. "We’ll go back in and you’ll shave me smooth after this round of drinks. I want it like that every time from now on. You in?"

Ed shakes his head as he laughs. "You bet."

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