June

Issue 45

    I cut hair.
    That is what I do, not who I am.
    I had just sat down in my barber chair for a nap when a young gentleman walked in.  That I had never seen him before was unusual since there are only about one hundred people living in town and only about a dozen go outside anymore.  Proximity breeds contempt, as my pap told me.  
    Some who still like the outside come to me to get their hair cut, to talk, or to have me listen to their chests for old time’s sake with my stethoscope.  I delivered most of them as babies years back when people still did such things.
    He pushed the screen door in and stood in the doorway.  It was fall, about 4:00 in the afternoon in upstate New York and the sun would be setting soon.  After dinner, I had drawn the sheers closed over the windows like I usually do to block the direct sunlight.  It gave a healthy red glow to the room as the light reflected off the brown wall paneling and the three leather chairs that I keep for customers.  Even so, the light seemed to ooze away from him, leaving him silhouetted in the doorway by the declining sun.