Scissors

Untitled Part 1

COVID is done for! Bars have opened, Stores are welcoming back loyal customers, and best of all... Hairdressers have come back and are ready to serve the public. The streets are bustling with people, desperate to come back to reality after being trapped in isolation, like sheep waiting to be processed, to feed humanity's never-ending hunger.

James, A 30-year-old man of average height, unusually long brown hair with a goatee. He usually wore a mint green button-down with black khakis, but today all his shirts were dirty so he wore a red hoodie with blue jeans, his comfy clothes. He woke up early, one Tuesday morning. He was excited to finally cut his hair, which was starting to form dreadlocks. He quickly got dressed and headed out the door to the nearest hairdresser, only to find that they were out of his budget. He went to every salon in town, only to find their inflated prices. "This is an outrage," roared James! "I'll never find a shop that I can afford..." Upset and dejected, James walks home, only to stop when something catches his eye. A small barbershop sitting on the street corner. It had a charming look to it, with its chipping paint, old shutters, and fogged up windows. The thing that distracted him the most was a glowing sign that read, "Free haircuts with every donation."

Intrigued, James walked in and was greeted by an elderly woman, but that wasn't where his focus was. His eyes shot from shelf to shelf, lined with what looked like hyper-realist mannequin heads with various hairstyles. The old woman saw that James was "admiring" the heads and croaked," See anything you like dear?"

James' attention was reeled back to reality and responded," Yes ma'am. I liked that hairstyle over there." The old woman nodded and motioned to a seat. James waltzed over to where the woman had pointed to and sat down. The woman walked off and grabbed the head that he had pointed to. She walked back over to James and plopped the head in front of him. 

The head, oh the head had set off red flags in James' mind. It wasn't just a mannequin, it was real. The hair had been cut and trimmed to meticulous detail, the neck was stapled together, and the face...the face had a look of pure horror like they had just stared death in the face, which they most likely did. The eyes were fogged and white, the mouth was sewn together. James' breathing became shallow, his heart raced. 'Is this what the sign meant by donation?' he thought. The details on the head were so pronounced, it's scared James to know that this was what her definition of the donation was. "This one, dear?" The woman croaked.

"I-uh...yea that one," James said quietly. It was all just part of his imagination, none of this was real. "Would you like to make a donation?" The woman had said. James froze for a moment, thinking whether to see if IT was real or not. "Yea, I would." James flinched to a metallic sound, like the sound of a sword being removed from its sheath.

Dark, cold, empty.

The last thing James heard was the old woman saying," Thank you for your donation..."

That was the last thing James ever heard. He never spoke again, because all he could do is watch the woman pick off her victims from the shelf, with all the other poor souls she took and trapped here. The only thing he heard from that point was the snip and click...of a pair of scissors.